IIM Indore - GD/PI Experience

The long wait for an IIM interview finally ended today.
Place : PESIT
TIME : 09:00 AM

Group Discussion: Was a very long case with lots of characters. Was quite confusing to remember who was who?
It was a case about a bank officer who is on his way to replenish an ATM along with a couple of security guards, two technicians and an off duty bank officer. He has been asked to replenish one of the ATMs by the bank manager as a customer is waiting there. They get waylaid by a group of robbers and the off duty bank officer is badly hurt. So the bank officer takes this guy to the hospital and doesnt replenish the ATM.
Meanwhile the customer needs cash himself as some one from his family too is in the hospital,and the hospital management has rules that require cash payment to be made before treatment. Since the hospital manager knows the customer he makes an exception to the rule.
The customer also is then admitted to the hospital for exhaustion. The hospital manager is suspended.
What should the hospital manager do?
What should the bank officer do?

My contribution:
Was the third person to speak. Made points about problems arising because of lack of clear cut policy for such exceptional cases in the hospital as well as the bank. Human angle involved in the situation.
Also hospital needs to change it's mechanism which considers only cash and not debit,credit cards, insurance etc. Both these people should be used as a feedback, maybe more number of security guards are needed.
Also that the hospital manager has to say that he was trying to protect the image of the hospital. What if the patient had died?
Thought it was a decent contribution from my side. But just a nagging feeling that I have got. Did the robbers steal the money? Because I said that the bank officer was responsible enough not to let anyone unauthorised replenish the money.


Personal Interview: Was the third person to be called.
Professor 1,P1. Professor 2,P2. and moi.

P1: So how does it feel to be back in college?
Moi: (was expecting this)Sir, very nostalgic. Spoke about all the places in college and meeting a lecturer in the morning. About how happy she was to know why I was there. Also about the changes in college especially the PACE(Partnersip for Advanced Collaboration in Education).
There were huge boards about PACE in college.

P1: So why dont you do MBA from PESIT?
Moi: Sir, MBA is in the rudimentary stage in PESIT. Also the quality of the students might not match the premier B-schools.

P1: What do you know about IIMI?
Moi: Spoke about it being established in 1996, different committees like equiti,infiniti, and also about ISC-Symposium.

P1: Do you know anyone in IIMI?
Moi: Yes sir, two from my school. Gave the names, and also my IIMI mentor.

P1: What kind of a job profile are you looking at post MBA?
Moi: Consulting, with focus on cross domain profile. Spoke about TAS, TSMG, McK and KPMG.

P1: But these kind of companies do not come to IIMI.
Moi: Not sure about McK, but others including Delloite, SAP and IBM consulting do come.

P1: So what all do you read?
Moi: I read whatever I can lay my hands on -fiction, non-fiction, tech, magazines, newspapers.

P1: What's the distribution between fiction and non-fiction?
Moi: Was into fiction a lot when I was in school and beginning years of college. Have started picking up books like... (was cut off here by P2).. wanted to talk about Blink and Freaknomics, which I had recently read.

P2: So what's your general day like?
Moi: gave the normal IT guy schedule answer.

P1: What was TCS' turnover last year?

Moi: Around 3 bn, moreover TCS Bangalore was 140 mn in Q3.

P2: What was TCS' share price?

Moi: Yesterday's closing was 1199. It has taken a hit along with the others, gave quotes for Tata Steel and Tata Motors.

P2: What do you attribute this to?

Moi: Shanghai Sneeze, all the world markets took a hit. Another reason could be FII pulling out their investements due to the budget. We are trying to control inflation and not supporting infrastructure development.

P2: Let's hear something about your work
Moi: Explained the business logic, didnt want to be grilled on tech much, so told about a technology called Siteminder that is used in our project.

P2: Do you write any programs?
Moi: Sir, only a little bit of UNIX and LINUX scripting.

P2: What's LINUX?
Moi: Told about it being a competitor to UNIX. Didnt have good performance to start off with. But with collaboration with RedHat, it has emerged a strong competitor.

(Things started going wrong from this point.)

P2: Is UNIX a level 2/3/4 language?

Moi: Sir, I have heard only of high and low level language. And UNIX is a high level language.

P2: What's an Os?

Moi: It's the interface between the user and the computer. It manages the computer software and hardware resources.
P2: So are UNIX and LINUX Operating Systems/Programming languages?
Moi: OS

P2: Are you sure?
Moi: hmmmm, no Sir, they are PL!!! (MISTAKE!!)

P2: You know the policemen?
Moi: Yes Sir.(Didnt like the sound of this question.)

P2: Why do they use Walky-talkys and not cellphones especially with such low costs that they offer?
MOi: !!! Sir they have a pre-determined frequency that is not available to public. Offers more security. Told about it being possible to track cell calls and sms easily.

P2: So how do they receive the Walky-talky message?
Moi: they have a radio reciever at the other end.

P2: Are you sure about radio receiver?
Moi: Yes sir.

P2: So why cant we have a receiver at the other end and tune into their frequency?
Moi: zapped. Not sure sir.

P2: So where are all your clients servers located?
Moi: Sir, in Phoenix and disaster recovery servers in Minneapolis.

P2: What are the advantages and disadvantages of servers at one place?
Moi: Sir, it offers a central location and thus easier maintenance, for hardware replacement and skilled job it needs to be in one location?

P2: Hardware replacement is skilled?
Moi: Yes sir, we dont do it here. A team from IBM takes care of this in US.

P2: ok and disadvantage?
Moi: In case of a natural calamity, entire infrastructure might fail.

P2: Only one advantage and disadvantage? You have been working for 2 1/2 years now, is this all you know?
Moi: Sir, this is all I am able to think of.

P2: So what is a router?
Moi: It's a specialised computer which ensures that requests are sent over the path of least congestion.

P2: What's a switch? We are not talking about the electric switch, hahaha!!!
Moi: Smile.Sir, it's also a networking component. Dont really recall what it does.

P2: You had Networks as your subject?
Moi: Yes sir.

P1: Have you heard of the Cold War?
Moi: It was about the war between the USA and Russia that arose because of Nuclear buildup.
P1: So when the US attacked Russia, did they do it by air/sea?
Moi: ??? Sir, it might have been by both. ( US did not attack Russia at all!!)
P2: So what is the Hot War?
Moi: I am not sure if there is something called a hot war, the World War II might be called a hot war.

P1: Ok where is xxx located?
Moi: Clueless.Never heard of this, was not even sure he was talking in English!!

P1: Where is yyy located?
Moi: Never heard of this too, again sounded non-english. Maybe it was because of the construction going on behind.

P1: Where is Lotus Temple located?
Moi: Not able to recall. (It's in Delhi)

P1: How about Taj Mahal?
Moi: Agra. (yaar what was he thinking of me?)

P1: Red Fort?
Moi: Delhi.

P1: ok, one last question... (I am not able to recall it, just wanted this to end before I ruined
a interview that I had begun well)

Strengths/Knowns:
Good communication and clarity, confidence and content in GD, also had a smile most of the times in the interview, workex. Overall it was a decent show.
Weakness/unknowns:
CAT percentile, low compared to others. Only one IIM call, so everything to lose. Not aware of other's performances and parameters looked at for selection.