CTS placement

6th Dec:
After the hectic morning with CAT, evening was also equally busy. I had to pack up for ettimadai. I had a placement process to attend the next day. I packed the best of clothes in my wardrobe, hoping to wear them for the interview if I made it through the apti round. I was ready bu 6 PM. Left hostel by 6:30 pm for the station keeping in view the frequent traffic jams in Bangalore. I picked up my friend on the way and reached station by 7 pm. I had my dinner at comesum and waited for the train. The train arrived on time. But it left after a half hour delay. I slept around ten PM. Thanks to my sony zapper, I had a sound sleep. Later I came to know that my friends couldn’t have a sound sleep as an old lady was crying all through the night.

7th Dec:
The train reached Coimbatore at 6 AM. We got a taxi and reached ettimadai by 7 AM. I got ready by 8 and reached the panthal(a tenthouse for 1500 people) by 8.30 Am. Every participant was given a bar code. It was funny to have a bar code. Bar code is usually given to a commodity. Here we were being identified as commodities and CTS was out on jumbo shopping spree. A lady in suit and boot came up with a boring one hour long pre placement talk. It touched upon all the important points that would woo the prospective candidates. I wasn’t interested in any of them as in the first place I have no plans of taking up a job and secondly I can never work in a company like CTS spending hours together in crammed up offices. Surprisingly the presentation was without a vision or a mission!! Probably they were too interested in wooing us the students than talk about their company in detail. The talk went on till 11 Am and then we were packed off in buses to IT block. We were allotted classrooms in IT block to take up the test. Over there we had to wait for another one hour during which we were told to fill up a sheet of questionnaires. It had the following questions.
Name, tenth and 12th percentages and B.tech aggregate percentage.
Q: strengths and weaknesses
My Ans:S: Will power,perseverance, Adaptability
W:Impatience
Q: What do you think are the requirements for a software engineer?
My ans: I don’t remember the answer
Q: What are your short term and long term goals with CTS?
My Ans:
Short term goal: To continuously upgrade my skills and be part of many a successful projects
Long term goal: To consistently deliver quality services and build a strong and dynamic CTS

And a few more question which I don’t remember.

The test started at 12 PM and went on for another 70 minutes. It comprised of three sections called as
Quantitative aptitude
Verbal ability
Attention to detail
It was not all that difficult to crack but one had to be quick to go through all the questions. We were told the results would be out by 3 PM. About 1500+ people wrote it . Their claim that they would be out with results by 3 PM was impossible. We went to the mess and had our lunch and spent time at cafeteria hoping results would be out by 3 PM. We waited till 4 PM and then went back to our rooms. People had already started preparing for interviews but I was in no mood to study after the gruelling CAT prep . I went around the campus enjoying the cool breeze and scenic surroundings. If CTS recruits me it would most probably be my last trip to this beautiful campus. I still regret not taking up a course at ettimadai. The results were out at around seven thirty in the evening when we were about to leave for dinner. Long namelists(like the ones in railway waitlist) were stuck up on the hostel notice boards. There were hoards of people all around it. I could get a glance of a few sheets but I couldn’t find my name on any of those. But most of my friends found theirs and were enjoying their moment of success. I decided to check my result after dinner. After a quick dinner , we rushed back to the hostel to check if our names were up on the list. Thankfully the crowd had reduced and i could easily skim through all the lists and finally I found mine . I was on panel 29 at 8 in the morning. I was happy that I got a morning slot as I didn’t want to spend nervous moments waiting for my chance. But later I realized that I was the last one in the panel. So I had to endure the long wait. However I would have the advantage of knowing the interviewer and type of question by the feedback I got from people going before me. We got back to our rooms . I spent an hour going through the interview questions to get a feel of the questions being asked. The questions being asked were very basic and sometimes the answer was too obvious. That gave me a lot of confidence. I decided to just go through basics of the subjects which I had stated as my areas of interest.
I spent about three hours with my interview prep. I went to bed by 1 Am



8th Dec:
I got up at 5:30 AM and was ready by 7. I arranged my file ,polished my shoes and left for breakfast by 7:45. The breakfast comprised of distasteful idlis.After the breakfast we proceeded to the IT block. There were in total 50 panels for interviewing over 900 people. The interviews were going to take place in classrooms itself.
It took me sometime to find out where my classroom was. One of my classmate was also on the same panel. Each panel interviewed 9 people per slot. The interviews started 1 and half hour late. Once interviews started , all that we were waiting for was the feedback from people about how their interview was.
The first one to go in was an ECE girl from Coimbatore. She was asked about VLSI and some easy HR. I was happy that he was asking about VLSI as I was quite comfortable with that subject. Next in was an MCA guy with a red tie!! He was asked about the projects done so far. Each interview on an average lasted 10-15 minutes. By the time my turn came I got a fair idea about the interviewer and sort of questions being asked. I hoped that he didn’t change questions for me. And thankfully he didn’t. Herez how my interview went on:
Me: May I come in
(Interviewer(I) gave a slight nod with his head and I walked in as dignified a manner as possible)
He extended his hand for a shake hand.Initially I thought he was asking for my file.After the shake hand I sat down.
He went through the answer sheet and my response to questionnaires and noted down some info from that into another sheet.
I:Okay vaishnov. Tell me about your life so far ie I want to know your family background,schooling,extracurriculars,how u ended in amrita, what did u do in dese 3 years,ur projects etc.
Phew that was a really long question and I had already forgotten what were the points he wanted.
I started framing up the starting sentence.
I wanted a punchline to start with
However that didn’t happen. It was a boring start
Me:
I am from Andhra Pradesh. My dad works in an Public Sector undertaking and hence gets transferred frequently. So I got a chance to do my schooling in different parts of country like kerala,tamil nadu,Andhra and delhi. This gave me an opportunity to understand the different cultures and work with different kinds of people. Coming to amrita errrrrr happened something like this. I saw an advertisement in the newspaper and decided to apply for it and on the basis of my AIEEE rank I got a seat in Amrita Bangalore. My three years at amrita have been wonderful. I got opportunities to interact and work with great minds. I have been to many fests, seminars, workshops and recently I organized Rubik’s cube workshop. It was pretty successful with around fifty people attending it.
I:What workshop you organized?(I guess he didn’t know what a rubik’s was)
Me: Rubik’s cube sir. Its a logical puzzle involving a cube with different colours.
(I guess he didn’t understand what I blabbered)
I:tell me what subjects you studied in your previous sem
Me:Sir. In 7th sem we had subjects like Cellular, management,embedded,biomed,microwave etc.(I purposefully left out VLSI as I didn’t want him to ask any technical questions)
I: Management! What did u study in management?
Me: Sir, management course plan was something like this. It starts of with basics of economics and then goes onto analyse relationship between price demand and supply. We also learnt various HR fundamentals like motivational theories,leadership skills etc.
I: U have one more management subject next sem?
Me: Yes sir.
I:okay. I think you had VLSI last semester. Can you tell me how to detect faults ?
Me: I told all diffrnt types of faults and causes for a few of them. He seemed satisfied with my answer
I: can u explain me chip’s life cycle?
Me: (I didn’t understand what he wanted)Sir u mean the fabrication process??
I:yes yes
Me: I explained something something.
I: Where is silicon wafer used in the process?
Me:Sir, In making silicon layer on substrate.
He asked the question again and I gave the same answer
I: Okay. Now u can leave. All the best for result
Me: Thanks to you and cognizant for giving me this opportunity
I left the hall and phew! it was a great relief.
I went to mess at around 1. Couldn’t find any of my friends. Had lunch and went to my room for a short nap. In the evening went for a stroll. The results were out at around 9 PM. 541 people were selected. The registration numbers were being announced in alphabtcl order. First Amritapuri CSE,ECE,EEE,EIE,MECh. It was a really tense moment for me. Next up was BANGALORE CSE. There were heck a lot of people from CSE and my wait prolonged. Then came ECE. I had to wait a bit longer as my reg no was after 73 people. And alas my number was announced. It was a cakewalk for me as at no point of time I felt I was tested . It was just a matter of getting through the process with a cool mind. That’s how it was for me.

CAT experience

6th Dec ’09:
After a year of start stop preparation, here I was to write CAT. My centre was RVCE. It is one of the prestigious colleges in Bangalore with state of art infrastructure. Hence I chose it as my centre. I arrived at centre at 7 AM. My dad had arranged for a cab to make my journey to the centre smooth and comfortable.
The security guard informed that entry opens at 8:30. So I spent a boring 1 and half hour in the car. I wasn’t even allowed to explore the sprawling campus. At 8:30 we were allowed to go to the computer centre where our test was going to be administered. There were four labs in which were allotted for the tests. My lab was on the first floor. After a half hour wait in queue a prometric guy allowed us to get in after checking our credentials. I deposited all my belongings at the security and moved to the lab. At the lab, there was a problem with my ID proof. I had taken my college ID as ID proof. My DOB was wrongly printed as 240588 instead of 89. This caused a problem and I was asked to get another id proof. Luckily I had my driving license to prove that I was born in 89. This brought in some nervousness . After that, I had to go through some biometrics and verification for the 3rd time!!
After the three layered check in process I was allotted my seat(S 15). I switched on my PC and there were over a dozen passwords which were keyed in by the proctor before the test interface came up flashing my photo that they took at check in. For another half hour I had nothing to do except for staring at my photo on the screen. At 9:45 were allowed to go through a tutourial video about the test interface.
At 10 Am , the test started off. We had to agree to the customary NDA before we started with our test. The first set of questions were from quant. It was a mixed bag ranging from sitters to complicated questions. It took me around 55 minutes to get throught he quant section. Next up was DI but I decided to skip it and move to verbal as I was tired of calculations that I had done in quant. But verbal gave me no respite. The RC were at its best and to make things difficult , the options were too close to eliminate. None of the options I was sure of. I had to go with a few guesses. Other than that, Parajumbles and Fill in the blanks were of moderate level giving me an opportunity to rush through and make up for the lost time in RC and quant. By the time I was done with verbal section I was left with around 40-45 minutes for DI. The DI however had a lot of sets and required much more time. I had to let go a few sets involving complicated calculations. However the remaining sets were direct and it wasn’t difficult to arrive at an option. On the whole , my CAT experience was like a roller coaster with certain highs and lows. Jan 22nd will determine what were in majority..highs or lows?