How Rajasa of Franklin Templeton juggles between baby and balance sheets

On the occasion of International Women’s Day 2024, Moneycontrol Personal Finance showcases five women fund managers, who have broken barriers in the Rs 50 trillion, male-dominated Indian Mutual Fund industry.

In the past year, the number of women fund managers remained the same; 42, as per a report by Morningstar Research. This, despite the fact that, that the total number of fund managers in the Rs 50 trillion Indian Mutual Funds (MF) industry went up to 473, up from 428. Rajasa K., Vice President and Portfolio Manager, Franklin Templeton India AMC Ltd says that perhaps by the time women become fund managers, a career move up from their initial year positions of being an analyst, many go through motherhood. This, she says, brings many careers to a temporary pause.

Few women fund managers

Rajasa knows this all too well. She recently gave birth to her first child. But not only is she back to work after her maternity leave, her office gave her a special private cabin so that her baby can spend time with her. “Juggling motherhood, especially in early years when our children are growing up, and work is very tough. Both are hugely important as well. And as a fund manager, I have to be physically at my office. It’s a very hands-on job,” says Rajasa. Hence, she says it’s important for organisations to support women employees, especially as they come back from their maternity leaves.

Also read: How a simple newspaper reading habit led Shibani Kurian down the fund management path

The other reason she cites is the talent pool from where fund managers usually come from. Most fund managers rise up from being analysts at brokerage houses. Here, Rajasa points out- from her own eight years’ worth of experience as a research analyst, first at Credit Suisse (now UBS Group) and then at Jefferies Securities- working houses are grueling. She says that on countless days she has left office past midnight.

Also read: Meet Anju Chhajer, who manages Rs 83,000 crore assets at Nippon India MF

But Rajasa maintains that it is just a matter of time when there will be more women fund managers and at top positions.

Women’s Day: Rajasa K. is Portfolio Manager & Senior Research Analyst for Franklin Templeton India AMC Ltd

Breaking barriers

That said, Rajasa says she has never faced any walls or discrimination in her career. But at times she has noticed the absence of women around her. For instance, in her college while studying Electronics Engineering, she remembers being among just five women students, in a classroom of 70. “Still, that was better than Mechanical Engineering where there were just one or two girl students in a class of 70,” says Rajasa laughing.

Also read: Meet Ennette Fernandes — from research analyst to fund manager

On another occasion during her education years, she was told in one of the casual conversations that women aren’t good at mathematics. That didn’t stop her from being a research analyst and then a fund manager, where she manages assets worth Rs 5,000 crore in management, across five schemes at Franklin Templeton MF. Here, she manages the equity portfolio of the Franklin India Balanced Advantage Fund and other hybrid funds (Including Franklin India Pension Plan, Franklin India Equity Hybrid Fund, Franklin India Debt Hybrid Fund, Franklin India Equity Savings Fund). She is co-portfolio manager for the Franklin India Flexi Cap Fund, Franklin India ELSS Tax Saver Fund, Templeton India Value Fund and Templeton India Equity Income Fund. In addition, she manages Franklin Dynamic Asset Allocation Fund of Funds and Franklin India Multi-Asset Solution Fund of Funds.

Also read: A college contest won this fund manager Rs 1 lakh cash prize and a career in mutual funds

After her engineering, she earned a management degree from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, one of the top management colleges. Although she knew she had a knack for finance, it was at IIM-A that she found her calling for equity research. “When Credit Suisse came to the campus, I instinctively knew that this was a role tailored to me and my temperament,” she says. She set her sights for the role and she got it.
But what’s her temperament got to do with it, we ask. “I am not entirely outgoing person; I use to be quite introverted. Of course, that has changed over the years, but I love to sit and read and look at- and work with- numbers,” she explains. She adds that she loves talking to managements of companies and telling stories about the companies.

Where to invest in 2024?
Although Rajasa manages a flexi-cap strategy across all her hybrid funds (investing in large, mid-sized and small-sized companies), she enjoys fishing in the mid-cap space. Unearthing diamonds in the dust gives her- and many fund managers she adds- a thrill. But she also has a particular proclivity towards large-caps too. “We can figure out opportunities in the large-cap space as well. They carry lower risks and can give good returns as well; I don’t think people are appreciative of this enough,” she says. The secret in finding good large-cap stocks to bet on, is to be nimble and “cognizant of trends,” she says.

At present, Rajasa is bullish on sectors like Financials and Industrial Capital Goods. The dark horse of 2024, she says, is the Consumption sector. “I would watch out for this sector in terms of a turnaround,” she adds. But for most part of 2024, she emphasizes, it would be a a time of bottom-up stock picking rather than big sector trends.

Are there enough ideas to pick from, after equity markets have hit their all-time highs of late? “It’s becoming harder. But I do think there are enough ideas to chase,” she says.