Sravan Pamar's Summer Internship At Samsung - TISS Mumbai
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”
“Everyone here has the sense that right now is one of those moments when we are influencing the future” – Steve Jobs. Such was the impact a Delhi-ite by heart, felt on entering the Blue Zone Cafe at Nivea India, reading her project description thrilled to be working in Mumbai, the city that never sleeps.
Interning with the Human Resources team in one of the world’s most admired companies was both exciting and challenging. The Walt Disney Company could well be called a media conglomerate with technology at the core of everything they do.
Hailing from the engineering background, when I thought of pursuing my career in HR, little did I know that I will land up getting an internship in Mercer Consulting (India) Private Ltd - where many HR professionals dream of their career. But bagging an internship at the company where you want, doesn't complete the work. The real journey starts after that....
I have outlined this piece (I will call it a show though) into 8 important scenes from my 8 weeks at Tata Steel. Hope you have a good read.
"What's your favourite show?" my boss asks as I walk into his cabin. "Iss pyaar ko kya naam doon," I reply with sparkling eyes. Oh, it's coming back for a new season; replies my boss with a smile. I struggle to control the surge of happiness that courses through me at the thought. Thus starts my first day at Star India Pvt Ltd. A refreshing cocktail of starry-eyed sightings of TV actors and former cricketers, TVs at every desk doling out generous portions of melodrama, romance and conspiracies to homely, warm and trusting housewives and a project that involved me analysing movies and shows, Star TV is only the best organisation I could have hoped to work for in my life. I can only hope that all MBA interns have half the luck I did to end up at a summer internship organisation that combines creativity with analysis, hard work with fun and global with local. On a work trip to Patiala, amidst gruelling focus groups discussions, Punjabi food feasts, horror stories of staying at a former palace alone, spiritual mornings doing seva at a gurudwara and phulkari dupatta shopping expeditions, I learnt a little about people and life; about priorities, living in the present and ambition. About the simple life, the importance of family and needs and desires of the masses. We get so caught up in the rat race in school, college, work and life that we forget that one doesn't need much to be happy, perhaps money, success and prestige are not what one should strive for, perhaps simplicity, love and family are more important and one shouldn't lose sight of them. These two months gave me some time to think about my future, career and what it is that I wanted to do in life. I asked myself why I was enjoying my internship so much, was it the industry (being a mass media graduate, the exhilarating world of media had always called out to me), was it the product which I was so passionately involved with, was it the work environment with friendly bosses and guides who were there to guide me every time I needed it, was it the project that spoke to the writer in me while also appealing to the logical, rational part within me or was it simply the fact that I was finally working for my dream organisation. I realised that it was probably a combination of all these factors and that I didn't need to find a reason for the happiness I felt as I walked through the glass doors of the office. Very few people know what they're looking for and even fewer find it and have the luck to make a career in it. They say "Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life." I have found what I love and no matter what happens in the future, I shall forever remain grateful to Star for helping me find my calling in life.
We all see a lot of mutual fund advertisements on television and most of us wonder how these things work. I was so very fortunate to work in a company which is at the zenith of Mutual Funds and Financial Services.
In the aftermath of the two and a half day long, bloody, sweaty battle of SIP, as dust (of the after-party) settled and people counted their wounds and in-Hand Stipend, the greetings around the campus turned from “which lecture?” to “which company?”