Second one

Second:

The idea is to help an underprivileged child in his/her education by mentoring and by helping financially.

It all started when I thought abt myself and what difference it could have made had I had a mentor who has seen the world, achieved a lot and had guided me from early on in my career. Also, looking at some of my achiever friends, I realize the difference their parents have made in their own lives. I have this great opportunity to make a difference in someone else’s lives.

Also look at my capability to earn. It’s far higher than an avg Indian. And look at farmers from AP committing suicides because they don’t have 20K to pay off their loans! A family gets ruined when a farmer commits suicide. Or look at students who don’t have money to pay their fee. Money has very high utility to them when compared to what it gives me. Can’t I help a child pay his/her fee? How much will it cut into my wealth? Not much. And what’s the difference it makes in a child’s life? Very big. So let me do it.

My current plan is to be conceptually clear abt who am I going to mentor (in Tamilnadu/Andhrapradesh or boy/girl etc), how to select (acads/financially needy), how much to involve myself (select from a hostel like Ramakrishna Matt? Or a poor family ? Should I be continuously involved in studies or during weekends?..) should I have any conditions (abt academic performance etc) for continuing help? What if the student continuously fails to study well (despite my efforts)? How should I help (finances or in kind?) etc

Once I am clear about these and probably in a few weeks, I will bounce off these ideas with my friends, family and an undergrad professor I trust and take it forward. I think I will get lot of inputs from that professor.

And abt my placement in KPO company, it is still dragging cos the CEO is unable to give an appointment now. Hopefully something will happen over the weekend.

And O.. "friends" in my last post is abt friends TV show (Rachel, Joey Tribbiani etc)

Interview never happens! Friends gets craking into my time

I got immersed into three things since my last blog.

First:

Further interview supposed to happen in that KPO Company I mentioned in my last blog dragged on for the last one week and it is yet to happen. There is a HR lady who kept dragging it for the past 4-5 days. I think she had no clue when her CEO boss is likely to be available. And so she promised me that she will get back in ‘an hour’ and that never happens until the next two days. It is slightly difficult to manage (and be ‘interview ready’) when stuff you anticipate does not happen. I am not sure abt issues at her end, but it is a drag on the company’s brand and my time. If I decide to get in that company, I will fix this expectation management. Oh and add to that my preference to do one thing at a time, I stuck to ‘be prepared’ agenda and ended up only preparing and watching ‘Friends’ to fill rest of my time!

Talking abt expectation mgmt, Infosys manages expectations well. In fin markets, every one knows infy to be a company to ‘under promise and over deliver’. Simply put that means, know what you are going to deliver and promise little less than that. Infy also couples high performance with that. Not sure whether the same thing holds at a project level.

That's abt the first one.

Iview for EA role in a KPO company

I was interviewed in a KPO company for EA to CEO role.

There were two interviews yesterday. There could be another round of interview at the company's location.

I will share more information later.

Chanakya

More jobs: Still searching

I got jobs in three companies till now (in and out of campus). And one with a good salary and in KPO opearations. But I am still looking for the role I want. I guess searching for job is like searching for your life partner. Some critical criteria have to be met before you are satisfied(!). I am currently planning contingencies to my plan [on job search... please.. :) ]. I may have an interview this weekend. After that, I may have to overhaul my plans.

Campus news : Approx 170 ppl would have got one or more jobs till now. Its 2 weeks since placements have started. Traction on placement front will go on at least till Feb end, as ppl from our previous batch told us.

Other than the placement hungama, market blues are troubling me. Am losing some money now. All decisions were good decisions when markets went up. Its the other way round when markets are going down.

- Chanakya

Another offer from a KPO co ::::: two more interviews to go

I received an offer from a KPO company (cant disclose it right now) I attended interview with.

I have an interview tomorrow with Evalueserve.

- Chanakya

Offers till now

Here is a count of offers till now. These are a day or two old.

DISCLAIMER : Numbers may not be accurate. These are not official figures

DBS 2
ATK 2
Mckinsey 6
Citi 4
IBM 8
Yahoo 2
Marakon 2
CTS 16
Nokia 5
Fidelity 5
GE Money 2
GECIS 7
BP-DCT 3
BP-Global 1
Amazon 3
Kanbay 8
GS 2
Ambit 4
Deloitte 22
JPM 3
NIIT 4
Wipro 13
RPG 4
ICICI MT 2
V customer 7
Mittal steel 2

Interview with Irevna

(Jan 6, 2008) How I cracked the Irevna interview post is here: http://chaitanyasagar.com/tell-me-about-yourself-no-not-that/

----

Had an interview with Irevna yesterday. Selection processes had a GD followed by interview. I did well in both.

Yesterday's interview drove home two important points:

1. Importance of reasearch about company and industry
2. what companies usually look for is just smart MBAs

I will explain these in my next posts because I cannot disclose some details right now. Interview results will be out next week.

- Chanakya

Another interview today-- details tomorrow

Another interview today-- details tomorrow

Happy Pongal!

A term and a new lifestyle

There was some confusion abt cognizant offers today. Lot of my time yesterday and today went towards organizing for representing our opinions before admin. Admin was receptive.

One of my favourite companies is coming to campus with the exact role I am looking for. My fav role (exec asst to CEO) is not just less frequently offered in campuses, but also "HOT" in the sense that CEOs tend to take their assts from open market than from campus placements. I lost some of the offers outside of campus just because companies cannot wait for 3 more months for me to join. Lets see how it goes.

Our next term started. And interviews are going on.

I am taking "IT enabled services and strategies" course by Mr. Ravi Aron, a prof from Wharton. He is a great prof and has excellent public speaking skills. He has vast knowledge and can relate interesting facts off the cuff. It has been a pleasure listening to him today.
Another good course I am taking is "Managing your career: Strategies for personal leadership". Ms. Tina Dacin is taking up the course. It is very introspective and promises to be an exciting course.

-Chanakya

got an offer : not satisfied yet

Got an offer from the tech company i mentioned in my last post.

Not satisfied yet.

Some folks are pretty happy and are accepting those offers.

Lets see how it goes

- Chanakya

Flash: IBM makes 12 + offers; gave a top 5 tech co interview

IBM made some 12+ offers. Many may not take them up as the package was not to the satisfaction of students. DBS made two offers.

Lot of other interviews are going on.

I gave a Tech co (a top five co) interview. It went on really well. I had the opportunity to quiz an IBU head on several issues (Why china delivery center? what does the co do to enhance domain expertise? Why is the company organized the way it is? Why does he like best in the co. etc). I may not get the generic analyst role but asked him for the exec asst role that I was looking for. Lets see whats in store.

- Chanakya

Flash: Mckinsey takes 6; ATK - 2

Flash: Mckinsey takes 6; ATK - 2

Got an interview tomorrow. Cya

- Chanakya

Interview prep - again!

A student from previous class (of 2004) has written us a wonderful mail today. THANKS for his support. I am sharing it because it may help some of you folks preping for ISB interviews. Here it goes:
----------------------
Dear Class of 2005,

It is that time of the year when ISB campus starts buzzing with a tremendous amount of activity round the clock. As if your own work pressure wasn’t good enough, you also have a lot of recruiters to deal with. Now that all of you are ready to make that ‘cut’, I have been trying to think about what makes good interviewing skills;

· I guess first of all confidence helps a lot. Last year most of the people who landed up two or more jobs weren’t the so called academically top scoring students of the batch. Sometimes, and especially so on ISB campus, knowing what you want to do and presenting that during the interview helps. It's just that if you appear too desperate for a job then the interviewer is less likely to be impressed. You should present your best face of course but the interviewer should also feel like he needs to convince you that the company is right for you, not that you'll take anything anyone offers you. Self confidence implies competence. If you're feeling nervous before an interview I think the best thing to tell yourself is that you have proved just by getting into ISB that you are one of the brightest in the world and with a proven record of success. You're in the top 0.000001% of the world population and in the long term you will be fine. If not this job then the next. If not this week then next week. Whether you're successful or not is not going to be determined by one job interview. It's going to be how you perform for the rest of your life. And you've proved that you've got the quality to make it. If you take that perspective then you'll feel less under pressure and hopefully more confident and more at ease.
· You should try and be an extremely good listener. Most people do not realise how much they can improve as ‘listeners’. If you stop thinking about what you're going to say when the interviewer is asking a question and rather concentrate on what the interviewer is asking you'll do far better. By listening well, you can pick up so many cues to what the other person is saying - the words, the tone, the unsaid questions. This would also ensure that there is a small pause after the question and before you start answering. You will come across as a more composed and sincere individual; a more mature professional which companies expect to find on the ISB campus.
· You should know your CV inside out. Look at every single line and think of all the questions they could ask you on it. What are the areas you're afraid of questions being asked. Trust me people will ask questions on this. Do not lie about what happened, interviewers are used to being lied to and they can spot subtle signs better than you can hide them. They've had more practice. Every single student they've ever met will try to exaggerate just a little somewhere. Say you made a mistake and that you learnt from it - that'll give you integrity points. You should have a good reason for everything you did. It should sound consistent with everything else. You should be able to explain what you learnt from each stage in your life and what mistakes you made – and how they helped you improve for the future. You should know everything (ok, may not be everything but most that a professional is expected to know about!!) about the industry and company you worked in.
· You should be able to speak for five minutes on any course you did at ISB. Before every exam you should ask yourself whether you could explain all the main concepts you studied to a bright college grad with no background in business. If you can't then it means you don't really understand it well enough to explain to someone who might grill you on the fundamentals. If you can speak at the drop of a hat for 5 minutes on any subject at the end of the MBA you would have done better than 90% of the graduates.
· You should know the company that you're applying for inside out. You should understand the industry and you should have a perspective on what the company should be doing. It may not be right but it's important that if you're asked for a viewpoint you deliver something that you've thought of and not something that you're repeating. For example, what new products its introducing, what are its competitors doing, most importantly how could what you studied in class or in some course can be used in a practical way for that company.
· Most of you have come to ISB after having worked for well known corporations around the world. ISB placements have to be, and are different from what happens on other Indian campuses. The process here is more detailed, you would go through two or three rounds of interview, meet the top management, will be able to negotiate your job profile and salary packages (edited)..... but then you can always contact them directly and try to get an interview organized for yourself!
· Finally, this is the time when you would need a group of close friends to work with, and work for. There would be long days and long waits, some great news and a lot of disappointments – so you need at least one or two such people who know your resume/strengths inside out. They would be the saviors when you have to look composed and confident immediately after a bad interview. So hurry up, form your own huddle and stand by it!

All the very best for the placement time. Alumni and the whole world (of your family, friends and competition schools) is watching you give another terrific performance this year. May you all get what you really deserve and desire for – yes THE BEST!

With all my best wishes,
XXXX
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Thanks dude.. that was great and timely help! Indeed, many of our "seniors" have been helping us on every important occassion.. and are keen on keeping ISB flag high. Thanks ALL of them.

Interview prep!

Many favorable events in the past few days!

First - The ex-boss I mentioned earlier asks me to inform him before I take the plunge because 'something is brewing' at his end 'that I may be interested in'. Well hope that something is really a good job offer.

Second - I got calls from a 3 placement agencies telling me that they have the job that I am looking for. The companies they talked abt include some well known technology companies. One is among top five. Lets see how it goes.

Three - My interview prep went on really well. It was a great experience to think through my past and list down what I learnt and what I achieved... very similar to the experience I had during my isb apps time. Only this time it is more structured i guess.

I will share a framework that will help both prepare for interviews and write your resume.

What your interviewers (ur prospective employers) will be looking for is a combination of your
- smartness
- domain knowledge
- leadership
- initiative
- execution
- drive and energy
- presence

and to add to that amount of responsibility you handled and ur customer centric approach

Think through your experience and categorize all your experiences and achievements into the above heads.
For your resume - figure out a likely combination of above skills/attributes a prospective employer or a school will be looking for and try and reflect those attributes in your resume.

For your Interview - Once you have your experiences categorized, it will be easier (in an interview) to recollect your experiences in the interview (e.g. tell me an instance you exibited initiative, leadership, blah blah...)

Hope this framework is useful. I learnt this in a workshop that mckinsey guys did for us.

Thats it for today. Enjoy!
- Chanakya
P.S. Another good thing that happened - Markets fell by 200 points :) and I pumped some money in... I was waiting for markets to crash for some time now. It just went up and up while I waited. Hope my money grows and hope I did not sink it today!!!!

Exams!

Exams!