Value Added Questionnaire

1. Tell me about yourself.

Hello, my name is Rishab Nayyar and I hail from Ludhiana, Punjab. I’m a fresher and I’ve done my engineering from
Chitkara University, Rajpura, in the field of Computer Science Engineering. During my final year internship, I
developed an Enterprise Resource Planning system for the company I trained at which helped digitalize the
internal workings of the company functions and enabled reduction in operational costs and document processing
time. Also, during my second year of engineering, I started a little business venture of selling laptop skins to my
fellow colleagues in my hostel. The experience of selling the product to people and handling the logistics of
carrying the laptop skins form the point of manufacturing to the college premises really helped me learn a lot
about various dimensions of a business. I along with my business partner sold around 100 laptop skins in a span of
2 months. On the whole it was a very enriching experience and gave me a taste of how the business proceedings in
the real world might actually work and also developed my interest towards the field of management. Some of my
hobbies include watching English movies and web series and playing lawn tennis. I like watching the digital content
because it helps me to learn a lot about different aspects of life from a variety of people all around the world, and I
love playing lawn tennis, and swimming as it helps me relax and keeps me fit.

2. What is the job role that you are looking for? Give us three reasons that make you
think you are best suited for this role
I am interested in pursuing a career in in the IT/ITES domain, which includes job roles such as Data Analyst,
Business Analyst, Technology Consultant, Product Manager etc. According to me having Come from a computer
science backhground, and pursuing my B.E. in the same filed has helped me get acquainted in the field in a
significant way. Being a Tech enthusiast made me realize that no one can forgoe adaptation to changing technilogis
in todays business world. Data is the new oil, and is going to be the game changer in the coming decade not just for
businesses but for the whole world and is the reason why I want to persue a job role in the said filed.
The three reasons that make me a good fir for my desired job role are my willingness to learn new things,
enthusiasm for technology and persistence. Being a fresh graduate and still having the flow of learning helps me to
learn and inculcalte new concepts and be agile in that way. Enthusiasn for technology is one of the most vital traits
according to me since whatever job role or field one choose they should be passionate about it in order to be
really good at what they. Lastly, one of the most important aspect of my personality is pesistance, which has
helped me to never give up in a tough situation and would be vital in any job one takes up to face the challenges
they would face during their career.
 3. What qualities do you think you possess to be a good fit in our organization?
One of the most important attributes for anyone to be a good fit at an organization is their ability to work with a
team, which is a quality I possess. Having worked in various academic projects throughout my engineering and
having organized college fests, all in teams of multiple people with varying perspectives and natures has helped me
understand the dynamics of working together in a team and doing it well. Another quality I possess is my
willingness to learn new things, as being an individual with no work experience and still being in the flow of
studying and learning having transited from my enginerring and then joining an MBA program, it has helped me in
being adapatable and versatile and to be able to learn new concepts or tasks without feeling it difficlut to adjust to
the changing conditions, which is a crucuial part of the business these days. Finally, my strongest attribute that
helps me perform well in a task I undertake is my passion, since without passion it is not possible to deliver quality
output. Always havning been passionate about the tasks I undertake has helped me immensely to not be
unnerved by the difficulties that I may face and is something I believe is important for whatever one does in life
since otherwise you can’t do justice to what you do and is a very important quality to have in order to perform well
in an organization and overcome challenges that me come your way.

4. Do you think your academic results, as mentioned in your CV, are a good indication of
your abilities? Elaborate.
My academic performance has been a roller coster of sorts, as you can see in my cv, with a good score in class 10,
and then a drop in acads in class 2 but ultimately recovering with a decent score in my undergrad. To answer the
question, I would say the academic results do indicate ones abilities to some extent but for me I would say that
isn’t entirely true. Having been a model student in my class 10, I performed well in academics and achieved a good
score of 93.1%. But after my transition from class 10 to class 11, I struggled to cope up with the sudden change in
the way to go about the academics and the new entirely different subjects which was a hit to my self-confidence
and thus I couldn’t give my best which I should have in my class 12 exams.
However, the experience taught me a lot about how to deal with difficult situations and helped me develop my
character to be adaptable to tough and dynamic conditions which is something that has stayed with me to this day.
Consequently, having learned tough but crucial lessions, I performed well in my undergraduation studies scoring
88.9% in my four-year course and also expanded myself to other fields as well, form organizing college fests, to
even starting a small business venture that was a wonderful learning opportunity.

5. What is your purpose of doing an MBA? How do you think it is going to add value? Can
you elaborate on the reasons behind changing your career path?

The idea of doing an MBA first came to my mind when I started a business venture of selling laptop skins to my
fellow collegues during my second year of engineering. The experience of selling the product to people and
handling the logistics of carrying the laptop skins form the point of manufacturing to the college premises really
helped me learn a lot about various dimensions of a business. I along with my business partner sold around 100
laptop skins in a span of 2 months. On the whole it was a very enriching experience and gave me a taste of how the
business proceedings in the real world might actually work and also developed my interest towards the field of
management.
Doing an MBA would really add value to my skillset since being a fresh graduate I don’t have much exposure to the
way the business world works which an MBA program provides in the form of peer learning, industry interactions
and learning about various business dimensions in the academic structure of the course. Having an interst in the IT
field and being a computer science graduate, I am aquainted with technical aspects of the domain but want to
learn the managerial aspect as well which would mean an allround development for my skillset and would help me
in my career progression.
 6. How do you see your career progression? Where do you see yourself 5 years from
now? Where do you see yourself 10 years from now?
A bachelor's degree in computer science engineering has helped me enhance my logical and analytical skills vital
for a career in business management and adding managerial skills to my skill set will really help me excel in my
career and will provide me a broader perspective of the intricacies involved in the management field. Five years
from now, I see myself at the middle management level in a corporation, handling challenging projects and
contributing to the organizations' advancement and at the same time enhancing my skill set with the essential
experience acquired thus further helping me excel in my career. This would help me become a better and a
seasoned manager and help in my long term growth both personally and professionally.
Ten years from now I want to reach the Senior managagement position in a reputed organizationnwhere I’ll be
able to take important business decisions for the fulfilment of my organizations short term mission and long term
vision. I see myself formulating essential business strategies and plans for my companys growth and advancement
and executing the same with competence and efficiency, and make the decisions and policies requires to achieve
those plans by proper management of both the personnel and company resources.

7. What are your professional goals in life? How do you plan to achieve them?
In the short term, I see myself at the middle management level in a corporation, handling challenging projects and
contributing to the organizations' advancement and at the same time enhancing my skill set with the essential
experience acquired thus further helping me excel in my career. This would help me become a better and a
seasoned manager and help in my long term growth both personally and professionally. In the long term I want to
reach the Senior managagement position in a reputed organizationnwhere I’ll be able to take important business
decisions for the fulfilment of my organizations short term mission and long term vision. I see myself formulating
essential business strategies and plans for my companys growth and advancement and executing the same with
competence and efficiency, and make the decisions and policies requires to achieve those plans by proper
management of both the personnel and company resources.
A bachelor's degree in computer science engineering has helped me enhance my logical and analytical skills and
combed with my learnings from my MBA journey, it would help me excel in my career in the short term. In the long
term, after having worked in the industry, having acquired valuable experience and learnings would help me grow
further as a seasoned manager and progress well in my career.

8. What qualities according to you are necessary to be a good leader? Detail 2 incidents
where you have demonstrated leadership qualities
One of the situations where I assumed the role of a leader was during my final year internship project where I, along
with 3 other team members and a team lead was working on developing an ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system
for one of our clients. I was 4 months in my internship and had been working on the project since the past 3 months. My
fellow team members had been assigned the project inly since the last 4 weeks and were relatively new to it. During
one particular week my team lead wasn’t able to work with us on the project since he was urgently required by another
team working in a different city. Since I had the most familiarity with the project was assigned the task of overseeing the
project progress which I was able to do satisfactorily and made sure we didn’t deviate from the timeline.

Another time I worked in the leader capacity was while organizing a sports event of the society I reside in during my
winter vacation in my 2 nd year of btech. The organizers were facing issues procuring the required sports equipment for
several activities which were supposed to take place during the event. I decided that we can contact sports vendors
directly and offer them sponsorship in the form of banners in return for timely delivery of the desired products we
required, which we were then able to procure successfully, while also getting a 12% discount on the entire bill.
According to these experiences the most important qualities a leader should possess would be the ability to think
quickly on your feet, to have good decision making ability for difficult decisions, to have good communication skills since
you often need to be able to convey your need both to the team members as well as your superiors, to have the
confidence in yourself to get the job done and to be able to hold yourself accountable in situations when things don’t go
according to plan.
 9. Can you describe two instances where you have proposed an innovative solution to
solve problems at the workplace (or internship or project)? What were the challenges
you faced? And results and learnings?
In my first year of engineering, we had 4-day trip to visit Manali, along with our classmates. The teachers were
facing a lot of issues in managing the logistics of getting student conformations, collecting money and keeping the
complex record of all the requirements. I made a simple suggestion of creating a google docs link which could be
floated to the WhatsApp group of the class to get the confirmations of various students thus saving a lot of
difficulty faced by both my teacher and my fellow batch mates. Also, I suggested the use of Paytm, google pay and
phone pay wallets to collect money from the students rather than maintain the hefty cash wads along with having
the risk of the money getting misplaced. Another instance was during my btech project where we had to rent
servers for hosting the data for our website but the servers were too expensive for out bidget and my whooe team
couldn’t see a way out other than to pay the extra money, this is when I porposed that we talk to the college
authorities and procure the servers through them since they could negotiate better prices on our behalf, which
they ultimately did and we were infact able to save 20% of our original budget.
Both the instances taught me different lessions that you not every problem needs a complex solution, the simpler
the solution the easier the implementation, you might not need to be smart, just street smart and the second
instance taught me that you might not always have the resources for your task at hand but should know how and
whom to reach out to and leverage the resources they posses to your advantage.

10. Give an example of a time when you were able to share what you had learned in a
particular area with others.

Last year I started a small initiative of teaching the kids of the domestic workers in our residential society. They
didn’t have the resources to afford a tuition and they were struggling to learn the concepts that were being taught
in their respective schools. I began teaching a group of five children the subjects they were facing problem with
which were mathematics, science, and English. During the time I was already preparing for my cat exam and was
therefore in touch with maths and English concepts, which proved to be an advantage for me.
I used to keep one hour classes each day to the kids at the tome their parents were workinh in the society so that it
was convenient for them. I began by teaching them the most basic concepts so as to build their base and provided
them the structure they needed to follow in order to be better at the process of learning itself. In a span of three
weeks they began showing improvement. I also used to provide them with tests so as to better judge their concept
clarity and to assess where they lacked, after which I taught them what they couldn’t solve. The whole process
really helped them clear their basics and perform significantly well in their academics. The process was also
advantageous to me since some of their

11. Tell us two instances wherein you had to take charge in a tough situation at your
workplace (or internship or project). What made the situation tough? What were the
risks and results?
I was the event organizer for a college fest where I had to ensure timely operations of various events and ensure
food supplies to various food stalls when the vendor couldn’t deliver the material in time, which would have meant
no food availability at the stalls for 800+ attendees. So I had to procure the required materials from the nearby
own by sending two my team members for ensuring that correct order placement and I coordinated with college
authorities to allow the last minute change by explaning them the situation and ultimately ensuring the timely
delivery of the said materilas.
Another instance was during my 3rd year engineering project, me and my four other group members were
developing a messanging app in which I was the project lead, to be used by students on campus, when I suggested
to add an extra functionality, which would have meant increased workload for everyone, because otherwise
without adding that feature to our platform, the project on the whole wouldn’t have been of optimal quality and
could have resuted in us getting low grades, but I convinced everyone by carrying out a two-week trial for starting
work in the modules involved and we were successfully able to integrate the functionality under the time
constraints
12. What is your single largest achievement so far? Why do you consider it to be your
biggest achievement?
During my second year of engineering, I started a business venture of selling laptop skins to my fellow colleagues in
my hostel. Since every student of computer science department was required to have a laptop, it seemed like a
great business opportunity due to the huge batch size of 800 students in the department with more than 400 living
in the hostel. The venture helped me learn a lot about various dimensions of a business. I had to interact with a lot
of people by going door to door to sell the laptop skins from where I learned a lot about how to talk to people and
communicate your ideas and thoughts to them effectively.
Also, the logistics of carrying the laptop skins form the point of manufacturing to the college premises taught me to
appreciate the workings of several large corporations of the world like amazon, Maersk and Walmart. I along with
my business partner sold around 100 laptop skins in a span of 2 months and generated a revenue of roughly Rs
15,000. On the whole it was a very enriching experience and gave me a taste of how the business proceedings in
the real world actually work. The whole venture was an amazing learning experience for me on so many fronts and
I actually earned money on my own fir the first time in my life so that is why I consider this to be the biggest
achievemt of my life yet.

13. Describe a time when you had to rely on personal or professional integrity to achieve a
result.
In my first year of engineering me and my team members had to make a class project as part of our curriculum. We
decided to make a project ‘security alarm using laser’, in which we made a hardware design using transistors, led,
LDR(light dependent resistor) etc. The alarm would buzz whenever the flow of laser light falling on the LDR was
interrupted. Since this was our first project in our undergrad course, we weren’t much aquainted with how to go
about working efficiently in a team and how to proceed with the project. One of my team mebers suggested
having it maid from someone else in exchange for money.
I felt that this wasn’t the right way to go about the problem we had infront of ourselves since it wouldn’t have
helped us to actually learn in the process which was the whole point of our degrees. I talked to my team members
explaining them that even if we do get the project ready mate, we would face similar problems sooner rather than
later as we progress through our course and that this solution won’t be available everytime, also it won’t help us
learn the essential concepts. Eventually everyone realized that this wasn’t and viable solution and we went to work
on the project diligently, consulting our professors and other batchmates whenever we faced difficulty, ultimately
submitting the project having done a decent work and learned a lot in the process.

14. Tell me about a time you worked well as part of a team. What role have you played in
ensuring the team’s success?
Last year, the residential society I lived in had a cultural and sports event in which I was part of the organization
team. The event consisted of several sports competitions including cricket, football, lawn tennis, badminton etc.
The organizing team was responsible for procuring the sports equipment, scheduling of the events, providing
refrees, and schedule all the fixtures for the games and keep track of the scores. I was part of the team
responsible for procuring sports equipment, one of the most important aspects of the event. We needed to
procure the material at an affordabke price since we were under budget constraints and had to look for the best
available price.
I proposed that we can contact the sports vendors directly and offer them sponsorship in the form of banners in
return for timely delivery of the desired products we required, which we were then able to procure successfully,
while also getting an 12% discount on the entire bill, which was really helpful for us given our budget. After that we
were able to deliver the required items from the vendors to the event and ensured that there were no shortages
by getting extra equipment in case it was needed on goodwill bases that we’ll return the said equipment after the
event and on the whole the event went smoothly without much difficulty and was a success.
15. What is it that irritates you the most about working in a team? How do you handle it?
Working in a team always requires you to work with a mix of people from different backgrounds and with varying
personalities. This might occasionaly lead to difficult situations when the people don’t sync together well and
there’s resistance in the team. These issues can be resovled through good communication and understanding.
However, one of the most irritating situation that really bothers me is when some team member doesn’t take their
work seriously and finds excuses for others to fill in for them on their behalf, at the same time they miss important
deadlines.
This is a very troublesome issue for me because working in a team requires you to be professional and deliver
quality work as that doesn’t just affect you but the team as a whole. In order to avoid the situations where people
layoff their work or miss critical deadlines, I make sure that the team leader has clearly communicated the
individual responsibilities of all the members and the importance of the deadlines is stressed upon enough. Also, if
I find someone behaving in the above mentioned way I talk to them directly about what I feel is wrog and try to
talk to them in a reasonable manner to help them see reason, which almost always is able to remedy the situation.

16. What motivates you to put forth your best effort?

Everyone does some sort of work in their life, for students it is their course work, for adults it is their jobs. However
when the person is not motivated for what they do, they often find it difficult to do quality work and kind of fall in
a rut. For me, the thing that keeps me motivated to put forth my best effort is that I believe in persuing the things
I’m genuinely passionate about. In doing so this really helps me to have the zeal in me in order to stay motivated
and not give up due to lack of interest.
One of the instances is during my second year of engineering I was finding one of the subects-basics of electronics
engineering very difficult to understand. It was a semester long core subject which meant I had to perform in that
subject as it would reflect on my gradecard. At one point of time I really felt like giving up since I wasn’t able to
comprehend it. However, at that point of time I decided to put forth more effort than I already was since it was
part of my engineering journey which was something I had taken up for myself. Ultimately I was able to perform
decently in the said subject by not giving up and it was my zeal and passion for what I believed in doing that I was
able to put forth my best effort when the situation needed it the most and to not falter.

17. How do you ensure the success of a project? Can you describe a situation where you
have played a critical role in ensuring successful completion?
While working on any project, there are a few essential things that should be made sure are kept in mind before
during and after the project. Firstly, the objectives and requirements should be clearly stated during the beginning
of the project, efficient communication between various team members is critical for a good result, and finally the
team members should be ready for any unforseen challenges that might come their way because more often that
not that does happen, so it is imperative to be agile and be ready for difficulties that may arise during any phase of
the project.
One instance where I played a critical role in ensuring project completion is during my third year engineering
project, me and my four other group members were developing a messanging app in which I was the project lead,
to be used by students on campus, when I suggested to add an extra functionality, which would have meant
increased workload for everyone, because otherwise without adding that feature to our platform, the project on
the whole wouldn’t have been of optimal quality and could have resuted in us getting low grades, but I convinced
everyone by carrying out a two-week trial for starting work in the modules involved and we were successfully able
to integrate the functionality under the time constraints and deliver a good quality project.
 18. How are the academics of MBA different than under graduation? Which subject do you
like the most? Least? Explain.
Academics in my under graduation were more technical in nature and they involved the theory about how things
work on the technical level. Often most of the subjects I studies were theoretical without any practical
demonstration or explanation along with them. The academics of my under graduation helped me develop my
analytical thinking abilities and also approach a problem in a systematic way.
On the other hand, the subjects in my MBA are vast and varies in nature containing a mix of both technical and
subjective courses which has helped me widen my horizions in terms of my learnings. A curcial part of the
academics in my MBA is the extensive prevelance of group projects on a regular basis which was missing in my
under graduation and has helped me learn and grow as a person alongwith helping me become more adaptable
and a better team player.
The subject that I like the the most is marketing management because it follows a holistic case study based
approach to explain the various concepts involved and has an interactive element to it when it comes to solving
group assignmnets. The subject which I don’t like much is financial accounting because I dins it difficult to
understand the concept having come from engineering background with no familiarity of various financial terms.

19. What are your hobbies and interests?

One of my hobbies is playing lawn tennis. I like playing lawn tennis since it involves being actively present in the
moment and pushing yourself to the limit physically which is something that makes it really exciting for me.
Learning to play lawn tennis was really a challenge for me since it seemed like a difficult sport to begin with but
ultimately going through that learning phase really helped me grow as a person by making me realize I can learn
new and diffuclt things if I set my mind to it.
Another hobby of mine is swimming which I have been doing so since the last five years. I learned swimming
during my class 12, which was a stressful phase for me and it really helped me to have a calm and centerd mind
due to the time I spent alone while swimming, sometimes underwater with no distractions and sounds but my own
thoughts and kid of became like a meditation for me helping me control my nerves.
Finally, one of my most avid interests is watching English movies and web series. Even though a lot of people do so
in today’s day and age, its not just about being an activity for entertainment or for passing my time but more about
connecting with the story and experiencing what the writer, director and actor wants to convey through the story,
helping me know about different life stories & see life through other peoples experiences and perspectives.

20. Can you state 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses of yours?

According to me my three strengths that make me a better personality and are an essential part of my character
are Perseverance, Love of learning and being a team player. Perseverance is something that has helped me deal
with even the toughest of situations head on and not being derailed by the difficulties I might face in a situation.
Being a fresher I am still in that flow of learning new skills and topics and is a big factor for my love of learing. It
encourages me to adapt with changing conditions and learn new thins to add to my knowledge. Finally, being a
team player is a very crucial quality I possess, because being a part of various academic prjects and organizing
teams has helped understand the dynamics of working in a team and be a good team player.
My three weaknesses are over thinking, self criticism and sometimes valuing other peoples opinion too much. I am
always thinking of varous scenerios in my mind which leads to over thinking and sometimes paralyzes in making a
particular decision so I try to list out the pro and cons of a decision and not think too much of the negative
possibilities. Self criticism is something that I face often due to my habit of comparing myself with others too much
and undermining yself which I try to avoid by trying to be my best self for me and not for others. Finally valuing
other peoples opinion too much sometimes makes me doubt own self and decisions so I try not to think of what
other people would do or say but go forward with what I think is best according to my judgement.
 21. Tell us about your lowest point in a career and how did you cope up with it and what
were the learnings?

22. Tell us something that is not there on your CV and makes you unique.
One of the most exciting thing that isn’t mentioned in my resume is the fact that I began my own business venture.
During my second year of engineering, I started a business venture of selling laptop skins to my fellow colleagues in
my hostel. Since every student of computer science department was required to have a laptop, it seemed like a
great business opportunity due to the huge batch size of 800 students in the department with more than 400 living
in the hostel. The venture helped me learn a lot about various dimensions of a business. I had to interact with a lot
of people by going door to door to sell the laptop skins from where I learned a lot about how to talk to people and
communicate your ideas and thoughts to them effectively.
Also, the logistics of carrying the laptop skins form the point of manufacturing to the college premises taught me to
appreciate the workings of several large corporations of the world like amazon, Maersk and Walmart. I along with
my business partner sold around 100 laptop skins in a span of 2 months and generated a revenue of roughly Rs
15,000. The important learnings I got from doing something which not a lot of people do really taught me a lot of
impotant lessons and is something that I feel makes me unique since I can actually relate with some of the
concepts and cases which are taught during the MBA course.

23. How would an ideal leader resort to conflict resolution? Describe a situation where you
resolved a conflict between you and your teammates.

Conflict resolution is one of the most crucial role that a leader plays in a team or an organization. If unresolved,
conflicts can make the daily workings inefficient leading to compromise on work quality and can also lead to a toxic
work environment.
An ideal leader should firstly diagnose the conflict by assessing the situation carefully and not avoid the issue
altogether. They should ensure there’s proof of wrongdoing by someone before deciding on any action plan and
try to minimize or neutrize the conflict through careful consel. Also in case of a conflict with the team members an
ideal leader must know to respect the difference of opinions since he/she may not always be right appreciate what
everyone brings to the table.
One instance where I had to resolve a conflict between me and my teammates was while organizing a college
cultural fest where they thought that the amount of work that’d been assigned to our team wasn’t fair as
compared to other teams. I explained to them that this wasn’t the case at all because the task of handling logistics
for the event material was an important and big one and that naturally would require more work. I proposed
having a few volunteers to assist us in our activites and my team members were able to successfully carry out our
duties.
 24. Can you share an instance of conflict between you and your manager and how did you
handle it?

25. How would you approach a disengaged and disgruntled employee who tanks the team’s
productivity? Describe a situation, where you had to deal with such a scenario.

A disengaged and disgruntled employee in a team or an organization can be really detrimental to the team
productivity and can derail the entire project at hand. One of the few ways to reach such an employee is by
involving them in the process of goal setting during the beginning of project thereby making them feel like a part of
the team and not feel disengaged. Another approach is to provide clear expectations you have from them so that
they can’t back away after being explicitly assigmed a particular task. Finally we can also provide them an
opportunity to excel by prasing them for a job well done and encouraging them to do better in the future in
anticipation of recognition.
One of such situations where I had to deal with a disengaged team member was when I was part of a team during
my first year engineering project where we were facing difficulty in completing the task at hand as it was a difficult
one. The team member almost never contributed to work and kept suggesting to outsource the entire project to
someone else by paying money. I along with my other team members explained to him that this would not be
acceptable since we were there to learn and grow and the project was a crucial one and tried to motivate him by
guiding him on how to go about his assigned tasks which he has finally able to do after some adjustment and we
were able to complete the project on time.

26. How would you ensure the good levels of trust and communications in a remote team?

Having worked in an online virtual mode during my MBA course in the past few weeks, it has really heped me
adapt to the new normal of online learning. I along with my batchmates faced a lot of challenges in terms of
building trust and familiarity amongst each other since we all had never met in person. Also we faced challenges in
ensuring good communication amongst each other since no one had previously been in such a situation of
facilitating good communication without being there physically and having to rely entirely on the online mode of
study and learning.
From my experience, first of all in the initial phase of working with a remote team I would keep a number of virtual
group activites planned in order to get different members of the team get familiarized with each other and begin
forming a level of trust and better communication. I would ensure to include both fun and work activities to keep
the balance just right and keep rotating the team members so that all team members get to work with all others.
Then I would give the team members tight deadlines for small tasks so that they are obliged to com together as a
team and work with each other without thinking too much about not being familiar with each other. This would
gradually build up trust amongst theteam when they have to trust other team members to complete the task and
to improve communication amongst them because without that they won’t be able to perform well in the task.
27. What is emotional intelligence? Can you share some instances where you showcased EI?

Emotional intelligence (otherwise known as emotional quotient or EQ) is the ability to understand, use, and
manage your own emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others,
overcome challenges and defuse conflict. Emotional intelligence helps us build stronger relationships, succeed at
work, and achieve ones career and personal goals. It also helps us to connect with our feelings, turn intention into
action, and make informed decisions about what matters most. Emotional intelligence is commonly defined by
attributes such as Self-management, Self-awareness, social awareness and relationship management.
One of the instances where I showcased emotional intelligence was when during the techno quiz competition
during the inter college cultural fest in another university. Me and my two other team members had lost the event
and gotten fourth position by the difference of just one question. I was really demotivated and low and so were
my team mates but it realized that self pity won’t solve anything but would rather hinder us to prepare better to
for upcoming competiton at our won campus. I gathered my thoughts and motivated my team members to give
our best for the next event rather than foucs on the loss and do well. In the end we managed to secure third
position in the competition and were really happy that we didn’t let our short term disappointment cloud our
judgement.
28. What is your approach to problem-solving? How do you arrive at a decision?

Problem solving and decision making are two activities that go hand in hand since without successfully identifying a
problem, you can’t arrive on the right decision. The steps followed by me in the process are as follows. First I try to
analyse the problem and see where the ussue actually stems from to figure out the ins and outs of the issue and
try to find the possible courses of action that can be followed. After determining and analyzing the intensity of the
problem, the next step is to gather more information about the causes of the problem to formulate a better
understanding of the issue at hand. After that the next step is to look at the alternative approaches to solves the
problem at hand by brainstorming and collecting as many relevant ideas as possible. Next step for me is to weigh
the pros and cons of a particular solution and try to determine the best among them by the means of SWOT
analysis. After arriving at a decision for a solution the next step for me is to implement the plan and ensure smooth
execution of the steps involved. Finally the last step for me is to moitor the decided solution and look for any issues
that are arriving after the implementation and see verify that the problem at hand is solved by the implemented
solution. This is the systematic way I try to follow while solving a problem and arriving at a decision to make sure
that the right decision is taken by me.

29. What are the 3 changes you would like to implement in your past institute/workplace?
How would they solve the problems faced by you?

Firstly I would want there to be a student representative body present in the college so as to represent student
interests to both the collge professors and the hostel wardens. Having lived in a hostel and attending lectures,
there were many instances that students faced issues and difficultites on individual level and had to approach
people on there own. Having a common representative body would help present the issues in a better way and get
them resoled in a shorter time frame too.
Second change I would like to implement in my college is that there should be an option to select business studies
electives such as economics, accounting etc during the four year tenure of the engineering. The whole course
curriculum only has technical subject knowledge which is good but the students also need to be ready for the real
world which would become a bit easier if they knew how the economy and businesses on a whole work and not
just a small part of it in terms of the technical subjects.
Finally, I would establish a e-cell of sorts to encourage incubation of business ventures that could potentially
become big companies if given the right guidance. I myself started a business venture during my engineering but
had to stop due to administrational issues faced by me and an e-cell would help ensure that this doesn’t happen.
30. How working in a virtual environment is different from physical? What are the advantages
and disadvantages of it? What would you prefer?

In a virtual environment the few disadvantages one faces is firstly in terms of lack of personal connect with fellow
colleagues. Having experienced my MBA in the virtual mode I faced a lot of issues to get aquainted with my
batchmates and to build a connection with them. The option of interacting with our professors is missing. Also the
physical toll of sitting for hours in a chair in front of a screen is also a concern. However, it has it’s advantages too,
the online lectures taken by our teachers are digitally available for us whenever we need to review them, also we
save time that would have been wasted in transit from one place to other and the resulting physical strain.
Another essential component is the increased level of industry interaction with starwalts of industry since it is
much easier for them to connect via webinar and share their experience and provide us with valuable industry
insights.
Physical enviromnet would have been better on a lot of aspects be it peer to peer learning, having the resources of
the institute available for your use, better faculty ineraction and most importantly a better connect with the fellow
colleagues. I would prefer a mix of both since virtual setting has made me realise there are a lot of tasks that can
be done just as efficiently as being there in person thereby saving valuable time, but at the same time the physical
enviroment has some aspects where it just can’t be replaced.
31. How would you ensure you would meet your objectives, especially when you would be an
intern, working virtually?

32. Tell me about a situation when you handled a project with strict deadlines and limited
resources. How did you manage to complete it?
33. How is your experience of learning virtually so far? Do you think it would affect MBA
learning?

Initially when the MBA course began online I along with my fellow bathcmates faced a lot of difficulty coping up
due to long hours of screen time and having to sit in the same positon. However we adapted to these changes after
our first week in. Another challenge we faced was not beig able to communicate and connect well with each other
in the batch as a whole since in the offline mode you establish the bond quickly being there woth each other. But
in the past week we have really pulled together as a batch by the means of virtual wings and buddies and having
video calls to share and connect whenever time permits.
The virtual mode definitely has its advantages since the lectures are easily available in th form of recorded online
videos incase we need to go back to clear our conepts. Also, this method has been really efficient in terms of time
saved between moving to different lectures and seminars, which in the offline mode would have meant wasting
precious time in transit form one place to another. Another essential component is the increased level of industry
interaction with starwalts of industry sinceit is much easier for them to connect via webinar and share their
experience. On the whole the virtual learning has affected the MBA learning because of the absence of peer to
peer learing and faculty interaction but on the whole it has benifited us as well by easier access to learning and
helping us to keep going and not stopping our studies inspite of the prevelant difficulties.

34. What are the most important learnings from your past work experience?

35. Can you tell us 3 adjectives that your friends would use to describe you and 3 adjectives
that your previous manager would use to describe you
 36. Can you share an instance where you added business value to the project and what was it?

During my fourth year engineering project, me and my four other group members were developing a messanging
app in which I was the project lead, to be used by students on campus, when I suggested to add an extra
functionality, of allowing the developers working on a common project to see the github push and pull activity in
the chat itself, helping them keep track of the current work progress of the current project.

This would allow the students in campus and even outside to work more efficiently with a better mode of
communication. My team talked to the college authorities about having the system available to our college
students for their usage while they work in their academic projects and the college authorities would even pay for
the service.

However, we realized that scaling it to that level requires a lot of resources and work to be done on the aplicaition
which we couldn’t afford to since we had our final year internships about to begin. But on the whole it was a great
experience of building the application which had actual business value associated to it and could be used on a
larger scale for student benefit.