The following was posted Verbatim (with all the Spelling and Grammatical errors) on Pagalguy forums, and the number of responses it drew from CAT aspirants was overwhelming. Just to preserve the memory, I'm putting this on this blog for posterity.
This has been due from the last two years. When I was preparing for CAT this used to be my favourite thread. I drew inspiration from many success stories here. THe best and most inspiring ones were where people achieved success after facing failure.
I haven't read this thread since 2009, i.e. after I got into IIM. I wanted to post this story, but just never sat down to write it. I don't know how the format is these days. I'll just post best according to how it used to be 2-3 years back. I hope someone can take away something from the story which inspires him/her, just like the stories on this forum at my prep time inspired me. Its not just a story about CAT. Its a life story. It starts from school, JEE prep, and goes on to CAT prep, and even beyond that, up untill I got my dream job!! so not just CAT aspirants, but even most people posting on this thread can probably take something away from it, assuming that most people coming to post would be the ones who are in some Bschool.
So I'll start my story from when I was back in school.
I was a good student till class 10th. That doesn't mean I sat on the front bench and was a teacher's pet. On the contrary, I was always notorious, used to play pranks in the class, always got complaints sent home about my being talkative and disturbing the class. But I managed to study regularly at home, studied hard during the exams and scored good marks.
JEE Take 1
I topped my school in class 10th, and like all good students, started dreaming about the IIT. Little did I know, it was going to be a much more turbulent path than I had imagined.
Come class 11th, I fell in love with a girl. Actually, I had a crush on her since 8th, but in 11th, we started talking. Life for the next 2 years was a roller coaster. I doubt many people have a love story like that in class 11th-12th. We became best friends, I eventually proposed, she rejected, mainly because her best friend had a crush on me. I set her best friend up with my friend, and she said yes to me after that. We had a very fulfilling affair that lasted for a year, but met turbulent weather when her parents got wind of it. We belonged to different communities, her parents were conservative, and were dead against anything intercaste. Moreover, it was Indore, in 1999... and we were in school. In short, nothing was in our favour. We couldn't fight back. I did try, but she gave up, and I can't really blame her.
Anyway, in the midst of all of this, studies had taken a backseat. Due to some bit of common sense , luck, and intelligence, I managed to clear JEE screening. But after that, there was not just the pressure of the break up, and a lot of crying, but also some problems at my own home
I , ofcourse, flunked JEE mains, and I managed a meagure 68% in my class 12th (I hadn't ever scored below 90% before 11th). I didn't get any admissions of note, even through AIEEE, MPPET, and a bunch of other engineering entrances I had taken.
JEE Take 2
My parents, flustered by my tanking stock, sent me to Kota, in the hope that maybe away from the girl who had been the object of my attention the last couple of years, I'd pay attention and study. BUt I was still not over my break up. I got to know about her hanging out with other guys from her college, back in Indore, and I travelled twice in train toilets from Kota to Indore (coz I did not have money to buy tickets) just to meet her. She refused to meet me both the times, but the second time her brother did find out and met me with his friends, with hockey sticks. They Didn't touch me thankfully, they just wanted to scare me. And I did get scared.
My parents got to know of my trips, and I was given a lot of grief and final warning that if I don't change my ways they would just disenroll me and admit me to some BSc course. I had given up on my girl anwyay, given that she hadn't bothered/dared to meet me after such effort filled trips. But it wasn't all that easy. I couldn't bring myself to study, I was heartbroken. I had a void to fill, I wanted to forget her, get over her. To distract myself, I made some friends, started Drinking. I used to get away from the pain of my heartbreak by sitting in cybercafes and watching movies, spending whole nights at the chaiwala having chai and chatting with friends. I did clear screening again, and I did manage to study a lil bit towards the end, and cleared mains but with a 4018 rank which didn't fetch me anything but NIFFT ranchi which was affiliated with JEE for just that one year. I managed VIT vellore comp sci through AIEEE, and that was the option I chose.
JEE Take 3...
I was all set to leave, but the day before I was to take the train southwards, my father intervened, and said that he believed if I studied hard, like really put in effort whole heartedly, I could improve my rank. I believed so too. But everyone else in our family was against it. I had already wasted one year to no avail, they said. But my father stood by me, we stood our ground and I took the huge risk of dropping a second year. It was a huge gamble. If I managed to make it to IIT, it would indeed pay off, but if I did not, I would be so low on confidence, and so outdone by life that I would probably consider myself a loser forever. I would go to a college I could have made it to the previous year, and forever in Life I would face tough questions of why I wasted my time. It was a big risk to take, but I took it anyway. So for that one year, I stayed at home, Studied hard. I hardly spoke to anyone but my family for that one year. I didn't call anyone (all my school friends were in 2nd year college and I hadn't even entered. It was weird to talk to anyone anyway. I had lost my own respect in my eyes actually.) . But finally the one year of hermitage paid off and I cleared JEE with an improved rank of 1585. To keep me away from distractions (read more access to girls) cities like Delhi and Mumbai would offer, my dad insisted I go to IIT Madras, and this time I took his advice. {Disclaimer - This is Not to say that Chennai doesn't have any women, I still think Shruti Hassan is one of the prettiest girls in the country, but well lets just say Delhi/Mumbai girls were more my type, and my parents knew that too}
IIT dayz
I was never fond of studying and took it a little light at IIT too. I actually thought that now that I was in IIT, the world was my oyster and I did not need to work hard now, life would sort itself out anyway. I performed well in subjects that interested me, not so well in subjects that did not. I was doing okay till term 4, with an average CGPA of 7.8 . but term 4, I flunked two courses. It wasa a wake up call, and thankfully I didn't snooze the alarm. I recovered from the damage in term 5, and even got a foreign internship after 3rd year etc. I was in Biotechnology, and like most people in my branch, and as per the precedent set by my seniors, thought the easiest career option was the do an MS-PhD in the US(which was not too tough to get given that we had a lot of IIT-M alumnus as professor/PhD candidates there). I took my GRE and TOEFL and did well in them (300/300 and 1500/1600) . I was all set to start applying and get the hell out of IIT. But then , I took an exam which changed my life.
A New Direction...
Yes.. It was an open mock test. I was lazing about on a Sunday, when some of my friends woke me up and asked me to get ready. I asked them what it was for, and they said it was a CAT mock in the city. I said I didn't even know what sections CAT had. I could sure as hell not do much in the mock. They said it was free, and I should come along as they planned a movie and dinner after the mock. Now we were always short of Cash and IIT was far off from the movie theater etc, so if I did not go with them I would have to go alone later, or miss the fun. If I went alone, the Auto would have cost me a 100 Rs one way, which was really costly by my standards coz I got limited cash from home. So I decided to go with them. I thought , how bad could sitting 2.5 hrs thru an exam could be. It was definitely worth saving the 100 bucks.
The exam started, and I decided to solve it, just to make the 2.5 hrs go by faster. I didn't even have a pencil, I borrowed it from the center. I had no clue what the fullform of DI was, trust me, but I still managed to do the questions as they were mostly common sense. English I was already good at coz of my GRE prep, and Maths.. well I had cleared JEE. I found myself flowing freely through the exam. I thought maybe everyone would have done well. But when the result came out around a week later, to my utter surprise, I had scored a scintillating 99.3%ile. I got a lot of taunts like 'chupa rustam', 'kitne time se prep kar raha hai' etc, and my friends wouldn't believe for the life of me that much less prepare, I hadn't even known much about the exam till then. That was when I looked at IIM placements and what they entailed. I thought if I could get a 99.3 in a mock without prep, I had a good shot to score a good percentile if I prepared. Moreover, the coaching institute called me and offered me a really discounted price for their test series. I took it.
I started doing really well mock after mock. Success begets success, it is true, for when a reputation started forming around campus that I was one of the guys to watch out for as far as CAT was concerned, I put in even more effort to prove myself. I was consistently in All India top 100 of TIME. I found the preparation actually interesting, as opposed to JEE prep which I found almost put me o sleep, esp Chemistry. The problems were shorter, mocks were more about strategy, and right choices of which questions to attempt, how much time to devote to which section, how to make sure you cleared sectional cutoffs as well as maximized overall score. Preparation was more about fine tuning certain skills than learning new stuff from thick books. It was probably the first exam I put in effort for in my life. I was so confident that I'd clear it that I did not apply to any foreign schools for MS/PhD. My friends said why are u wasting ur GRE/TOEFL, i said well I think i've finally found something I've good at. I hate biotechnology. I'd much rather pursue the post MBA careers. Moreover, I might get to stay in India!..
CAT Take 1
CAT though, was a disaster. While I aced the Maths and DI sections, the English section in that year was horrible. No offence to anyone setting/clearing/managing the exam, but I personally thought that the options in the English passages were so close together that in the 'what is the author most likely to think' question after the passages, even the author would probably be confused as to what he was most likely to think. Anyway, I got a mere 13/100 in English, nowhere near the cutoff. So inspite of an overall 99+ score, I didn't get any IIM calls, and hadn't filled any other forms.
I sat in campus placements at IIT, and I didn't even have a shot in the first 2-3 days of placements when the top consults and banks (Lehman, Mckinsey) etc visited. Even when i started getting shortlisted (The Deloittes and ITC phase - which again was limited for me because Biotech wasn't really a preferred branch by most) I didn't make the cut, coz in the last round, invariably questions arose about my class 12th score. and 2 years of gap in education (Arghhh). I managed to get an averagish job on the 12th day of placements (the later the day, the worse the job, although the placecom would never admit it). I decided to take it and take a shot again at CAT. After all, things couldn't go wrong twice in a row. I was good, I knew it.
CAT Take 2
I managed to get past IIT with some more adventures, like getting a Project extension etc, and moved to DElhi. I started working, and before I knew it, it was mock season again. I did extremely well in mocks this time around (was a regular in All India TOp 10 in CL, and even got All India Rank 1 in 2 of the 8 mocks) and they offered me classroom coaching even though I was just a test series student. They took me to a boot camp, asked me to attend any classes of any topic i was uncomfortable in, in any batch. I was given VIP treatment. I was quite confident of clearing CAT. I remember it as clear as crystal. Coming back from a mock, calculating the score, discussing the mock on PG and other forums, and then the result coming out midweek, getting a good rank, and then dreaming about being in an IIM. Dreaming about my friends and family congratulating me, that dude, despite what happened till now, you finally made it. The toppers of my IIT branch calling me from their good universities in US and congratulating me, saying that dude, u got the best crack. The feeling when other mock takers in my office asked about my result the next day, and I proudly told them, and then they were like, this dude is going to IIMs for sure. It felt wonderful. And it gave more fuel to my passion and I put in even more effort.
Meanwhile, this was 2007, and the economy was at the peak of boom, and many of the IIT grads who had joined my firm with me, moved to much juicier jobs within just 3-4 months of us joining. I had the same options too, and infact was called by a few recruiters, but all the offers I got required me to move to Bombay or Bangalore, and I did not want to disrupt my CAT prep. So I gave up on those jobs, and decided to just stick it and keep preparing. IIMs were calling out to me, after all.
come C-day though, and English was like a bouncer. And this time around, even the answer keys of institutes did not match. I was getting a score between 12 (min) - 44 (max) in english. I started praying real hard. The cutoff was expected to be low. The result came out a month later. I sstill remember it reading on my cellphone. Got it through SMS. Don't remember the scores, but I remember the percentiles. Overall 99.35%ile. DI 100%ile, QA 99.88%ile, English 31%ile. ENGLISH 31%ile!! It went through me like a hot iron. I had 4/100 in English. THat was lesser than the minimum possible score I had expected. The IIM Key had answeres different in even questions that all institutes agreed on. I was in a shock. It was as if my dream had finally been shattered. Failing twice, was something I wasn't prepared for. I could be unlucky once. Not twice!! I had topped the entire country in DI/LR but still couldn't get a single IIM call.
CAT No More....
For the first time.. I was faced by the reality, that I would have to work in a job that wasn't really my first choice. I mean, till that point, it was a whirlwind. I had moved to a new city, and the initial few days of the job were a honeymoon, with Training going on which was only for a few hours a day. I had made a lot of new friends with like minded people, had a lot of fun.. partying after work and on weekends. And then the mocks began so they took much of the focus. So I hadn't really got time to stand back and evaluate life till then. I treated my job as a place which gave me money to spend some time at while I prepared for CAT. I never took it seriously, never tried to learn anything there. But It hit me then that I had 1.5 yrs at the very minimum I had to spend at that place. And that was a really sad thought.
I somehow scraped through my time. I began hating the IIMs and the godforsaken CAT. I hated them that they set papers which were so unreasonable. If I had topped Mocks, not once, but consistently over two years, I definitely deserved to atleast had a shot at the GDPI. I knew people who I thought to be much less deserving, who never crossed 95%ile in mocks, and had still got calls. That made me feel much worse. I was in no mood to take the exam again actually. I decided I had wasted too many hopes on it.
GMAT & CFA..
I started thinking of other venues. I dared to think beyond the IIMs (no no.. not abt THAT! ). I decided to take the GMAT. but CAT had shattered my confidence so badly that I didn't know if I could do well in that. I bought Princeton review and the OG and started preparing, and within a week I took my first mock and got 780/800. But by this point, I had stopped trusting mocks. It seemed that they were mocking me, nothing more. I continued with prep, for another 3 weeks, just studying over weekends.
I didn't have a lot of hopes when I went to the exam center, I didn't have a score in mind. I had done exceedingly well on the mocks, but like I said, that didn't mean anything to me. The exam started, and ended, and my score came up on the screen. 760/800. I was in the top 1%ile of test takers. Just like that. I hadn't even have to put in a total of 40 hrs of effort. Some of my much needed confidence came back. It was like redemption. I wasn't so bad after all. The mocks did not lie. CAT did. I hated CAT all the more. I decided to apply to foreign schools, and forget about IIMs.
But I found to my chagrin, that most of them required a minimum of 2 years of work ex at the time of application, and I wouldn't have that before all the application deadlines were well over for this year. So if I went the GMAT way I'd have to slog for another 2.5 yrs at this place at the minimum. Ofcourse I could take another job, but the thing with me was, if I knew that what I was doing wasn't what I was going to do my whole life, I wouldn't excel at it. I was atleast comfortable in my current job. It required minimal effort from my side, (not that I was unprofessional, the expectations themselves were pretty low, and I just met them, rather than trying to do my best and take more responsibility). To take my mind of things and keep myself busy, I decided to take the CFA exam and learn a lil bit about finance. I was in IT for an investment bank anyway, and the company had a policy of reimbursing ur CFA fee if you cleared the exam. I studied hard for CFA level 1, and managed to clear it. I also found myself taking an active interest in the content. I liked finance. And more than anything else, I decided I wanted to be an investment banker. Not only did it pay the most, It also was something I found interesting.
CAT forms came out, and I decided to just go ahead and buy it, because a few friends were going to buy it. For most people fresh into the IT Industry, CAT was like an annual festival for the first 3-4 years anyway, till they gave up on it. It was just a ritual people went through. Like buying a lottery ticket. If u got it, great, if not, life's okay anyway. I procastinated filling up the form and filled it quite late, just in time rather. I did not want to attach any emotions with CAT. It had bitten me twice. I was definitely shy.
ISB....
Around mid september, a friend told me that ISB admissions had opened up. The website said they needed a minimum of 2 years workex. But my friend asked me to go ahead with it anyway. He suggested that if nothing else, going through the whole admission procedure would give me experience, which would help me with my application the next year to ISB and foreign Bschools. It wasn't too costly either. So I decided to give it a shot.
I wrote the essays really well, but didn't take any professional help. I was just honest. Just wrote my life's story. Wrote what I really felt. I never thought I had a chance anyway, so I did not indulge in any decorations, or revising, rereading, sending it out to people, institutes etc. I just wrote what came to my heart, just like I'm writing this post.
I pretty much forgot the application after I had filled it, but a month later, I was sitting and drinking at my friends place after work and randomly opened my Gmail, and to my surprise I found an EMail from ISB stating that my interview was a week later. It was a shocker, give that I was short of workex. I thought well, so much for experience. I prepared hard for the next one week, going through the PG thread and looking at past years interview experiences. I made a list of the FAQs that applied to me, thought of impressive answers to them and made notes. I rehearsed answering the few expected opening questions in front of the mirror. I got a new suit. On the interview day, I was calm and composed, especially because I did not consider this a make or break interview of my life, but rather went in with the mindset of gaining experience. The interviewers were very nice to me. They didn't touch upon the topic of my 12th score or 2 years gap. They just quizzed me on my future aspirations and goals which is the way it should be. They found me to be a good communicator with clear ideas on what I wanted to do in life in the future.
At the end of the interview, they said, that they don't have a policy of spot offers but they would definitely say I did exceedingly well, and asked me that just in case they were to offer me a deferred admit for the following, since I did not have sufficient workex to be admitted to this year's batch, would I be okay with it. I said ofcourse, yes. A bird in hand is better than N in the bush. And ISB was doing well in all those FT rankings anyway. It couldn't be so bad, I thought.
CAT Take 3.
CAT came closer, but I was hardly bothered. Well, the weekend before CAT I did take a couple of mocks I had kept with me from last year. I guess, it was just human. The eve before CAT I just looked at the maths formlae for a few hours. I had no high hopes. If I couldn't get through with hardcore prep the last two years, I definitely didn't stand a chance when my total prep this year was around 10 hours.
As soon as I saw the paper, and realized they had made the English section 160/360 and the remaining two 100 each, therefore increasing the weightage of English more than before, I lost all hope. I thought I'd just go to the English section first, see how it was, and then if it was as bad as before, probably not waste a lot of time getting another heartbreaking 100%ile in DI. I went through the first passage, and looked at the questions, and to my surprise they were straightforward. Ditto the second paassage, and ditto the third. My confidence was back. This was like a mock. I realized, English was actually teh section I could maximise my score in.. I was confident of clearinng the cut off for the first time in 3 years. I rushed to the DI, and did a few caselets. Enough to make sure I waas beyond the cutoff. All my previous skill in assessing how much the cutoff should be for what level of toughness was coming back. It comes with practice, its not an exact science, but once you take enough mocks, you just know how much you need to do to be able to clear the cutoff by a decently safe margin, and then you know what section to do to maximise your score. For me, surprisingly, English was the section. I went to maths, and because I was out of practice, I was cautious to not touch the topics I wasn't very well versed in. I only took the more generic topics, with easier questions. I went home and calculated the score. Now I know, CAT these days is online and all, but trust me, the Paper based format had a certain romanticism to it. For one, entire India took the same exam. The questions were discussed for days after the exam. All the coaching institutes came up with Answer keys a few hours after the exam, and then expected cutoffs after assessing a good number of data points provided by their students. You could never forget the evening following the CAT. I went to a friends place and we all aclculated our scores based on the various coaching institues keys. Because English section was straightforward, The answer keys weren't too different. I was getting a great score by any standards.
I enjoyed the next 2 months tremendously, for I had an ISB admit and was expecting BLACKI calls. I was on top of the world. My hatred for IIMs had evaporated away. I think it had been a case of sour grapes anyway. Finally, the result came, and apparantly people at Deloitte were able to see it a day before everyone else could. Somehow. I have no clue. I messaged a friend of mine at Deloitte and she gave me back a screenshot on email of my result page. It was the most beautiful webpage I had ever seen. Except for on exception. The scores were quite good. 99.92 Total... English and DI 99.96 and 99.90 respectively (English 99.96! After the HUMILIATION. It was a just redemption). Quant was 96.02, I think as a result of too few mocks and a little butterflies in the exam. But the shocking part was, the IIM Calls I had. It said CLIK.
For one day I was in Denial, that probably, since the offical result day hadnt come through, The call list was not complete. But when the actual result came out the next day, the page looked exactly the same. CLIK.No A. No B. Period. I couldn;t believe it. I thought well, maybe it was Quant, but calls to a few friends with slightly lower quant percentiles confirmed that it wasn't Quant.
I could understand why B wouldn't give me a call. With a 68% in class 12th, I did not stand a chance based on their 'Academic' criteria. And to be honest, I didn't mind much. B was never my dream college. But I was hurt about A. A had always given calls based on purely CAT scores. True, I would have had a hard time explaining the holes in my CV in the interview, but ISB interview had prepared me well for that.
BUt I did realize, that the exact year that I cleared CAT, was the exact year IIMA decided to apply the past-perfect Criteria. Giving very high weightage to 10th and 12th scores. Now I couldn't explain that I was in love. I couldn’t explain that I was having family problems during my 12th boards. I couldn't explain that I did go on to Clear JEE after the hole I was in where I was almost going to Kill myself. I could have explained it had they given me a chance. Atleast had called me for an interview, after I had finally managed to clear the reckless barrier after 3 trials. It was as if destiny did not want me to go to a dry state. What else could explain this. that first I couldn't clear English, A language I am not so bad at, and then A changes its criteria without any pre-warnings. I wanted to sue the Gujjus. aRgghhh.
Well, I hated A and all the snootyness it stood for (at that point, Don't feel so now) . So I started worshipping C and all that it stood for instead. Not that C was by any means second to A. But I guess its just the rankings and the reputation , that in general aspirants at that time considered A better. But I spoke to some seniors, and looked at the placement figures, and realized, that while A was good, undoubtedly, C was no lesser. C had the exact same firms visiting it for placements, and had instead been tiptoeing slightly ahead of A in placement figures the past few years. Moreover, the reverrent Investment banks, which I wanted to go to, actually somewhat preferred C. It was considered the place to be to enter the BFSI.
GDPI
So I set about preparing for the GDPI, with complete fervour. JOined coaching classes, entered the Rat race again. I wasn't so sure what I would choose between IIMC and ISB. It would be a tough decision, because I had already associated myself with ISB and had attended meets, met their alumni and people who made it that year. I had read about the place, vouched for it on forums, spread more awareness about it to people who thought there was no school parallel to IIMs in India. I had read blogs by ISBians, read about their swimming pool dunkings, the parties, the kind of professors coming, the batch profile, the 25% women in the batch, all those things. Anyway, I wasn't really sure, But i thought I'd atleast have a crown of converting one of the Big 3, wouldn't be bad for my 2 CAT smashed ego. I thought I would cross the bridge of what to choose what I came to it. I wasn't going to count my chickens before they hatched. A problem of plenty isn't such a bad problem.
So I went regularly to classes, and I actually did well in the Mock GDPIs. I did have the problem of talking a lot, as u can make out from my long winded post. That was corrected in the first few sessions and then I was good to go. Thankfully the order was IKLC, so that I could treat IKL as Net practice. I was quite sure I wouldn't join these 3 schools, as amazing as they are, but I just thought I'd prefer ISB. My I, K and L GDPIs were amazingly smooth. I was able to lead the GDs, yet maintain the right balance and not overdominate them. PIs I impressed my interviewers like anything. Maybe it was because I was under 0 performance pressure. It was like India playing a league match in the world cup after having already qualified for the next stage.
However, C was completely different. For one, the GD had 11 people, one of the largest groups I saw in an IIM GD. THe GD was 10 minutes, towards the shorter end. All of them were men (a single lady in a GD can infuse peace, order and good behavior), and the topic was abstract. Artists should learn mathematics. Everyone has something to say about such an extract topic. Everyone wanted to take the lead as the stakes were very high. People wanted to be heard. People wanted to change the direction of the GD all the time. It became a fish market in no time. And then the confusion ensued for a full 10 minutes, and then abruptly we were stopped. The moderator then asked people to summarize the GD, and I was asked to do it in the end. Now even though I had not heard much in the GD, busy trying to make my own point, I had definitely heard the 10 people summarize before me. BUt I thought I'd just not repeat their points and sound like a parrot. I tried to give a different angle to the summary trying to cover points that had not been covered by others. This probably didn't go too well with the moderators, who were none too happy with the GD fallout anyway.
And therefore, what followed in the PI, can only be described as waht happened to Mithunda's on-screen sister in most of his movies. They started by literally scolding me for the chaotic GD, and when I proclaimed that there was nothing I could have done, they told me I could have infused order by asking people to calm down. arghhh! And then they went on to serially accuse me of not hearing as shown by my way-off summary, and then followed on to rag me about my past academics, my 'average' IIT CGPA, the other holes .. And also new ones I had never realized. I tried to wriggle out of the 12th question by saying I was ill. Obviously I did not want to mention the family problems and the break up. But I guess when you are dishonest, these people can see right through it, and it further ruined my impression. Infact the immidiate retort was - 'Fine you were ill in 12th. Were you ill in your whole graduation too?'. Then followed weird Questions. Let me give an example - P: What are your hobbies.. M : Sir I love to Travel, write.. P (Cutting me short) : Where have u travelled? M: Sir In India I have been to Kashmir, Himachal (I thot I'd go north to south, then Europe etc) P (Cutting me short) : Where in Himachal? M: Sir Shimla, Kullu-Manali, Kufri P: (cutting me short) : Tell me something about Kufri. M: (thinking-WTF! I had gone there when I was like
.. Sir.. Kufri.. umm.. Sir apples
are grown there. P: That is true for Entire Himachal pradesh. TEll me about
kufri. M: (remembering that I had a pic of me sitting on a Yak.. only memory I
had of Kufri) - Sir There is Yak Farming in Kufri. P(looking at me amazed) :
What? M: Yes Sir. THey breed yaks and then sell them to toher parts of the
state. P: (Looking at me in disbelief): Are u sure? M: Yes sir. P: I don't
think so. I was already low on confidence and thus fumbled with even simple CFA
questions they asked me on seeing CFA L1 on my CV. They got into FSA,
Differences between GAAP and IFRS. I fumbled badly and answered the complete
opposite of what I was going to say. It was a Stress Interview, and I was
totally stressed out, for this was the one important interview I had after a
long time!
Anyway, the Interview ended on a bad note.. with two of the profs making this verbatim conversation: "Sir Economics ka kuch poochna hai? isne college me elective liya tha" "Chhodo, isko basic accounting to yaad nahi, economics kya hi yaad hoga. chhodo sir, why waste our time" "OKay N***, thank you. All the best for your other interviews, prepare better for them. Do u have any other interviews left" "No sir already done with my other calls". "Oh.. well, all the best" (I think he meant to say - God save you). So well, My confidence was rattled. But I kept hoping for the best.
This has been due from the last two years. When I was preparing for CAT this used to be my favourite thread. I drew inspiration from many success stories here. THe best and most inspiring ones were where people achieved success after facing failure.
I haven't read this thread since 2009, i.e. after I got into IIM. I wanted to post this story, but just never sat down to write it. I don't know how the format is these days. I'll just post best according to how it used to be 2-3 years back. I hope someone can take away something from the story which inspires him/her, just like the stories on this forum at my prep time inspired me. Its not just a story about CAT. Its a life story. It starts from school, JEE prep, and goes on to CAT prep, and even beyond that, up untill I got my dream job!! so not just CAT aspirants, but even most people posting on this thread can probably take something away from it, assuming that most people coming to post would be the ones who are in some Bschool.
So I'll start my story from when I was back in school.
I was a good student till class 10th. That doesn't mean I sat on the front bench and was a teacher's pet. On the contrary, I was always notorious, used to play pranks in the class, always got complaints sent home about my being talkative and disturbing the class. But I managed to study regularly at home, studied hard during the exams and scored good marks.
JEE Take 1
I topped my school in class 10th, and like all good students, started dreaming about the IIT. Little did I know, it was going to be a much more turbulent path than I had imagined.
Come class 11th, I fell in love with a girl. Actually, I had a crush on her since 8th, but in 11th, we started talking. Life for the next 2 years was a roller coaster. I doubt many people have a love story like that in class 11th-12th. We became best friends, I eventually proposed, she rejected, mainly because her best friend had a crush on me. I set her best friend up with my friend, and she said yes to me after that. We had a very fulfilling affair that lasted for a year, but met turbulent weather when her parents got wind of it. We belonged to different communities, her parents were conservative, and were dead against anything intercaste. Moreover, it was Indore, in 1999... and we were in school. In short, nothing was in our favour. We couldn't fight back. I did try, but she gave up, and I can't really blame her.
Anyway, in the midst of all of this, studies had taken a backseat. Due to some bit of common sense , luck, and intelligence, I managed to clear JEE screening. But after that, there was not just the pressure of the break up, and a lot of crying, but also some problems at my own home
I , ofcourse, flunked JEE mains, and I managed a meagure 68% in my class 12th (I hadn't ever scored below 90% before 11th). I didn't get any admissions of note, even through AIEEE, MPPET, and a bunch of other engineering entrances I had taken.
JEE Take 2
My parents, flustered by my tanking stock, sent me to Kota, in the hope that maybe away from the girl who had been the object of my attention the last couple of years, I'd pay attention and study. BUt I was still not over my break up. I got to know about her hanging out with other guys from her college, back in Indore, and I travelled twice in train toilets from Kota to Indore (coz I did not have money to buy tickets) just to meet her. She refused to meet me both the times, but the second time her brother did find out and met me with his friends, with hockey sticks. They Didn't touch me thankfully, they just wanted to scare me. And I did get scared.
My parents got to know of my trips, and I was given a lot of grief and final warning that if I don't change my ways they would just disenroll me and admit me to some BSc course. I had given up on my girl anwyay, given that she hadn't bothered/dared to meet me after such effort filled trips. But it wasn't all that easy. I couldn't bring myself to study, I was heartbroken. I had a void to fill, I wanted to forget her, get over her. To distract myself, I made some friends, started Drinking. I used to get away from the pain of my heartbreak by sitting in cybercafes and watching movies, spending whole nights at the chaiwala having chai and chatting with friends. I did clear screening again, and I did manage to study a lil bit towards the end, and cleared mains but with a 4018 rank which didn't fetch me anything but NIFFT ranchi which was affiliated with JEE for just that one year. I managed VIT vellore comp sci through AIEEE, and that was the option I chose.
JEE Take 3...
I was all set to leave, but the day before I was to take the train southwards, my father intervened, and said that he believed if I studied hard, like really put in effort whole heartedly, I could improve my rank. I believed so too. But everyone else in our family was against it. I had already wasted one year to no avail, they said. But my father stood by me, we stood our ground and I took the huge risk of dropping a second year. It was a huge gamble. If I managed to make it to IIT, it would indeed pay off, but if I did not, I would be so low on confidence, and so outdone by life that I would probably consider myself a loser forever. I would go to a college I could have made it to the previous year, and forever in Life I would face tough questions of why I wasted my time. It was a big risk to take, but I took it anyway. So for that one year, I stayed at home, Studied hard. I hardly spoke to anyone but my family for that one year. I didn't call anyone (all my school friends were in 2nd year college and I hadn't even entered. It was weird to talk to anyone anyway. I had lost my own respect in my eyes actually.) . But finally the one year of hermitage paid off and I cleared JEE with an improved rank of 1585. To keep me away from distractions (read more access to girls) cities like Delhi and Mumbai would offer, my dad insisted I go to IIT Madras, and this time I took his advice. {Disclaimer - This is Not to say that Chennai doesn't have any women, I still think Shruti Hassan is one of the prettiest girls in the country, but well lets just say Delhi/Mumbai girls were more my type, and my parents knew that too}
IIT dayz
I was never fond of studying and took it a little light at IIT too. I actually thought that now that I was in IIT, the world was my oyster and I did not need to work hard now, life would sort itself out anyway. I performed well in subjects that interested me, not so well in subjects that did not. I was doing okay till term 4, with an average CGPA of 7.8 . but term 4, I flunked two courses. It wasa a wake up call, and thankfully I didn't snooze the alarm. I recovered from the damage in term 5, and even got a foreign internship after 3rd year etc. I was in Biotechnology, and like most people in my branch, and as per the precedent set by my seniors, thought the easiest career option was the do an MS-PhD in the US(which was not too tough to get given that we had a lot of IIT-M alumnus as professor/PhD candidates there). I took my GRE and TOEFL and did well in them (300/300 and 1500/1600) . I was all set to start applying and get the hell out of IIT. But then , I took an exam which changed my life.
A New Direction...
Yes.. It was an open mock test. I was lazing about on a Sunday, when some of my friends woke me up and asked me to get ready. I asked them what it was for, and they said it was a CAT mock in the city. I said I didn't even know what sections CAT had. I could sure as hell not do much in the mock. They said it was free, and I should come along as they planned a movie and dinner after the mock. Now we were always short of Cash and IIT was far off from the movie theater etc, so if I did not go with them I would have to go alone later, or miss the fun. If I went alone, the Auto would have cost me a 100 Rs one way, which was really costly by my standards coz I got limited cash from home. So I decided to go with them. I thought , how bad could sitting 2.5 hrs thru an exam could be. It was definitely worth saving the 100 bucks.
The exam started, and I decided to solve it, just to make the 2.5 hrs go by faster. I didn't even have a pencil, I borrowed it from the center. I had no clue what the fullform of DI was, trust me, but I still managed to do the questions as they were mostly common sense. English I was already good at coz of my GRE prep, and Maths.. well I had cleared JEE. I found myself flowing freely through the exam. I thought maybe everyone would have done well. But when the result came out around a week later, to my utter surprise, I had scored a scintillating 99.3%ile. I got a lot of taunts like 'chupa rustam', 'kitne time se prep kar raha hai' etc, and my friends wouldn't believe for the life of me that much less prepare, I hadn't even known much about the exam till then. That was when I looked at IIM placements and what they entailed. I thought if I could get a 99.3 in a mock without prep, I had a good shot to score a good percentile if I prepared. Moreover, the coaching institute called me and offered me a really discounted price for their test series. I took it.
I started doing really well mock after mock. Success begets success, it is true, for when a reputation started forming around campus that I was one of the guys to watch out for as far as CAT was concerned, I put in even more effort to prove myself. I was consistently in All India top 100 of TIME. I found the preparation actually interesting, as opposed to JEE prep which I found almost put me o sleep, esp Chemistry. The problems were shorter, mocks were more about strategy, and right choices of which questions to attempt, how much time to devote to which section, how to make sure you cleared sectional cutoffs as well as maximized overall score. Preparation was more about fine tuning certain skills than learning new stuff from thick books. It was probably the first exam I put in effort for in my life. I was so confident that I'd clear it that I did not apply to any foreign schools for MS/PhD. My friends said why are u wasting ur GRE/TOEFL, i said well I think i've finally found something I've good at. I hate biotechnology. I'd much rather pursue the post MBA careers. Moreover, I might get to stay in India!..
CAT Take 1
CAT though, was a disaster. While I aced the Maths and DI sections, the English section in that year was horrible. No offence to anyone setting/clearing/managing the exam, but I personally thought that the options in the English passages were so close together that in the 'what is the author most likely to think' question after the passages, even the author would probably be confused as to what he was most likely to think. Anyway, I got a mere 13/100 in English, nowhere near the cutoff. So inspite of an overall 99+ score, I didn't get any IIM calls, and hadn't filled any other forms.
I sat in campus placements at IIT, and I didn't even have a shot in the first 2-3 days of placements when the top consults and banks (Lehman, Mckinsey) etc visited. Even when i started getting shortlisted (The Deloittes and ITC phase - which again was limited for me because Biotech wasn't really a preferred branch by most) I didn't make the cut, coz in the last round, invariably questions arose about my class 12th score. and 2 years of gap in education (Arghhh). I managed to get an averagish job on the 12th day of placements (the later the day, the worse the job, although the placecom would never admit it). I decided to take it and take a shot again at CAT. After all, things couldn't go wrong twice in a row. I was good, I knew it.
CAT Take 2
I managed to get past IIT with some more adventures, like getting a Project extension etc, and moved to DElhi. I started working, and before I knew it, it was mock season again. I did extremely well in mocks this time around (was a regular in All India TOp 10 in CL, and even got All India Rank 1 in 2 of the 8 mocks) and they offered me classroom coaching even though I was just a test series student. They took me to a boot camp, asked me to attend any classes of any topic i was uncomfortable in, in any batch. I was given VIP treatment. I was quite confident of clearing CAT. I remember it as clear as crystal. Coming back from a mock, calculating the score, discussing the mock on PG and other forums, and then the result coming out midweek, getting a good rank, and then dreaming about being in an IIM. Dreaming about my friends and family congratulating me, that dude, despite what happened till now, you finally made it. The toppers of my IIT branch calling me from their good universities in US and congratulating me, saying that dude, u got the best crack. The feeling when other mock takers in my office asked about my result the next day, and I proudly told them, and then they were like, this dude is going to IIMs for sure. It felt wonderful. And it gave more fuel to my passion and I put in even more effort.
Meanwhile, this was 2007, and the economy was at the peak of boom, and many of the IIT grads who had joined my firm with me, moved to much juicier jobs within just 3-4 months of us joining. I had the same options too, and infact was called by a few recruiters, but all the offers I got required me to move to Bombay or Bangalore, and I did not want to disrupt my CAT prep. So I gave up on those jobs, and decided to just stick it and keep preparing. IIMs were calling out to me, after all.
come C-day though, and English was like a bouncer. And this time around, even the answer keys of institutes did not match. I was getting a score between 12 (min) - 44 (max) in english. I started praying real hard. The cutoff was expected to be low. The result came out a month later. I sstill remember it reading on my cellphone. Got it through SMS. Don't remember the scores, but I remember the percentiles. Overall 99.35%ile. DI 100%ile, QA 99.88%ile, English 31%ile. ENGLISH 31%ile!! It went through me like a hot iron. I had 4/100 in English. THat was lesser than the minimum possible score I had expected. The IIM Key had answeres different in even questions that all institutes agreed on. I was in a shock. It was as if my dream had finally been shattered. Failing twice, was something I wasn't prepared for. I could be unlucky once. Not twice!! I had topped the entire country in DI/LR but still couldn't get a single IIM call.
CAT No More....
For the first time.. I was faced by the reality, that I would have to work in a job that wasn't really my first choice. I mean, till that point, it was a whirlwind. I had moved to a new city, and the initial few days of the job were a honeymoon, with Training going on which was only for a few hours a day. I had made a lot of new friends with like minded people, had a lot of fun.. partying after work and on weekends. And then the mocks began so they took much of the focus. So I hadn't really got time to stand back and evaluate life till then. I treated my job as a place which gave me money to spend some time at while I prepared for CAT. I never took it seriously, never tried to learn anything there. But It hit me then that I had 1.5 yrs at the very minimum I had to spend at that place. And that was a really sad thought.
I somehow scraped through my time. I began hating the IIMs and the godforsaken CAT. I hated them that they set papers which were so unreasonable. If I had topped Mocks, not once, but consistently over two years, I definitely deserved to atleast had a shot at the GDPI. I knew people who I thought to be much less deserving, who never crossed 95%ile in mocks, and had still got calls. That made me feel much worse. I was in no mood to take the exam again actually. I decided I had wasted too many hopes on it.
GMAT & CFA..
I started thinking of other venues. I dared to think beyond the IIMs (no no.. not abt THAT! ). I decided to take the GMAT. but CAT had shattered my confidence so badly that I didn't know if I could do well in that. I bought Princeton review and the OG and started preparing, and within a week I took my first mock and got 780/800. But by this point, I had stopped trusting mocks. It seemed that they were mocking me, nothing more. I continued with prep, for another 3 weeks, just studying over weekends.
I didn't have a lot of hopes when I went to the exam center, I didn't have a score in mind. I had done exceedingly well on the mocks, but like I said, that didn't mean anything to me. The exam started, and ended, and my score came up on the screen. 760/800. I was in the top 1%ile of test takers. Just like that. I hadn't even have to put in a total of 40 hrs of effort. Some of my much needed confidence came back. It was like redemption. I wasn't so bad after all. The mocks did not lie. CAT did. I hated CAT all the more. I decided to apply to foreign schools, and forget about IIMs.
But I found to my chagrin, that most of them required a minimum of 2 years of work ex at the time of application, and I wouldn't have that before all the application deadlines were well over for this year. So if I went the GMAT way I'd have to slog for another 2.5 yrs at this place at the minimum. Ofcourse I could take another job, but the thing with me was, if I knew that what I was doing wasn't what I was going to do my whole life, I wouldn't excel at it. I was atleast comfortable in my current job. It required minimal effort from my side, (not that I was unprofessional, the expectations themselves were pretty low, and I just met them, rather than trying to do my best and take more responsibility). To take my mind of things and keep myself busy, I decided to take the CFA exam and learn a lil bit about finance. I was in IT for an investment bank anyway, and the company had a policy of reimbursing ur CFA fee if you cleared the exam. I studied hard for CFA level 1, and managed to clear it. I also found myself taking an active interest in the content. I liked finance. And more than anything else, I decided I wanted to be an investment banker. Not only did it pay the most, It also was something I found interesting.
CAT forms came out, and I decided to just go ahead and buy it, because a few friends were going to buy it. For most people fresh into the IT Industry, CAT was like an annual festival for the first 3-4 years anyway, till they gave up on it. It was just a ritual people went through. Like buying a lottery ticket. If u got it, great, if not, life's okay anyway. I procastinated filling up the form and filled it quite late, just in time rather. I did not want to attach any emotions with CAT. It had bitten me twice. I was definitely shy.
ISB....
Around mid september, a friend told me that ISB admissions had opened up. The website said they needed a minimum of 2 years workex. But my friend asked me to go ahead with it anyway. He suggested that if nothing else, going through the whole admission procedure would give me experience, which would help me with my application the next year to ISB and foreign Bschools. It wasn't too costly either. So I decided to give it a shot.
I wrote the essays really well, but didn't take any professional help. I was just honest. Just wrote my life's story. Wrote what I really felt. I never thought I had a chance anyway, so I did not indulge in any decorations, or revising, rereading, sending it out to people, institutes etc. I just wrote what came to my heart, just like I'm writing this post.
I pretty much forgot the application after I had filled it, but a month later, I was sitting and drinking at my friends place after work and randomly opened my Gmail, and to my surprise I found an EMail from ISB stating that my interview was a week later. It was a shocker, give that I was short of workex. I thought well, so much for experience. I prepared hard for the next one week, going through the PG thread and looking at past years interview experiences. I made a list of the FAQs that applied to me, thought of impressive answers to them and made notes. I rehearsed answering the few expected opening questions in front of the mirror. I got a new suit. On the interview day, I was calm and composed, especially because I did not consider this a make or break interview of my life, but rather went in with the mindset of gaining experience. The interviewers were very nice to me. They didn't touch upon the topic of my 12th score or 2 years gap. They just quizzed me on my future aspirations and goals which is the way it should be. They found me to be a good communicator with clear ideas on what I wanted to do in life in the future.
At the end of the interview, they said, that they don't have a policy of spot offers but they would definitely say I did exceedingly well, and asked me that just in case they were to offer me a deferred admit for the following, since I did not have sufficient workex to be admitted to this year's batch, would I be okay with it. I said ofcourse, yes. A bird in hand is better than N in the bush. And ISB was doing well in all those FT rankings anyway. It couldn't be so bad, I thought.
CAT Take 3.
CAT came closer, but I was hardly bothered. Well, the weekend before CAT I did take a couple of mocks I had kept with me from last year. I guess, it was just human. The eve before CAT I just looked at the maths formlae for a few hours. I had no high hopes. If I couldn't get through with hardcore prep the last two years, I definitely didn't stand a chance when my total prep this year was around 10 hours.
As soon as I saw the paper, and realized they had made the English section 160/360 and the remaining two 100 each, therefore increasing the weightage of English more than before, I lost all hope. I thought I'd just go to the English section first, see how it was, and then if it was as bad as before, probably not waste a lot of time getting another heartbreaking 100%ile in DI. I went through the first passage, and looked at the questions, and to my surprise they were straightforward. Ditto the second paassage, and ditto the third. My confidence was back. This was like a mock. I realized, English was actually teh section I could maximise my score in.. I was confident of clearinng the cut off for the first time in 3 years. I rushed to the DI, and did a few caselets. Enough to make sure I waas beyond the cutoff. All my previous skill in assessing how much the cutoff should be for what level of toughness was coming back. It comes with practice, its not an exact science, but once you take enough mocks, you just know how much you need to do to be able to clear the cutoff by a decently safe margin, and then you know what section to do to maximise your score. For me, surprisingly, English was the section. I went to maths, and because I was out of practice, I was cautious to not touch the topics I wasn't very well versed in. I only took the more generic topics, with easier questions. I went home and calculated the score. Now I know, CAT these days is online and all, but trust me, the Paper based format had a certain romanticism to it. For one, entire India took the same exam. The questions were discussed for days after the exam. All the coaching institutes came up with Answer keys a few hours after the exam, and then expected cutoffs after assessing a good number of data points provided by their students. You could never forget the evening following the CAT. I went to a friends place and we all aclculated our scores based on the various coaching institues keys. Because English section was straightforward, The answer keys weren't too different. I was getting a great score by any standards.
I enjoyed the next 2 months tremendously, for I had an ISB admit and was expecting BLACKI calls. I was on top of the world. My hatred for IIMs had evaporated away. I think it had been a case of sour grapes anyway. Finally, the result came, and apparantly people at Deloitte were able to see it a day before everyone else could. Somehow. I have no clue. I messaged a friend of mine at Deloitte and she gave me back a screenshot on email of my result page. It was the most beautiful webpage I had ever seen. Except for on exception. The scores were quite good. 99.92 Total... English and DI 99.96 and 99.90 respectively (English 99.96! After the HUMILIATION. It was a just redemption). Quant was 96.02, I think as a result of too few mocks and a little butterflies in the exam. But the shocking part was, the IIM Calls I had. It said CLIK.
For one day I was in Denial, that probably, since the offical result day hadnt come through, The call list was not complete. But when the actual result came out the next day, the page looked exactly the same. CLIK.No A. No B. Period. I couldn;t believe it. I thought well, maybe it was Quant, but calls to a few friends with slightly lower quant percentiles confirmed that it wasn't Quant.
I could understand why B wouldn't give me a call. With a 68% in class 12th, I did not stand a chance based on their 'Academic' criteria. And to be honest, I didn't mind much. B was never my dream college. But I was hurt about A. A had always given calls based on purely CAT scores. True, I would have had a hard time explaining the holes in my CV in the interview, but ISB interview had prepared me well for that.
BUt I did realize, that the exact year that I cleared CAT, was the exact year IIMA decided to apply the past-perfect Criteria. Giving very high weightage to 10th and 12th scores. Now I couldn't explain that I was in love. I couldn’t explain that I was having family problems during my 12th boards. I couldn't explain that I did go on to Clear JEE after the hole I was in where I was almost going to Kill myself. I could have explained it had they given me a chance. Atleast had called me for an interview, after I had finally managed to clear the reckless barrier after 3 trials. It was as if destiny did not want me to go to a dry state. What else could explain this. that first I couldn't clear English, A language I am not so bad at, and then A changes its criteria without any pre-warnings. I wanted to sue the Gujjus. aRgghhh.
Well, I hated A and all the snootyness it stood for (at that point, Don't feel so now) . So I started worshipping C and all that it stood for instead. Not that C was by any means second to A. But I guess its just the rankings and the reputation , that in general aspirants at that time considered A better. But I spoke to some seniors, and looked at the placement figures, and realized, that while A was good, undoubtedly, C was no lesser. C had the exact same firms visiting it for placements, and had instead been tiptoeing slightly ahead of A in placement figures the past few years. Moreover, the reverrent Investment banks, which I wanted to go to, actually somewhat preferred C. It was considered the place to be to enter the BFSI.
GDPI
So I set about preparing for the GDPI, with complete fervour. JOined coaching classes, entered the Rat race again. I wasn't so sure what I would choose between IIMC and ISB. It would be a tough decision, because I had already associated myself with ISB and had attended meets, met their alumni and people who made it that year. I had read about the place, vouched for it on forums, spread more awareness about it to people who thought there was no school parallel to IIMs in India. I had read blogs by ISBians, read about their swimming pool dunkings, the parties, the kind of professors coming, the batch profile, the 25% women in the batch, all those things. Anyway, I wasn't really sure, But i thought I'd atleast have a crown of converting one of the Big 3, wouldn't be bad for my 2 CAT smashed ego. I thought I would cross the bridge of what to choose what I came to it. I wasn't going to count my chickens before they hatched. A problem of plenty isn't such a bad problem.
So I went regularly to classes, and I actually did well in the Mock GDPIs. I did have the problem of talking a lot, as u can make out from my long winded post. That was corrected in the first few sessions and then I was good to go. Thankfully the order was IKLC, so that I could treat IKL as Net practice. I was quite sure I wouldn't join these 3 schools, as amazing as they are, but I just thought I'd prefer ISB. My I, K and L GDPIs were amazingly smooth. I was able to lead the GDs, yet maintain the right balance and not overdominate them. PIs I impressed my interviewers like anything. Maybe it was because I was under 0 performance pressure. It was like India playing a league match in the world cup after having already qualified for the next stage.
However, C was completely different. For one, the GD had 11 people, one of the largest groups I saw in an IIM GD. THe GD was 10 minutes, towards the shorter end. All of them were men (a single lady in a GD can infuse peace, order and good behavior), and the topic was abstract. Artists should learn mathematics. Everyone has something to say about such an extract topic. Everyone wanted to take the lead as the stakes were very high. People wanted to be heard. People wanted to change the direction of the GD all the time. It became a fish market in no time. And then the confusion ensued for a full 10 minutes, and then abruptly we were stopped. The moderator then asked people to summarize the GD, and I was asked to do it in the end. Now even though I had not heard much in the GD, busy trying to make my own point, I had definitely heard the 10 people summarize before me. BUt I thought I'd just not repeat their points and sound like a parrot. I tried to give a different angle to the summary trying to cover points that had not been covered by others. This probably didn't go too well with the moderators, who were none too happy with the GD fallout anyway.
And therefore, what followed in the PI, can only be described as waht happened to Mithunda's on-screen sister in most of his movies. They started by literally scolding me for the chaotic GD, and when I proclaimed that there was nothing I could have done, they told me I could have infused order by asking people to calm down. arghhh! And then they went on to serially accuse me of not hearing as shown by my way-off summary, and then followed on to rag me about my past academics, my 'average' IIT CGPA, the other holes .. And also new ones I had never realized. I tried to wriggle out of the 12th question by saying I was ill. Obviously I did not want to mention the family problems and the break up. But I guess when you are dishonest, these people can see right through it, and it further ruined my impression. Infact the immidiate retort was - 'Fine you were ill in 12th. Were you ill in your whole graduation too?'. Then followed weird Questions. Let me give an example - P: What are your hobbies.. M : Sir I love to Travel, write.. P (Cutting me short) : Where have u travelled? M: Sir In India I have been to Kashmir, Himachal (I thot I'd go north to south, then Europe etc) P (Cutting me short) : Where in Himachal? M: Sir Shimla, Kullu-Manali, Kufri P: (cutting me short) : Tell me something about Kufri. M: (thinking-WTF! I had gone there when I was like
.. Sir.. Kufri.. umm.. Sir apples
are grown there. P: That is true for Entire Himachal pradesh. TEll me about
kufri. M: (remembering that I had a pic of me sitting on a Yak.. only memory I
had of Kufri) - Sir There is Yak Farming in Kufri. P(looking at me amazed) :
What? M: Yes Sir. THey breed yaks and then sell them to toher parts of the
state. P: (Looking at me in disbelief): Are u sure? M: Yes sir. P: I don't
think so. I was already low on confidence and thus fumbled with even simple CFA
questions they asked me on seeing CFA L1 on my CV. They got into FSA,
Differences between GAAP and IFRS. I fumbled badly and answered the complete
opposite of what I was going to say. It was a Stress Interview, and I was
totally stressed out, for this was the one important interview I had after a
long time!Anyway, the Interview ended on a bad note.. with two of the profs making this verbatim conversation: "Sir Economics ka kuch poochna hai? isne college me elective liya tha" "Chhodo, isko basic accounting to yaad nahi, economics kya hi yaad hoga. chhodo sir, why waste our time" "OKay N***, thank you. All the best for your other interviews, prepare better for them. Do u have any other interviews left" "No sir already done with my other calls". "Oh.. well, all the best" (I think he meant to say - God save you). So well, My confidence was rattled. But I kept hoping for the best.
On HOLD...
And the best happened. On the result day, I had cleared all 4 of my calls. CLIK final callgetter. Maybe it was the 99.92 that put me in thru C inspite of the horrible GDPI. I was happy. I called my office, took the day off. I spent the day talking to atleast 10 different knowledgable people, including Alumni from IIMC and ISB, some cousins of mine well placed in the industry, other couple of people I could bounce thoughts of, and Decided on IIMC. To this day, I love and respect ISB a lot, but basically the factors which made my decision were - Better Ibank placements at IIMC, Better profile fit (I thot I had less workex, and of a lower quality, for ISB), Lesser fee at IIM, more recognized brandname, and the jingle to the term 'IIT-IIM Grad'. Having made my decision, I threw a party in the evening for friends, spent a good half month's salary on the bill, had some emotional farewell speeches given by drunk close friends, danced, slept at 4. I got up with a bad hangover in the morning, but I was still happy and smiling. I logged into my Gtalk, and I got a message from a friend saying that IIMC results had been withdrawn and would be put up after revision. I felt like someone had just kicked me where it hurt the most. I spent an Anxious day, and the results came back on. My result said 'You are on Hold'. Now I wasn't really on a Telephone that I would be put on hold. This was the most awkward situation to be in. I didn't know if I was in or not. I had announced to the whole world I was in (Obviously! I saw it on their website). I had told my boss I was going to resign. Thankfully I hadn't actually resigned. The calls made to IIMC admissions office remianed unanswered. It was a Saturday afterall. and it was status quo for 2 days. The 2 complete days were literally spent on PG, Possibly on one of the threads which was to gather the most posts in the shortest times among all threads I had seen on PG. People came up with their own theories, some comforting some distressing.
Finally on Monday, the Admissions office gave the answer. On hold was a sort of a waitlist. which had a priority over the other waitlist they had announced on the result day. What had happened was this - IIMs, and many other institute, typically give out more admits than the seats, based on Historical data about the number of candidates accepting their offers out of offers made. IIM-C, in previous years, had had a massive overlap with IIM-A, because both had the same criteria for shortlisting - CAT scores, and most students back then chose IIM-A. Thus C gave out more admits than seats. Now this year, that pattern suddenly changed as A introduced Academic criteria for shortlisting. The overlap between A and C was much lesser than expected. Therefore, C realized after giving out the results, that they had made a faux pas. They had probably given out too many offers, and there might be a scenario where acceptances might be more than the number of seats. Increasing seats was not an option - For one, the seats had been increased to 408 in view of the Reservation coming in and institute responding by increasing total seats. The facilities on campus were already under a lot of stress. New hostels were under construction but would take time to build. In the meantime, the 408 would be accomodated with some trouble, with some people having to live in dorms. Therefore increasing seats wasn't an option.
Ofcourse, we candidates who had first got the admit and then were put on hold had our own point of view. For many of us, most of us who didn't have A/B admits, rather, this was probably the biggest achievement of our lifetimes. Getting an IIMC Admit. As a natural reaction, people had told all and sundry about the admit when they got it. Their parents had boasted about it to their neighbours, distant relatives had called to congratulate, they had thrown parties for their friends, got a celebratory kiss from their girlfriends, told their office guys they are going to resign etc. Thus they felt shortchanged that such a thing should be dangled in front of them for a day and taken away. They say its better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. Well it definitely wasn't the same for clearing IIMC. And thus the reactions were filled with anger, frustration, helplessness. Things were getting tougher at work too, where the boss was saying that if u got to resign, do it. And I just couldn't I don't know how others handled it, I lied about being confused between ISB and IIMC and wanting to delay my decision. Every week he said that resign.. or else u wud have a problem with the notice period. everytime I somehow talked my way out of it. That IIMC admissions office wasn't professional enough to face the issue didn't make it any easier. We recieved no answers to questions we had. Like when would the On hold fate become clearer, how many total admits were given, how many on hold candidates were there.. In fact we asked for our on hold number - waitlist number, if u will, for there had to be a waitlist number if it was a waitlist- and we weren't given any.
The Then current students of IIMC and even some Alums though, tried their best to soothe nerves, and be apologetic on behalf of the institute. At this point, all we needed was someone to tell us they understood, and these guys did that job well. Ofcourse, even they didn't have the power to change anything, and none of them was at campus since it was vacation time, so they couldn't provide us any information either, but they did our best to keep us calm.
A week later, the admissions office started giving out the on-hold numbers. Mine was 31. From PG, it became clear that the total onhold candidates were 65. The people who had been given waitlist initially lost hope at this point, as the guy with waitlist #1 was now effectively #66. The focus shifted to the onhold guys. Various spreadsheets and mathematical models made their appearance on PG everyday. It was as if everything in the world became irrelevant. All that mattered were those seats being given to us. There were google spreadsheets doing the rounds, and onholders were in constant touch , accessing PG from their dorm rooms or offices all day. We found out people who had A-C and B-C admits and were chosing the other college over C. A list of such people was compiled and the longer this list became, the more the hopes were raised. Infact, the seniors from IIMC stopped pitching IIMC on forums and to their GDPI Mentees. Infact if someone had an admit from A/B, they actually asked them to choose that. Even they wanted that all the on hold guys would be in, just so that no one is left feeling shortchanged.
Most people already with admits also supported us, but soon they wanted to do away with the discussion and focus on their upcoming Joka life. Therefore a separate thread for onholders was constituted. Anyway, days passed slowly. The Admissions office gave us a date. Nothing happened on that date, but a second date was given. And on that one, a third. Sunny deol's dialogue from Damini comes to Mind. 'Tareeq pe tareeq tareeq pe tareeq.. insaaf nahi milta, milti hai to bas tareeq'.. Finally, around a month after the reverted result, they announced that the first 20 on hold ranks had final admits, and that no more shall be converted. I felt horrible. I had come so close to my dream, even touched it for a day. The last 3 years flashed before my eyes, the 2 unsuccessful CATtempts, the final successful one, the GDPI prep, all those hours of dreams, the last 30 strenous days hoping against hope that I'll make it. I was too shattered to even talk to anyone. And the reality that I would have to pass another year working my job before I joined ISB. And ofcourse, to face the public ignominy- "tera to IIMC clear ho gaya tha na. Fir kya hua".
Redemption..(and CFA2)
Another 10 days passed. I had stopped accessing PG. I went through my days at office like a Zombie. I had killed my social life. It was almost like facing a break up. Then suddenly, once when I was in office, I got a call. "IIM-C admissions office - the lady said. We want to congratulate you on being admitted to the PGDM program at our institute. We have mailed you the....." I didn't listen ahead for I was jumping up and down in Joy in the middle of my cubicle. Everyone was looking at me shocked. I just ran outside to continue the conversation. Ofcourse I did not resign this time till I got the actualy documents via courier the next day. Once bitten twice shy I guess. But I forgave IIMC for everything. And to my delight, the On hold had cleared till 40, and another 10 days later, it cleared till 54. (All of the on hold guys had got so close that we actually prayed for the ones still to get an admit, and thankfully, a week after we entered, the last bunch of onholders also got through. The last guy completed our batch of 408. Destiny..)
Anyway, I somehow fought my way through my resignation. Interesting story there but its off topic and this post is getting too long. So I had 20 days to go before I had to go to Cal, and I had my CFA level 2 just 3 days before I had to join Joka. tHe devil in me said, screw it, lets not take the exam, lets have fun. we've cleared IIMC! .. but the sane me said, your CV could use that, for you hve a lot of holes. Thankfully Sanity prevailed. I thought fun could wait. My last day of office was 29th May, and I partied like crazy after leaving work that day. The next day was spent nursing the hangover, but 31st May to 6th June, for 7 days, I did nothing but study. I hadn't studied much during thewhole On Hold fiasco, and CFA 2 isn't easy. So for 7 days and 7 nights, I ate, drank and slept CFA. I locked myself up in my house and just studied. Went to Mumbai on the 7th, took the exam on the 8th. (I cleared it ) . And then came back,
packed my stuff up in a day, and took the Train for Joka.
And the best happened. On the result day, I had cleared all 4 of my calls. CLIK final callgetter. Maybe it was the 99.92 that put me in thru C inspite of the horrible GDPI. I was happy. I called my office, took the day off. I spent the day talking to atleast 10 different knowledgable people, including Alumni from IIMC and ISB, some cousins of mine well placed in the industry, other couple of people I could bounce thoughts of, and Decided on IIMC. To this day, I love and respect ISB a lot, but basically the factors which made my decision were - Better Ibank placements at IIMC, Better profile fit (I thot I had less workex, and of a lower quality, for ISB), Lesser fee at IIM, more recognized brandname, and the jingle to the term 'IIT-IIM Grad'. Having made my decision, I threw a party in the evening for friends, spent a good half month's salary on the bill, had some emotional farewell speeches given by drunk close friends, danced, slept at 4. I got up with a bad hangover in the morning, but I was still happy and smiling. I logged into my Gtalk, and I got a message from a friend saying that IIMC results had been withdrawn and would be put up after revision. I felt like someone had just kicked me where it hurt the most. I spent an Anxious day, and the results came back on. My result said 'You are on Hold'. Now I wasn't really on a Telephone that I would be put on hold. This was the most awkward situation to be in. I didn't know if I was in or not. I had announced to the whole world I was in (Obviously! I saw it on their website). I had told my boss I was going to resign. Thankfully I hadn't actually resigned. The calls made to IIMC admissions office remianed unanswered. It was a Saturday afterall. and it was status quo for 2 days. The 2 complete days were literally spent on PG, Possibly on one of the threads which was to gather the most posts in the shortest times among all threads I had seen on PG. People came up with their own theories, some comforting some distressing.
Finally on Monday, the Admissions office gave the answer. On hold was a sort of a waitlist. which had a priority over the other waitlist they had announced on the result day. What had happened was this - IIMs, and many other institute, typically give out more admits than the seats, based on Historical data about the number of candidates accepting their offers out of offers made. IIM-C, in previous years, had had a massive overlap with IIM-A, because both had the same criteria for shortlisting - CAT scores, and most students back then chose IIM-A. Thus C gave out more admits than seats. Now this year, that pattern suddenly changed as A introduced Academic criteria for shortlisting. The overlap between A and C was much lesser than expected. Therefore, C realized after giving out the results, that they had made a faux pas. They had probably given out too many offers, and there might be a scenario where acceptances might be more than the number of seats. Increasing seats was not an option - For one, the seats had been increased to 408 in view of the Reservation coming in and institute responding by increasing total seats. The facilities on campus were already under a lot of stress. New hostels were under construction but would take time to build. In the meantime, the 408 would be accomodated with some trouble, with some people having to live in dorms. Therefore increasing seats wasn't an option.
Ofcourse, we candidates who had first got the admit and then were put on hold had our own point of view. For many of us, most of us who didn't have A/B admits, rather, this was probably the biggest achievement of our lifetimes. Getting an IIMC Admit. As a natural reaction, people had told all and sundry about the admit when they got it. Their parents had boasted about it to their neighbours, distant relatives had called to congratulate, they had thrown parties for their friends, got a celebratory kiss from their girlfriends, told their office guys they are going to resign etc. Thus they felt shortchanged that such a thing should be dangled in front of them for a day and taken away. They say its better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. Well it definitely wasn't the same for clearing IIMC. And thus the reactions were filled with anger, frustration, helplessness. Things were getting tougher at work too, where the boss was saying that if u got to resign, do it. And I just couldn't I don't know how others handled it, I lied about being confused between ISB and IIMC and wanting to delay my decision. Every week he said that resign.. or else u wud have a problem with the notice period. everytime I somehow talked my way out of it. That IIMC admissions office wasn't professional enough to face the issue didn't make it any easier. We recieved no answers to questions we had. Like when would the On hold fate become clearer, how many total admits were given, how many on hold candidates were there.. In fact we asked for our on hold number - waitlist number, if u will, for there had to be a waitlist number if it was a waitlist- and we weren't given any.
The Then current students of IIMC and even some Alums though, tried their best to soothe nerves, and be apologetic on behalf of the institute. At this point, all we needed was someone to tell us they understood, and these guys did that job well. Ofcourse, even they didn't have the power to change anything, and none of them was at campus since it was vacation time, so they couldn't provide us any information either, but they did our best to keep us calm.
A week later, the admissions office started giving out the on-hold numbers. Mine was 31. From PG, it became clear that the total onhold candidates were 65. The people who had been given waitlist initially lost hope at this point, as the guy with waitlist #1 was now effectively #66. The focus shifted to the onhold guys. Various spreadsheets and mathematical models made their appearance on PG everyday. It was as if everything in the world became irrelevant. All that mattered were those seats being given to us. There were google spreadsheets doing the rounds, and onholders were in constant touch , accessing PG from their dorm rooms or offices all day. We found out people who had A-C and B-C admits and were chosing the other college over C. A list of such people was compiled and the longer this list became, the more the hopes were raised. Infact, the seniors from IIMC stopped pitching IIMC on forums and to their GDPI Mentees. Infact if someone had an admit from A/B, they actually asked them to choose that. Even they wanted that all the on hold guys would be in, just so that no one is left feeling shortchanged.
Most people already with admits also supported us, but soon they wanted to do away with the discussion and focus on their upcoming Joka life. Therefore a separate thread for onholders was constituted. Anyway, days passed slowly. The Admissions office gave us a date. Nothing happened on that date, but a second date was given. And on that one, a third. Sunny deol's dialogue from Damini comes to Mind. 'Tareeq pe tareeq tareeq pe tareeq.. insaaf nahi milta, milti hai to bas tareeq'.. Finally, around a month after the reverted result, they announced that the first 20 on hold ranks had final admits, and that no more shall be converted. I felt horrible. I had come so close to my dream, even touched it for a day. The last 3 years flashed before my eyes, the 2 unsuccessful CATtempts, the final successful one, the GDPI prep, all those hours of dreams, the last 30 strenous days hoping against hope that I'll make it. I was too shattered to even talk to anyone. And the reality that I would have to pass another year working my job before I joined ISB. And ofcourse, to face the public ignominy- "tera to IIMC clear ho gaya tha na. Fir kya hua".
Redemption..(and CFA2)
Another 10 days passed. I had stopped accessing PG. I went through my days at office like a Zombie. I had killed my social life. It was almost like facing a break up. Then suddenly, once when I was in office, I got a call. "IIM-C admissions office - the lady said. We want to congratulate you on being admitted to the PGDM program at our institute. We have mailed you the....." I didn't listen ahead for I was jumping up and down in Joy in the middle of my cubicle. Everyone was looking at me shocked. I just ran outside to continue the conversation. Ofcourse I did not resign this time till I got the actualy documents via courier the next day. Once bitten twice shy I guess. But I forgave IIMC for everything. And to my delight, the On hold had cleared till 40, and another 10 days later, it cleared till 54. (All of the on hold guys had got so close that we actually prayed for the ones still to get an admit, and thankfully, a week after we entered, the last bunch of onholders also got through. The last guy completed our batch of 408. Destiny..)
Anyway, I somehow fought my way through my resignation. Interesting story there but its off topic and this post is getting too long. So I had 20 days to go before I had to go to Cal, and I had my CFA level 2 just 3 days before I had to join Joka. tHe devil in me said, screw it, lets not take the exam, lets have fun. we've cleared IIMC! .. but the sane me said, your CV could use that, for you hve a lot of holes. Thankfully Sanity prevailed. I thought fun could wait. My last day of office was 29th May, and I partied like crazy after leaving work that day. The next day was spent nursing the hangover, but 31st May to 6th June, for 7 days, I did nothing but study. I hadn't studied much during thewhole On Hold fiasco, and CFA 2 isn't easy. So for 7 days and 7 nights, I ate, drank and slept CFA. I locked myself up in my house and just studied. Went to Mumbai on the 7th, took the exam on the 8th. (I cleared it
) . And then came back,
packed my stuff up in a day, and took the Train for Joka.
"June me hum.. JOka aaye" .
The first few days at Joka were the absolute most fun I've had. Meeting new people, making new friends, new classes, new hopes, new dreams.. no more going to the office every morning, Awesome conversations on the dinner table at the mess.. the confidence, that I was amongst Achievers..
But soon, we ran into the the fundamental truth every Bschooler has to face in term 1. Summers is just a tad bit away. With all my enthusiasm I set about preparing my CV, and studying for summers. I also did quite well in term 1, given that I had already covered Accounting, economics and Statistics in my CFA. The other courses, BS and Marketing were more Theoritical in nature, and because I didn't have to study the other three, I could give them more time. Anyway, so I did really well in term 1 and got the 20th Rank in my batch. I also did a good job of preparing my CV. Not that I could improve on the points I had, the verification process at college was very strict and not a single made up point could go through. But I did my best to show the points I had in the best way possible. there was no way I could cover up the obvious gaps in my CV though. I have to thank the seniors who spent hours with me trying to ,make my CV look better. I must have met like 50 seniors and they were always selflessly helpful.
Placement season came nearer, and most free time was spent in the library studying for the interview. CFA 2 on my CV was like a double edged sword. I would be expected to know more than the average 1st year MBA student. That was something that could go in my favour if I answered the questions correctly, but which would go against me if I did not.So I revised the syllabus all over again just so that I don't mess up. I read other stuff more pertinent to markets, like Hull, Vault guides and what not. I also kept a daily track of news, read in depth blogs to the pertinent financial issues. Prepared personals. Did everything I possibly could. I would again reiterate, that The best thing about IIMC was, the senior junior bonding, and that helped a lot. You could literally approach any senior any time, to understand something, take their advice, or a mock interview.
THen the shortlsits started pouring in. Day 0 shortlists came before the process. day 0.5 onwards,the shortlists came during the process. The consults came first. I did not get a single day 0 consulting shortlist. People who got shortlists had huge grins on their faces, and were not trying to conceal it at all. They were the stars of the campus. Yes. It was always that way in the first half of first year. People had come in all charged up and with high hopes. Every single person on campus was an achiever in their own right. And the time before placements had been full of pressure. People spent nights preparing for it. Making their CVs, preparing for interviews, Attending company PPTs, all of this apart from regular classes, term projects, quizzes, assignments and exams! People were always short of time. As far as I look at my IIMC life wholistically, real friendships were forged only after summers. Till summers, everyone was competition.
So after my consult dream (not that it was a dream, it was always banks, but still, who doesn't like getting shortlists?) was shattered, I was despondent, but my friends boosted my morale was saying, that when the banks shortlists come out, I'll be the star. That did not turn out so when the first bank shortlist came out. I was shocked. BUt I thought well, maybe an exception. After that, as the bank shortlists started coming in, one every 2-3 days, I did not have any shortlist. 6-7 banks passed that way, and I was in disbelief. I even contacted the placecom to confirm if it was my correct CV going to the banks (as we had diff CVs for diff sectors, and I hadn't highlighted finance as much in the marketing CV, I began wondering if my Marketing CV was reaching the banks!) But it wasn't so. The correct CV was being sent. I almost gave up on preparation. I contacted a few seniors from IIT who were working in Banks, and they told me the reason was that banks looked at the 10th and 12th scores too. There was very little to choose from between candidates at summers time. Especially as our CVs were made before the First term result and therefore did not have term 1 scores/ranks.
So essentially, it meant the ghost of my 68% hadn't left me even though I had conquered the CAT and got into one of the top Bschools in the country. It was a mistake made in the past I just couldn't do anything about, and yet every step of the way, I kept paying the price for it. Be it IIT placements, IIM calls, IIM interviews, or now IIM placements. I was always left shortchanged because of that one mistake. Or rather, that one circumstantial result. I wanted to askthe banks the same question I asked IIMA. If I got 68% in class 12th, does it really matter, given that I cleared JEE and CAT and CFA2. But apparantly, everyone on my campus had cleared CAT, and a lot of them had cleared JEE too. I heard banks make excel sheets inputting 10th, 12th, and graduation marks, sorted them, and then eliminated the bottom few, thus making a sort of cutoff. Probably no one was even looking at my CV. I just got deleted on an Excel sheet.
Finally, when I had given up hope, as was the normal pattern in my life, a good news came calling. A certain top investment bank had shortlisted me. Moreover, they had a small shortlist, of just 20, whereas most shortlists were around 60-70. That just meant a better shot at selection. I was elated. I spent the entire night reading up about the bank. I wanted to ace this interview. It just might be the most important interview in my life. I wanted to be the best informed about their bank among their 20 candidates. The other 19 had multiple shortlists already. THey wouldn't be as focussed on this particular bank. I didn't bother that the 2-3 other banks after this one did not shortlist me. I was in love with this one. I did get 4 more shortlists, but 3 of them were from what were considered lower rung IBs on campus. 1 was from a good one, almost equal to the one I had. Lets call them IB1 and IB2 in the order that I got the shortlists.
So, placement day came, and till then, I was almost sure to prefer IB1 over IB2. Ofcourse it would also depend on who the banks wanted to interview (as in their 'hotlist' . Yes. just a shortlist wasn't enough) , but we had to fill a preference list too. The schedulers tried to optimize the process as much as possible so that the candidates and companies preference were both considered as much as possible. Anyway, so the day before day 0, we had an interaction session with the banks, each lasting approximately an hour, after which another one started, but the candidates who didn't have the next shortlist could further interact with the bank they were shortlisted with after the time slot. Here is where i Decided to make a difference. Those with multiple shortlists would have to move from Interaction to Interaction. I just had 5, and 2 which I was really keen on. So in the interaction of IB2, I created very positive vibes with the gentleman from HK who was to interview me the next day. We had an in depth discussion on some nuances of markets, which I was able to carry on very well with thanks to my good preparation. He was sufficiently impressed, and indicated that if I go to him tomorrow morning he just might give me an offer. IB1 interaction was later, and more informal in nature, but I impressed the gentlemen there too. Only, no hint was given as to the following day. So late in the night, I re-edited my preference to fill IB2 above IB1. I rolled around restlessly in my bed all night, and then the clock struck 6, and I had to get up for another extremely important day in my life.
. The first few days at Joka were the absolute most fun I've had. Meeting new people, making new friends, new classes, new hopes, new dreams.. no more going to the office every morning, Awesome conversations on the dinner table at the mess.. the confidence, that I was amongst Achievers..
But soon, we ran into the the fundamental truth every Bschooler has to face in term 1. Summers is just a tad bit away. With all my enthusiasm I set about preparing my CV, and studying for summers. I also did quite well in term 1, given that I had already covered Accounting, economics and Statistics in my CFA. The other courses, BS and Marketing were more Theoritical in nature, and because I didn't have to study the other three, I could give them more time. Anyway, so I did really well in term 1 and got the 20th Rank in my batch. I also did a good job of preparing my CV. Not that I could improve on the points I had, the verification process at college was very strict and not a single made up point could go through. But I did my best to show the points I had in the best way possible. there was no way I could cover up the obvious gaps in my CV though. I have to thank the seniors who spent hours with me trying to ,make my CV look better. I must have met like 50 seniors and they were always selflessly helpful.
Placement season came nearer, and most free time was spent in the library studying for the interview. CFA 2 on my CV was like a double edged sword. I would be expected to know more than the average 1st year MBA student. That was something that could go in my favour if I answered the questions correctly, but which would go against me if I did not.So I revised the syllabus all over again just so that I don't mess up. I read other stuff more pertinent to markets, like Hull, Vault guides and what not. I also kept a daily track of news, read in depth blogs to the pertinent financial issues. Prepared personals. Did everything I possibly could. I would again reiterate, that The best thing about IIMC was, the senior junior bonding, and that helped a lot. You could literally approach any senior any time, to understand something, take their advice, or a mock interview.
THen the shortlsits started pouring in. Day 0 shortlists came before the process. day 0.5 onwards,the shortlists came during the process. The consults came first. I did not get a single day 0 consulting shortlist. People who got shortlists had huge grins on their faces, and were not trying to conceal it at all. They were the stars of the campus. Yes. It was always that way in the first half of first year. People had come in all charged up and with high hopes. Every single person on campus was an achiever in their own right. And the time before placements had been full of pressure. People spent nights preparing for it. Making their CVs, preparing for interviews, Attending company PPTs, all of this apart from regular classes, term projects, quizzes, assignments and exams! People were always short of time. As far as I look at my IIMC life wholistically, real friendships were forged only after summers. Till summers, everyone was competition.
So after my consult dream (not that it was a dream, it was always banks, but still, who doesn't like getting shortlists?) was shattered, I was despondent, but my friends boosted my morale was saying, that when the banks shortlists come out, I'll be the star. That did not turn out so when the first bank shortlist came out. I was shocked. BUt I thought well, maybe an exception. After that, as the bank shortlists started coming in, one every 2-3 days, I did not have any shortlist. 6-7 banks passed that way, and I was in disbelief. I even contacted the placecom to confirm if it was my correct CV going to the banks (as we had diff CVs for diff sectors, and I hadn't highlighted finance as much in the marketing CV, I began wondering if my Marketing CV was reaching the banks!) But it wasn't so. The correct CV was being sent. I almost gave up on preparation. I contacted a few seniors from IIT who were working in Banks, and they told me the reason was that banks looked at the 10th and 12th scores too. There was very little to choose from between candidates at summers time. Especially as our CVs were made before the First term result and therefore did not have term 1 scores/ranks.
So essentially, it meant the ghost of my 68% hadn't left me even though I had conquered the CAT and got into one of the top Bschools in the country. It was a mistake made in the past I just couldn't do anything about, and yet every step of the way, I kept paying the price for it. Be it IIT placements, IIM calls, IIM interviews, or now IIM placements. I was always left shortchanged because of that one mistake. Or rather, that one circumstantial result. I wanted to askthe banks the same question I asked IIMA. If I got 68% in class 12th, does it really matter, given that I cleared JEE and CAT and CFA2. But apparantly, everyone on my campus had cleared CAT, and a lot of them had cleared JEE too. I heard banks make excel sheets inputting 10th, 12th, and graduation marks, sorted them, and then eliminated the bottom few, thus making a sort of cutoff. Probably no one was even looking at my CV. I just got deleted on an Excel sheet.
Finally, when I had given up hope, as was the normal pattern in my life, a good news came calling. A certain top investment bank had shortlisted me. Moreover, they had a small shortlist, of just 20, whereas most shortlists were around 60-70. That just meant a better shot at selection. I was elated. I spent the entire night reading up about the bank. I wanted to ace this interview. It just might be the most important interview in my life. I wanted to be the best informed about their bank among their 20 candidates. The other 19 had multiple shortlists already. THey wouldn't be as focussed on this particular bank. I didn't bother that the 2-3 other banks after this one did not shortlist me. I was in love with this one. I did get 4 more shortlists, but 3 of them were from what were considered lower rung IBs on campus. 1 was from a good one, almost equal to the one I had. Lets call them IB1 and IB2 in the order that I got the shortlists.
So, placement day came, and till then, I was almost sure to prefer IB1 over IB2. Ofcourse it would also depend on who the banks wanted to interview (as in their 'hotlist' . Yes. just a shortlist wasn't enough) , but we had to fill a preference list too. The schedulers tried to optimize the process as much as possible so that the candidates and companies preference were both considered as much as possible. Anyway, so the day before day 0, we had an interaction session with the banks, each lasting approximately an hour, after which another one started, but the candidates who didn't have the next shortlist could further interact with the bank they were shortlisted with after the time slot. Here is where i Decided to make a difference. Those with multiple shortlists would have to move from Interaction to Interaction. I just had 5, and 2 which I was really keen on. So in the interaction of IB2, I created very positive vibes with the gentleman from HK who was to interview me the next day. We had an in depth discussion on some nuances of markets, which I was able to carry on very well with thanks to my good preparation. He was sufficiently impressed, and indicated that if I go to him tomorrow morning he just might give me an offer. IB1 interaction was later, and more informal in nature, but I impressed the gentlemen there too. Only, no hint was given as to the following day. So late in the night, I re-edited my preference to fill IB2 above IB1. I rolled around restlessly in my bed all night, and then the clock struck 6, and I had to get up for another extremely important day in my life.
Day Zero..
As we filed into the audi, there was a hush in the air. Today the batch of 2011, IIMC would have its first real test. Summer placements were extremely important, especially for I-banking aspirants, for these companies largely hired through PPOs or Pre PLacement offers. Very few of these visited the campus for Final placements. So if you had to become a banker, this was your best shot. The process started with the first lot of names being called out. I wasn't in it. IT was a little disappointing as this meant that I wasn't on any company's 'Hotlist'. Moreover, within the first 10 minutes, IB1 had already made 2 offers. They had mentioned in the interactions that they were looking to hire 4-5. The numbers were rarely fixed, because they could recruit more or less depending on the quality of students they met. A B and C schedule their summers to being on alternate days, for example Monday Wednesday and Friday in the same week, so that the panels flying from Foreign countries can finish their recruitments in one visit to the country. So if they didn't fill their Quota from one campus, the excess seats rolled on to the next. So with 2/5 of their seats gone, I felt I had done the right choice by preferring IB2. However, I still felt a sort of closeness to IB1, since they had been my first shortlist and had brought me back from the verge of hopelessness.
The second lot had my name in it and I was directed to IB2. The same gentlemen interviewed me, but unfortunately had made the one offer on his desk to the guy who had gone before me in lot 1. He said that he had no way to know if I would turn up or be lapped up by another IB. Now the thing with day0 is, there are some amazing CVs on campus, people who every bank wants. Banks typically want to go through their processes as soon as possible, making the first few offers in the minimal time, lest these 'superstars' get lapped up by their competitors. The banks are as tense as the candidates. They want their next crop of outperformers, and missing out on good people on day 0 might leave them at a long term disadvantage. As a result, most banks started their process in the morning and finished it way before lunchtime. And by lunch All banks recruiting teams and recruited candidates were at the Taj Bengal on adjacant tables.
The gentlemen said he felt truly bad for not having an offer left for me, and redirected me to a colleague of his interviewing for a different desk. I was a little perturbed, and the interview did not go too well. For one, it was not for markets but for IBD, which I wasn't interested in. I wanted to be a trader. Anyway, the interview didn't last too long. The Gentlemen again met me outside the interview room and said he would give HK a call and see if he could hire another intern. He asked me if I could wait for an hour. I obviously couldn't wait, as I would miss out on my other shortlists too. Time was a critical resource on day 0. I told him my problem very politely, and requested him to inform the placecom in case they wanted to make me an offer. In case I was still in the process I would accept it.
It was disappointing, to say the least. I saw day 0 evaporating in front of my eyes. I never had much of a chance anyway. I was redirected to IB1, and I thought I'd just go there and give it my best and leave the rest to god. When I reached IB1, I saw the batch topper coming out, shaking hands with the interviewer. He had been made an offer. The Company volunteer from 2nd year told me that 4 offers had been given till now, and they just might take one more. Now, they had around 10 people on their shortlist they hadn't interviewed, and they had one slot left. Ofcourse, the wouldn't interview everyone, but it was still a far shot. The company HR came to the company volunteer with a list, asking for a particular guy. That guy was more interested in consults and was interviewing with them. However, he was still in the process. IB1 badly wanted that guy, he was on their hotlist. The company volunteer handled the situation gracefully, telling them that he was busy with other processes, and asked them to interview me instead, telling them that I had a good reputation on campus. The HR looked at me and recognized me from the previous day. He seemed indifferent, and then, I think just for the heck of passing time, he said, fine we'll interview him till the other guy comes around. So basically, they had 1 slot left, had a guy in mind. What was I doing here, I asked myself. But I decided to try my luck nonetheless. The other options I had, well, would have been compromises really.
So I go into this room to the India head of the firm. His very presence was Awe inspiring. He started off very politely, making some light talk and asking my view on the market. The interview was more like a conversation and I felt very comfortable. Then came the expected Question. "So N*, what went wrong in 2001?" . I knew this was coming. This had haunted me from the very start. This was the question which made me uncomfortable and made me jittery whenever it came forth. And yet, it always came forth. I had paid a price for that bad score at various stages in the last 10 years. ENOUGH! I said to myself. I will not let this ghost haunt me anymore. I had to exorcise it. It was a now or never moment. Everything I had worked for the last 3 years.. THe CAT mocks, the CFAs, the GDPI Prep, the pain of failure, the ecstasy of success, the anxious on hold moments, the sweat and blood since coming to Joka, everything narrowed down to this moment. I just wanted to sign on that offer acceptance sheet lying in front of me on the table. So I decided to, for the first time in my life, be completely honest about what happened. I remember the interview clearly in my head.
Me (M) : Sir, I was in love with a girl. And my family came apart. A lot of problems you see.
IB : looking at me intently. Tell me more.
Me - Told whole story. as it happened. not sparing any details. And then I continuned
M : .. so you see sir, that's what happened, and inspite of that, the fact is that I'm sitting across from you on this interview table. The fact that I made it from that place to this table, I feel, says a lot about my character. I am resilient. I am persistent for achieving my goals. And that's why sir, I feel I would make a good trader. For nothing can knock me down. I can take a huge loss, and still come to office the next day and try to make a profit. I know I've not seen the worst in life yet. Maybe a lot more can happen in the future. But what I know is, I'd be man enough to face it. I'll not get bogged down in the face of failure. I'll never give up. I will always rise back again after I fall, I know this about myself. And Sir, I promise you, as much as I know myself, even if todays interview does not go as I hope it would, I promise you I will still enter the industry, some day or the other, for this is what I want to do.
IB : Giving me a nod. I like you N*. I really like your fighting attitude towards life. I feel it that you will make a good trader someday. Let me talk to my colleagues. He left me in the room alone. I felt extremely light. I actually felt nice. It was as if a huge load had been lifted off my shoulders. Even if I failed this interview, I felt I had exorcised the ghosts of my past.
He came in again after sometime. "N*, As you know, we were very impressed by this one person's CV, and the other 2 of my colleagues still want to interview him. As far as I'm concerned, I definitely want to hire you, but they feel its fair if we interview the other guy too. In the meantime, I'd suggest you interview with both of my colleagues just so that you could probably impress them too. I agreed, though I knew the other 2 interviews were just because they wanted to bide time till their hotlisted guy came over. I went through the motions, the interviews were more of Maths and Market talk than anything personal, so there were no awe-inspiring moments. Finally, when they got tired of asking me questions, they left me in the room and went outside and gathered. Now I could have probably left for my next interview with IB3, but I had seen a small ray of hope here and didn't want to leave it. THey had been my dream. So I decided to take a risk. I decided to go out and outrightly pitch myself. I approached them, and all 3 of them looked at me. I was very candid. "Sir, I know you are waiting for a certain candidate. But sir, as far as I know him, he is more interested in consulting firms. Whereas I, I have lived breathed and slept your bank for the last 1 month since you shortlisted me. Since I got to know about the world of Investment banking, I have wanted to be a part of it. Now this candidate you are waiting for might have better credentials than me academics wise. But even if he comes to you right now and accepts your offer, it would be because Consulting firms did not work out for him. Its because he got rejected there. You would be his second choice. Whereas I have been waiting here from the past one hour, ignoring my other 3 shortlists, because I so badly want to join you. However, I feel that its not prudent of me to wait any longer, so please tell me your decision. They looked at me shocked. They then asked me to go inside the room and wait for another 2 minutes while they discussed it. A few minutes later, the gentlemen who interviewed me the first, came in and said, "So N*, would you like Mumbai or Singapore?"
Epilogue..
The story ofcourse, continues. But at that point I finally got over the shadow of my class 12th. Ofcourse, a PPO had to be secured. It was a tough ask, given the Situation in Greece during my internship, and the fact that 3 of the other guys of 5 that were hired from my campus by my IB were rank 1, 2 and 6 of our batch. I, during my internship time, was rank 25. HOwever, It so turned out that I worked really hard during my internship, and on my penultimate day, my boss took me for review, and told me he felt I would make a good trader, and offered me a Full time role. It was unprecedented, as typically PPOs were given in Early September, when all the internship cycles for the year were over. However, my desk felt I had done exceedingly well and were in no doubt they wanted to hire me, and thus the HR formalities were ignored and I signed the contract with them on the last day of my internship, thus fulfilling a dream.
As we filed into the audi, there was a hush in the air. Today the batch of 2011, IIMC would have its first real test. Summer placements were extremely important, especially for I-banking aspirants, for these companies largely hired through PPOs or Pre PLacement offers. Very few of these visited the campus for Final placements. So if you had to become a banker, this was your best shot. The process started with the first lot of names being called out. I wasn't in it. IT was a little disappointing as this meant that I wasn't on any company's 'Hotlist'. Moreover, within the first 10 minutes, IB1 had already made 2 offers. They had mentioned in the interactions that they were looking to hire 4-5. The numbers were rarely fixed, because they could recruit more or less depending on the quality of students they met. A B and C schedule their summers to being on alternate days, for example Monday Wednesday and Friday in the same week, so that the panels flying from Foreign countries can finish their recruitments in one visit to the country. So if they didn't fill their Quota from one campus, the excess seats rolled on to the next. So with 2/5 of their seats gone, I felt I had done the right choice by preferring IB2. However, I still felt a sort of closeness to IB1, since they had been my first shortlist and had brought me back from the verge of hopelessness.
The second lot had my name in it and I was directed to IB2. The same gentlemen interviewed me, but unfortunately had made the one offer on his desk to the guy who had gone before me in lot 1. He said that he had no way to know if I would turn up or be lapped up by another IB. Now the thing with day0 is, there are some amazing CVs on campus, people who every bank wants. Banks typically want to go through their processes as soon as possible, making the first few offers in the minimal time, lest these 'superstars' get lapped up by their competitors. The banks are as tense as the candidates. They want their next crop of outperformers, and missing out on good people on day 0 might leave them at a long term disadvantage. As a result, most banks started their process in the morning and finished it way before lunchtime. And by lunch All banks recruiting teams and recruited candidates were at the Taj Bengal on adjacant tables.
The gentlemen said he felt truly bad for not having an offer left for me, and redirected me to a colleague of his interviewing for a different desk. I was a little perturbed, and the interview did not go too well. For one, it was not for markets but for IBD, which I wasn't interested in. I wanted to be a trader. Anyway, the interview didn't last too long. The Gentlemen again met me outside the interview room and said he would give HK a call and see if he could hire another intern. He asked me if I could wait for an hour. I obviously couldn't wait, as I would miss out on my other shortlists too. Time was a critical resource on day 0. I told him my problem very politely, and requested him to inform the placecom in case they wanted to make me an offer. In case I was still in the process I would accept it.
It was disappointing, to say the least. I saw day 0 evaporating in front of my eyes. I never had much of a chance anyway. I was redirected to IB1, and I thought I'd just go there and give it my best and leave the rest to god. When I reached IB1, I saw the batch topper coming out, shaking hands with the interviewer. He had been made an offer. The Company volunteer from 2nd year told me that 4 offers had been given till now, and they just might take one more. Now, they had around 10 people on their shortlist they hadn't interviewed, and they had one slot left. Ofcourse, the wouldn't interview everyone, but it was still a far shot. The company HR came to the company volunteer with a list, asking for a particular guy. That guy was more interested in consults and was interviewing with them. However, he was still in the process. IB1 badly wanted that guy, he was on their hotlist. The company volunteer handled the situation gracefully, telling them that he was busy with other processes, and asked them to interview me instead, telling them that I had a good reputation on campus. The HR looked at me and recognized me from the previous day. He seemed indifferent, and then, I think just for the heck of passing time, he said, fine we'll interview him till the other guy comes around. So basically, they had 1 slot left, had a guy in mind. What was I doing here, I asked myself. But I decided to try my luck nonetheless. The other options I had, well, would have been compromises really.
So I go into this room to the India head of the firm. His very presence was Awe inspiring. He started off very politely, making some light talk and asking my view on the market. The interview was more like a conversation and I felt very comfortable. Then came the expected Question. "So N*, what went wrong in 2001?" . I knew this was coming. This had haunted me from the very start. This was the question which made me uncomfortable and made me jittery whenever it came forth. And yet, it always came forth. I had paid a price for that bad score at various stages in the last 10 years. ENOUGH! I said to myself. I will not let this ghost haunt me anymore. I had to exorcise it. It was a now or never moment. Everything I had worked for the last 3 years.. THe CAT mocks, the CFAs, the GDPI Prep, the pain of failure, the ecstasy of success, the anxious on hold moments, the sweat and blood since coming to Joka, everything narrowed down to this moment. I just wanted to sign on that offer acceptance sheet lying in front of me on the table. So I decided to, for the first time in my life, be completely honest about what happened. I remember the interview clearly in my head.
Me (M) : Sir, I was in love with a girl. And my family came apart. A lot of problems you see.
IB : looking at me intently. Tell me more.
Me - Told whole story. as it happened. not sparing any details. And then I continuned
M : .. so you see sir, that's what happened, and inspite of that, the fact is that I'm sitting across from you on this interview table. The fact that I made it from that place to this table, I feel, says a lot about my character. I am resilient. I am persistent for achieving my goals. And that's why sir, I feel I would make a good trader. For nothing can knock me down. I can take a huge loss, and still come to office the next day and try to make a profit. I know I've not seen the worst in life yet. Maybe a lot more can happen in the future. But what I know is, I'd be man enough to face it. I'll not get bogged down in the face of failure. I'll never give up. I will always rise back again after I fall, I know this about myself. And Sir, I promise you, as much as I know myself, even if todays interview does not go as I hope it would, I promise you I will still enter the industry, some day or the other, for this is what I want to do.
IB : Giving me a nod. I like you N*. I really like your fighting attitude towards life. I feel it that you will make a good trader someday. Let me talk to my colleagues. He left me in the room alone. I felt extremely light. I actually felt nice. It was as if a huge load had been lifted off my shoulders. Even if I failed this interview, I felt I had exorcised the ghosts of my past.
He came in again after sometime. "N*, As you know, we were very impressed by this one person's CV, and the other 2 of my colleagues still want to interview him. As far as I'm concerned, I definitely want to hire you, but they feel its fair if we interview the other guy too. In the meantime, I'd suggest you interview with both of my colleagues just so that you could probably impress them too. I agreed, though I knew the other 2 interviews were just because they wanted to bide time till their hotlisted guy came over. I went through the motions, the interviews were more of Maths and Market talk than anything personal, so there were no awe-inspiring moments. Finally, when they got tired of asking me questions, they left me in the room and went outside and gathered. Now I could have probably left for my next interview with IB3, but I had seen a small ray of hope here and didn't want to leave it. THey had been my dream. So I decided to take a risk. I decided to go out and outrightly pitch myself. I approached them, and all 3 of them looked at me. I was very candid. "Sir, I know you are waiting for a certain candidate. But sir, as far as I know him, he is more interested in consulting firms. Whereas I, I have lived breathed and slept your bank for the last 1 month since you shortlisted me. Since I got to know about the world of Investment banking, I have wanted to be a part of it. Now this candidate you are waiting for might have better credentials than me academics wise. But even if he comes to you right now and accepts your offer, it would be because Consulting firms did not work out for him. Its because he got rejected there. You would be his second choice. Whereas I have been waiting here from the past one hour, ignoring my other 3 shortlists, because I so badly want to join you. However, I feel that its not prudent of me to wait any longer, so please tell me your decision. They looked at me shocked. They then asked me to go inside the room and wait for another 2 minutes while they discussed it. A few minutes later, the gentlemen who interviewed me the first, came in and said, "So N*, would you like Mumbai or Singapore?"
Epilogue..
The story ofcourse, continues. But at that point I finally got over the shadow of my class 12th. Ofcourse, a PPO had to be secured. It was a tough ask, given the Situation in Greece during my internship, and the fact that 3 of the other guys of 5 that were hired from my campus by my IB were rank 1, 2 and 6 of our batch. I, during my internship time, was rank 25. HOwever, It so turned out that I worked really hard during my internship, and on my penultimate day, my boss took me for review, and told me he felt I would make a good trader, and offered me a Full time role. It was unprecedented, as typically PPOs were given in Early September, when all the internship cycles for the year were over. However, my desk felt I had done exceedingly well and were in no doubt they wanted to hire me, and thus the HR formalities were ignored and I signed the contract with them on the last day of my internship, thus fulfilling a dream.
Key Takeaways -
Well I'm in no stage to preach to people. I still have a long way to go in my life and a lot to achieve. For one I've done everything till now in my life for myself. I want to reach a stage where I can give back to the society. I also am very new to my industry and have a LOT to learn here. Its very competitive, and either you are good or you are out. I also broke up a few months back and I guess an immdiate goal is to find a soulmate. So a lot of stuff still pending to do, But I still feel I have more experience than I had say 10 years ago, when I started off on this journey. So I can give a few takeaways I have from this journey.
A) Never EVER .. EVER.. give up on your dreams - However stupid you feel they are. Its only over when YOU feel its over. Till you don't give up, things do work out. Watch the movie - "The secret". In a nutshell that movie can be summarized in SRKs dialogue in Om Shanti Om. "Agar kisi cheez ko poori shiddat se chaaho, to saari qayanaat tumhe usse milaane ki saazish me jut jaati hai", i.e. If you love something with all your heart, the Universe conspires to give it to you. There are a lot of times during the whole fiasco called life mentioned above, when I almost felt like givng up. There were a lot of failures, a lot of Nadirs.. But I'm so thankful I did not. So don't ever give up on your dreams. Even if you are the underdog!
B) wake up.. as soon as you can - I don't know in what stage of life you are, but some people, like me, need a wake up call at times. My Wake up call was around the area where I flunked CAT the 2nd time. The realization was , I had wasted my IIT degree. Ofcourse the knowledge was there beforehand, but it sank in then, when I saw 1.5 yrs of a mediocre job in front of me. I mean, I had invested 2 extra years of my life to get into that place, and that place did give sufficient opportunities, but I blew them away by not being focussed enough. I did not know what I wanted to do, I did not even have a well prepared CV in placements, I didn't have a good CG to show and a couple of flunked courses. I had wasted a golden opportunity. Investment banks hired from IIT too, though in much smaller numbers than IIM. But the absolute best guys there made the cut. I know of people who were my batchmates at IIT, who are now 4.5 years into the industry I'm 6 months into. I'm essentially 4 years behind them in my career. OFcourse, you always compare yourself to your peers wherever you are, and this is not to say that I'm unsatisfied with my station in life. But still, I wish I had got the wake up call I got much later, at an earlier point. Once I did get the wake up call, I fought hard. For example, I sweated hard in IIMC against odds, be it academics or placements, because I did not want to waste my IIM degree like I did my IIT. The days after IIT were like a social stigma. I was in a very average job, whereas people I chilled out with in hostels, went to movies with, attended classes with and had dinner with were earning 3 times as much money as I was, handling much more responsibility. I even didn't want to talk to such people because it made me feel insignificant and an underachiever. I did not want to make a similar mess at IIM, so I woke up then, thankfully. If you are still in the unawoken stage, and chances are, many of you reading this have just entered/are yet to enter IIM, you can still make a difference. Just remember, getting into a good Bschool is not the End of your struggle. It is the beginning. Once you are in, sweat harder than ever, because your competition is top class. You might still land up pretty average on a comparitive basis if you just stop working hard after entering a Bschool.
C) Be honest. Be it an interview, an essay.. anywhere. If you have a story, be honest about it. If you make stuff up, they would catch you and it wouldn't be appreciated. But most of all, be honest to yourself. A lot of time we lie to ourselves. We actually manage to convince ourselves of things which aren't true, by repeating those things to a 100 people and to ourselves. We start living an alternate reality, a make up truth. We justify our failures to ourselves, putting the blame on external factors rather than ourselves. Never blame others for what's wrong in your life. Take ownership, responsibility, be honest to yourself about it, face it and Fight it!
Godspeed!
Well I'm in no stage to preach to people. I still have a long way to go in my life and a lot to achieve. For one I've done everything till now in my life for myself. I want to reach a stage where I can give back to the society. I also am very new to my industry and have a LOT to learn here. Its very competitive, and either you are good or you are out. I also broke up a few months back and I guess an immdiate goal is to find a soulmate. So a lot of stuff still pending to do, But I still feel I have more experience than I had say 10 years ago, when I started off on this journey. So I can give a few takeaways I have from this journey.
A) Never EVER .. EVER.. give up on your dreams - However stupid you feel they are. Its only over when YOU feel its over. Till you don't give up, things do work out. Watch the movie - "The secret". In a nutshell that movie can be summarized in SRKs dialogue in Om Shanti Om. "Agar kisi cheez ko poori shiddat se chaaho, to saari qayanaat tumhe usse milaane ki saazish me jut jaati hai", i.e. If you love something with all your heart, the Universe conspires to give it to you. There are a lot of times during the whole fiasco called life mentioned above, when I almost felt like givng up. There were a lot of failures, a lot of Nadirs.. But I'm so thankful I did not. So don't ever give up on your dreams. Even if you are the underdog!
B) wake up.. as soon as you can - I don't know in what stage of life you are, but some people, like me, need a wake up call at times. My Wake up call was around the area where I flunked CAT the 2nd time. The realization was , I had wasted my IIT degree. Ofcourse the knowledge was there beforehand, but it sank in then, when I saw 1.5 yrs of a mediocre job in front of me. I mean, I had invested 2 extra years of my life to get into that place, and that place did give sufficient opportunities, but I blew them away by not being focussed enough. I did not know what I wanted to do, I did not even have a well prepared CV in placements, I didn't have a good CG to show and a couple of flunked courses. I had wasted a golden opportunity. Investment banks hired from IIT too, though in much smaller numbers than IIM. But the absolute best guys there made the cut. I know of people who were my batchmates at IIT, who are now 4.5 years into the industry I'm 6 months into. I'm essentially 4 years behind them in my career. OFcourse, you always compare yourself to your peers wherever you are, and this is not to say that I'm unsatisfied with my station in life. But still, I wish I had got the wake up call I got much later, at an earlier point. Once I did get the wake up call, I fought hard. For example, I sweated hard in IIMC against odds, be it academics or placements, because I did not want to waste my IIM degree like I did my IIT. The days after IIT were like a social stigma. I was in a very average job, whereas people I chilled out with in hostels, went to movies with, attended classes with and had dinner with were earning 3 times as much money as I was, handling much more responsibility. I even didn't want to talk to such people because it made me feel insignificant and an underachiever. I did not want to make a similar mess at IIM, so I woke up then, thankfully. If you are still in the unawoken stage, and chances are, many of you reading this have just entered/are yet to enter IIM, you can still make a difference. Just remember, getting into a good Bschool is not the End of your struggle. It is the beginning. Once you are in, sweat harder than ever, because your competition is top class. You might still land up pretty average on a comparitive basis if you just stop working hard after entering a Bschool.
C) Be honest. Be it an interview, an essay.. anywhere. If you have a story, be honest about it. If you make stuff up, they would catch you and it wouldn't be appreciated. But most of all, be honest to yourself. A lot of time we lie to ourselves. We actually manage to convince ourselves of things which aren't true, by repeating those things to a 100 people and to ourselves. We start living an alternate reality, a make up truth. We justify our failures to ourselves, putting the blame on external factors rather than ourselves. Never blame others for what's wrong in your life. Take ownership, responsibility, be honest to yourself about it, face it and Fight it!
Godspeed!
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