Interview experience of: Prahalad
M: in the course of the interview I never said any of these things
P2 (smiling) I can infer them then
P1 and P2: thank you and all the very best M: thank you sirs
So that was it. Quite a stressful interview and the panel kept making some weird faces as though to suggest they were just not happy with any of my answers. But the one good thing from my side is I didn’t lose my cool or thought process and answered the questions as calmly as possible.
Interview experience of: abhishek85born
The following interview experience took place at about 4pm at Shangri La Hotel, New Delhi on 12th Feb... Couldn’t post it earlier...
My profile:
Final Year, Electrical Engg, IIT Roorkee
CAT %iles: DI : 94.52; Verbal : 93.72; Quant : 99.84; Overall : 99.63 IIM Calls : B, L, I, K
CGPA : 8.53/10 (after 6 semesters) Xth : 92.33% ICSE
XIIth : 93.40% CBSE
Internship : Max Planck Institute of Plasma Physics, Germany (May-July 2006) Case Study started at about 2.30 pm. 8 Ppl (6 guys, 2 gals)
Case - Gyani, a student among toppers, faculty thinks high of him, but his fellow mates think he uses unfair means.. Gyani has never been caught despite proper vigilance systems in institute's examination halls... Institute has decided to give him the prestigious Gold Medal but recently, Gyani is caught cheating in placement papers. Chairman of Institute in dilemma what should he do, give the medal to Gyani or not? 10 mins to think, 15 to discuss, 15 to write summary (they emphasized that pls do write in a good hand- writing...). MOST peaceful case study I ever experienced, no one tried to cut other one in between.. I wanted to start but one female started with me and I backed out. I was second one to speak, spoke 5-6 times, gave decent points, and one suggestion was accepted by almost whole group.
My interview was scheduled to be 2nd in the grp...
Panel - 2 profs (1 teaches Organisational Behaviour @ IIMB, other teaches Corporate Strategy and Policies) After checking on IIMB website, I found out their names -
Corporate Strategy prof : J Ramachandran (James BOND.. my interview wud substantiate this statement) OB prof : Sourav Mukherji (No less..)
Referred to as - JR, SM from now onwards.
SM opens the door and invites me in. I enter, SM indicates me to take the seat...JR is having a look at the certificates and mark sheets (about 40+ of them in all, Xerox copies) which I had sent to IIMB along with my application.
JR: Abhishek, my God... you sent me so many certificates. My arms are still aching... Me (faint smile): I wish I had even more Sir...
JR: So, you want my arms to break or what??
Me (ohh!): No Sir, but still...
SM: Abhishek you went to Germany, right? Me: Yes sir.
SM: How many people went for internship to Germany? Me: Sir, about 60-70 from all IITs.
SM: How do you know?
Me: Sir, actually we used to be in touch with each other through yahoo group and we had created a database.
So, I know through it.
SM: And how many were there at your institute? Me: Sir, I was the only one.
SM: So, that was something great... very few people got such an opportunity.
SM: Ok, what is Max Planck's contribution to society? (My internship was at Max Planck Institute of Plasma
Physics)
Me: Sir, Max Planck institutes are a chain of research centres in Germany... (Interrupted) SM: No, asked about Max Planck's contribution...
Me (my mind-bulb glows: idea: Sir, Max Planck gave the Planck's constant which related energy of a particle with its frequency as wave nature...The relationship is given by E = hv...
SM: What else...
Me: It showed that every particle has a particle as well as a wave nature.
SM: But why was it such a breakthrough in Physics? Why was this discovery so important?
Me (Thinks, answers something...)
SM: Ok, if I say that as Abhishek entered the room, a wave entered the room. Would it be correct to say? Me (thinks): Sir, I would say that as Abhishek entered the room, he did create waves around himself...
Both smile...
JR comes into picture.
JR: Those waves you had created earlier itself even before entering. Me (faint smile): Sir, I meant the sound and air waves.
(SM says that let's leave that discussion about Max Planck... I bit serious...)
JR (gets up from his seat, at his ease): Why are your hands shaking Abhishek? (My hands were on the
table)
Me (I see myself and my hands were not shaking as such. I wondered why he said so): No Sir.
SM: Abhishek, you are nervous and if you will be nervous, you won’t be able to perform to your full potential
and we won’t get a chance to know Abhishek. So, just take relax yourself.
Me: No Sir, I am fine.
JR: Are you really fine? Abhishek... (A long pause from his side)
Me (now at this stage, my hands actually started shaking a bit: sad: I did realize that they are trying to test my nerves)
JR: Take a deep breath...be easy...
Me (I adjust me seat a bit, look down and take a couple of seconds to relax myself..): I am very fine Sir.
JR: Do you want something, water? Me: No Sir, I am fine.
JR: tea, coffee?
Me: No Sir, I had tea in the waiting room earlier.
JR (standing at the back of his seat): Alcohol?
Me (what?? Now, I thought I too would enjoy the interview): No Sir that I'll have once I... (I stopped)
JR: Once you crack the interview? Me: Sure Sir.
JR: Ok, which brands do you drink? Say any brand, we'll order it here itself...
Me (yeh ho kya raha hai!!): Sir, when I went to Germany, we went to a beer-hall in Munich. That beer-
hall is famous for serving 110 years old traditional beer...
JR (smiles): So, from there you started drinking... how often do you drink?
(He also says to SM that 'peene ke baad toh everyone gets the confidence to survive anywhere! ’A sarcastic remark to what I had said earlier about Germany and confidence thing.)
Smiles all around.
Me: Sir, I take it veryyy occasionally...
JR (sarcastic laugh): Don’t tell me... all these people from IIT Roorkee and side, I know how often they
drink...
Me (seniors ne aisi kya image bana rakhi hai? wink:): No Sir, I take it just once in a month or so,
sometimes even once in 2 months.. actually, I have a group of 12-13 friends at IIT Roorkee and..(Interrupted)
JR: And all are big-time drunkards. That’s what you wanted to say?
Me (huuu!): No Sir, I didn’t mean that. 6-7 of them do take it bit regularly and they have a tendency to
attract others too.
JR: So which category, do you fall into? Once who get attracted or ones who don’t get attracted?
Me: Sir, once who don’t get attracted... My friends know that he is a 'no nonsense' kind of a person who has
his priorities clear and wouldn’t follow them blindly. And it does happen at times that they feel bad, but then next morning, all is fine and they realize that he is right...
JR: Does your girlfriend want you to join IIMs?
Me (Is this an interview going on??): Yes Sir, absolutely.
JR: What is she doing?
Me: Sir, she is doing final year in computer science from...XXX JR: What are her career plans?
Me (Why is he more interested to know her plans than mine?): She'll be going for job. She'll be joining ...XXX (company name)
JR: Where? Me: Trivandrum.
JR: So, you want to come to Bangalore so that you rush to Trivandrum every weekend to meet her? Me: No Sir, that's not the case.
(SM says to
JR: Trivandrum too is quite far from Bangalore...)
JR: What do you think of a life without romance? Do you think long-distance relationships work?
Me: Sir, I have been in this long-distance relationship for quite long and I have always seen my relationship
as my strength. So, I think, I'll be able to manage it.
Me: Sir, few days back my girlfriend asked me a question - Abhishek, give me your priority sequence out of
these 3 things - your career, computers and me. Again both have a good laugh...
JR: Abhishek let me tell you 1 thing - either you dump your girlfriend or she'll surely dump you one day!!
Me (what!!): No Sir, it can’t be...
JR (can’t put his sarcastic face expression in words): That’s a typical male chauvinistic attitude!
Me: No Sir...
JR: Doesn’t your girlfriend think you to be so boring? I wonder why she is with you.
Me: I don’t think that she sees me as boring. Rest, she must be knowing better why is she with me. JR: What do you want to do after this MBA business?
SM asks another question on the same time.
SM: How much do you sleep? Me: Sir, about 4 hours on weekdays...
Me: Sir, I compensate for it on the weekends. And actually my sleeping timings got stretched once I joined
IIT Roorkee. Initially, I used to sleep at 11-12 pm, and then it came onto 1-2...
SM: What time are your classes? Me: Sir, 8 am mostly.
SM: Firstly, do you actually attend classes? (Smiles) Me: Yes Sir, I do.
SM: What time do you get up?
Me: Sir, 7.15(actually, I get up at 7.45 for 8 am class!) SM: If my Maths is not weak, 2 to 7, does it make 4 hours?
Me (hadd hai yaar): Sir, I meant to say that my timings have got stretched and now a days, I sleep in between 3 and 3.30 and so that way, it comes out to be 4 hours or so..
JR: At what time did you sleep in Germany? Me: Sir, about 10 or 11 pm.
JR: And get up at? Me: 7 am or so...
JR: So, average we take it 8 hours a day, right? Me: Yes Sir.
JR: You were there for 3 months, so out of those 3 months; 1 month goes off in sleeping. Right?
Me (thinking): Hmm... Yes sir.
JR: And how many days I week, did you use to work? Me: Sir 5 days... and Friday used to be half day...
JR: Yes, in Europe, it is like that... So, we assume that you worked 5 days a week. So calculate, how many
days off?
Me (wondering that what kind of Maths he is applying? I realized that he wanted to show that the actual working time would come out to be very less): Sir, if we calculate this way, the actual working time would come out to be very less but it is the quality work that matters.
JR: So, in other words you mean to say that it was your team that actually worked on the project?
Me (how could he infer that?): Not at all Sir, in fact as I said there was no other intern at my institute, I worked on this project alone under the guidance of a computer scientist and my professor who had called me. (No counter questions on this further)
JR: What was the work about? Me: tells in brief...
JR: How big is your family?
Me: Sir, just me, my parents and my younger brother. JR: What does your father do?
Me: tells... JR: mother? Me: tells...
JR: and younger brother?
JR: Does he look up to you?
Me: Yes Sir. In fact, when I was in Germany, his class 10th board results were declared and he scored 96.5 %
aggregate which is the highest in the history of that school... Both seem kinda impressed.
JR: That’s even more than yours. Do congratulate him from our side... Me: Sure Sir.
SM: Ok, now that you would be entering a B-school, what do you know about the world of business? What
all do you read?
Me: Sir, I try to keep in touch...
SM: By touch you mean The Times of India?? Me: Yes Sir, the Times of India...
SM (nods his head with that don’t-tell-Me:Times-of-India look!!?? :): Ok, go ahead, tell what about business?
Me: Sir, Indian entrepreneurs which were not seen as 'sharks' till now are turning out to be sharks... (There
was that big Birla-Novelis and Vodafone-Hutch news that day itself) JR (smiles): You said 'sharks'?? 8-)
Me: Yes Sir, sharks... which engulf the smaller fishes of their sea... JR: Which Indian sharks are you talking about?
Me: Sir, like today we have the news of Vodafone bidding for Hutch? JR: Is Vodafone an Indian company??
Me: Ohh, sorry sir. Actually, I wanted to come to the point of Birla's acquiring Novelis and earlier Tata-
Corus deal that has taken place...
JR: So, Vodafone is not an Indian company? Me: No Sir.
JR: Are you sure? Me: Yes Sir.
JR: Who is its CEO? Me: Sir, Arun Sarin. JR: Is he an Indian? Me: Yes Sir.
JR: Vodafone's head is an Indian, so now think again whether Vodafone is an Indian company or not? Me: (knew that it’s a UK company but still forced to think a bit...): No Sir, it’s not an Indian company. If
suppose I go to US and become its CEO, it won’t make that country to be Indian...
SM: So, how do you think is the nationality of company determined?
Me: Hmm... Sir, from where it started...by where its headquarters are located... SM: So, you mean to say that origin matters...
Me: Yes Sir.
Then there was a discussion on whether 'origin' or 'ownership' matters. They did try to confuse a bit by discussing something about Infosys and Mittal-Arcelor. I guess I handled decently but said 'I am not sure sir' at few places...
JR: Abhishek, you know what? When you entered the room, we thought you are a Superman. Do you know
who is a superman?
JR: exactly.
(He tried to show that he expected me to know everything about business but I wasn’t sure about few things...a sarcastic smile...)
SM: Ok Abhishek, that’s it... do you have any questions?
Me: Sir, I want you to ask me why I want to do an MBA :-). I want you to complete that question which
couldn’t be completed earlier. (Don’t know what made me say that!!) (Both are bit surprised that why he wants to go into this question!)
SM: Why should we ask you this?
Me: I want you to know why I wish to join a management institution... SM: Ok go ahead...
JR: But don’t tell us something which we have been hearing since morning, that holistic approach n stuff... Me: Sir, I won’t be saying something like holistic approach, diversity of experiences, etc.
JR: If not that, you would be saying something taught in your coaching classes...
Me: Sir, after having such interaction for 20-30 minutes, I don’t think anyone can speak just learnt
answers...
JR: But did you join any coaching for interview preparation? Me: I attended a boot-camp by Career Launcher.
JR: I know all this coaching business. This Career Launcher has been started by my son Satya... (Not sure if
these were the exact words but something on these terms)
Me: (surprised!)
JR: Ok, tell what you were saying...
Me: (I gave a technical analogy telling about my goal, etc...) JR: Did you read history in school?
Me (Will he go into History now?): Yes Sir. JR: Did you read of 'slave’s dreams’?
Me (what's that): Hmm... No Sir.
JR: Do you know who slaves are? Me: Yes Sir.
(He tried to show that my technical analogy suggested that I want to become a master of slaves... WHAT an inference has he made out of my answer !!?)
Me: No Sir, I just wanted to convey that I wish to coordinate activities of my group and don’t intend to treat
them as slaves.
JR: Ok thank you Abhishek, it was nice interacting with you. Me: (gets up): Sir, I wish to say one thing which I strongly feel... JR: Yes, what?
Me: I believe that such a GD-PI experience should be there in admission procedure for IITs too... (He didn’t
ask why...)
Both smile and extend their hands...Handshakes and me leaving by saying...Thanks, thanks a lot Sir...