Hello all, This is Krishna Chaitanya (ECE dept) of 2010 passout batch.

I was successful in getting placed in the premium company recruitment drive held between 21st to 31st dec 2009. I got placed in INFOSYS which is top in my preference list of companies (INFOSYS, TCS, CTS, WIPRO). Hence I wanted to share some of my experiences and tips for my juniors. The below information is most suitable to IT companies and is only my opinion regarding how to attend an IT company. According to me, the order of things which one should do before attending any company is 1. Know about the company this tells you if the company suits you or not. Dont attend the company if you are not interested in the company. 2. Prepare well for the written test 3. Prepare for interviews (should spend lot of time on this compared to the above ones) I had done lot of home work regarding the companies by meeting people who work in those particular companies for two reasons. Primarily, I had to make a preference list of these companies. Secondly, to know some points about the company which are not available in the website. For example, for INFOSYS It is choosy about its clients. It even rejects projects if they dont like the clients background (which most of the other companies dont dare to do!!!) It has CMM level 5 certificate (it is a standardization given by some organization). Even other companies have it but they doesnt maintain the same standard after getting the certificate It is process oriented

Please understand, am not boasting about Infosys as I got placed in it. My point here is every company has some unique points which others dont have. Understanding these points will help you answer questions better when they ask why you want to join their company. Coming to written test, refer www.freshersworld.com & www.placementpapers.net . In these websites you get previous test papers and interview experiences. The question paper pattern can be changed, so be prepared with puzzles, synonyms and antonyms. INFOSYS paper was easy; it has simple aptitude and moderate verbal section. CTS aptitude was very easy, they have sectional time limits and give more time to aptitude when compared to verbal. The verbal section in CTS was the toughest part amongst the tests of the 4 companies (mostly because not enough time was given for verbal section) TCS exam has normal aptitude again and the verbal section had synonyms and antonyms (my friends prepared GRE Barrons for the test but they told me that it dint help them). WIPRO test is also easy but it had 10 technical questions. No worries, they concentrate on the fundamentals of C and C++. For our batch TCS was the only company which had no sectional cutoffs. This may change!!! Coming to interviews, as the companies come to recruit FRESHERS, they dont expect you to be an expert in any field (at least these 4 IT giants). So we just need to show in our interview that we are willing to learn many new things and are capable of working in a stressed environment. Be prepared with

basics of your respective core subjects, C and C++, most importantly about the projects you have done TCS and WIPRO have technical interviews where you have to be prepared well with any of your 2 subjects (this may not be the same sometimes coz many of my friends were asked basics from all the core subjects of their respective groups). TCS technical interview was also very easy, just asks basics in any of the 2 core subjects and C and C++. WIPRO recruits for two posts; one under software department and another under VLSI department (eligible only for ECE group). Technical interview for software job was easy but for VLSI job was tough, they asked from the depth of the subject like stating some laws and deriving expressions for them. Primarily it is important to prepare a good resume. Dont worry even if you got very less to put in your resume. Number of pages in your resume doesnt matter but the way you present your resume really matters. Believe me I had a one page resume well presented and it worked. Secondly it is more important to be prepared with your resume. Few HR managers might ask you to explain any word in your resume. So dont include complicated words unless you know their meaning and correct usage. Be confident throughout the interview. For the HR interview be ready to answer some questions like Tell me about yourself? Role model Short term and long term goals About your family Likes and dislikes Social activities Achievements Strengths and weakness Hobbies Happiest moment in life Life changing incidents Difficult situation encountered in life and how did u over come it

When you tell about some quality of yours in an interview they test you on that quality by asking many questions in different ways. They see if you show that quality in all of your answers and find out if it is your real quality or just trying to fool them. For example, in my INFOSYS interview I told that I learn from my mistakes. Then I was asked what I would do if I was not given a job in INFOSYS. Then I gave an answer like this Sir, I would go home and recollect what I have spoke in my interview and how I have presented myself in the interview. If I realize any mistake, I would definitely improve and prepare well on that aspect and again apply for INFOSYS job If I had told that I would search for another job, then am sure he would have kicked me out the next minute. Being a student from a very good engineering college, they expect, you are planning for further studies but we are not supposed to tell that but again if you tell that you are not interested in further studies and then they would think that you are not willing to learn and only need a job to earn money. So when I was asked about my further studies I replied like this. Sir, right now am a bit confused to go either for research or for masters program or MBA program. So I first wanted to get into an industry, work for 3 to

4 years and understand the corporate needs and simultaneously understand the area in which I can excel. So I would then make a choice accordingly but right now I dont have an intension to study I found a good way of answering when the HR manager asks you why you want to join their company. I thought if I had any 1 quality in common between me and the company, so that I would stress on it. From my home work, I found out that INFOSYS is process oriented and TATA is into many different sectors and has established a large network in Asia. These are the qualities which I can relate to. My answers for the both the companies are below. Please remember that you should really have a quality in common with the company coz if you try making up a quality which is not yours then the HR manager can easily find it out. INFOSYS Sir, I can relate myself with INFOSYS. INFOSYS is process oriented and strategically implements its ideas. Even I plan before I start performing any task. I would prioritize my work and set reminders for my work so that I can complete it within time. And I believe when my principles match with the companys, I can do well in such an organization. Also INFOSYS is known for its brand and it is a CMM level 5 certified company. TCS Sir, I can relate myself with TCS. TCS is Asias largest IT Company; TATA is widely spread into different sectors. Even I have a large network, I have many friends studying in IITs, NITs, BITS, in other JNTU and OU affiliated colleges. And most importantly I work in a NGO called BHUMI where I have friends from various backgrounds and belonging to different age groups. I believe in large networks, suppose when I need to buy a camera, I would search for a guy in BHUMI who is interested in photography and would ask the best specifications of a camera for my use. And I believe when my principles match with the companys, I can do well in such an organization. The day before my TCS interview, I was browsing TCS website to understand more about the company. Then I found TCS targets for 2009-10. They are; public reporting on climate change issues, 10% increase in Rain water harvesting, 5% decrease in Power Consumption. They promote the Reduce, Reuse and Recycle philosophy. So I highlighted this point in my interview. I said Sir, I will be proud to have a TCS tag because TCS is not purely into business but is also concerned about the global issues like climate change etc there was a smile on the HR manager face when I made this point. He appreciated me saying that am someone who told a different point about TCS. He dint ask me any question after that, he said it was very nice talking to me and asked if I had any questions before leaving. The mantra for doing your interview well is to be confident about yourself, behave in a polite manner and have control over your emotions. Some interviewers test your emotions, they try to degrade you but you should not be depressed or annoyed on the interviewer, instead you need to convince him by stating facts supporting yourself. In my INFOSYS interview when I said I conducted an event in my college, interviewer argued saying I was just lying. He was actually checking how I would react to that. Then I smiled at him and explained what all I have done to convince him. Even in TCS interview some girls were grilled so badly saying that they are only good at studies but not in any extra curricular activities. They remained bold and justified themselves and at the end of the day they were selected for TCS.

It is not necessary that you answer every question asked in the interview but should answer everything confidently. In fact you should confidently say when you dont know any answer. It would be great if you give a reason for not knowing the answer. In my TCS technical interview he asked some basic questions from my favourite subject. Then he started asking about data structures. When he asked me 1st question, I said I dont know. He asked 2nd question, this time also I said dont know but with a reason. I said Sir, I have no idea about data structures. We ECE students are not taught data structures, it wont be their in our curriculum My friend was asked 10 questions in an HR interview. He dint have any proper answer for the first 8, but the last 2 he answered with confidence. He even supported himself stating examples. He too cleared that round of interview and went to the next round. My friend who is from MECH department was asked Why should I recruit a MECH engineer in an IT industry? How are you useful to the organisation? he answered very politely like this Sir, you know that am from a MECH dept but you still selected me for the final round of interview, so it shows that even a MECH engineer is useful for organisation He too got selected for TCS. The last advice I would give is asking questions to the interviewer when your interview is done. Even though the interviewer doesnt ask if you have any questions, you tell him politely that you have some questions to ask. For me asking questions to interviewer is the last opportunity to prove oneself in an interview. If you think you dint answer well to the questions the interviewer has asked or if you think you created a negative impression about yourself while answering. You can still change his impression by asking GOOD QUALITY questions. Below are some questions which you should and should not ask after an interview. SHOULD NOT ASK Will an ECE/EEE/MECH/BME/CIVIL guy be given special training compared to CSE and IT guy? This shows that you yourself are telling the interviewer that you cant challenge a CSE guy. Will I have an option to prefer the technology in which I work? - This shows that you are not flexible enough and adjustable to any work. Instead you can change the way of asking this question. Look at the 1st point in SHOULD ASK What are the major domains in which you work? This shows that you have not researched about the company.

SHOULD ASK In how many technologies will I be trained? After placing me in a project will I have have an opportunity to learn other technologies as well? Will the company sponsor for my further studies? How should I train myself before joining your company?

In all the above questions it shows that you are eager to learn many things. If you find the interviewer friendly, then you can ask him a question What kind of apprehensions you had when you joined this company? How did you grow to this position? You can ask many questions other than the above

mentioned but be prepared with them and see to it that it will not create any negative impression like which I mentioned above. Our placement officer had done a great job. The premium company recruitment drive was successful only because of UMA MAHESHWAR sir. 30 mins before the CTS test was to begin, telangana agitators came and asked us to leave the campus and said there would be no placements until a decision is taken on telangana issue. But our sir with the help of some students convinced them by saying that companies will not come back again if they are not allowed to conduct the test now. I would like to thank sir for his instantaneous thought to shout JAI TELANGANA on 23rd dec. He asked us to shout JAI TELANGANA when telangana agitators came to interrupt our event. That was a brilliant way of handling a critical and tense issue I have ever seen. The next day when this agitation has increased in the campus, companies refused to come to the campus for conducting interviews but Uma maheshwar sir coordinated with all the companies to have interviews in their respective companies. Its not a easy job, generally companies doesnt accept due to security reasons and more over when they have apprehensions about OU college students doing any harm to their companies. But sir took all the responsibility in assuring that engineering college students were very obedient and doesnt do any harm to their companies. Thanks again to the big brain behind it.

ALL THE BEST!!