In his HCL Comnet days, Vineet Nayyar used to run a boot camp for his new recruits in a far-off place. For a week, the cadets went through hell, doing team tasks in high pressure situations, mostly in a sleepless zombie-like state.

Within a month of being hired by HCL Technologies, Vineet Nayar, who later rose to become the company's CEO, was asked to leave. For Nayar, there were two major takeaways from it — a company is not always right, and neither is the individual. As for his management thought on the event — there is a need to search for a thought-in-between.

Poised to provoke: Vineet Nayar caused a row by declaring that American technology graduates were unemployable

This interview with Vineet Nayar, chief executive HCL Technologies, was conducted and condensed by Adam Bryant.

Q. Talk about some of the important leadership lessons you’ve learned.