Day ‘1’

Today was Day ‘1’. I could not sleep last night because my mind was preoccupied with placement tensions.

I reached ATK interview venue at about 0800 hrs. I saw some guys congratulating each other in the atrium and wondered when I would get the same opportunity. As soon as I saw Pranshul, I asked him about my pending ATK interview. “I will arrange it, do not worry,” he replied. I saw other candidates being called for the interview while I was totally ignored. That companies like ATK could be so unprofessional, was beyond my imagination. I was kept waiting until 0900 hrs after which Pranshul came and said, “Abhishek, you can go ahead and finish off your other interviews, if you have any, and come back within an hour.” I had my Aditya Birla Group (ABG) interview which is why I excused myself only to wreck my ABG interview so that I could be back in time for my ATK interview.

I reached the ATK interview venue back at 0930 hrs. I was again kept waiting until 1100 hrs with no updates. In the mean time, I talked to people who had appeared for the final round of OW interviews. They said they had received final offer from OW through the Placement Portal and had also got a call from the Placement Executive of ISB to sign the offer. I had not received any call from anyone until then. “F*** you! OW is out too.” Right then, Pranshul came to me and told me that it would not be possible for ATK to interview me because the final list was almost out. I was like, “I have been waiting so long for my interview. How can you reject me without even interviewing me? You had said everyone will be interviewed. What about your commitment?” All Pranshul said was, “I am sorry but it is too late now. Let me know if I can be of any help to you in future.” I was damn irritated. “You do not need to be sorry. You have helped me enough. Thanks!” I responded.

I then headed straight to my interviews with another Consulting major. During my first interview itself, I knew I was in. But you know, you do not want to believe until the expected good things actually happen to you. They kept telling me in different ways that they wanted me. I sailed through their 3 rounds of interviews. Before my final round of interview for this firm, one of the alums in that consulting firm took me aside and said, “Dude, they like you. You are almost in but see that you don’t ruin it in the final round. All the best.” Still having 20 minutes to kill before my final round, I thought of checking my emails and orkut in the library. I took out my laptop and opened my inbox only to be stunned. “Oh my God! Should I believe what I am seeing?” I felt my lips moving but my vocal chords were too shocked to output the sentence I wanted to speak. I was ecstatic. I saw there was an offer from OW. I just could not believe it. I read that same email umpteen times to make sure the offer was not a result of any human error. I rushed to the Placement Office to sign OW’s offer letter. I saw the salary figures and was bubbling with joy. I got one of the highest packages with a placement abroad. My happiness doubled because this was the company almost everyone had applied and wanted to get into (probably because of the package).

Quite a few people at ISB were surprised at my selection because they thought I was a kid and could not compete with others at ISB. Well, kiddo or no kiddo, I was selected. It’s the intelligence/smartness that matters, not the age.

If I have to give credit to anyone, it will be to my closest friend. Though ambitious, she did not think twice before she left her job and came to Hyderabad only to look after me when I was terribly ill. She was the one who made me dream what I achieved. I am glad I have her by my side even now. She definitely deserves a blog post. Let me work on that while you take a short break and come back for more blogs…only on abhishekchandra.blogspot.com