With the semester in full swing, we share with you the journey of current student Jagadish Kumar Ananda Murthy, MBA '15, from Bangalore, India, as he navigates the world of internship searching with the help of Weatherhead's Career Management Office.
I came to the U.S. for higher
education to gain a holistic perspective over the business world, acquire
new
skills and knowledge, and build a strong professional network. Since day one of my MBA program at Weatherhead,
starting with orientation, I heard a lot of conversations about job
opportunities, the Cleveland business market, networking, etc., all aimed at
securing a bright future, for which an internship in a reputed firm in the
field of your interest, was the key. Fortunately, I realized this very early
into the first semester and started networking actively through LinkedIn and
other avenues provided by the Career Management Office (CMO), such as City Treks to Chicago and New York, Coffee Connections program and mock interviews, to name a few.
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Jagadish Kumar Ananda Murthy, MBA'15 |
Before I started my internship
search, I took some time to decide on what I actually want to do post-MBA and
where I would like to see myself five years down the line. This helped me to narrow
my options and target specific opportunities/contacts, which saved me a lot of
time and effort. Considering my hectic coursework, this was very crucial. Once
I was clear that I wanted to leverage my three years of consulting experience
with Deloitte, I started to network with professionals from the consulting fraternity—alumni
, former colleagues, LinkedIn contacts and others. Though it was easy to
connect with various professionals, it was very hard to maintain those contacts
and convert them into useful relationships and eventually into job referrals. I concentrated hard on this and treated my
internship search as an additional course in my MBA program, thereby dedicating
time for it regularly.
My first offer came through CMO’s
Coffee Connections program. My advisor was Rohit Reddy, director at AIG, New
York. After a couple of interactions, he offered to assist with my internship
search. Though he wasn’t aware of any opportunities available in his company,
based on my interests, he connected me to his client EXL Services, a technology
consulting firm in New York. I managed to convert this referral into an offer
after a few rounds of interviews in November 2013. Though the offer was not
promising, it gave me immense confidence in approaching new contacts and facing
interviews to come.
I met Mark Wipper, a senior official
from Kelvin Smith Library, during a city trek in Chicago. This was a very
casual encounter but proved to be an important factor in my overall success.
Upon constant follow-ups, Mark introduced me to several of his contacts on
LinkedIn and almost all of them were in a very high position in their careers.
Initially it was intimidating to start a conversation with such contacts but
once I spoke with a few of them, my confidence sky rocketed and from then on, I
was not hesitant in approaching senior professionals—a very important factor in
performing well in the interviews.
My second offer was from Briteskies, a local consulting
firm present at the Weatherhead Career fair. After some interviews I got an
offer for the position of business analyst. All along, I was mentored by alumni
Amogh Garg, Vaibhav Pawar and Akshay Altekar (MBA 2012), Bhargab Banerjee (MBA
2013), Jathin Shetty and many others form the MBA class of 2014. They
constantly motivated me, helped me in making critical decisions and ensure I
was heading in the right direction. This also helped in keeping me up to date
on happenings in the business world.
Bhargab referred me for an
interview with PwC, New York, in its ARCA practice. This was a dream
opportunity for me as it was one of my target companies and I wanted to make
the most out of it. I spoke with a couple of individuals working in this team
and learned a lot about the practice in general, which helped me better prepare
for my interview. After a telephonic interview, I was invited to the New York
office for the final three rounds of interviews. I was able to perform well in
the interviews and I got an offer that day, which was a pleasant surprise.
Through my former manager, Yasim
Kolathayil, I got an opportunity to interview with Deloitte, but I wasn’t
successful in the final interview, which was very disappointing as it was an
ideal role for me and it would have been much easier to go back to the firm I
came from. I learned a lot from this failure and concentrated on my next
interview with Ernst & Young (EY). With experience and confidence gained
thus far, I was best prepared for this interview and felt it was one of the
easiest among all. This position offered me all I was looking for in an
internship and I immediately accepted the offer, which brought my internship
search to an end.
During my internship at EY, I had
the wonderful opportunity to work for a major automobile company based out of
Atlanta, Georgia. I efficiently managed assets worth $10 million and helped
reduce taxes by adopting appropriate tax depreciation strategies. I was able to
quickly adapt within the team, managed a long standing project and completed it
successfully, which was critical in gaining the trust of the client and
retaining their business. Two months of persistent efforts paid off as I was offered
a full-time position to join post-MBA and selected to represent the team at
EY’s International Interns Leadership Conference in Orlando, Florida.
A few things I learned during
this journey were:
- Start your internship search early. Getting an internship you desire is a result of constant effort toward your goal.
- Discover your strengths/weaknesses and work on them throughout.
- While networking, do not under-estimate any contact; every individual could have something in them that you may benefit from.
- Follow up, follow up, follow up! Developing meaningful relationships is more important than building your contacts.
- Applying through a referral is a million times better than applying online.
- Use resources available—CMO Library and other CMO resources, workshops, mock interviews, Coffee Connections , Employer Information Sessions, Career Fairs and other events,
- Do not pigeonhole yourself—be on the lookout for multiple sources/opportunities.
- Once you have an interview lined up, do the best you can to learn more about the position and the firm, talk to professionals in that industry, read related articles and better prepare.
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