interview-preparation on S Anand

Prof Vijay Kumars Interview tips

Sat, 10 Feb 2001 12:00:00 +0000

Prof. Vijay Kumar was kind enough to give us hints on how to prepare for placements.

How to prepare for interviews

Have a list of intelligent but unoffensive questions for each company.
Contact alumni who are working there, and find out what work is like.

What should I find out

How does the work improve my employability or value? Specifically in terms of the
- Nature of work
- The experience that I get
- Skills acquired
What will the salary growth be over time?
What are the perks at different levels?
What are the promotion and growth opportunities?
What industries does the company focus on?
How many people are there, and what is the employee growth rate?
What do clients feel about you? (Talk to clients themselves – maybe friends in client organisations.)
Which is the largest office? Where are most of the projects executed? (It makes a lot of sense to get into this office. Project staffing is usually done with people in the same office.)

What should I question

Revenue per employee. Is the denominator total employee hours or billable hours? That makes a big difference. Usually its the former, to make it look inflated.
Why are you giving me international figures? What are the Indian figures for revenue per consultant? Revenue per partner? Salary per consultant? Billable hour percentage? Consultant to partner ratio? As a rule of thumb, the consultant’s salary is one-fifth of the revenue per consultant. For partners, its usually half.
What components of the cost-to-company will come to my pocket? Could you break down the components of the cost-to-company?
What component of the pay is sign-on? The larger the sign-on, the less the basic pay, and hence the less the next year’s pay.

What does an interviewer want

Brains: logical thinking, primarily
Creativity
Hard-work, but one can take that for granted for a person from the IIMs
Willing to take direction, and yet is a self-starter
A person who can explore new ideas on their own
Good interpersonal relationships
A person who can make casual conversation
Can suavely deflect objectionable questions
Well dressed, good posture, etc.

Should I go for consulting?

If you like solving problems, want to move quickly from one assignment to another, and like helping people, you’re good for consulting.

How are consultants evaluated?

Quality of assignments
Followup on assignment
Client feedback
Budget overruns (applicable more to PLs and managers)
Input into thought leadership and knowledge-base
Strengths and weaknesses
Future directions for improvement.

Comments

pegasus 2 Feb 2007 11:03 am: nice points… I also once had the fortune of visiting him in person.

Placement magazine

Fri, 29 Sep 2000 12:00:00 +0000

LBS’ placement cell publishes a magazine called Target, some of whose pages I’ve scanned. It gives an idea about what consulting and finance is, what companies look for, how to prepare for interviews, alumni feedback, etc. Sorry about the small size of scanning, but I had to conserve disk space. I’ll bring the book to IIM-B when I come back.

Student Exchange Interview

Sat, 20 Nov 1999 12:00:00 +0000

There were 22 vacancies, and 45 were shortlisted (out of less than 70 applicants). We were interviewed by 5 panels, each with 2 professors. We had submitted our resumes, a writeup on why we were applying for the programme, various declarations and our grade sheet. Though it was rumoured that grades played a 50% part in shortlisting, it was not so. Each panel ranked their candidates independently (in which grades played only an implicit part) – so it was the interview that really counted. After ranking, they pooled the rankings across panels (this is probably where grades might come in) and allocated the first available preference by rank. If the universities you opted for are not available, you would not be considered for other universities even if your ranking is high. So it makes sense to fill out all the universities of your choice if you’re keen on going.

One standard question acroess panels was on aspects of Indian culture – particularly in Prof. CM Reddy’s panel. Questions ranged from “What was the Yaksha’s last question to Yudhisthira?” to “What is the essence of Indian spiritual philosophy?” Other standard questions were “What will you do for IIM-B once you come back?” and “How will you serve as the ambassador of IIM-B?”

Interview

How did you break your leg?
Do you think businesses have a social function?
What will you do for IIM-B when you come back?
Tell me more about your social contributions. (From my resume.)
What is the central message of Indian philosophy?

Prof. Mahadevan and Prof. Prakhya interviewed me. Both were IITians, and I discovered that Prof. Prakhya was also my school senior. Prof. Mahadevan was genuinely seeking an answer to all his questions. That is, he was really interested in how exchange students could improve IIM-B’s functioning. Prof. Prakhya was pretty sharp, and tried pricking holes in my arguments. Before I left, Prof. Mahadevan commented, “This is nothing to do with the interview, but I just wanted to say that, based on your resume, you have a great future.” Pallavi and I were selected for London Business School.

Learnings

I had ready-made answers to all their questions, and that helped.
I was passionate about all the answers. I think a feeling of genuineness came through.
As always, the resume counted for a lot.

Comments

Ramya 18 May 2007 8:15 am: Can I ask you to guide me thru the interview processes in Insead.In addition to this , they also have asked me to sumbit a brief yet all inspiring essay to avail the scholarship that can help me negate atleast 25% of the course fee..Thanks - Ramya
Gopinath 31 May 2011 7:06 am:Hi Anand,Just to trace back, can you just post as to what answers you gave to these questions.
Gopi

Citibank Leadership interview

Wed, 10 Nov 1999 12:00:00 +0000

Citibank awards Rs. 50,000 to 2-3 candidates from IIM Bangalore based on leadership traits. We had to submit ‘brief’ writeups on what leardership is, why we’re good leaders, what our social contributions and academic achievements are, etc., along with our resume. We also had to turn in a student and faculty nomination. Since I had lots of time (I was bedridden with a fractured ankle) I prepared quite well for this interview. 11 were shortlisted. The interviews were scheduled for 20 minutes each.

My preparation largely involved reading what I’d submitted, and preparing for some standard questions like ‘What are your career goals?’, ‘Strengths/Weaknesses’, etc. In our previous batch, 3 people won the award – Hemalata, Saurabh Singh and Sahil Bhandari. All 3 were good speakers with accents. So I brushed up my accent too – turned out to be unnecessary, though.

Prof. Umesh Rajamani & Prof. Rupa Chanda were on my panel. They asked me about my leg (I was on crutches), and went on reading the writeup. All questions were directly based on the writeup.

Interview

Who do you think are easier to lead? Tamilians or Kannadigas? (Prof. Umesh Rajamani asked this question, and soon said that he wasn’t really looking for an answer.)
Tell me about your experiences as a project leader at IBM.
Some details on your social contributions… (based on the writeup)
What are your extracurriculars at IIM-B?
What did you learn as the captain of your basketball team?

Mostly, they were asking me to expand on what was there in the writeup. It was a relaxed atmosphere, and Prof. Rupa Chanda was very encouraging. The results were announced on 3rd March. Sunny Sharma and I made it.

Learnings

I think they were looking for a well-rounded personality.
Personal experiences were given a lot of weight. They were especially interested in what I had done in such-and-such a situation.
all questions were based on the writeup and resume. I feel they gave equal weightage to the interivew and the writeup – but the writeup may have been used only for shortlisting.
Confidence during the interview was very important.
They were looking for someone with the ability to communicate well, too.

Comments

abhishek 10 Nov 1999 12:00 pm: it is great help to students like us to put such a interview in the site
T.R.Kiran Kumar 29 Oct 2008 11:34 pm: All question were related on one point to know Personality & his Patiency.
How far he can manage Risk analysis
& How confident his answers was. (Pratically & Proffessionally)
Roshan L. Joseph 10 Mar 2013 7:41 am: Please give me Prof. Umesh Rajamani’s email id as I am a friend of his father and wish to contact his Dad

Lehman Brothers interview

Sat, 09 Oct 1999 12:00:00 +0000

Lehman Brothers was recruiting Sales, Trading & Research in Tokyo, and Investment Banking in New York. If that sounds like greek, read Vault’s report on investment banking.

They seemed disappointed at the number of questions that came their way during their pre-placement presentation. There were hoping for a lot more, and agressive, questions. The people who came included Alan Cutter, Pamella, Isabella, Sarab Bhutani (all from New York), Dalip Awasthi and Sumant Gupta. They shortlisted 21 people for New York and 9 people for Tokyo. Rajesh Dalmia and I were on both shortlists.

My preparation for the interview was minimal. I went through the day’s newspapers; found out Lehman’s and IBM’s stock price (IBM because I used to work there); the Sensex, NASDAQ, Nikkei, etc. Read an article in the Economist on Central Banks (Sept ‘99). Overall, I put in about 3 hours on the previous day.

The first interview was with Dalip and Sumant. They had split themselves into 3 panels. Dalip and Sumant were for STR, while the others interviewed the remaining candidates. Sumant’s opening question was, “So you were at IIT Madras?” He was from IITM too. A year senior to me. I said, “Yeah. You were at Jamuna Hostel, right?” We went on a bit about IITM after that.

Interview

What were you doing at IBM? (We went into quite a bit of detail.)
What are your hobbies? (Again, quite a bit of detail.)
How do you value technology stocks? (This is where I scored. I said nobody knows.)
How did you find Japan in your earlier visits?

Sumant advised me to speak a little slower, and sent me to the next panel. Isabella and Sarab asked me about my long term plans, my intentions to work abroad, and whether I preferred I-Banking or STR. I said, “Equity research looks the most attractive, based on what I hear.” After a while, Sumand and Dalip called me back and asked a bit about basketball. With that, the STR interviews were closed. By 11PM, they announced that Manoj would be going to New York, and I would be working in Tokyo.

Learnings

The resume matters a lot. I filled mine with what looks ‘impressive’, and was shortlisted for both I-Banking and STR.
Lehman’s shortlisting parameters are: a good academic record, work experience in a reputed firm, and extra-curriculars – strictly in that order.
It helps to have a senior in the panel. (Manoj is from the IITs too.)
I think my work experience and prior travel to Japan worked in my favour too.

If I were preparing again for the Lehman Brothers summer interview, here’s how I’d go about it.

First, get a thin book about how to crack an interview from the library and read it, end-to-end. I say thin because it’s not worth spending more than 2-3 hours on the book, and you DO need to read it end-to-end. Of course, guides are available on the Internet, but it would be cheaper to borrow it than print it out.

Second, know thyself. That’s the most important part. Here are some questions for which you should have ready-made answers for. The rule-of-thumb, of course, is to be perfectly frank.

Why do you want to join Lehman Brothers / Investment banking / Finance?
What other companies have you applied for?
How have you been doing at IIM-B?
Tell me more about (any item on your resume).
What did you like/dislike about (any item on your resume).
What are your strengths and weaknesses (3 of each)?
Where do you see yourself 5/10/20 years down the line?

Ideally, you should get someone to interview you, ask you some of these questions. Catch your classmates, your seniors, anyone. Ask them to give you feedback on their first impression of you, and whether, if they were in that company, they would hire you. More importantly, why they wouldn’t, if at all.

Third, find out what the recruiters would be looking for. My guess is, they’re looking for someone with

Good communication skills – so speak slowly and clearly.
Confidence – so think your answer before speaking; ask for time if you need to think; relax if you’ve made a mistake.
Analytical skills and intelligence – so say “I don’t know” when you don’t, and tell them about all the analytical and intelligent things you’ve done before.

Fourth, learn a bit about the industry. Vault and Wetfeet have good industry guides. Don’t read it end-to-end. Just skim through it and get a feel of things. People haven’t gotten a feel of it after 2 months of working there, so perhaps 2 hours of skimming won’t tell you much. But it’ll get you used to the kind of words that are used there, like “80 hours a week”, “bond price”, etc.

Fifth, learn some concepts. You need to know what a stock or a share is, and what a bond is.f you’ve worked, you may like to know the share price of your former company, and why it’s there. You probably ought to have an opinion on some of the things happening in the business arena, so if you don’t have one, get one. Also make sure to look through SEO reseller pricing to pick out the best marketing strategy for your company. I’ve listed some possible questions below, and my answers, had I been asked these.

Do you think dot-coms are overvalued?: Yes. I don’t think that the productivity growth will benefit companies selling computers. I think it will benefit the users of computers. (No one knows, really, but we need an opinion and a reason.)
Are the second-phase of reforms going in the right direction?: No idea.
Why is the Euro falling, or why is the dollar rising?: No idea.
How would you value a petroleum company?: (I’m a chemical engineer, but…) I don’t know.

Well, the point, I guess, is not to have answers to all questions. The answer is to have a reason for any answer that you give. So do find out about what’s happening in the world. Read the papers. But don’t bother remembering everything. Just have an opinion on a few items of importance, with a reason.

Best of luck!

Comments

vishal 20 May 2007 7:13 am: I think this would really help ..its given nicely..& i have even copied it.. thanks for posting
nikhil 9 Oct 1999 12:00 pm: Hi,thanx for ur guidance ….
vikrant 9 Oct 1999 12:00 pm: thanks buddy … great use
Sera 9 Oct 1999 12:00 pm: I m thinking of applying for an entry level analyst position at Lehman Brothers in Japan. Your tips gave me a very insightful idea about how I should preapre for my interview. (hopefully i’ll make it to the interview.) thanks for the posting!

interview-preparation on S Anand

Prof Vijay Kumars Interview tips

Comments

Placement magazine

Student Exchange Interview

Comments

Gopinath 31 May 2011 7:06 am:Hi Anand,Just to trace back, can you just post as to what answers you gave to these questions.

Citibank Leadership interview

Comments

Lehman Brothers interview

Comments