It all began in November 2018 when Big Basket came to our campus for recruitment. After a smooth Group discussion round, I qualified for the personal interview wherein my domain knowledge and the urge to learn was examined. Big Basket had the most meticulously planned summer internship program planned from April for 8 weeks. It started with 2-days induction program, where on Day-1 several meetings were conducted with the process owners who gave us a brief into the current processes, followed by of course, coffee sessions and lunch provided by the company during induction. The second day of induction had our DC visit in Jigani, Karnataka which is one of India's largest distribution center.
The next day, our actual internship work started where I was assigned a mentor who within a span of 70 mins explained properly to all the interns under him how Big Basket works, how B2B works and by the way that was the department assigned to me. Then started the 8 weeks of learning and fun with the B2B team and the rest of the interns. The project given to me was Category wise planning: Sales trend and forecasting tool for B2B where my first year of MBA helped me understand the project requirement. I couldn’t be happier because I had been given a project which involves two of the domains, I wish to pursue my career i.e. Marketing and Analytics. But then things move fast at Big Basket, so you need to be on your toes every day. All the work I did was deeply rooted in research of the categories in B2B vertical and driven by data. The best about working in any start-up is there are no reporting time and Big Basket also follows the same trend which means no mandatory number of hours that we had to clock at office. In fact, it has one of the best working environments.
Apart from domain learning and giving recommendations to the team when they faced problem, I also made good friends. During our tea breaks, we played Foosball which made our internship full of fun. I learnt impeccable communication and presentation skills and how to field questions with confidence in front of everyone including leaders. I came out of my summer internship more polished and a professional person than I had ever been.
Lastly, about my mentor Mr Kuldeep Bakshi, Head of Buying and Merchandising. One of the most dynamic people, I have come across in my life. He is such a good manager to work with. Not only he gave us knowledge about the business, he guided us with our career plans. He took us for team lunch and helped us with important matters during internship like where we get the best food nearby and the best tea.
All in all, my internship was a “big basket” full of learning, experience and lots of fun. So, if you are planning of pursuing your career in e-commerce or retailing then Big Basket is the best place to work for.