Reliving the Placement Experience…

My sincere apologies to those who wanted me to come back with my new posts much before than I actually have. I was a little busy with my family business. I now have quite a few experiences to write about, the first two of which would be my state just before the placements and my state during the placements.

As I told you in my last blog, I did not form a group for my interview preparations. What happens in an interview prep session is that one guy in the group interviews the other. The rest of the group members observe and later give feedback. Group members take turns and interview.

Almost everyone had a group by December ’07 end. On the other hand, I kept on procrastinating joining a group. In January ‘08, when I returned from Patna, I started to feel the heat. I asked a few groups to let me in but they were already overflowing with additional members. An offer from a group of IITians finally came and I joined them. I attended their prep sessions for a week. After a week, I left their group because their objectives were not in line with mine or rather we had different ways of working. They were a sincere bunch of guys but they were reviewing different courses before they would get into case-study interview sessions. I knew Management Consulting was my priority and case-study interviews formed a major portion of these interviews. I do not work more than what is required. I, therefore wanted only case-study interview sessions. I then joined hands with a girl named Neha Iyengar that did help a lot. Though I had only 2 sessions with her, I learnt a lot. I think I will seriously remain indebted to her because she cleared all my doubts and also filled me with confidence. Other offers to join any group were turned down by me because those groups might not have been of much use to me.

I started prepping (preparing) on my own. I used to interview myself. [Wait a minute. Do I hear guffaws???] I know it sounds weird but this is what had happened. My quadies (‘quadies’ comes from quad-mates which means the students I used to share our quad with) had laughed at hearing this. Anyone would. But they used to say I would get the best job. I guess they knew my capabilities or may be, they were just being sarcastic.

One week before the interviews, I was totally lost. Jaundice made my life tougher. Check out my pics on my orkut profile at

http://www.orkut.co.in/Profile.aspx?uid=12944013261399948546&pcy=3&t=0

in the albums to see my condition just before placements. I had shortlists from all (except one) Consulting companies. The issue that worried me was whether I would be able to convert at least one of them. I always knew I would get the shortlists because I had a powerful resume. Few alums (alumni) who reviewed my resume told me that their companies would think that I had a fantastic resume and that I had done in 1.5 yrs what others do in 4 yrs. They thought I was pretty sharp but then the next thing that came to their mind was, “This guy is just 23. He is still a kid.” The alums scared the shit out of me when they said I had done a big mistake by not forming an interview prep group. My friends used to look at me with pity. My confidence plummeted leaving me worried.

Pressure never eludes me. My uncle (my mother’s cousin), a graduate from IIT KGP and IIMB had already bagged an offer from Barclays, London. Let me tell you, Barclays offers a hefty package. Comparisons between him and me were inevitable among our relatives. That my friends from other IITs always kept saying I would get a 1 cr package obviously did not ease the pressure off me. People do not understand that it is only 1 or 2 guys who get the 1 cr offer and not everyone. Even those who get it have considerable experience under their belt whereas I had just a year and a half. Every relative and most of my friends I talked to were like, “You will get lacs of rupees. Tumhari to life ban gai hai. You are so lucky.” Yes, this is what happens. You slog your guts out to get into IIT, to get into ISB, to get into companies like L&T and Oliver Wyman, etc and people will call you ‘lucky’. They will not appreciate your hard work (may be because then they will have an excuse for not being in the same situation as me). Do not get me wrong. Do not think I am contradicting myself when I say I am just average. But yes, I wouldn’t refute having worked hard and having been focused on my aims. I cannot comment on whether their wish of me getting one of the highest package was genuine or not but I certainly knew, it was not doing any good to me. I did not tell my parents and other relatives/acquaintances that the ISB Placement Week was just a week away. I did not even tell my closest friend about the placements. However, she always told me I would get the best. It seemed the objective of every expectation in this world was to intensify the pressure on me. And the problem was that I could not share it with anyone. Had my head been made of some highly elastic material, I would probably resemble an alien with a 5 feet diameter head. I still wonder whether everyone was conspiring to convert me into an alien.

My “orkutting”, talking for hrs on my cell phone, chatting on gtalk, going back to Delhi, Mumbai or Patna in each of the 7 term breaks and also thrice during the terms seemed determined to let me down. It was then that I decided to talk to myself. I told myself I could do it in a week’s time too because “Impossible” says “I M POSSIBLE”. I then prepared all alone 18 hours a day for 4 continuous days. I interviewed myself about 50 times in these 4 days and after each interview analyzed my performance.

February 14, 2008 - Valentine's Day was the day before Day ‘0’ of placements. I was nervous. To make matters worse, I had arguments with my closest friend too. I couldn’t tell her that I had my interviews the next morning because that might have pressurized me even more. I had thought talking to her about other things in the world without telling her about the Placement Week, would calm me down a bit. I know had she known about my situation, she would have supported me a lot and would have talked to me until I felt better. So finally I was left all alone…no close friends, no relatives with whom I could share my fear, my nervousness, my anxiety…My condition was so pitiable that even my sleep betrayed me that night :(

Each time I talked to myself, my brain and my heart said in chorus - "Jaane hoga kya."