01
Reframe the problem
Nokia kept building a better phone. Its rivals built a device. One reframe rewrote an industry — is there a Nokia moment waiting in your business?
HBN Mentor Series · Episode 01
Navyug Mohnot
Founder, QAI Global · Stanford-certified Designing Your Life teacher · Faculty at Ashoka, ISB & NID
Navyug Mohnot builds the systems behind other people’s success — first, processes for India’s software industry; now, frameworks for designing a life.
An IIT Delhi graduate, he left his PhD in the US in 1993 to come home and start QAI. While everyone around him was starting a software company, he built the process company that helped them scale. Today QAI Global works with large corporates across six countries, and Dataquest has named him among the top 50 leaders who shaped Indian IT.
He then redesigned his own life. Certified by Stanford in Designing Your Life, he now teaches it at Ashoka University, ISB and NID, and his Life Design Foundation funds life design programmes at 14 universities. Away from work, he meditates every morning, loves world cinema, and mentors founders — including, years ago, a 28-year-old Paritosh Pathak.
“Until date, he has never said no.”— Paritosh Pathak
The Full Interview · 1 hr 30 min · with Paritosh Pathak
Navyug Mohnot on Designing Your Luck
Chapters
From the Session
6 insights to take with you
02
Widen your luck surface area
Fortune happens to you. Luck is behaviour, compounded. The more people, ideas and worlds you meet, the more opportunity you catch.
03
Weak ties open new worlds
Strong ties give you belonging. Weak ties bring opportunity. One old contact took him to Ashoka — and from there, to ISB.
04
Stay in motion, act quickly
Leave the comfort zone, meet people and ideas — then act on what you find. Most luck is simply this, repeated.
05
Take tiny bets. Grow in the dark.
The big leap is what holds you back. Small, low-risk experiments build skill, courage and clarity before anyone is watching.
06
Make room for stillness
Spotting patterns needs a quiet mind. The lack of stillness, he says, is one of today’s biggest villains.