My Placement Experience

It's been a long time since I last posted here. A lot has happened during this time. The hectic end to 6th sem, my Summer Internship at Facebook (I had to mention this at least once :P), the whole 7th sem; but as always, I was too lazy to write about anything. I've wanted to write something for long, but why write when I can waste time watching a TV show?

Now since I'm finally done with the 7th sem and have too much time to spare (at least for a few days), I decided to come back here. I can't get all the credit though. I got inspiration from Sujeet and SRG, who both have written about their placement experiences. I saw this as a good opportunity to get back in the game, and also to (hopefully) get more views on my blog ;-)

Background Information
There is a good chance that some of you would've left this page after the first paragraph. So, I have to make sure that the rest of the brave souls who stayed, don't leave too. Hence, some info on what all offers I got during placements.

Some of you might already know that I'm a student in Computer Science and Engineering department of IIT Madras. On day 1 of placements, I got following 4 offers:

1. Goldman Sachs

2. Samsung R&D (US & South Korea)

3. Samsung India Software Operations

4. Samsung India Electronics

Well, that's a lot of Samsung. I ended up choosing Goldman Sachs over all Samsung profiles including the one with the highest paying job in IITM(probably in all IITs, I'm not sure).
So, here is the story of placements.

Before Placements
I applied to a lot of companies(Around 20) mostly core companies like Adobe, Microsoft, Linkedin, Amazon, Yahoo etc. along with big finance companies like Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs. A lot of my friends said that for a CS 9 pointer, I was applying to too many companies, but I just believed in what Spock said "It was logical to cultivate multiple options". I will be lying if I say that I wasn't scared of screwing up in all the interviews. There were times when I screwed up placement tests, and feared that I might not get any job in first 4 days. Since I had not written CAT or GRE, I had no back-up. I started thinking that I should have applied to even more companies, even those which I didn't really find interesting.

During all these tests, I realized that I needed to revise topics like OS, Compilers, and Networks. I wasn't super confident in Data Structures and Algos either, but my practice on SPOJ had made me somehow confident in those.

Week before Placements
During Endsems week, I had lots of breaks between the exams. I guess I should've utilized that time by doing some revision. That was actually my original plan. But, I ended up watching 6-7 movies. I re-watched the whole Lord of The Rings series. Even after Endsems, I had to follow the great tradition of Computer Science Department where you have to finish assignments after Endsems(Unless you are MVK, who finishes everything at least a week before deadlines). So, next 3 days went in finishing assignments and writing placement tests. 2 days before placements, Flipkart conducted a test. Out of the 2 coding questions, I couldn't solve even one. That was a big blow to my confidence. I decided to put as much effort as possible on the last night. But, I was so tired that I just slept off early and decided to get up early and read something.

The Day (December 1st)
Interviews were supposed to start at 7am. I had somehow managed to qualify for Google, Samsung(3 profiles), Goldman Sachs, and Directi. I decided to get up at around 4, and revise. But as it always happens with a lazy fellow like me, I couldn't. Before leaving, I just had 20 minutes to revise, during which I chose to read up on hash tables.

I was nervous, yes. I was worried at my insufficient knowledge of some topics. But strangely, I was not scared anymore. My father always asks me to think about "what is the worst that can happen?" in tensed situations like this. So, that's what I did. The worst that could happen was that I wouldn't get a job on day 1. I guess that should be a scary thought, but for me it was a bit of relief. I got into my "Jo hoga dekha jaayega" mode.

Morning Session
The big day started with Google interviews. I had 2 back to back interviews. I felt I screwed up one, and did okayish in the other. Bad start. Then came Goldman Sachs, and Samsung US. After 2 interviews with Samsung and 5 interviews with GS, I was 80% sure that I was going to get selected for both. I started wishing that these two companies declare their results soon, so that I can go and sleep. Little did I know that they were not allowed to announce their results before 10pm. Since I had already had 9 interviews, I had no enthu to sit for another. But I had to sit through all the interviews in the afternoon session also. :(

Special thanks to all the placement coordinators at that time. They were really helpful and encouraging. Google's second interview took up my GS interview slot. The Samsung interview was scheduled in the next slot, but GS people were also calling me to come for that interview. At that time, the placement coordinators really helped me manage the situation. They ensured that I could sit for both the interviews without any trouble.  

Afternoon Session
Afternoon session started with Microsoft test from which they were going to select people for interviews. During that test only, I got calls for Directi and Samsung interviews. This was gonna be a painful session. After 3 more interviews for 2 profiles of Samsung India, I found out that I didn't get through for MS interview. I didn't know whether to feel disappointed or relieved. By 6:30, I was done with all the interviews except Directi. I was hoping to get done with it quickly. I was daydreaming about food and sleep. But, 2 Directi interviews lasted for 3 hours, and I was stuck in the interviews hungry and sleepy. Finally at 10pm, it was over. I had survived through 14 interviews in one day.

Result Time
After all this fight, I wanted to know the results as soon as possible. So, instead of waiting for results to come on placement website, my friend Sagar and I went to placement office to find out results as soon as possible. And yay, I got offers from Goldman Sachs, and all 3 Samsung profiles.

It was pretty awesome to see that so many of my friends had got great job offers. Almost everyone in class was placed on day 1. 6 guys were placed from my hostel wing that day.

Moral(s) of the story 
1. Have confidence in what you know. There were a lot of things I didn't know. I hadn't really prepared properly. I am not encouraging anyone to go unprepared or partially prepared like me. What I want to say is that having confidence in whatever you know, does help a lot.

2. Don't let bad performance in one interview affect the other.

3. Having so many interviews in such a short period, means there will be conflicts in timings. Naturally, you will be late for some of the interviews. But, make sure that you are not too late for any of the interviews. If you are late by say 2 hours, your chances will be pretty bad. It's like designing a good Scheduling Policy.

4. If you don't know something, ask for a hint or something. Don't try to fake your way through it. Particularly, if the question is about some core CS concept or about finding a good algorithm. I personally don't like the HR type interviews where you have to sell yourselves. It's not that I'm bad at those(actually it turned out that I'm pretty good at those), but it's easier to put fart there. They obviously won't buy everything, but you can still do a decent job of faking knowledge there. At the other hand, if the interviews check your knowledge of Algorithms and other core concepts, it is very difficult to fake it.

5. Most importantly, having good friends help a lot. There were times during this sem when I was low in confidence, when I was scared. At those times, good friends like Prateek, Vaibhav, MVK, Saheel, Ashu etc (can't type all the names, so 'etc') were a great help. Although they basically accused me of being over-dramatic (Saale sab kamine hain :P), it was really great to see so many people believing that I could do well.

6. Placements are not end of life. Enough Said.

P.S. : This post is a blatant attempt to get more hits on this blog. :-P