Season 7

I haven’t blogged for a while after my... er, passionate Independence Day post. Now that the semester is over, I think it’s time that I tell you people a bit about it. And anyone with an idea of how things work at most engineering colleges will know that the last two semesters are mostly, if not all about placements and admits. In my case, it was sadly all about placements. The ‘sadly’ has been introduced as a result of my summer internship making me realize what work after BTech means for a mechanical engineer.

Anyway, this post is mostly about my placement experience. You’ve been warned in advance, so don’t read this if you’re not interested in such boring stuff. My preparations for placement season were quite thorough, as thorough as most preparations for any exam from third year and ahead. I guess I need not say more. The first company to visit for mechanical was Bajaj. Actually it was among the first companies to visit campuses altogether. Having worked at a motorcycle company over the summer, my dislike for automobile companies had only increased. Yet, being the focused and determined person I am, I sat for Bajaj.

Bajaj is sort of like the Microsoft for mechies I guess. It pays well (best in the market, significantly more than certain companies which think of themselves as Bajaj’s competitors), location is good (Pune), profiles are challenging and the company as a whole is virtually the best indigenous manufacturer of bikes here. So, we all sat for it out of respect actually (the ones who weren’t that keen on it even). I was so confident and keen on the company that I hadn’t even bothered to bring my formal clothes or shoes. I just sat for the test because it would be a good experience. As it turned out, the paper had both general aptitude and technical questions with, wait for it, equal weightage. I focused on the general aptitude questions and attempted a few technical ones. I got lucky and qualified for the interview. Yes, Bajaj were all about quick and efficient recruitment methods. There was just one interview and they said they didn’t bother about what we wore. All the same, I didn’t want to be the only one in casual clothes and ran back to the hostel to borrow pants from one guy, shirt and tie from another and... Well it was chaotic, to say the least. I took my documents and ran to the Training & Placement department. I don’t remember having to wait that long. My interview was quick and enlightening. It was clear that not only was I disinterested in automobiles but I was also quite incompetent at them. Or that’s what the interviewers made me feel like. I was asked a few questions on my project on lighting systems in automobiles (which was pretty useless, I must admit) and then later I was asked a question on how I’d make vehicles more efficient without touching the engine (yes, that was it, it was that general) I told them about making the vehicle more streamlined with the aid of some very clumsy figures, talked about how a vehicle that hugs the road with down force ultimately gets more traction (is that right?) and about how CVT can give more appropriate gear ratios for every speed and thus increase efficiency. I guess that wasn’t enough.

Having not had much hope anyway, I returned to my room to later find out that 5 people had been recruited. Company 1 down.

The next one was Caterpillar. Now for those who don’t know about this company, it is the world’s biggest manufacturer of construction and mining equipment and machinery. They’re a Fortune 50 company if I’m not wrong and are very proud of what they do, rightly so. They are by no means a ‘low profile’ company and don’t want people who see them a stepping stone to higher studies or some 2 year stint. At NITK they are up there with Bajaj in terms of pay and frankly even work I guess. Okay, so the test. This time I had brought my formals, thankfully. I wrote the test, which had aptitude, technical and verbal components. Technical was the most important part this time. The topics which I remember were thermodynamics, hydraulics and pneumatics (major portion, this), fluid mechanics and manufacturing. The test was pretty tough and far more of a challenge than the Bajaj test. I say this because I qualified in this as well. I know, how modest right? I somehow made it through. There was a group discussion which went quite smoothly. I think the topic was about how education is/isn’t necessary for success. I thought it was and spoke a bit. The interview was easy. They asked me about my CGPA trend and why it had a negative slope. To be honest, they didn’t seem very bothered by it. They asked me about my project. Asked me about the effect an open fridge had on itself and its surroundings. They also asked me to define a tool and a machine, which was slightly weird and also fun. Bottles, pens and the AC were used as examples. And then they asked me my interests to which I said strength of materials/structural. They asked me to design a diving board from scratch and it was pretty easy given that to me it was basically about designing a very flexible cantilever. The problem was, I was having second thoughts about the work and the location. They had no guarantee as to whether they would assign me an R&D job or a manufacturing one. I know this was a bit arrogant on my part, but I voiced these concerns and also asked them about the possibility of relocation. They weren’t pleased by this I guess or maybe didn’t find me good enough. All the same, Company No. 2 was down. Truth be told, I wasn’t that sad about this either.

In the following days quite a few companies came and went. I would go to their presentations and get disappointed with some aspect of the job. These were the initial days and some of the companies I skipped were actually gems which I stupidly did not try for out of greed. There, I said it. Others, the work was simply not what I expected and I’m happy to have not tried for. Oh, and I tried for Pepsico but was deemed unfit in the preliminary online psychometric test. That was interesting. Psychometric tests are awesome, you should try one.

Next came the one company I really wanted. Tata Motors, a Tata company, market leader in many segments, a job profile that gave an insane amount of exposure to the industry, good locations and a good compensation package. The test was conducted a few days before they came to the campus and it was online. Most of the questions were general aptitude and verbal. The technical part was varied in terms of topics. I remember questions on gears and other drives, production and operations management etc. The on campus process involved a group discussion followed by two interviews. The GD was on whether Indian television was exploiting the youth. The next technical interview was the longest I have faced. It went on for more than 50 minutes. I was asked questions on my project, manufacturing processes (I was asked what a pattern was, specifically),  Iron-Carbon diagrams and was grilled for around half an hour on why Finite Element Methods are required. Also a question on how section modulus impacts the member’s load carrying capacity where I was asked to quantitatively prove this for an ‘I’ section. That was it. The next interview was an HR interview. The HR guy seemed to be making an overt attempt at an accent and to be honest, trying to emphasize his ‘HR’ness. I guess it is pretty clear that I did not like him in the least, with his. His language was difficult to comprehend and at one point he said ‘crub’ instead of ‘curb’, which I unconsciously corrected. He seemed to have a severe disagreement with some points I had expressed during my GD and he brought them up. When I defended them, I was labelled as arrogant. Well, if that was the case I have no regrets in not making it there. If I was expected to not defend what i thought was right just to get the job, I’d rather be unemployed. Either he used that point to test me (in which case I took the bait most gloriously) or he did something very wrong by trying to impose his personal opinion on me and disregarding me because I did not yield. That or I was simply not good enough for the tech guy, which I have no problem with. Anyway, Company 3 down. I was pretty disappointed this time.

The next few days involved more disappointing presentations and returning to the room.

Irunway. This company was one which I’d never heard of before. They were basically a firm which helped companies sue others by ascertaining if and how patent infringements were made. Good pay, interesting job and a great location made me register for it. The test was interesting. There were some reasoning & comprehension questions with the subject matter being mainly consumer electronics and associated technologies, some mathematical questions (Olympiad type and basic calculus), a few programming questions (C++, mainly logic based) and some mechanical ones. It also has a small essay type question where you were supposed to write about your aims and interests. Anyway, that evening we had the Tata Steel test which I was more interested in. Tata Steel pays very well and although the location is not that great at first sight, it is supposed to be a very fulfilling and secure job. The test that evening was another case. Insanely difficult, it was made for a metallurgy student rather than a mechie. Questions were asked on steel, how it is made, its properties, basic manufacturing processes, fluid mechanics and thermo. Towards the end I was just ticking answers randomly in spite of the negative marking system. I was more hurriedly doing this because at the beginning of the test I was informed that I had qualified for the Irunway interviews happening RIGHT THEN. It had started raining, so I wrote what I could and ran to my room, dressed and went to TnP. The interview was bizarre. Like a sort of HR round, the guy asked me about my interest, football, regarding interesting incidents that happened on campus (I told him about the rickshaw accident I had two days ago) and other such stuff. We had discussions on relativity and how Newton was different in terms of expressing the law of gravity. Yup, it was a very strange interview. I qualified for the next round where I was asked questions on IC engines, Wankel engines and questions on guesstimation (estimating the number of Joshuas in the world, the number of webpages created everyday). I was asked to explain some of my answers in the written test too, and failed miserably at solving the C++ questions. I won’t elaborate, they were really laughable. The impression I got from this interview and the subsequent lone recruitment was that they wanted someone who knew his stuff well (whether that was Rock Blasting or Artificial Intelligence was immaterial to them) and also someone with a fairly high IQ. Expected, given the nature of their work. They wanted a smart person who was thorough. Okay, Company 4 down (or if you include Pepsi, Company 5).

By now I was panicking. There wasn’t any news about any good companies coming in the foreseeable future (read Placement Site schedule). By good, I mean the companies whose profiles seemed appealing to me. There was Reliance, and that was it. My hopes about Atkins or L&T (Bombay) coming were dashed. Reliance had a good reputation. Okay, that goes without saying. The location was not bad, I absolutely adored the CM of Gujarat and some really good seniors were there. The presentation reinforced that. The profile they offered was not exactly in line with my interest but it was good, with great potential for professional growth.

Okay, I’ll cut the crap. I wanted to get placed and get it over with, and Reliance was more than enough. The presentation was embarrassing because of the power cut and the projector flopping as usual. The test involved aptitude and verbal questions which were very easy but required effective time management. Technical was okay, focusing on manufacturing processes, fluid machinery (pumps, pumps and more pumps) and some other subjects which I totally forgot. I qualified for the interviews. Me and the department’s erstwhile topper were sitting together and revising (now that I think of it, this was the first interview before which I actually did some focused study. Thank you Tintin for that little bit of motivation) We were lucky, both of us were asked questions on topics which we had seen moments ago on Wikipedia. That reminds me, thank you Jimmy Wales and team. I shall definitely donate soon. In the interview I was asked about the subjects I had taken that semester, a question on casting defects, some welding question I don’t even remember, a question on pressure vessels and the pressure components associated with them (Hoop stress etc.) and a general question on the role of a mechanical engineer in an industry like Reliance. It was over in less than ten minutes. I assumed that I had been disappointing and was hence dismissed early. Went back to my room in a very bad mood and if not for the salt, I might have really lost it. I slept off only to be woken up much later to Tintin calling me to TnP. The results were about to be announced and I didn’t want to go there to be rejected for a fifth time. But then I got a call telling me that I’d got it. The feeling is hard to describe. You only get it once in your life. I went there to TnP in my shabby jeans and FSUK shirt, got the offer letter, was asked about my attire and berated by the Reliance guys for not having enough confidence in myself. I told my loved ones about it, went back to my room and wore three layers of underwear and also my then redundant ankle crepe bandage in a vain effort to protect myself against the barbarism that was to follow. My butt was blue and pink for a week after that.

Well that was it, the day I got my first job. I honestly don’t know why I wrote this long post, but maybe it has something to do with the absolute lack of work I’m facing now. Hardly any classes anyway in college and now I’m on holiday. Getting placed has been a relief and the whole process leading up to it, a memorable experience. Thought I’d share it with you. Hopefully the next post shall be a little less boring and narcissistic.

And oh, for those of you who are looking for something better than placements, here is a pretty informative blog by a friend of mine :- http://opulentverses.blogspot.in/2012/10/a-tryst-with-internships-part-2.html