Renewed interest in job

coming out of an interview with not so flying colours, you may suddenly develop a renewed interest in your job. may be because you suddenly realise the truth behind that old adage – a bird in hand is better than two in the bush.

seems i am passing through a similar phase. after my interview with accenture and genpact, i have suddenly started feeling that my job is still better.

genpact dealt with instructional design and e-learning that i was always against doing. only that they were offering me a supervisory post and into editing that i agreed. and in accenture, it was business writing, another hated style of writing. creative writing is my forte and it is creative writing that i seek opportunities in.

In search of greener pastures

sometimes i behave too childishly (some people will quip to say that most of the times i behave as one). just as a child gets excited at the merest prospect of a good life, so do i.

i got this call from accenture and genpact. had to appear for an interview there on a sunday. my eyes glowed with dreams of working in a new company, that too with a chic crowd of a BPO. i had forever wanted to work in one and now was the opportunity.

on friday, the interview plans were suddenly preponed. the consultant called that genpact people were holding interviews on saturday instead of sunday. i wasnt ready for last minute changes. had already taken a leave on friday, and one more leave would surely fire my boss. thankfully he wasnt in india, so i safely decided to take the chance.

hopped for gurgaon early in the morning on saturday. was expecting a tedious journey. but as is luck – the expected seldom happens – i got a direct bus to connaught place from where i got another direct bus to dhaula kuan and then to gurgaon.

i reached genpact an hour earlier. to my surprise they had an extensive security machinery installed at the entry gates. fortunately i had my pan card or else i would have kept waiting at the gates.

once inside, i found there were many who had come over for interviews. didnt know there were so many content writers in competition. subsequently discovered that interviews were being conducted for several processes.

vinay too had come over for the graphic designer’s post. wanted to avoid him at first; later went over to him and had some bantering. also scolded him for not coming to rahul’s marriage.

soon co-ordinators came over to take us to classified testing areas. while we were handed papers and pencils, vinay and his tribe was handed the computers.

the test had some 45 questions. the questions were okay – neither too tough nor too easy. my forte was the essay that was at the end. the topic i chose was one with which i could have related to best – commuting to gurgaon.

there was a particular set of questions that was particularly incomprehensible to me. the instruction was “using the diagram below, identify the product”. immediately following were four abstract sentences. immediately after were more lines and i didn’t know what has to be done with these least related things and how on the earth can i find a product out of these.

talking to the co-ordinator once didnt help. the second time, she directed me to the actual instruction. this was “spot the errors in the following article”. god this was so easy. and all the time i was trying to make some idea out of all these.

one good change was that i was the last one to give my papers. i checked the paper thoroughly this time (i remember how exam co-ordinators used to shout at us to check for last minute mistakes and we seldom followed). may be because i have grown a little more responsible.

didnt feel the test satisfactory. there were four of us. the coordinator said she would call us in some 20 minutes after she is done with the checking. in the meantime i called in swati from accenture to schedule the interview for the same. didnt tell her i was here for another interview. she agreed.

having finished with the coffee at the cafetaria, i joined the other three for some talks. talked well about my job and the company; in fact one of the girls said it might be really good to work with my company. he who experiences knows well, i thought. they too were from biggies like yatra.com and cybermedia.

little did i know that the aged lady who was the exam coordinator would be taking the tech interviews. mine was the last. time was ticking and i feared if i would be on time for the interview at accenture. she was really sweet and we discussed many things. i talked about shakespeare and as if in disbelief she asked me to name the plays that i had studied. she caught me however on quotes from the plays. now who tells her that we didnt have to learn the quotes by heart. she in turn quoted that very popular one “if music be the food of love …”. i faked being impressed.

the tech interview over, i was headed for the HR interview. here was this guy who seemed very young, in fact also seemed someone known. but he had sharp, probing eyes. we were particularly stuck on the shifts. genpact has very odd timings, the oddest starting at 3.30 in the morning and ending at 12.30. the other started at 12.30 in the noon and ended at 8.30 in the night. the last shift was from 8.30 in the night to 3.30 in the morning. all of them so absurd. he knew by my looks that i wasn’t very comfortable to the shifts, although i showed that i was willing. why such odd shifts for content developers who have to do no interaction with clients from afar?

also there were salary issues. i overheard him saying that i am demanding more. okays he came out and worded that usual recruiter’s dialogue “we will inform you later”.

it was already 2.15 and i had to rush. didn’t know if swati had booked the slot for 2 o’clock. instantly took a rickshaw, after much haggling with the rickshaw-wallah. reached accenture at around 2.30. wasn’t as big as genpact. also didn’t want to take up a pure writing job. but as there was nothing good to do, i thought lets take a chance.

once inside accenture premises, i saw there were several people sitting in the reception area for the interviews. i took my seat at the corner with this huge LCD TV installed on the wall just overhead me. my head was aching like anything. the tiger woods ad repeatedly showing on the TV further worsened the headache. may be because of the day long fasting. i only had an apple for breakfast. immediately rushed for the cafetaria where i had two glasses of water and a cup of coffee. the headache seemed a little better now.

met here a girl from wipro infotech. coming for interviews can be beneficial since you get to meet people from several companies. she said she had been waiting for some fifteen minutes. she had just been five months in her last organisation and felt the interviewer will surely ask her why she is job searching so early. i asked her to be confident and as she has already come, just give the interview confidently.

she was called immediately thereafter. when she returned with a gloomy face, i thought she was coming to pack her bags. instead, she had to wait for the written test. just then a guy came out frustrated as to why he has been kept waiting for so long. he was somehow pacified.

some very pretty girls had come – some were employees, others were here for interviews. a girl, who had come over from accenture bangalore, looked really pretty in the long gown and a body clinging top.

i had this HR interview with another sweet HR. she asked me if i was ready to do business writing. still as i wanted to sit for the written tests, i showed my willingness. in reality, i hate business writing. also knew i wouldn’t be able to do business writing. still don’t know what was stopping me from leaving accenture.

this guy who was entrusted the task of reading out candidates fate announced that i am to sit down for the tests, which would span some 2 hours. god it was already 5 and in another two hours it would be 7. how come will i get a bus back home. okz let’s take a chance.

the written tests included a memo that was to be edited and a memo that was to be written out using a few slides with figures. the second part appeared perplexing, but once i got down to writing the same, it didnt appear as difficult.

i completed the tests in an hour. i was now anxious to leave. but as i had waited for so long, why not wait for some more time. in some time the same guy came to announce that i come with him to a room to fill out the forms. this was an extensive form requiring me to talk about marks percentage from tenth and twelth that i little remember.

was in the middle of completing the form when a stern looking HR called me to follow her. she seemed quite tired- dont know with my resume or by the large number of interviews that she might have to take that day.

she didn’t seem impressed. and then my confidence slowly started giving away.  and then the usual recruiter’s dialogue was blurted out.

knew it was time to come out of accenture as well.

it was 10 in the night when i came back home. was feeling very hungry. grabbed three rotis and subji left over from the lunch. brother tried to console me that there would be many good opportunities to come. i said there was no need for the counselling since i wasnt feeling bad. by sunday i had forgotten everything. in the evening we partied. joined from today with the hope of reviving my boring job, but with me blogging instead shows that my job is not going to revive so early.