Meet Nishtha Sharma, Karuna Dusane, Saurabh Kishore Singh, Amresh Kumar and Suruchi Dutta. They have today been successfully placed with large conglomerates such as the Vedanta Group and the Trident Group, with annual packages of Rs.12 lakh and Rs.18 lakh, respectively. While Nishtha, Karuna and Suruchi have been placed with the Vedanta Group, Amresh and Saurabh conquered positions in the Trident Group. They spoke to Corporate Citizen, in depth, on their first break, about their college days, challenges faced and ways of overcoming them, and their dreams for the future.
“I have always believed that every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world,” says Karuna Dusane, who has been successfully placed in the Human Resource (HR) division of the Vedanta Group, thanks to SBS.
Since the very beginning, Karuna was inclined to specialise in HR. “I completed my Bachelors in the Commerce stream and decided to do my post-graduation, specialising in HR,” adds Karuna.
The induction program at SBS gave these youngsters gist of what they would learn in the next two years. After the induction program, regular classes commence. The institution regularly invites stalwarts who lead on various facets of the corporate world—corporate leaders who coach the students, not just in academics but also in enhancing their lifestyle.
Guest lectures take place in the evening at 6.30 pm, post their classes. “We had to follow a tight schedule, no holidays for the first year, we would study all seven days of the week, had to go through frequent surprise tests and so on. At that point in time they were too stressful, but today I realise how important they were, after I got placed,” reminisces Karuna, with a smile on her face.
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Says Suruchi Dutta, placed in the Marketing division of the Vedanta Group, “We were very fortunate to get highly experienced and qualified permanent faculty as well as guest faculty who helped us in building up on our management fundamentals, making them stronger.”
“I learnt how to work in groups, how to work to tight work schedules, keep calm and be patient. My institute prepared me from day one to face the corporate world. The long academic hours, the hectic and packed regimens, busy schedule, assignments, surprise tests, economic time sessions played their part in getting us ready to face the tough corporate world,” says Nishtha Sharma, who has also got placed in the HR division of the Vedanta Group.
Nishtha, a Commerce graduate and a company secretary, and had always dreamt of doing her Masters in HR, hails from Punjab. She recalls, “It was my dream to do MBA that brought me to Pune. I have always liked to deal with people and so decided to specialise in the HR stream. I still remember, when we had assembled at the Ganesh temple in the SBS and were all set to start our Masters. We knew that life was going to change for the good,” she recalls.
Like most Punjabis, Nishtha aims to be an entrepreneur and start her own venture in the future. Her mother, who is her pillar of strength, has always supported her in every step she took.
All these youngsters have applied the three mantras of success -- Discipline, Determination and Dedication (3Ds), something that the institution (SBS) strongly believes in for every student to achieve success.
Tough times do not last, tough people doIt is true that tough times do not last, tough people do. Tough people pull themselves up by the bootstraps and stay strong, keep fighting. These youngsters too did not give up. Recalls Karuna, “I remember, during my first year of college, I was badly injured during a dance competition and had undergone a knee surgery. I was forced to go on leave then. My Dean was of the view that I should go back to my parents, take adequate rest and come back after a year. But I didn’t want to give up. I used to take physiotherapy after my classes and was on medication. I started recovering.”
Nishtha who has also been involved in managing events at the college, and coordinated several functions along with her studies, says the balancing act was tough. “Sometimes we had classes from 8.a.m. to 8 p.m. Surprise tests and presentations used to drain us out. But I was determined to achieve my goal.”
Adds Karuna, “Soon after my first year, I got a chance to intern with a start-up company at Gurgaon. I was staying as a paying guest in a small room, close to my workplace there, with very little facilities but decided to hold on.” Placement season begins…
Once the students complete their internship, they are back in college, making presentations on the findings of their internship programs. But come September, the placement season kicks off. Indeed, one of the most crucial and testing time for any student.
“The entire campus is full of mixed emotions. There is fear, anxiety, competition, encouragement and motivation from friends and faculty, there is nervousness when you appear for your very first interview round and group discussion. You do get disappointed when you are rejected by a company, but the key to come through all this is to maintain your calm and focus on your priorities,” says Nishtha.
Recalls Karuna, “When the placement season began in October, most of my friends got successfully placed with different corporates. It was taking some time for me to get through. I started getting worried by December, as I was yet to be placed. I didn’t really panic but the thought that I had not yet been placed was troubling me.”
Karuna cracked the fourth company that visited the campus, but took all her previous interviews as an experience. “They were basically an eye-opener to the areas I needed polishing from my side, especially organisational behaviour, application of labour laws and aptitude.”
Amresh Kumar, placed with the Trident Group with a package of Rs.18 lakh per annum, went through seven rounds of interviews before he finally made it.
“By the time I got to know about this opening with the Trident Group, I was already placed in another company but with a lower package. But my friend Saurabh and I thought, how about giving it a shot?” recalls Amresh. Amresh hails from the Gopalganj district in Bihar. His dad is a farmer and mom is a homemaker. Amresh completed his engineering in Electronics and Telecommunications in 2009 from RTMNU and worked with Hindustan Coca Cola beverages and United Breweries Ltd. After working for 42 months, he decided to take a break to pursue his post-graduation from Sri Balaji Society.
Saurabh Kishore Singh, also placed with the Trident Group, says the selection process in Trident gave him a lot of confidence and boosted his morale. “I too can compete with the top-notch B-school students of this country and eventually win,” says Saurabh.
Tough selection processExplains Saurabh, the selection process of the Trident Group was divided into four stages, namely, written test consisting of 50 objective questions on Sales and Marketing, Psychometric Test, Plant Visit (Trident Group had paid for the trip to Barnala, Punjab) and the final round. The final round was conducted by E&Y, which was divided into five phases, such as Functional Interview, Behavioral Interview, Case study based group discussion, Case study presentation and Scenario discussion.
“In the final round, there were students from IIM Shillong, IIM Indore, IMT Ghaziabad, Goa Institute of Management, BIMTEC Noida and so on. That one day of the selection process at the company head office was quite exhausting. In the functional interview round, there were questions relating to the practical application of sales and marketing concepts, while in the behavioral interview round, there were questions related to my previous work experience where I was judged on the responses given towards a particular problem that was asked. In the group discussion round, a case was given to us 30 minutes in advance, on which we needed to have a discussion for 30 minutes. We were asked to respond to different scenarios where we had to think like a manager and handle a situation where my junior was not up to the mark. In the second scenario, I had to explain my superior the reason for me not achieving the targets,” said Saurabh.
This interview was a different kind of experience for both Amresh and Saurabh, as they had never competed with students from other top B Schools of the country. “Though I have given several interviews in the past, I had never gone through such a systematic and indepth interview,” says Saurabh.
Students who got placed at the Vedanta Group had to go through two group discussion rounds and a personal interview. The company went through their academic scores and filtered candidates accordingly. SBS trained its students well for the GD rounds.
Says Suruchi, “My group discussion topics were, instabilities in the Middle East, and is promotion the real factor for the success of a movie? There were other questions like tell me about yourself, why did you choose marketing, what is the difference between sales and marketing, talk about your internship and its findings, tell us about your family background, why do you want to join this company, tell us about your strengths and weaknesses, etc.
Karuna and Nishtha were asked to introduce themselves and elaborate on their aspirations, strengths and weaknesses, prior work experiences, role models, goals in life, interests and hobbies, achievements and internship learnings.
Sri Balaji Society (SBS), based in Pune, is truly an institution in itself. Built on the pillars of ‘Discipline, Determination and Dedication’, SBS provides career specific contemporary education with a strong emphasis on practical training and overall development of students. The institution believes that every student has the potential to be groomed to have a successful corporate career. Converting the right candidates to the right jobs through right training and development has always been the goal of this society. The institution believes in “One Family, One Team, One Culture, One Goal…Corporate Citizenship for our students.”
Group discussion rounds had topics like “Make in India a boon or a bane?” and “Performance Management”. After the second round of the process, they were individually spoken to by the Head HR with regards to the selection criteria being used.
All work and no play?Well, that’s not true. There are a lot of extracurricular activities like sports day, dance programmes, debates and quiz competitions that are conducted in the campus. In fact, the college is quite well known for its college festival, Drishti, which is a delight for students. Not just that, the college celebrates all the festivals in its premises.
Recalls Saurabh, “I had participated in the Drishti quiz competition and had won the first prize. I also won a cash prize of `10,000 in the Sri Balaji Society’s General Knowledge competition.”
Says Suruchi, “I made friends for a lifetime. The best part of the learning experience is time management as we had classes on all seven days of the week. It taught us to use our time more productively. Being part of the corporate relations team enhanced my communication skills, team building and various other skills.”
Amresh too made a lot of friends from different colleges of the Society, from other specialisations. “I spent a lot of time catching up with my friends during my free time. Those were indeed the best days,” he signs off
By Mahalakshmi Hariharan
