Wednesday, June 18, 2008

my NI exploits

Hello again..

well m true kshtariya I guess.. m following what the ramayan says abt raghu kul. “Raghu kul reeti sada chali aayi, pran jayi par vachan na jayi” (the legacy of raghukul says- keep the promise made, until your death). Promise kept- NI interview it is people. As mentioned in my previous blog(go read it if you haven till now) I was in Delhi for a holiday n was not prepared for an interview. I got this message on the 3rd from elitmus saying I’ve been short listed for an interview with NI on the 6th. I was happy but then I was more worried about the holiday to manali. The trip got delayed again by a day. Got a couple of congratulatory calls from friends. Suggestions pourin in. I effectively dint have no time for preparation. All friends met up on the 5th( nothing happened on the 4th) and I and Ritvik went with Gauri to his place in Gurgaon as that would be closer to the place where my interview was. I did not have any formals so took a pair of shoes and a tie from Charul. Bought a pant in Gurgaon and took a shirt from Gauri. All this on 5th around 830 pm (interview at 930 next morning). And yeah forgot to mention- my resume and hall ticket. I was well prepared with them. Got the printout from Gauri’s dad’s office at 5pm itself. We got to Gauri’s place and I thought I should get online asap n do sum research about NI. But then naaaa. Life me riks lena mangta. Saw TV, had dinner, admired his majestic palatial house and then slept by 2.

I had a nice decent sleep till 1st of my 5 alarms rang hard. Got up some how and started getting ready. Meanwhile Gauri called for the taxi. I quickly logged n went through some basics (checked my scraps n mail). I read what else NI did other than labview (only then I realized that they do nothing else). I was ready by 830 n so was the taxi. I left and reached by 920 or so. Nice decent place to work in. I mean huge attractive structures and a few more coming up in the vicinity. I met up with ankit whose interview was scheduled for the morning (my interview was at 230. I went early so that I get kicked out early n I can go to manali). We went up and I requested the in charge that I need to go home (manali) in the evening by the 8 o clock flight (830 bus). He said not an issue and put me in the first GD.

We were taken to a room were the GD was supposed to happen. I was surprised to see a senior and another girl from VIT. The lady who was going to evaluate us came in. we introduced ourselves and we got the topic “MBA – passport to success”. 2 min and we start. Everybody got onto their writing pads. Even I wrote something (cant tell you what). This guy started and spoke well. I mean clean accent, fluent, and well drafted sentences. And then 1 by 1 everybody spoke. Oh I forgot. This by the way was my 1st GD ever. So ya I was a bit nervous. I was may be the 6th or 7th person to speak. The only 2 sentences I said in the whole GD were 1.“ we do have good managers who don have an MBA. For example the dabbawalas of Bombay who have the 6 sigma ratings with them din do no mba, in fact have taught lessons at business schools. But then yes MBA does add professionalism to corporate business” (this was when the discussion was on if mba means good managers) and 2. “success surely is a relative term and cant be generalized with how lucrative the job offer is, coz quite often the students who get the top placement end opening their own restaurants and travel agencies”( applause applause). That’s all I’d to say. My final concluding remark was that for success- MBA might be a necessity but not a compulsion. We came out. I was quite happy. I thought I’ll get through but MANALI was still all over my brain. The elitmus representative came out. Called in 3 names. And then said “last is that guy from Vellore who had to go back today”. Hurrraaayyyyy. I’m through. He asked others to come back the next day at 10, and me to come back by 1330 and that he’ll try to sneak my interview when ever they get free as the actual interview panel was flying in from b’lore the next day.

I left with ankit for PVR saket which he(and many others) told me is a target rich environment. I gobbled upon a McVeggei burger with fries and coke. I love junk food. We went round that place in search of more targets but were not very lucky. I got back to NI by 1 or so.

A lot of people kept coming in for GDs. I kept waiting waiting and waiting. In between I distinctly remember this very sweet girl from NIT who sat next to me for some time. Petite, harmless, sweet. I tried hard to read her name but in vain. I wanted to talk more but she left after her GD. I sat waiting for my interview.

Finally the female called me in at 430. Nice decent start. Picked up pace slowly. I was totally in form. Answering almost all questions very confidently-HR(88.5) or Technical(11.5). It was quite close to that line from andaz apna apna- unka eik sawaal mere do jawaab, sawaal eik jawaab do sawaal eik jawaab do(sorry for the RCD*) . suddenly this guy comes out of no where disturbing my interview to talk to the lady. I excused both of them n they talked for a min. For some reason the guy also came in and started asking questions. Weird bad questions (I din know the answer to them). he screwed my happyness on the thermocouple effect. he basically proved me wrong. The lady then explained what the job profile was like and that would involve sales but technical also. So she asked me to jus pick up anything from the room and sell it to them. I picked up a bisleri and tried my best to sell it. They bargained so hard that they got me from 35 for a can to 25. The two simply would not listen. I gave them their happy price of 25 and sighed. Bottomline—I’m a bad salesperson. don’t buy anything from me. She told me to wait as I would have another round. I waited for 20 min, gained sympathy from the guard and cleaner at NI. She came smiled and said “ u can leave, in case there’s another round we’ll have it over the telephone”( dere cun’t have been a more polite way of saying go back home kid,your rejected). I called up everybody n said I’m free. Gauri said he would pick me up from saket. I reached PVR again(my pick up point). Dunno why but Guari somehow is always under the impression that people love waiting for him. I sat there again searching for potential targets. He should change his name to Gaurang always late Sethi. But then I thank him from the bottom of my heart that he took me and Ritvik safely to his house (where Jayant-his friend for 17 years hasn been yet) and got us back to mayur vihar. That people was an ELABORATE account of my NI exploits(I told you that’s the right word).

Keep reading

*RCD is Repetitive Compulsive Disorder

7 comments:

Harshit Gupta said...

You rock Man! U really really rock.. what a blog... One of the best I have read... Phod diya... This one was seriously amazing..

aritreyee said...

hey this was better than the last..must say u are good at gds..u spoke well..haan not everyone needs to be great at sales when there might be better jobs in store for them...congrats again on the blog..keep writing:-)

maverick said...

under a heavy dose f chetan bhagat..were u wen u wrote dis..!!! heavily inspired ( which s a polite way f saying u copied his style) but lovd reading it...wz delightful..to say d least..d only mistake i found wz d concept of "harmless" girl which u mentioned..as if most f d girlz u hav encountered hav been a la TRINITY out of matrix..n so u were surprised to find her d normal types..everything else wz fun to read..i wud even go to d extent f saying tat i wz worth multiple readings...

maverick said...

n staying true to myself i forogt something...d gd point f dabbawalahs wz truly remarkable...exactly d difference between just reading and reading n applying..which u did..3 cheers to u..!!! easy point to know but difficult to recollect wen u need it d most...n u did it like a pro..hard to tel tat it wz ur frst gd...seems u found something tat ur good at..(since cricket & quiz hav let u down)

Power of Words said...

It was nice reading ur blog. I just happened to see this before but didn't read it but then today i felt like reading. As i read i could see the picture clearly!!:) wud look forward for more.

maverick said...

thanx evrybody for ur comments.

@ maverick
good observation made. i din realize that but the writin style is VERY similar. dis mite b coz i've read only his novels till date. n i said "harmless" coz i felt that way. that surely din imply "most of the galz i've met have been a la TRINITY out of matrix." she looked extremely kind and fragile.

Hmmmm :) said...

Updiya ?
Didnt you try to find the identity of that NIT girl? atleast her coll name ? Buck up son,