In this article, Sanjana Bansod a student of IIM Kashipur who interned at Numocity Technologies Pvt. Ltd. in Sales and Marketing Domain talks about her summer internship experience. Find out about how her onboarding process went, what her learnings are, and her experiences during this internship.
Hi, Tell us about how you got selected for this internship? Take us through the moment you realized you had got the internship.
So we were around 10 students who got selected for the interview round. Since it's an EV SAAS startup company, having a background of Electrical Engineering and work ex in sales and operations for logistics, helped me convince the interviewer that I was the fit for the job. I was well prepared with questions regarding my work experience. When the results came out, the company had selected 2 of us and I was very excited to be the one who cracked it.
On joining the company as an intern, how has your onboarding experience been like?
Onboarding was very smooth as our mentor was very helpful and friendly in making us understand the company and its values. From the first day itself, we were assigned some small interesting tasks which further excited us to learn even more.
How has your interaction with the team members and colleagues been like? How will you make sure to leave the best impression on your supervisors by the end of the internship?
We were 2 of us who got selected for the internship and we have a really good bond and are very helpful towards each other. Our mentor is the same and we have meetings twice per week. We make sure that we are well prepared with our work before the meeting and discuss our suggestions openly which is appreciated every time by our mentor.
Tell us in brief, about the project you are currently working on and how is this project going to help the company?
Since the project is confidential, I will be sharing just an overview of my work. It includes doing market research about different companies from the same sector, in India as well as across the world. This will help the company in making a go-to strategy for building a platform for its customer acquisition. Recently I have also been assigned to do a Market Estimation exercise in order to learn how to project the upcoming market for the next 10 years.
Give us an overview of how you prepared for your summer placement season.
Since I have quite a few years of work experience, I was well prepared with the questions about my company and job profile. It is an opportunity to market yourself, so a well-prepared resume and knowledge about the domain will be very useful. But the most important thing is confidence which will make a good impression on the interviewer.
Based on your internship experience till now, what are some necessary skill sets one must be prepared with before starting an internship?
Excel and Presentation skills are most important in order to enhance our learnings in summers. Basic knowledge of excel can help save time and improve analysis of trends and patterns in large amounts of data. The presentation will improve your communication skills at work and will obviously help to build stronger customer relationships.
What are some new skills that you have developed while working in the company?
While working towards building a Customer Acquisition Strategy, there has been a tremendous improvement in doing my market research. Also, Market Estimation is something that was very interesting to learn.
What are some of the challenges that you have faced in your internship and how have you overcome them?
In order to know the onboarding process of the other companies/Competitors, it was very difficult to get in touch with the employees. Their websites had the same process followed, but none had shown the roadmap for onboarding. With constant efforts to somehow get in contact via call center or other methods, I could finally get to know some processes.
Tell us about a situation where you were complemented by your Manager for your work.
The efforts put in order to know the onboarding processes of other companies/competitors were really appreciated. It was an unexpected and risky method, but the courage to give it a try was complemented not just by my Manager, but also the rest of the office staff.
What have been your major learnings during the internship?
Always give a push to yourself to work better. The result isn't important, but the struggle and process to get the impact, matter.
Tell us about your final presentation of the project to your manager in brief. What was the toughest question asked during the presentation and how did you answer it?
The final presentation was hectic and lasted for around 45mins. But the research done by me was very well appreciated. The toughest question was regarding the market estimations for the years 2025 and 2030. Based on the research, news, and various reports, I was able to answer the question.
Some advice that you would like to give to your juniors based on your internship experience.
Internships are for learning. So give your all to learn and grasp whatever you can about the company, industry in these 8 weeks. Each activity will give u a new perspective about the market and the experience that you get after this internship will be very much useful for your final placements.
What was one of the best moments according to you during your internship?
The final presentation of course was a great experience. To present for straight 45mins and to be able to answer all the questions, with an appreciation at the end, was indeed the best moment.
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TIMELINE, PROCESS AND RULES
- You don't need to register on InsideIIM.com or on the Kampus App to take part in Summer Saga Season 8. Simply share your experiences in the Digital Diary. To maintain standardisation, every Digital Diary will have a few questions that you'll need to answer.
- Access all the Digital Diaries forms from here: Digital Diary 1 | Digital Diary 2 | Digital Diary 3 | Digital Diary 4 | Digital Diary 5
- Your overall submission will be evaluated on the following parameters:
-Completeness: This depends on the number of Digital Diaries you have filled.
-Value Addition: This depends on how in-depth your answers have been. The score for this parameter will be given by our Judges.
-Reach: This depends on how many unique people have read your internship experience once we publish the article. We maintain fair play, we will publish all the articles on the same day, so that you can also share the same in your network.
- There is also a title called, ‘Campus With The Most Interesting Interns’ that will be awarded to (a) the campus that submits the maximum number of entries and (b) the campus that submits the best quality entries (based on the score given by our judges). The minimum entries from campus to be considered for this title is 10. So, if you want your campus to win the title then make sure your classmates and other students from your b school share their experiences in this year's Summer Saga Competition.
This competition is broadly divided into four categories. Refer to the table below to know more about prizes in each category.
Prize Money
|
Category
|
|
Banking and Finance
|
Sales, Marketing and General Management
|
Operations
|
HR, Consulting and Others
|
1st Prize |
₹ 10,000 |
₹ 10,000 |
₹ 10,000 |
₹ 10,000 |
Runner Up |
₹ 5,000 |
₹ 5,000 |
₹ 5,000 |
₹ 5,000 |
The 1st Prize winner will also get a one-hour 1-on-1 career guidance session with an industry stalwart, from our panel of mentors in Kounsel.
ABOUT THE JUDGES
Every year, we have Campus Managers from some of the top companies (such as Reliance, HSBC, Flipkart, ABG, HUL, TAS, etc) judging the annual Summer Saga competition. We will release the details of the judges of Summer Saga Season 8 soon!
Check out the previous year's
winners!
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Maybe this will help you reflect and recall these two months as well (which can come in handy when appearing for interviews in the future). InsideIIM is the perfect platform to chronicle your experiences, your highs, your lows and everything in between.
So guys, what are you waiting for? Start writing! You have a voice. You have the experience. Make the best of it!