I am sitting here sipping coffee, recovering from a long week of hard work and an all nighter I pulled off to prepare for a report I had to present in the company’s monthly review. My designation - “Business Analyst” in the strategy division of a startup called Health Care at Home. The assignment was to do an analytics study to find out the trends in volumes, pricing, sales, clinical quality, operations, HR across different business units. Hungry and deprived of sleep, I entered the conference room little realising that my audience included Vivek sir(our CEO), our senior Vice President, business unit heads, Director - Marketing, Heads - Nursing, Physiotherapy, Finance, HR, Sales and Customer Service. Not that I didn’t know that they would be present for this, what I had failed to realise was that with just a week’s work, I was about to present insights, point out trends and issues in the work that they have been dedicatedly been doing since last 3-4 years. I had to be responsible and understand the dynamics of the data I was about to present. With luck, the presentation went well, small mistakes ignored and my work was well received. The point? I’ll come to that.
Its been 3 months that I have been working with HCAH. Just three months ago, I graduated out of IIT Roorkee without a job and without a plan. Preparing for GRE, CAT, taking coding courses on Coursera and hoping to enroll into Vajiram and Ravi for IAS coaching. Funny times. I even got The Hindu subscription which I read for exactly 1 day.
My placements season was really happening. I had a CGPA above 8, played Inter IIT for four years, 2 good research interns and I had a few certificates from Cogni events. I cleared a good number of aptitude tests to keep me busy in the first 6-7 days of the placements. I cleared all the GDs too. Just that, I was honest that I didn't know what I wanted to do and nobody wanted the truth. I studied geophysics for 5 years, did 2 research interns and still applied to your consultancy. Isn't it clear that I want to experiment? But hypocrisy! Both the company and students want the best and not what’s the best for them.
Every interview that I gave felt too plastic and rehearsed. Same cut the cake in 8 slices, two coloured socks in a drawer and the bulbs problem. Everybody knows the answers to all of them and would pretend to think and work it out. Based on these lousy puzzles and repetitive guess-timates, candidates (not people) are hired. Then companies complain about the high attrition rates and the students cry about the stupid work they end up getting. I had always imagined a Raju (3 idiots) style interview to get a job, "Koi to company hogi jo machieno ko nahi, insaano ko job de" types. Because if the interviewer doubts my abilities about calculations after I had cleared the aptitude tests, have a good cgpa and also cleared JEE, I really doubt his decision making capabilities. Would he be able to trust me with difficult problems?
Anyways, in my first interview with Royal Bank of Scotland within 5 minutes, the hiring manager told me that I would be better suited to other positions in the company but not the one they were hiring for and handed out his business card telling me to contact him in case I fail to get a job in campus placements.
Lesson learnt : Please measure how much you speak and research the profile you are sitting for really well. They are broadly consulting, IT, data scientist, strategy, operations, marketing and futures first. Know what each requires you to do.
And I lost it when after answering all the answers correctly interviewer from WIPRO informed me about high scopes in Oil industry and that I should stick with it instead of joining WIPRO. I understood his concern and decided to opt out of the placements because I had lost faith in the placement process. Then I chilled out for the whole next semester because I didn’t know what else to do with my life.
Owing to my luck, two days after I completed college, a batch-mate persuaded me to apply to HCAH. I had to prepare a case on COPD management in 2 days, which I somehow managed to do owing to a lot of free time post college. Later got selected for an interview which I was expecting. My interview with Ankit sir (who happens to be an IIT Roorkee and IIM Lucknow alumnus) exceeded my expectation. I had 1.5 hour interview which was more like a discussion about the company, the role, my background and my long honest stories (3 idiots style). Vivek sir, our CEO told me straight that he trusted IITians with their ability to get the work done and only expected dedication and slogging. And he promised good work and good recommendations in case I plan for an MBA. Sounded good! I started next week.
Please research about the kind of work the company is offering. Have a heart to heart talk with the people you will work with. Also, remember a few points before applying for/joining a company-
1. If you do important work, there are chances that you’ll make mistakes. You’ll make mistakes anyways but when its with important work they’ll hurt and your manager will save your a**. Ankit sir sits with us through nights when we miss the deadlines. Patiently covered up for a 100 crores modelling mistake I made in the financial model we sent out to the investors. And a lot of other mistakes, I feel sad when I think about them but they're a part of the learning process.
2. You’ll be given good work only when someone believes in the ability of your doing good work. So, please find people who would believe in you. Like I worked from home for 3 days last week without having to ask for permissions only with a promise of delivery of work.
3. Working in a startup also gives you an opportunity to shift roles. Like I took a ROR project for our pilot chronic disease management program. I was under the impression that everyone needed to learn to code. That’s still true but I learnt that one should code once you need to automate tasks. No need to learn it because everyone says so. Don’t get into coding, if you are not into coding.
4. If you are applying to a strategy role - be curious about working with financial models, about how businesses like Flipkart, OLA etc. sustain the low prices i.e. if and when they’ll break even, be excited about launching new challenging projects and hoping they work. Be updated from YourStory and read about how startups are working and what and how they are offering what they are offering. Its challenging and exciting.
5. Choosing a company with Roorkee alumnus you’ll also get a lot of chapos.
6. I also urge you to check Rahul Adhikari’s blog and his advice here. He's awesome!
Be honest, ready to work hard and don’t panic. Industry needs people who want to work. And you’ll be valued outside./
* Note:
1. Ignorant people like me who have not been able to prepare for case studies and guesstimates a good place to start would be Victor Cheng's videos.
Case studies just need a good imagination and a right frame of thinking. And they'll get you your first job.
All the best.
hcah.prateek@gmail.com
 |
| Strategy team. |
My placements season was really happening. I had a CGPA above 8, played Inter IIT for four years, 2 good research interns and I had a few certificates from Cogni events. I cleared a good number of aptitude tests to keep me busy in the first 6-7 days of the placements. I cleared all the GDs too. Just that, I was honest that I didn't know what I wanted to do and nobody wanted the truth. I studied geophysics for 5 years, did 2 research interns and still applied to your consultancy. Isn't it clear that I want to experiment? But hypocrisy! Both the company and students want the best and not what’s the best for them.
Every interview that I gave felt too plastic and rehearsed. Same cut the cake in 8 slices, two coloured socks in a drawer and the bulbs problem. Everybody knows the answers to all of them and would pretend to think and work it out. Based on these lousy puzzles and repetitive guess-timates, candidates (not people) are hired. Then companies complain about the high attrition rates and the students cry about the stupid work they end up getting. I had always imagined a Raju (3 idiots) style interview to get a job, "Koi to company hogi jo machieno ko nahi, insaano ko job de" types. Because if the interviewer doubts my abilities about calculations after I had cleared the aptitude tests, have a good cgpa and also cleared JEE, I really doubt his decision making capabilities. Would he be able to trust me with difficult problems?
Anyways, in my first interview with Royal Bank of Scotland within 5 minutes, the hiring manager told me that I would be better suited to other positions in the company but not the one they were hiring for and handed out his business card telling me to contact him in case I fail to get a job in campus placements.
Lesson learnt : Please measure how much you speak and research the profile you are sitting for really well. They are broadly consulting, IT, data scientist, strategy, operations, marketing and futures first. Know what each requires you to do.
And I lost it when after answering all the answers correctly interviewer from WIPRO informed me about high scopes in Oil industry and that I should stick with it instead of joining WIPRO. I understood his concern and decided to opt out of the placements because I had lost faith in the placement process. Then I chilled out for the whole next semester because I didn’t know what else to do with my life.
Owing to my luck, two days after I completed college, a batch-mate persuaded me to apply to HCAH. I had to prepare a case on COPD management in 2 days, which I somehow managed to do owing to a lot of free time post college. Later got selected for an interview which I was expecting. My interview with Ankit sir (who happens to be an IIT Roorkee and IIM Lucknow alumnus) exceeded my expectation. I had 1.5 hour interview which was more like a discussion about the company, the role, my background and my long honest stories (3 idiots style). Vivek sir, our CEO told me straight that he trusted IITians with their ability to get the work done and only expected dedication and slogging. And he promised good work and good recommendations in case I plan for an MBA. Sounded good! I started next week.
Please research about the kind of work the company is offering. Have a heart to heart talk with the people you will work with. Also, remember a few points before applying for/joining a company-
1. If you do important work, there are chances that you’ll make mistakes. You’ll make mistakes anyways but when its with important work they’ll hurt and your manager will save your a**. Ankit sir sits with us through nights when we miss the deadlines. Patiently covered up for a 100 crores modelling mistake I made in the financial model we sent out to the investors. And a lot of other mistakes, I feel sad when I think about them but they're a part of the learning process.
2. You’ll be given good work only when someone believes in the ability of your doing good work. So, please find people who would believe in you. Like I worked from home for 3 days last week without having to ask for permissions only with a promise of delivery of work.
3. Working in a startup also gives you an opportunity to shift roles. Like I took a ROR project for our pilot chronic disease management program. I was under the impression that everyone needed to learn to code. That’s still true but I learnt that one should code once you need to automate tasks. No need to learn it because everyone says so. Don’t get into coding, if you are not into coding.
4. If you are applying to a strategy role - be curious about working with financial models, about how businesses like Flipkart, OLA etc. sustain the low prices i.e. if and when they’ll break even, be excited about launching new challenging projects and hoping they work. Be updated from YourStory and read about how startups are working and what and how they are offering what they are offering. Its challenging and exciting.
 |
| First Chapo! |
6. I also urge you to check Rahul Adhikari’s blog and his advice here. He's awesome!
Be honest, ready to work hard and don’t panic. Industry needs people who want to work. And you’ll be valued outside./
* Note:
1. Ignorant people like me who have not been able to prepare for case studies and guesstimates a good place to start would be Victor Cheng's videos.
Case studies just need a good imagination and a right frame of thinking. And they'll get you your first job.
All the best.
hcah.prateek@gmail.com
Hey great piece of mind you got there bro. I sure hope that the pre-final and final year students will learn a lot and sort out all the stuffs before placement season this year. Cheers!!
ReplyDeleteThank you Bunty sir. I hope they are not as ignorant as I was!
DeleteThat's really good sir. I couldn't sleep the night I read this.
ReplyDeleteTruly well written, backed with actual insights and not just 'gyaan' !
ReplyDelete