'Work Hard, Party Harder' - Varun's Internship Experience At Nestle India Limited - NITIE
The word Summer Internship brings out different emotions in people- the most common ones being curiosity and excitement. Most of us are excited to go to a company for two months and be able to test our classroom learning in the real world. Same was the case with me. The day I got selected for Nestle, I was very excited to be given the opportunity as we grew up with the company’s products. Be it Maggi or Kitkat, we have all bought a Nestle product at some point of time in our lives. My curiosity level kept peaking as I kept waiting for the day Nestle would send me the mail regarding my joining. Needless to say, once the confirmation mail came, I was ready to take on my internship and give it my best shot. The induction was fun and interesting, we got an overview of the all the processes being carried out at Nestle. The company had also planned various trips for us throughout the week. We got the opportunity to see the process of taking orders from the retail stores along with the salesmen. We saw the plant at Samalkha and visited the R&D Centre, which was the best experience of them all. Once the induction was over, we got our projects and that was the time when the work really started at full throttle. We were allotted our work stations and introduced to our mentors. My project was in Logistics, more specifically it was related to the Secondary Freight Optimization for Chennai Branch. I was introduced to the complete supply chain team at Nestle and my mentor explained the project to me. I was told that after some time I would also get the opportunity to travel to various warehouses across south India as my project was related to the Chennai branch. The first few days into the project were a bit confusing as I tried to get a grip on what was expected and tried to understand the need of the project. But slowly my understanding of project started becoming clearer. After a discussion with my guide I got much more clarity. I planned out my work with my guide and started working on the project. Whenever I was stuck somewhere I could ask anyone in the team for guidance and the discussions helped me move ahead with my work. In a few days I got the opportunity to travel to some warehouses around Chennai to see the ground reality. This was an informative experience for me as it helped me see the bigger picture. It helped me incorporate a lot of changes after discussions with the staff at the warehouse. I also got the opportunity to get hands-on experience in warehousing and got to observe various processes being carried out in the warehouse apart from the ones pertaining to my project. Throughout the project I was given complete freedom and flexibility. Whenever I needed any guidance I could approach anyone in the supply chain team. The discussions were insightful and helped me progress with my project. I got an opportunity to present my project to SCM Head of Nestle and other leading people in the senior management who gave me an encouraging feedback. My project’s recommendations are being implemented and I expect that they will fetch very good results. These 8 weeks at Nestle were an experience of a lifetime. They exceeded all my expectations. As it is said that work gets interesting if you enjoy doing it, and I definitely enjoyed my time at Nestle. Some advice that I would give to the soon to be mangers is to be open minded and be ready to learn, talk with various people and try to soak in as much about the business as possible. The two months will be full of surprises and might be tough at times but they will help build your character and prepare you for the future. As my mentor told me the first day he met me. “Work Hard, Party Harder”
