Interview with Krishna Mukherji | Leader | Internationally Certified American Accent Coach | Certified Soft Skills Coach | Influencer

At BrilliantRead Media, it is our constant endeavour to bring meaningful and powerful stories from India and around the world to empower and motivate our growing community. As part of this, we invited Krishna Mukherji for an exclusive interview with us. She is an Entrepreneur, Leader, Internationally Certified American Accent Coach, Mentor, Certified Soft Skills Coach, Trainer, Change Enabler and Influencer. Let’s learn more about her incredible journey, background and advice for our growing community!

Excerpts from our exclusive interview with Krishna: 

Could you please talk us through your background and your journey?

Let’s start with my background first and then we will move to my journey. Gosh, it was so long time ago that it now feels, while I go down the memory lane, as if my childhood was in a different era. Feels good that, I get to rekindle those beautiful memories of my childhood through this interview:)

Well, I am Mukherji now but I was born in a small town Berhampore, in West Bengal, in a Roy Family (We were basically a Zamindar family and my great grandfather was conferred with the Title “Roy” during the British rule)

Childhood was amazing. I had everything one could ask for. It was filled with fun, love, care and an abundance of everything. I studied in a convent school from early childhood. In those days, about 59 years ago, a girl child was rarely sent to a convent school. It was more expensive to give a convent education to a girl child. That was one reason. The second reason being it was thought that the girl might grow up into an ultra-modern woman and parents feared, that it would be difficult to get them married at a later stage.

My parents were very progressive in their thoughts and therefore I had the opportunity to go to an English medium convent school from Montessori onward. This convent education helped me immensely in my later life and I cannot thank my parents enough for giving me the best of the best education that was available in that mofussil town that I was born in.

I was an intelligent child and was the cynosure of all eyes at school. My teachers and peers loved me equally. From early childhood, I would take up responsibilities and lead. I was one of the captains and the Head Girl of the school.

We did not have TVs or modern-day entertainment then, that we have today but still we were never bored. I remember going out to play with other neighbourhood children every day and had some really good friends. I remember playing games like kho-kho, hide and seek and many other fun-filled outdoor games which kids don’t play anymore these days.

I remember going to school in a rickshaw every day. I remember how wonderful our summer vacations and “Durga Pujo” used to be, with my uncles and aunts visiting us with our cousins. My childhood was so beautiful that I wish I never grew up.

And oh yes! I forgot to tell you about my hobbies. I enjoyed reading and I think I have read almost every single book written by Enid Blyton, Alfred Hitchcock and Agatha Christie when I was in school. They used to be my favourite authors. Even today reading is my favorite hobby but I don’t like to read from “Kindle”. I love real books!! Gardening also, I remember, was one of my favourite hobbies.

Well, everything was hunky-dory until one summer in May when I lost my dad in a road accident. I lost my father at a pretty early age and my world came crashing down, with that very untimely death of my father. My dad’s sudden demise was a huge blow to me and it changed me completely. I plunged into a dark phase as that event changed my life totally. It was very difficult to cope with the hard times that followed my father’s death.

It was as if the roof above your head was gone and you were suddenly exposed to the scorching heat of the sun and the lashing battering of the rain. I suddenly transformed from being a happy go lucky school girl to a responsible young lady almost overnight. Mother was in deep grief and I had to start taking charge of my own life.

I had to leave the town after the 10^th boards as there were no good English medium colleges in my hometown. I went to Bangalore for my High School, from my small hometown Berhampore and I chose Jyoti Nivas College over some other good schools from Kolkata, Kurseong and Delhi.

I was interested in doing medicine in Bangalore but soon I found out that to get admission in a government medical college I would have to produce a 7 year domicile certificate and to get admission into a private medical college, capitation fee in those days was around 12 to 15 lakhs, which perhaps is around 1 crore today. So, I had to forget about my dream of becoming a doctor and with a heavy heart I went back to Kolkata and took admission in a private college there.

Then I got married. I married at a very young age and it was a love marriage. I married a distant relative and it was the worst decision of my life. That marriage was a disaster which ended in divorce after 13 long years. My first husband was extremely abusive and he was nothing less than a monster. He was extremely temperamental with a very criminal bent of mind.

He was arrested twice for domestic violence but I could not muster enough courage then, to go to court and file a divorce. So, I accepted and faced all his abuses as my fate and kept compromising for 13 long years. I used to be very sacred and I had no support. Within 5 years of my father’s passing away my only brother also met with an accident and he succumbed to his injuries.

As if that was not enough, three years later I lost my first son also. It felt as if misfortunes were pouring on me from Heaven and there was no stopping. Life was choking me from every angle and I went into severe depression. Amidst all these miseries, one smart thing that I did was to continue with my studies.

I graduated from Calcutta University with a first class and that opened several doors for me. I started taking competitive exams and got selected in both the railways and the Reserve Bank of India. Again, I chose to join RBI and let the railways go.

Soon after I joined RBI, my second son from my first marriage was born. For a brief period, there was a lull, but soon everything was back to square one. I thought that finally after the birth of my second son, things would start showing improvement. But God! Was I wrong! Abusive behaviour resumed soon afterwards and when my second son turned 3, I said to myself “Enough is Enough” and I gathered all the courage to go to the police station and lodge a FIR against my first husband, followed by slapping a divorce case on him.

An ugly divorce battle ensued, followed by an equally ugly custody battle of our son. With a lot of good luck and Divine intervention, I won both the cases and I was able to keep my son with me.

From the time my second son was born, I wanted to give him a good life. I wanted him to grow up in a healthy environment at home and not see his parents fighting all the time during these formative years at this tender age. So, I took this extreme step to end my marriage so that my son would have a peaceful environment to grow up in. It was an extremely difficult task for a mother to be both a mother and father to the child. I had immense support from my mother without whose help I would not have been able to end my extremely traumatic first marriage.

Finally, there was a relief from daily bickering and home was peaceful again with three of us living under the same roof; my mother, my son and myself. We three were living a happy life. I had my job in Reserve Bank of India and by then I had also moved to an apartment, provided by the Bank, in its housing society.

Fate intervened again. 3 years after my divorce, I met a gentleman who was my neighbors’s nephew. He lived in New York City in the US. He was a widower and he worked as a senior engineer in New York City Transit, a company that runs the New York metro, called Subway in the US.

Life went topsy turvy again. I remarried and left for the US with my son. I embarked on a new journey, a new life with a new life partner, in a new country and in a new culture. Oh, that was quite a handful! Settling down in the US was not that hard and both my son and I adjusted to the new life very well. My second husband was easy to get along with. I resigned from my job in RBI in India before immigrating to the United States.

After immigrating to the United States, I started working as a Student Finance Advisor in a college in New York City and finally, life started to look good again both for me and my son. My husband and I are married for 27 years now and my son has grown into a fine gentleman. He is well settled in the US, married with a lovely wife and a daughter. All is well that ends well and I am so happy and grateful that my story had a happy ending!

My husband, son and I are all citizens of the United States. We love our life in the US but we also love India. We therefore, bought a home in Bangalore in India after my husband retired and we now split our time between US and India. During winter, we come down to India and return to our home in the US during the summer months.

How did you discover your passion?

It was quite accidental, to be honest. After we started coming down to Bangalore during the winter months from 2011, I realized that I had plenty of free time at my disposal. I wanted to use this time to do something that would enable me to share what little knowledge and experience I had gained, internationally over the years and something that would help people benefit from it.

I wanted to do something meaningful and purpose driven that would enable me to give something back to the society. And hence the decision to become a US Accent Coach and a Soft Skills Coach.

I next put a plan in place. I first joined a MBA program and completed my Masters in Business Administration at a very “young” age (if I may say so !) of 54 years and I again secured a First Class !!! Then I enrolled into The Institute of Language and Phonology (ILP) in the US and got myself certified to become an US Accent and Pronunciation Modification Instructor. Currently, I am the only ILP-certified US Accent Coach in India and one of the very few ILP-certified US accent coaches, internationally.

I also got myself certified to be a Soft Skills Coach from Image Consulting Business Institute in Bangalore. I have successfully completed the TTT course, which is NABET approved. I have successfully completed a course on Tricky American Pronunciation from the University of California US. This is how I prepared and skilled myself to become an US Accent Coach and a Soft Skills Trainer.

So, what exactly do you do as an US Accent Coach? What exactly is Accent Coaching? Who needs to do this course?

In India and in many parts of the world people speak grammatically correct English but they often speak in an accented English that has a lot of “mother tongue influence”.

So, I help professionals, students who go to the US for higher studies, fresh graduates readying for interviews, teachers from English medium schools etc. to first get rid of the MTI on their speech.

I then teach them the correct pronunciation, rhythm and intonation that is used to speak the English language. This way they learn to speak English in a neutral global accent that is better understood and recognized all over the world.

This boosts confidence and helps to improve communication skills immensely while speaking with Clients from the Western World, particularly from the US. It also enables a professional to understand the English accent of native speakers better, especially from the United States.

What do you love about your work the most? Also, tell us about some of your hobbies and interests;

Everything. What I do is extremely gratifying. My learners are immensely benefited from the knowledge that I share and impart to them. They get skilled to be a better and more confident communicator, which is a very essential skill. It’s a very emotionally fulfilling job that I do. Hence this love for what I do. I love to travel. I like to socialize and I am involved in a few philanthropic activities as well. I still love reading books, again hard books not kindle:)

I am content with my life and my journey. Some of the phases were excruciatingly painful and unbearable. It nearly killed me. But after having overcome all those very trying times with the Grace of God, all I can say now is that, I am very grateful to God, to the Universe and to all from my family and my friends, who helped me immensely in this journey.

My life eventually made me stronger, more empathetic, caring, giving, loving, understanding and more importantly spiritual and a believer. I am grateful that I am still alive and I made it this far, to this point.

I still work as a Freelance Coach and trainer but making money is not my primary motive. I feel good knowing that I am helping professionals to gain a very important life skill which is a big part of Communication Skills. I do charge a professional fee but I am more committed to the cause. I want my students to learn to speak English using the right speaking pattern and acquire other soft skills and position themselves as confident Global Service Provider experts.

Who do you believe has been the biggest source of motivation in your daily life?

ME!! Considering the journey and the battles and the dark phases that I have been through I had to derive strength from my own self; from within. I am my own motivator. I draw inspiration from my own journey.

What are some of the strategies that you believe have helped you grow as a person?

1) Visualisation

2) SWOT Analysis,

3) Value (how is it going to help me and others)

I also ask some questions to see what value my strategy adds such as:

Is it sustainable? Does that make me happy? Will it be good 3 months, 6 months or 6 years from now? How will it impact my close ones down the line?

In your opinion what are the keys to success?

1) Having a Vision

2)Acquiring the Right Skills

3) Having the Capabilities.

4) Setting SMART Goals.

5) Having a loving and a safe family environment

What advice would you give to our readers?

I am an Accent Coach. So let me give you advice in that area. If you are working for a corporate and you are dealing with global customers/clients, mainly from the US OR if you are a student going to the US or any other country for higher studies OR if you are preparing for an interview in a MNC then I would strongly advise you to take a course in English Accent even if you speak good English.

In most English medium schools, the emphasis is on learning the grammar, vocabulary, writing, reading and speaking but no necessary help and training is given to establish adequate pronunciation skills. This is a separate process from knowing grammar, vocabulary and the ability to speak English correctly.

So, individuals grow up speaking good English, but their pronunciation and the speaking pattern are poorly developed. This leads to confusion as your clients may not understand your pronunciation very well. This can be and should be addressed and improved with proper guidance from a qualified Accent Coach.

The second advice would be to improve your soft skills. We often have very good technical and domain knowledge but we may lack in communication skills, may not have good body language, may have poor customer service skills or may be always struggling at time management etc. etc. So, it is always good to seek help and acquire and improve these skills.

They will serve you well in climbing up the career ladder. Take short courses. Attend workshops. There is a lot of learning available there. Acquire a few new skills and sharpen your prospects of becoming the most sought-after employee of the company.