I just completed a year as a professional!! Congrats!! Pat on the back!! Hurray. But is it really a great achievement?? It is just another year passed by!! But going by my experiences in the past one year, its definitely worth a mention!!
It all started last year!! July 12th 2006 was the day when I set out from my home in Udupi to the city of dreams, Bangalore!! A year earlier, in July 2005, I was placed with one of the leading two wheeler manufacturers in the country, who called themselves TVS Motor Company Limited. Back then, we were all very curious about what TVS stood for!! And the answer we got was TVS meant Trust Value and Service. Not too convinced about the explanation, we were definitely more curios to learn more about it. And as an icing on the cake, we got an opportunity to meet all our future colleagues and visit the factory even before we joined it!! This was an event organised by the company in March 2006!! Incidentally it coincided with our annual inter college cultural fest "Incident". Being in final year, skipping the fest was a difficult decision to take. But then, the excitement of visiting the factory and coming back and boasting about it among our classmates, won over the difficulty of deciding against attending the fest!! In fact this was a unique practice, as no other company called their freshly recruited graduates to the factory! There were companies who used to send T Shirts, bags, caps, Jackets and other goodies with the company name and logo printed on them. But this was a totally new experience. An all expenses paid trip!! And after visiting the factory, we were even more impressed with the work culture and all those things over there!! There we learnt that TVS was the initials of the founder of the TVS group and many of our other unanswered questions were answered on that trip.
Infact, I had plans of going for higher studies too!! But then, a placement in one of the best manufacturing sector companies in the countries, coupled with the thoughts of enjoying and freaking out in the final year and the trip to the factory took out whatever little amount of motivation that we had in us!! Though we had written GATE, the entrance exam for M Tech, it was not a whole hearted attempt.
So after all the ups and downs of college, I had decided to go in for the job offered by TVS Motor Company Ltd. Towards the fag end of our college, we got a call from the HR in the company asking us whether we preferred to join in the first week of June or the second week of July!! We were actually hesitant to join so early. And in fact our exams were scheduled to end only in the last week of May. So we too needed a break!! So finally the date of our joining was decided as July 17th 2006.
I came down to Bangalore, where I have plenty of relatives, with a lot of my luggage!! Not sure about what the immediate future had in store for me, I was a bit apprehensive with butterflies in my stomach!! And also the sudden change in climate also took a toll on my health. Only one of my classmates (4 of us were selected) was joining along with me. Besides, one of my classmates in my PU, who did engineering from a different institute was also joining!! So I knew only two other people!! The company had arranged accommodation for all of us in a hotel in Hosur for a week. We were supposed to look out for permanent (or temporary) means of accommodation within that period!! I reached Hosur on the 16th evening with my uncle who dropped me at the hotel. The first priority was to search a house. As I had mentioned earlier, I had not yet recovered from my illness either. But then, we had to search a house to stay in. Lots of thought process went in, first to decide whether to stay in Bangalore or Hosur (the places are 40 kms apart and company has buses plying between both the places). Having decided to stay in Hosur after consulting seniors in the company and also people who had joined in the first week of June, the real problem started. We were 6 people from Karnataka and had initially intended to stay together. But then differences of opinion started coming out openly. One wanted to stay close to the city, whereas one wanted stay in a secure place. One wanted to stay in an independent house whereas another had a different idea. Moreover, it was very difficult to find a house which could accommodate 6 people!! Rent was never an issue, but then we decided to break into smaller groups, so that people with similar basic tastes and habits joined hands and came together. I preferred staying in a locality where security was sound!! After a lot of running around here and there, we(myself and another person) finally found a good house at a good bargain. By then 6 days were over!! We immediately shifted our luggage which was lying in the hotel. During the weekend, I shifted whatever was left over in Bangalore in another trip to Hosur with my uncle!! House hunting was probably the first occasion where I got exposed to the outside world. I had to take a decision on my own. Of course there were people to guide me, but then end of the day, I had to take a call!! It was a nice experience after all and I knew that there was a lot more in store.
In the first week in office, other formalities like identity cards, opening of salary accounts and other similar formalities were completed. But by and large we were free!! Literally having nothing to do!! Incidentally the company had also applied for BVQI certification and most of the executives were busy with the TS 16484 (I dont really remember the exact number!!) audit!! There were brief one hour odd sessions by some department heads coming and boasting about their respective departments, but that was only for one odd hour in a day!! That was a time when all of us (19 people had joined) started getting bonded together!! It was the beginning of a great relationship. I will never forget my first set of colleagues ever in my life!! And moreover having nothing to do, we started having fun and passed the time by playing games like dumb charades, su do ku, kakuro, discussing about movies, sports, etc etc and God knows what else!!! But this is literally what we did for the first two odd months!! Breakfast, lunch, tea twice a day and fun, fun and more fun. Infact we played so much of DC that, by the end of 2 months, we were all confident of acting out anything under the sky!!
But then there were things that were happening against us also!! Small things which started pinching our happiness. We were supposed to alternate Saturdays off. But because of the TS audit and some other reasons, we never got an alternate Saturday off for the first 2 months!! And moreover, the bad thing was that these things were intimated to us only the previous morning or evening!! So all plans of the weekend were screwed!! We were only cursing the authorities, having nothing else to do!! We were all so much offended that for our first salary (something anyone will be very very anxious about), we had to wait for one and a half months and we got it only in the end of August. The reason given was that we had joined on 17th, and all salary calculations are done on 15th itself!! What a ridiculous idea!!! Anyway, this was not the only thing, there was lot more to come!!
In almost mid September, the batch which had joined in June, finished all their so called orientation and on job training(for which they had to come in the morning shift and the same for us had also just started!!) and had to be placed in some department or the other!! All the department heads being very busy people, they made one big blunder!! They had our placement interviews along with the previous batch people!! We had no idea what was happening around!! Also just for the sake of having the interview, they had it!! We were supposed to give our choices for departments under three broad choices: Product development, Sales and marketing & Manufacturing!! Having interacted with a lot of people in the two months, I had started to have an aversion towards manufacturing!! Product development was always my first choice, but since I dint want Manufacturing, I put it third and put Product Development first!! Fortunately or unfortunately for me, 90% of the people put Product Development as the first choice!! So they decided based on the second choice!! And only 3 from our batch had given Sales and Marketing as the second choice!! And tak fell the hammer on our heads!! I still was happy to get into the Sales and Marketing department. Earlier the VP of the department had impressed me personally. And moreover, I was fed up with the discipline and other things in the factory like food, the language(everyone starting from the machine operator to the VP speaks in Tamil!!! Even the President speaks in Tamil in the monthly meetings!!!) So getting into the field meant a lot of freedom and a cool life away from the factory!!
But the transition from the factory to the field was not as smooth as we had expected!! First of all, as all others were in the factory, they were supposed to continue with the factory orientation and coming in the first shift!!(Coming in the first shift meant no alternate Saturdays for another two months!!) But our department had literally nothing to do with things going on in the factory other than selling them!! So big shots(atleast at that point of time, we thought so) from our department said we need not attend it, but the TQC department said we had to undergo the basic orientation under any cost!! Nobody boldly said this or gave it in writing, and we were literally like ping pongs moving from here to there(In fact both departments are located exactly opposite to each other in the same building!!) The most frustrating part was yet to come!! We were supposed to report at the Product Training Centre(PTC) where the person had not received any communication about our arrival. Again a ping pong!! And mind you, these places are miles apart!! Another big confusion was that we were told that we were only for service and not for sales!! That was the most disappointing point!!
It all started last year!! July 12th 2006 was the day when I set out from my home in Udupi to the city of dreams, Bangalore!! A year earlier, in July 2005, I was placed with one of the leading two wheeler manufacturers in the country, who called themselves TVS Motor Company Limited. Back then, we were all very curious about what TVS stood for!! And the answer we got was TVS meant Trust Value and Service. Not too convinced about the explanation, we were definitely more curios to learn more about it. And as an icing on the cake, we got an opportunity to meet all our future colleagues and visit the factory even before we joined it!! This was an event organised by the company in March 2006!! Incidentally it coincided with our annual inter college cultural fest "Incident". Being in final year, skipping the fest was a difficult decision to take. But then, the excitement of visiting the factory and coming back and boasting about it among our classmates, won over the difficulty of deciding against attending the fest!! In fact this was a unique practice, as no other company called their freshly recruited graduates to the factory! There were companies who used to send T Shirts, bags, caps, Jackets and other goodies with the company name and logo printed on them. But this was a totally new experience. An all expenses paid trip!! And after visiting the factory, we were even more impressed with the work culture and all those things over there!! There we learnt that TVS was the initials of the founder of the TVS group and many of our other unanswered questions were answered on that trip.
Infact, I had plans of going for higher studies too!! But then, a placement in one of the best manufacturing sector companies in the countries, coupled with the thoughts of enjoying and freaking out in the final year and the trip to the factory took out whatever little amount of motivation that we had in us!! Though we had written GATE, the entrance exam for M Tech, it was not a whole hearted attempt.
So after all the ups and downs of college, I had decided to go in for the job offered by TVS Motor Company Ltd. Towards the fag end of our college, we got a call from the HR in the company asking us whether we preferred to join in the first week of June or the second week of July!! We were actually hesitant to join so early. And in fact our exams were scheduled to end only in the last week of May. So we too needed a break!! So finally the date of our joining was decided as July 17th 2006.
I came down to Bangalore, where I have plenty of relatives, with a lot of my luggage!! Not sure about what the immediate future had in store for me, I was a bit apprehensive with butterflies in my stomach!! And also the sudden change in climate also took a toll on my health. Only one of my classmates (4 of us were selected) was joining along with me. Besides, one of my classmates in my PU, who did engineering from a different institute was also joining!! So I knew only two other people!! The company had arranged accommodation for all of us in a hotel in Hosur for a week. We were supposed to look out for permanent (or temporary) means of accommodation within that period!! I reached Hosur on the 16th evening with my uncle who dropped me at the hotel. The first priority was to search a house. As I had mentioned earlier, I had not yet recovered from my illness either. But then, we had to search a house to stay in. Lots of thought process went in, first to decide whether to stay in Bangalore or Hosur (the places are 40 kms apart and company has buses plying between both the places). Having decided to stay in Hosur after consulting seniors in the company and also people who had joined in the first week of June, the real problem started. We were 6 people from Karnataka and had initially intended to stay together. But then differences of opinion started coming out openly. One wanted to stay close to the city, whereas one wanted stay in a secure place. One wanted to stay in an independent house whereas another had a different idea. Moreover, it was very difficult to find a house which could accommodate 6 people!! Rent was never an issue, but then we decided to break into smaller groups, so that people with similar basic tastes and habits joined hands and came together. I preferred staying in a locality where security was sound!! After a lot of running around here and there, we(myself and another person) finally found a good house at a good bargain. By then 6 days were over!! We immediately shifted our luggage which was lying in the hotel. During the weekend, I shifted whatever was left over in Bangalore in another trip to Hosur with my uncle!! House hunting was probably the first occasion where I got exposed to the outside world. I had to take a decision on my own. Of course there were people to guide me, but then end of the day, I had to take a call!! It was a nice experience after all and I knew that there was a lot more in store.
In the first week in office, other formalities like identity cards, opening of salary accounts and other similar formalities were completed. But by and large we were free!! Literally having nothing to do!! Incidentally the company had also applied for BVQI certification and most of the executives were busy with the TS 16484 (I dont really remember the exact number!!) audit!! There were brief one hour odd sessions by some department heads coming and boasting about their respective departments, but that was only for one odd hour in a day!! That was a time when all of us (19 people had joined) started getting bonded together!! It was the beginning of a great relationship. I will never forget my first set of colleagues ever in my life!! And moreover having nothing to do, we started having fun and passed the time by playing games like dumb charades, su do ku, kakuro, discussing about movies, sports, etc etc and God knows what else!!! But this is literally what we did for the first two odd months!! Breakfast, lunch, tea twice a day and fun, fun and more fun. Infact we played so much of DC that, by the end of 2 months, we were all confident of acting out anything under the sky!!
But then there were things that were happening against us also!! Small things which started pinching our happiness. We were supposed to alternate Saturdays off. But because of the TS audit and some other reasons, we never got an alternate Saturday off for the first 2 months!! And moreover, the bad thing was that these things were intimated to us only the previous morning or evening!! So all plans of the weekend were screwed!! We were only cursing the authorities, having nothing else to do!! We were all so much offended that for our first salary (something anyone will be very very anxious about), we had to wait for one and a half months and we got it only in the end of August. The reason given was that we had joined on 17th, and all salary calculations are done on 15th itself!! What a ridiculous idea!!! Anyway, this was not the only thing, there was lot more to come!!
In almost mid September, the batch which had joined in June, finished all their so called orientation and on job training(for which they had to come in the morning shift and the same for us had also just started!!) and had to be placed in some department or the other!! All the department heads being very busy people, they made one big blunder!! They had our placement interviews along with the previous batch people!! We had no idea what was happening around!! Also just for the sake of having the interview, they had it!! We were supposed to give our choices for departments under three broad choices: Product development, Sales and marketing & Manufacturing!! Having interacted with a lot of people in the two months, I had started to have an aversion towards manufacturing!! Product development was always my first choice, but since I dint want Manufacturing, I put it third and put Product Development first!! Fortunately or unfortunately for me, 90% of the people put Product Development as the first choice!! So they decided based on the second choice!! And only 3 from our batch had given Sales and Marketing as the second choice!! And tak fell the hammer on our heads!! I still was happy to get into the Sales and Marketing department. Earlier the VP of the department had impressed me personally. And moreover, I was fed up with the discipline and other things in the factory like food, the language(everyone starting from the machine operator to the VP speaks in Tamil!!! Even the President speaks in Tamil in the monthly meetings!!!) So getting into the field meant a lot of freedom and a cool life away from the factory!!
But the transition from the factory to the field was not as smooth as we had expected!! First of all, as all others were in the factory, they were supposed to continue with the factory orientation and coming in the first shift!!(Coming in the first shift meant no alternate Saturdays for another two months!!) But our department had literally nothing to do with things going on in the factory other than selling them!! So big shots(atleast at that point of time, we thought so) from our department said we need not attend it, but the TQC department said we had to undergo the basic orientation under any cost!! Nobody boldly said this or gave it in writing, and we were literally like ping pongs moving from here to there(In fact both departments are located exactly opposite to each other in the same building!!) The most frustrating part was yet to come!! We were supposed to report at the Product Training Centre(PTC) where the person had not received any communication about our arrival. Again a ping pong!! And mind you, these places are miles apart!! Another big confusion was that we were told that we were only for service and not for sales!! That was the most disappointing point!!
Looking back in retrospect, now I feel it was definitely a good thing to happen. It would have been definitely difficult to handle the pressure, especially when we are not doing so well, more so as a fresher. Anyways, days passed on in PTC with no formal and proper training. We were asked to open and close vehicles and engines and whatever technical things we learnt, we did on our own with little help here and there from some assistants there!! Then it was time for tests, in which we fared pretty badly. And the diploma holders did pretty well in those tests!! The main reason for our poor performance was that we were all brought up in such environments where we never made a habit of remembering things which were easily available in books!! And we were so humiliated there by the all India Training head, that we felt like slapping him then and there. Whatever the reasons, after two months in that hell, we set out for our deployments. Again lot of confusion. 4 people got what they wanted. Only me and my friend from Bangalore asked for Karnataka. But they said no vacancies in Karnataka and tried to divert us to Hyderabad and Vizag. My friend, unwillingly opted for Hyderabad. Which meant that I go to Vizag, which was unimaginable at that point of time. So I asked for West Zone. Again lot of dirty politics was played, lot of equations changed. Meanwhile we were all deployed in Bangalore for field orientation. That two week period was by far one of the best periods in TVS. As soon s that was over, I was asked to report at Hyderabad the nest day. My friend got Bangalore. I took a couple of days off an then reported at Hyderabad.
When I first landed in Hyderabad, it first reminded me of Mumbai with a lot of flyovers on a single road. Slowly, as I started moving around, I started realising the differences and concluded that the two cities were miles apart. The very first day I came here, the president of the company was also in Hyderabad. And I was fortunate enough to have shook hands with him and spent some time with him. Infact he had some encouraging words for me which motivated me even more!! I was probably the first GET to have spent 10 minutes one-on-one with the president of the company!! My boss also turned out to be a good person. Very friendly and gave me enough time to settle down. But now its totally opposite!! And my first week in Hyderabad was the most eventful week!! House hunting was not a problem this time as I had previous experience and was pretty sure how to go about it this time!!
Slowly I started learning all the tricks of the trade. Somehow or the other, I was feeling that being posted in Hyderabad was a blessing in disguise for me!! I started to ride the motorcycle(Officially nothing was assigned to me, but i used to take whichever as free. And moreover I had my first long bike ride only after coming to the field!! I still don't have a valid driving license for a two wheeler!!).
Parents visited my place in early January. After they left, it was heavy work fr me with new dealership inauguration! And that was one hell of an experience I will never forget for life!! Tat was when I became close to my counterpart who is looking after sales, and that association continues even today!!
Slowly and silently boss isms started increasing. I started feeling the real pressure. Customers screwing from one side, boss from the other; it was becoming really intolerable at times. Mainly because my boss lacks clarity in expressing his thoughts!! He always emphasizes on the use of body language, but that's not everything!! But then he has been in this company for 20 yrs, and that fact I saluted. He was God for me!! By the end of the financial yr, during policy deployment for the next year, I got an opportunity to meet other bigheads in the company. And then I realised what a person I was working with. My boss is nothing compared to those and I am nothing compared to my boss!! So still a long way to go. After the policy deployment, I became more clearer. Now I know what exactly is my duty and what exactly is expected of me!!
Looking back, the one year has seen lots of ups and downs for me and terribly huge number of mood swings!! But at the end of the year, I am definitely wiser than I was last year at the same point of time!! I have met lots of people, dealt with lots of issues, attended lots of official dinners and parties and all these have definitely added to my KQ!! So even though joining TVS was with lots of confusions in the mind, today, as I prepare for my confirmation interview, I must say I am a far better person than i was before I joined TVS. I even had thoughts of doing MBA earlier(before I joined), but now I feel with a work experience of one year, I am definitely well equipped for it.