In this article, Sarah Gajbhiye ,a student of IIM Bodh Gaya who interned at Tata Steel Ltd. in the Sales and Marketing domain talks about her summer internship experience. Find out about how she prepared for the summer placements, her onboarding process, her experiences & what her learnings are during this internship.
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Hi, Tell us about how you got selected for this internship? Take us through the moment you realized you had got the internship.
I had a summer internship offer in the very first month of my MBA which was with a small startup and I realised and kept telling myself each day that "this is not where I belong, I belong in a big company, amongst intellectual people and students" (No offense to startups, I just never got the correct vibes). With this thought, I started my search for a good and satisfying internship. After a number of rejections consistently for more than 3 or 4 months, I came across a site of Tata Steel Ltd. under the name of 'Tata Prashikshan' that claimed to offer internships and scholarships to students and I was extremely excited and elated that I finally got an opportunity and I went forward and filled the form. Then come the tougher times, a lot of wait, no answer in the initial days of application submission. Only then when I was about to give up, comes an email in my phone which states that my application has been approved and I am now officially a marketing intern at Tata Steel Ltd.
I literally was so overwhelmed and had tears of joy that I finally did it and that I'll get to work with the best in the market. I was very excited and happy. Today, my internship has started and I must say, I don't regret waiting for those 3-4 months to get such an amazing internship. As they say, the wait was worth it!
On joining the company as an intern, how has your onboarding experience been like?
Employees of Tata group are known for maintaining good relations outside and a respectable workplace. Not only have I heard these sayings but also experienced it. Even though the interns were not allowed in the department and were working from home. We were given a formal and a beautiful onboarding experience. With all those gifts, guides, their help, professional behavior and whatnot. I personally felt welcomed by the people and in their work culture.
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?
My mentor, Mr. Rajashri Hore's cooperation is the epitome of 'how to have engaging conversations with interns', in my opinion. He explained a lot of topics to me and was very polite when describing how things worked. He is always enthusiastic to start a conversation, answering all of my questions thoroughly, particularly because I had very little idea on how B2B and B2C worked.I am grateful to be in the company of such a cooperative team, particularly my mentor, as I always received adequate clarifications and answers from him to all my doubts.
Talking about the next question, I always had two phases whenever I thought of my internship. Those were- 1) Getting one and 2) Acing it
When I got my internship, I focused on the second point. I read relavant articles, watched videos on the same topic. When the internship started, initially I faced few hardships as it was wfh but sooner I established great connections with my mentor and other colleauges too. Networking helps and through this I am hoping to make professional connections here at the company. Other than this few points that I ensure to make an impression on my guides are
- To have adequate communication
- To update my work in time rather than on time
- Ensuring that my research work and recommendations are of great quality to them as a company etc.
Tell us in brief, about the project you are currently working on and how is this project going to help the company?
My project revolves around the task to search, recommend and design digital avenues of Tata Steel product distributors in Faridabad, Haryana.
The major scope of the assigned project includes the identification of channel partners of Tata Steel in Faridabad and to get to know about their digital presence. If not present digitally on different platforms, I was expected to design few strategies to increase their digital media presence over the time and to ensure smooth functioning of it.
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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!