Disclaimer
: Contents in the blog are strictly based on my opinions and are not meant to
offend anyone. You are most welcome to agree or disagree on any of the points.
Also please ignore the grammar mistakes, if any.
If you are some automobile geek who is
reading this blog because of the title representing mileage, then this page is
definitely not made for you.
So, before starting let me first
introduce myself. I am a PGDM student of a new born IIM (Batch 2013-15).
Though its winter but currently in
almost every B-School, Summers are going on. No No, don’t get confuse, I am
talking about Summer Placements. The two important months where we get the real
feel of the business. We do live projects for the company which in itself is a
very awesome feeling. Though company provide stipend to interns but the main
purpose of the summer internship is to gain knowledge.
But actually, for most students this
is not the real objective of internship. Now-a-days, the students don’t see
what profile the company is offering but rather are attracted towards the
stipend. Let’s see some examples. For the following examples, I am considering
an assumption that it’s a student’s call whether to apply for the company or
not.
· A
student who is not interested in HR, applies for a company offering the profile
of HR just because the company is paying a hefty stipend and in the interview,
he has no answer of why he is applying for HR. My simple question to this guy
is that will he gain something from this internship. Whatever work company will
provide him, he will do it just for the sake of completing it (as we do in our
projects :P), not to learn. Those two months will be a total waste of time. And
if they persist this attitude in final placements also, then I would like to quote
a saying of a great saint, Baba Ranchoddas – “Zyada package waali company mein
select ho ke zyaada paise toh kama loge par life ke agle chaalis saal tak
tumhara balatkar pe balatkar hota rahega”.
· Another
student who is interested in let’s say Marketing. A company comes and offers a
damn good job profile in Marketing but only paying Rs. 2000/- per month. The
guy doesn’t apply just because the company is offering very low stipend. He
doesn’t know what opportunity he is losing.
Actually, there is an irony hidden in
it. The purpose of internships is not to earn money, which you will definitely
do after you complete your MBA. The purpose is to make you understand the
practical part of the theory you have studied in 1st year. So, tell
me guys how often have you been paid for receiving the education. Till now, we
have received education by paying the fee. In case of MBA, company pays some
amount because you, in some sense, will work for it. Now, let the company
decide what amount they want to pay, you just focus on your learning part.
Let’s also consider the case of a
student (good in Finance) who is forcefully made to sit in a company offering a
job profile (HR) which is not of his interest. And due to some bizarre twist of
fate, he gets selected. My suggestion to this guy is that the PGDM course is of
18 months. Out of that, if he considers those two months as a waste, then
consider the remaining 16 months as an opportunity which he can leverage to attain perfection in his
field of interest. Participate in events, do live projects, publish some
research papers. I can bet on my bottom dollar, that if you strive hard to be
perfect in your field, no one gonna ask you why you did your summers in some
other field.
Now comes a myth breaker. Many
students feel that working in start-ups will not add much value to them as
compared to some well known companies. Guys use your grey cells and try to
think for a while where the opportunity is more. I think you got it right. It’s
the start-ups who provide us the opportunity to experiment. In the high end companies, it might be possible that they won’t give you any work for two months. On
the other side, a company which has just put its steps in the market has a wide
dimension to experiment and generally the projects are like creating their
brand image or introduction of a complete new product in the market. Think what
tremendous amount of knowledge it will provide.
There are some students who consider
themselves as they are of no value and they don’t have that standard that they
can choose their company. These people always feel that they don’t have enough
confidence and they fear to put forward their points. Such people apply for
each and every company visiting the campus and their attitude creates a bad
impression in front of the company, which spoils the relationship of the
institute with the company. Here, I would like to tell them that for God’s
sake, you are an IIM student (har student ka khwaab). You have entered this
premier institute with your continuous efforts. And if you still feel that you
have many weak points then start working on them right now (not exactly, first
read the complete blog :P).
At the end I would like to say that we
are students of a new born IIM. No, no need to feel pity about it but what my
point is that it would be better if we keep our expectations low to some
extent. To be more precise, all the high end companies which are currently visiting
in so called Tier 1 institutes, might not visit so early to our campus. But if
you have that spirit in you, then one day you will definitely get your dream job. So try to focus on your interest, not the stipend.
Here I would like to quote one more line
said by the same great saint – Baba Ranchoddas
“Success
ke peeche mat bhaago, excellence ka peecha karo, success jhak maar ke tumhare
peeche aayegi”.
By
Rishabh
Bhardwaj
PGDM
2013-15
IIM
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