In a shocking turn of events that stunned the business community last week Kishu Gomes, a celebrated business personality in the country called it a day at Chevron formerly Caltex, completing an illustrious career spanning over 22 years of which 18 and 1/2 years was as the Chief Executive Officer of the multinational entity in Sri Lanka.
Kishu was the youngest CEO to be appointed to a truly multinational organisation having operations in over 180 countries to succeed an expatriate that Sri Lankans are capable and could produce better results than expatriates. When he took over as Managing Director of Caltex in 2000, the lubricant industry comprised only five players with exclusive selling rights in the state owned retail fuel channel.
The company’s Profit After Tax (PAT) which stood at around Rs. 559 million at the dawn of the millennium rose to Rs. 3.4 billion in 2016 under the stewardship of Kishu amidst stiff competition from 13 top regional and multinational giants in the country. Having worked for two US multinational establishments, Coca-Cola and Chevron for over two decades Kishu rose to fame both locally and internationally as an award winning celebrity CEO. He had won many accolades bringing pride to the country and the entity he worked for.
The Gold Award for Best Business Performance in the Asia Pacific Region, the ‘Inaugural Best Young Corporate Director’, the ‘Inaugural Top Three Marketer’ the ‘Most Outstanding Young Person in Sri Lanka and many regional awards to name a few. Kishu counts oratory among his multitude of talents and skills and is a well known orator having addressed many national and international forums such as the Global Marketing Forum, Commonwealth Youth Forum, WORLD Conference on Youth 2014 and Oil Exploration Technology Conference in Texas. He also addressed the the senior management of the Parliament of Sri Lanka on public sector leadership transformation on the invitation of USAID.
Kishu is currently serving on the Expert Committee to formulate the National Sustainable Development Vision of Sri Lanka under the Presidential Secretariat.
A truly Sri Lankan with values embracing wholeheartedly the culture of the country, Kishu wants to do more for economic development and social equity in Sri Lanka.
He plans to spend more of his time to groom youth with knowledge, skills, perspectives, creativity, innovation and constant change needed to be competitive at a level that could take on global challenges. He also believes that the biggest asset the country has is its ‘People Asset’.