How to get job in Campus Placements & Off-Campus interviews? - Ajay Chhabra

 Hi guys my name is Ajay Chhabra and I want to talk about very important topic which is of concern for thousands of engineering graduates or MBA graduates and equally important for students of other disciplines as well, who have spent a number of years and a lot of money in getting their degree, but at the final juncture they could not score the placement at their college or university. This is a matter of grave concern in getting as placement always motivates a student as it brings to him a positive attractor and success factor. The students who are not able to score the placement they usually get depressed. If those students are from lower middle income background who have either taken loan or debt from family or relatives that on the family are under more moral pressure to get a job immediately after their degrees. So this content is more so important for all of them.

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What inspired me to make this topic was my own story as I was in Kurukshetra University and we were part of Masters of international business program and the second batch from the University. In the first batch nobody got any campus placement and it was a moral pressure on all of us in the second batch to work something extra so that companies come to our campus for the placement interview. I got selected in this program at AIR third position and at the time of counselling, first two students did not come, so I was kind of number one in the university and in my batch. I was always regular to the classes. I was sincere with all the teachers. Students used to do leg-pulling with me, which was normal and fine for me. I came from a very humble family background and we were four brothers and sisters and my father was working in the Haryana electricity board active very low salaried position but we were very much proud of Our parents for the way they raised us and inculcated the importance of education.

This issue of getting ready for placement was discussed with our department director, Professor Hooda and as students we made few decisions to differentiate our department and students. We also had MBA department in Kurukshetra University, which was there for long and had a long history of getting good companies for placement. So one decision in which we all took was to always wear formal blazer and look like well-dressed management professionals. We did a photoshoot at the department and created a great placement brochure. We made a number of teams of students and sent them to a number of cities to meet the human resource department by walking into those companies and meet with HR and left our placement brochure there and requested them to come for campus placements.

So with all the efforts, first company came known as NewGen software. So we were all very bullish and excited. To differentiate my own resume, I went to the university gate and made a detailed resume, got it printed on Executive Bond paper, got a plastic folder cover and since I knew that the company is headquartered in New Delhi, so in my address, I wrote my sisters address from New Delhi as my address, although at that point of time my residence was in Rohtak Haryana which was not considered to be a city of polished people. Then I did research about the company and some news about them. I had good relations with MBA students also in the hostel. First they they visited the MBA department and selected a couple of students. 

On one night before our campus placement, I went to meet one Sharma Ji, MBA student and asked him that what sort of questions they were asking what kind of questions were there in the aptitude test. He just gave me a one line clue that most of the questions in the aptitude test what are around theory X and Y. So I went ahead and refreshed my concepts from leaderships and management theories point of you and that’s the only thing which I prepared. I was very good in group communication, interpersonal skills, presentation skills, taking initiatives, respecting teachers and it is not that that you have to shine only on the day of placement. You have to create a sincere student image throughout your program so that teachers can vouch for you and that is the biggest recommendation one can get at the time of placement interview. Normally we do not value this point what is this is the most important one to consider.

So we all appeared for the aptitude test, after few hours of wait we came to know that I have been shortlisted along with some of my major competitors in the class. It was very tough competition that day. The irony of the Fate was that even some of the seniors who were in dire need of this job, they also appeared for this placement round. Then came the interview round and based on my personality, knowledge, Communication skills, impressive CV, I was able to convince the HR head and the business head Mr Sanjay Kalra. Plus also I had the blessings of the teachers of my department and I was a topper till that juncture in my Masters of international business program. All of these factors added to my success and when finally they released the name of shortlisted students for placement, it was ONLY ME from our department. 

It led to a lot of popularity for me in my last semester in the university for the next six months in the last semester. I made a lot of new friends and even girls / boys from other department used to come, meet and congratulate me. You will be surprised to know that I’ve got annual offer letter of 1,20,,000 per annum In the year 1997. It amounted to INR 10,000 every month as my salary. At that time salary of 10,000 was a real big amount. But this was a heartbreak for a lot of deserving fellow students as well as they have poured in a lot of efforts but could not achieve the campus placement. In my case the most important success factor was my own confidence as I never compared myself and had any inferiroty complex against the students of top B Schools or even anyone from even Indian Institute of management. In our placement consultation meetings I was the only student who is to say that, please give me my degree and I will go to Delhi and get my job tomorrow. Not everyone had that kind of confidence. So from MBA department picked up 2/3 students and only me from MIB department. Then there was your day in my life wherein I conducted a workshop of 50 top be school guys and brand managers and brand directors of PepsiCo in their Gurgaon office for eight hours on the topic of strategic importance of digital marketing in 2017.

This is the most comprehensive article on how to get a job in campus placement.

But story doesn’t end here. People who could not get campus placement The struggled for initial few years but were able to get into good brands within 2/3 years by applying off-campus interviews. In my case within two years, I got a foreign job offer and appeared for my UK work visa interview and went abroad for one year. Some of those of off campus guys Did not leave their first best company and are currently also doing very well in life. I was on different mission. I kept on learning and moving. My average day was never more than 2 and half years and on an average basis one year. But in the spree, I was fortunate to join Ogilvy, McCann and then the Global headquarters team of General Electric Company, As the biggest achievement of my career.

So based on my overall experience of how to get a campus placement and what to do when you don’t, these are top points to focus. I assure you that if you spend these 20 / 30 minutes of your time on this content today, you can master the art of cracking any interview for your job placement. These are the following points every student irrespective of their program, whether they are in Engineering graduates or MBA passouts. I am not restricting my advice to these two but most of these points are applicable to law students, art students, design students and science students as well. 

In return guys, I only need your support in terms of liking, sharing and commenting on this content and subscribing to my YouTube channel and following me on Spotify, so that I am motivated enough to create similar content in future. I also want to tell you a honest truth that whosoever contacted me for any placement help or job recommendation, I never used to get proper sleep till the time I helped that student. I would have helped hundreds of students in getting their internship or their jobs with no hidden agenda of mine own. I always used to believe that God should make me that much powerful oneday, that in just one phone call I should be able to help any needy to get a job or get an interview arranged immediately. Till today also I have been doing the same selflessly and if anyone of you need any help or need the contact details of any of my 30,000+ Linkedin Connections and followers, please feel free to do so when I will be the first one to respond back immediately.

These are the top pointers for you to become a placement rockstar:

As I indicated earlier, please read and Regulrly Update Yourself beyond your subjects, The quest for a good placement should start from the day of joining any program. Start reading The Economic Times newspaper and keep a track of the number of industry verticals and your target companies and what’s happening in the country business scenario. If you are the person from other field try to read and Subscribe to the blogs for your industry vertical and even set up Google alerts so that you can read the top news of your industry every day. This is the most important aspect of knowledge and personality development for a student, which is even the most ignored as well. Nobody will give you this advice but since I know the importance of updating yourself and that is why I am sharing this as my first point. So if you’re not updating yourself beyond your subjects, so please start doing that right now.

Create a positive perception about yourself in the eyes of all the teachers. Don’t bunk classes. Don’t ask someone for a proxy attendance. Always go to your teachers after the class and ask for Live projects, case studies or internship recommendation. This shows your positive attitude towards work and your seniorsness about your parents investment in this program your pursuing. Always interact with the visiting professors and guest faculties and ask intelligent and meaningful questions in the conversation. Always search for their profiles on LinkedIn and sent connection requests later on. There is a Shloka which says that the status of Guru is even bigger than of that of a God. It says something like this.

अर्थ – कबीर दास जी ने इस दोहे में गुरु की महिमा का वर्णन किया है। वे कहते हैं कि जीवन में कभी ऐसी परिस्थिति आ जाये की जब गुरु और गोविन्द (ईश्वर) एक साथ खड़े मिलें तब पहले किन्हें प्रणाम करना चाहिए। गुरु ने ही गोविन्द से हमारा परिचय कराया है इसलिए गुरु का स्थान गोविन्द से भी ऊँचा है। so if you’re not respecting your teachers enough, start doing that right now.

Create ongoing resume while you are in campus. Your resume should not be limited to one page, that’s the biggest mistake 40 to 50% students do and they don’t get shortlisted at the resume stage. Your resume should be lengthy. Try to include all the assignments, all the internships, all extra curricular activities, all the online certifications and all your achievements, be it in sports, Studies or extra curricular activities. Go to the best photo studio in your town and pay him some money to get a well dressed professional picture, which you should use on all your social profiles. Even the HR department nowadays does a bit of research in Reading on the social profiles of the candidates. Make sure that your social profiles are clean and have meaningful conversations and topics. So if I have if you have a lot of garbage on your social media profiles, please clean it up. Create profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn, Behance, GitHub or other relevant platforms depending upon your course or area of specialisation. Always keep on updating these profiles with your latest work and assignments.

Keep an eye on companies and off-campus placement opportunities. Be self dependent. Don’t be only dependent upon the department and the placement team. There are a large number of companies who are always on lookout of bright talent by the way of regularly conducting their pool interviews or technical tests or recruitment challenges or Hackathon or placement drives. Towards the last semester of you programme, beyond The Economic Times, which has a career section once in a week, start reading the Times of India as well. You can easily keep an eye on identifying right opportunities for freshers. Before joining any college or university, always get the number of alumni, or talk to or post a new thread in the alumni community clarifying your doubts about the type of and number of placements students have got before paying the fee for the programme.

Make your seniors your mentor in the university or the college. This is a very good advice and always try to be in the company of good people who have already built their image of being the top of the senior batch and occasionally interact with them, maybe by the means of understanding any concepts or clarifying about any class assignments. When they get placed you should be the first one to one congratulate them. Have their contact numbers, Connect with them on LinkedIn early. Try to attend alumni meetings or even propose to the department that they should regularly bring in the recently placed Alumni for guest lectures. Explore social media for any such community and platforms about your college or university and be an active participant in that online forum or community so that you can seek recommendation from anyone any time. These are some of the relations, which will last the life time. If you’re not doing that please start doing that right now. You may never know your seniors might have right position in their own company and you get a call for job interview.

Explore job sites, newspapers and the new age technology HR apps and companies which specialise in conducting sector specific placement exams oof-campus which helps you in getting off-campus placement. The job sites to look at are, Naukri.com, indeed.co.in, monster.com and LinkedIn jobs. All leading newspapers have classified jobs section on weekends so do not ignore them. There are tests like elitmus, GATE. A large number of PSU organisations and Large global companies conduct their own enterance test for management trainees or leadership programs for B school students and BTech students as management trainee or graduate engineer trainee. Keep this keyword in your Google Aletrs There are mobile apps like HIRECT plus find out there might be many more such opportunities, applications, tests and options in your field of study. All you have to do is to just Google search and get close to these resources. Create your profiles. Appear for these tests. Increase your chances of success In getting more offer letters. Most of the times the off-campus opportunities offer better packages, you may miss, If you’re only focused on Your Luck in the campus placements.

From the day one, when you are in campus make a list of top 10 companies and have a focus industry in mind. This approach will help you in keeping track of these companies and developments plus you will have a point of view on New developments in that industry sector. This builds your overall awareness and you are mindful of what is happening in that industry. This makes you a lot more confident while you are interacting with the HR & the business team whenever you will appear for an interview. Read industry specific magazines. Try to solve business and indystry case studies. Nowadays there are a number of Consultants offering case over coffee or have portals to submit your answers to the number of business cases. In case of engineering, there are a lot of Hackathons which are organised by industry leading IT companies. Always be the first one to form an internal team and participate. Nowadays even government of India keeps on organising a lot of such technical contests. Please refer to mygov.org for any such Opportunities.

Every summer vacation is an opportunity for internship in the company and the industry of your choice. Don’t waste your time. Even if you get unpaid internships, go ahead and do that. Work diligently. Always delight your supervisor. Get a good recommendation on company’s letterhead and beyond that great recommendation on your LinkedIn profile can do magic for you. This will really help you in looking at the corporate world, refine Ettiquets and behaviours which are liked in the corporate. These internship assignments help you to get closer to the real business world and helps you amplify your resume. These practical assignments will add to your skills and you will be much more confident when appearing for your campus placement interview or off-campus interviews. By doing this you can demonstrate to the recruiter that you have already got trained in a similar summer job and companies will have to spend less time, training hours and energy in bringing you to the productive level in the Company. 

Crack the interview code much before appearing. Beyond technical round or aptitude round, whatever the case maybe based on your program, be positive about the case study in question for the topic of the group discussion as this might be the next step for you to  shine in the eyes of Recruiter. I can tell you the top 10 hygiene questions which a HR manager is bound to ask you. Simply do a Google search and there are thousands of blog and interview preparation sides which will give you these top 10 questions like: tell me something about yourself, why do you want to join our company. Tell me about your strengths and weaknesses, what is your opinion about the government of India’s policy on the fate of our industry, tell me something about one of your best project so far, what is your expectation of the salary, How soon you can join, Can you perform under pressure, why should we hire you and can you give an example of leadership skills in your past assignments or in your educational institution. How much difficult it is to form a group within your educational Institute and appear for mock interviews and practice these questions. if you haven’t done that please start doing that right now.

Be ready for the placement weeks and months proactively. Meet your placement officer and get a list of companies which had come for placements last time and start reading and keeping track of these companies. If you have your alumnis in those companies. Take their numbers from the placement team and schedule to talk to them and seek inputs and advice for the placement round. Get a clue on their aptitude test and technical rounds. Brush yourself with the management concepts and leadership theories. If you are a technical person prepare well in advance for the technical questions which get asked for a particular technology and prepare well. All you have to do is to simply google the name of the company and type placement test questions and interview questions. You will get a large number of blogs and community conversations where you have all these resources already available online even if you don’t talk to any seniors. Do a bit of hard work at this stage and this will help you so that why you are facing the interview questions you have a fair understanding of what the recruiter may ask you.

Emphasise on your personality development, soft skills and Communication skills in English language. English language Is the language of business. We all accept that. People who Look polished, have pleasing personality and have Good soft skills and command on English language are bound to do well in the placement interviews. So if you are a tier II or tier 3 towns student or student from village, please invest in the above programs beyond your studies. If you simply Google search, wherever you are, you will get English language coaches. Join them. Read a vocabulary book. I also came from a very small town. The first book which I bought was Norman Lewis English vocabulary made easy. This book really help me grab thousands of important English words and I enriched myself. I even attended English-speaking coach and his classes so that I could improve my spoken english.

Give your best shot at your interview. Be it a placement inerview or off-campus placement interview. Be well dressed in power dressing. Carry a attractive resume folder. Pray to the God of your choice. Always ensure to visit your place of worship on the day of interview.  Arrive 10 minutes in advance at the venue. Never judge anyone or make any opinion about anything you notice. Be calm, cool and confident. Be jovial, Positive and curious. Try to answer all the questions with a balanced approach whenever you are asked to decide one side or the another one. If you are not sure about the answer of any question you may politely decline to answer that question or pass that question. Your answer should reflect your honesty, Integrity and ethics. Always read the core values of the company and try to answer questions in such a way that you realise the recruiter that you know the values of their company and while your values match with that of company. Show the hunger and need for the job, Even if you are millionnire or son / daughter of a rich businessman. Demonstrate that why you are the right fit for this job. Make a little bit exaggeration of the future. Carry few ideas about the revenue growth of the company even if if this question is not asked. Share these ideas with the recruiter on how this company can embrace new and emerging technologies and grow their revenues exponentially. Even if it’s not your responsibility at this level but that Proves your fittment and attitude. Give your best shot. Smile and come out of the interview room. Always expect that you will get this job. Be positive. You will get it for sure. Talk to the universe around you and tell the universe that you need this job. Universe always reflects back on what you ask and you get that.

So what to do if you’re not lucky in the campus interview or job interview. Don’t break your heart. You can always go for advanced studies in the similar program. Join hands with your friends and create a start-up which is being supported by a lot of startup accelerators, investors, incubation centres and government of India’s startup India program. Take contractual, freelance assignments and projects. If you get opportunity for teaching. Please take it up as well but keeping long-term view on the goal of getting a great company for placement. If you have a family business, go and join that. If you have a hobby or passion, pursue that little harder as at this juncture you don’t have too much family responsibility or liabilities. If your passion becomes your profession there is no success like that in the long term. Meat Political influencers, Corporate honchos from your friends and family connections and don’t be shy to ask for job interview recommendation. To increase your chance of success make multiple profiles for multiple roles and start pushing your CV to job portals. Go on internshala.com then immediately join any internship based  job even at low salary. This will make you self-sufficient and you will have time to strike for better options. If you don’t wish, don’t show this internships in your CV but Which is in contrast of my previous advice that your CV should be like a book and has everything you’ve done so far. So depending on objective change the strategy. Keep on throwing your CV all across. Try to call in companies and speak to HR executive and request to ask for careers  email ID and push your CV. See the classifieds and circle all walk in opportunities. Even if you don’t get the function of your choice or you are forced to work in the sales area. Accept that. No work is bad. Work is worship. Keep on working without focusing too much on the results. If you are a performer the company will be obliged to retain you, promote you and give you the role of your choice. Jobs in BPO / KPO / Insurance / banking in the third-party sector / Pharma sales are always available in abundance. Join them. Keep on preparing yourself for the next big move. The moment you get your choice. Move on. That’s the same way companies do. They don’t think twice before laying off or hiring someone on top of you from outside. Be emotional with your skill and performance but not with your company. Although Japanese principal says that once you join a company retire from that. Average time which you should give to your company is around three years and three appraisal cycles. Then move on. If you have already become a critical resource for that company they will try to retain you, else you can get the better appreciation and compensation outside. 

The above will set a strong foundation for you and I can assure you that you will be hundred percent confident about yourself and your success in a job interview, be it a campus placement or off-campus placement. If you still have any questions and doubts, feel free to write in the comment section and I will individually respond to each and every question. You can always reach out to me on my WhatsApp number and I will ensure to answer. Best of luck. Be little more sincere. Success is just waiting for you. You can do that. Be confident that you have the desired skills. Have a bit of faith in God of your choice and he will never disappoint you. God is with you. Look is with you. Even Ajay Chhabra is with you.

Thank you so much. Please like, share and comment on this content and let me know If you became successful or if you are able to remove any mental blocks you had so far. Let me know your success story. I will try to add your success story in any of my next content.