Hello Guys
This is a little off-track from the life @ MHRM but still I would like to share the experience of a MHRMian in Young India Fellowship Interview. For all those people who never heard Young India Fellowship here is the link where you can get an insight regarding the Fellowship
The best way is to start with the fellowship when I heard that fellows are coming to the campus to interact with the students but missed it in epic style by assuming wrong date. But sincerely speaking once you go through the website there is no necessity to interact with any one. It is quite crystal clear. After cracking esteemed B-Schools like NITIE, XIMB, IIFM, TAPMI; I joined MHRM, IIT Kharagpur with a passion towards HR Function. The application ask you each and every detail which results in nothing to be asked in the Interview.
The 3 important phases in the selection process for the fellowship are
- · Application
- · Telephonic Interview
- · Personal Interview & Group Discussion & Group Activity
Once you were shortlisted based on your application you have to undergo a Telephonic round.
Telephonic Interview:
3 Simple questions:
- o How do you know about YIF?
- o Why do you want to join YIF?
- o Your Internship/Project related questions?
This basically test whether the details mentioned in the applications are true or just copy pasted .
Next comes the final selection for personal Interview. PI round takes place in 4 parts of the country New Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata.
Personal Interview:
I am first surprised to see 20 students in the afternoon session on Sunday because only 10 were active on the Facebook page. God even now people are not active in Facebook. Puzzled but then half of the team is sent to the GD and remaining half to the Interviews. And interview panels are 2 and to be precise 2 types. One panel interviews for 30 min and the other for 3 min. And to my luck I was sent to the panel that interviewed me for 37 min. Here is a detail about the Interview.
Me: Good Morning sir
Int: Good Afternoon Krishna , take your seat. Give me two min to take a look in to the Application.
(He had a detail look in to my application underlying the mentioning in the application)
Int: Ok Krishna, You are a masters student in IIT why do you want to join YIF?
Me: Yes Sir I’m a master’s student in Human Resource at IIT Kharagpur.
Int: But why do you come to Delhi for Interview?
Me: Presently I’m doing my winter Internship at PEPSICO , Gurgaon . So I thought why I shouldn’t take the interview as it is on Sunday so that I can interact with fellows and also can see the campus.
Int: Great carry on. Tell me why YIF after masters and also about the Internships you did . you do have a long list.
Me: Sure sir. Though I have been studying in one of the reputed institutes of the country, I never enjoyed studying with peers. Most of the guys in the course joined either being frustrated in the software job or joined because they were not able to get placed in any companies. So learning experience is minimised. And though we have faculty with Ph.Ds. and experience of each of them equals my age but since it’s a govt institution I need not comment either on their teaching style or on the passion of them towards the course and students. So I desired a learning experience with top students of the country and faculty renowned from Multinational universities. Are these reasons good enough for me to apply for the course in liberal arts?
Int: Sorry to interrupt can you say wat do u mean by liberal arts?
Me: Liberal arts include art, painting, sculpture, anthropology, ethics, and communication l. In simple words its study of our childhood passions. For instance I draw cartoons very well. But I could not study or take a professional coaching in it . Because our education system never allows us to do it. But liberal arts allows us. This is not studying a theoretical course but studying life, society, passion.
Int : Great you can continue regarding your internships.
Me: Presently I am doing my winter internship at PepsiCo handling the annual performance and development review of India region and working on the effective internal communication process through revamping the intranet. I also did my Internships in designing the recruitment cycle of 2 start-ups. Prior to it I was an associate business consultant of Freshersworld.Com a start up in IT recruitment. I also had my internship in marketing and campus relations. And did my project at Amaron batteries in designing the urine activated paper batteries for bio systems.
Int: Good ok you mentioned about a medical camp in tribal villages. Can you tell more about it ?
Me: explained in and out of the camp, how it is initiated and problems we faced, how did we motivate fellow students, how we organised and how it is being implemented even now.
Int: But Krishna you haven’t mentioned this more effectively in the application. Good I asked you. Now can you say down the line after 10 yrs where would you like to see yourself?
Me: Precisely I have two goals. Primarily to grow in my career. I wanted to pursue my research work in Organisation capability that deals with employee engagement and leadership capabilities of the organisations. Secondly I wanted to train the youth in developing the skills that suits the corporate environment.
Int: Can you elaborate on the second thing regarding the skills.
Me: Sure sir. As it is well known India is major constitute of villages. Where are the youth of villages studying .Not in IITs or NITs but in tier-2 and tier-3 colleges? The brilliant minds of India lack in possessing the skills required by the organisations name it IT or any field due to lack of infrastructure, funds. So I wanted to train these students in terms of skill development. I did the same by taking seminars in 32 colleges during my final year regarding the Interview tips, GD tips, Stage fear elimination. But alone I will not be doing it. It requires the corporate support and YIF can be a good support where I can network with brilliant minds of the country and mentored by the renowned faculty and network with other big names like Infosys Narayana Murthy, Idea, and Barclays.
Int; definitely you would be able to do that. Ok Krishna I can see that you have presented 25 papers with 1 international paper during your under graduation and participated in many extra and co-curricular activities. What about your master program?
Me: As it is a known fact IITs are hub for B.Techs but still I’m a core member of Dramatics society and Debating society. My zeal to act/perform in dramatics which I do not have any chances during my under graduation, I got in IIT and debating which I think I am good at. These are the two extra curricula’s I am part in IIT. Besides being the Media and PR head of Saamanjasya , The socio Business fest of IIT Kharagpur, a co – curricular activity.
Int: It seems you love interacting with people, name it the HR course you were pursuing or the extra curricula’s and co curricula’s. Good to see it. Can u say why do you want to break the flow of your career with YIF in middle?
Me: as I told you earlier the reasons like networking with top 50 brilliant minds, faculty, corporate biggies involved in this I would also mention once you climb the ladder name it from School to under graduation and UG to PG, the chance to meet people and network declines. Now If I go ahead with my Ph.D. I will be narrower entering a niche sector. So I wish to take the break and pursue my passion. Who knows at the end of the course I may find my solutions like I may not go for Ph.D. I may directly pursue my career from here.
Int: That’s true. Life takes wonderful twists and I too believe you will find answers here in YIF. So Krishna Do you have any queries?
Me: Yes sir. For me the course is a learning experience to proceed further in the career. But I could see a placement week in the website. So what careers can a fellow pursue after the course?
Int: Yes we planned for a placement week earlier. But now we cancelled it. Instead we did 4-5 rounds of counselling with fellows trying to identify their interest areas and grouped them together. To name few consulting, marketing, film making, NGO, Higher studies. And we are sending the resumes to different companies we are associated with. For instance consulting resumes to companies like Barclays, McKenzie and Film making to top directors of Bollywood and instead of placement week we are planning for individual placements. So the process is on and it will be completed by Feb end. Placement week disturbs students. For example student interested in NGO will be applying for consulting after seeing the pay scale and else. Did this answer your question?
Me: yah sir perfect.
Int: Ok Krishna nice talking to you. All the best.
Thus the PI round ended on other side there is one more panel which interviewed for only 3-5 min and some of my fellow applicants weren’t happy about it. Then came the GD and Group Exercise round.
Group Exercise:
We are students of 8 in number. We are all asked to stand in a line and given 15 min to strategize. The task is simple. We have to walk simultaneously towards a rope placed before us and have to jump/cross it all together at a time. Without talking or touching each other. We did it with little planning but there is a twist. To check the co-ordination 2 out of 8 will be blind folded. Fortunately one among them is me.
Group Discussion:
Topic: IS IPL ROBBING THE DEGNITY OF SPORTS?
Time unlimited unless and until the discussion is out of track/fish market scenario/fight/ repetition of discussion.
The ma’am decided who have to start and it’s a healthy discussion with terms like talent acquisition, foreign investment. I added my own points like directing the discussion from cricket to all other games like hockey league, also had some laughing moments when I compared test cricket to marriage and IPL to live in relation. After ample time ma’am decided to stop it and asked everyone to conclude. So at the end each and every one spoke to satisfactory levels.
That’s how the day at YIF ended. Now it’s waiting time for the results .
Few points I found to be improved in the process
- o Interaction with seniors … I could see no one there
- o Panel that interviewed for 3 min should stretch their interviews
At the end a small suggestion for the second round applicants
Make sure you take time to fill your application in detail because PI is all about your application. Mention in detail. Be confident and positive.
All the best.
