“
Every Day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.” - Matsuo Basho
It’s the fourth week of our internship, and we are slowly nearing to the end of our two months stint. The internship is truly like a journey and we interns are sailing through its different ventures every day. From the day you enter your team till the day you deliver your project, every experience is a different one which helps you explore yourself even more.
So, my second week at Mahindra started with the team introduction and interaction with my manager and the buddy. As anyone would have expected that this first interaction would have been an awkward one but it was not, the reason being the scheduled guide and buddy calls before we even joined the company. Those short chats really helped me to understand the project to some extent beforehand, be prepared with what to expect from my internship experience and also helped me get rid of awkwardness with my peers. Therefore, my first day in the project was a casual introduction with the rest of the team, where they gave me a walk through of the whole business and what projects are currently being worked on.
Mahindra Susten is the cleantech arm of the Mahindra partners and is mainly into the Solar PV business. Hence, my project required knowledge of electrical engineering and power generation, with which I was not well acquainted. Being an Industrial Engineer and an IT professional for four years prior to joining IIM Bangalore, this area was pretty new to me. Aware of this situation, my guide shared various documents which would help me understand the industry well and also asked me to approach anyone from the team anytime when I got stuck anywhere. Therefore, most of my first week was spent in exploring and understanding the power generation and the equipment used in it. And my team was also accommodating and approachable in this respect.
The best part of my stint is that I am the owner of my project. On the first day itself, my manager told me that in Mahindra Susten everyone is a
free bird and they have to find their way on their own, no one will spoon feed you. And this pushed me even further to explore my inquisitions before I approached anyone for help. I realized, brainstorming about what you really need an answer for helps you to filter out all the obvious or irrelevant questions. It’s good to stay foolish and hungry for knowledge, but it’s better to know what you are really looking for as an answer. This is what my first two weeks in my project taught me and has improved my research abilities.
Another thing that I realized was that talking to people who are not related to your field of work helps you to understand your work even more, because while making them understand what you are doing, you break it down into simpler terms, thereby making it more straightforward for yourself. Learning this, I adopted this habit and shared my difficulties & hindrances with my friends interning/working in other companies, who are not related to my area of work, and got many insights which could help me in my work.
I am sure my learnings from this internship are definitely going to add on to my remaining management studies. Now like everyone else, it’s time for the mid-term review, and even I am working hard on my presentation. Let’s see how it goes, and I hope to achieve the expectations of my peers and even myself in the remaining weeks of my stint at Mahindra Susten.
Signing off until next time!