Saturday, February 11, 2006

Sittin in here in a boring room...

Just having been on the receiving end of an iim interview has led me to delve into the psyche of the other side...

Time-9.20 am
yup,there sit the suckers,and haveta babysit em..well they havent met an iim prof yet..
"you eight people get into room 3 and take ur seats in anticlockwise direction on the table in the order told"
ok a gd topic..hmmm...
"your gd topic is "the blue curtain in my room is actually a television"and your time starts now"
well its always fun having a gd with an inane topic....atleast it ends fast..The scheduled time was 10 minutes but within the first 40 seconds there was a deafening silence and the the squirming and swallowing was proceeding in earnest..I let them feel the slow fading of hope of ever getting into the institute by just allowing the eerie silence continue for another couple of minutes....
"ok people..time up..now wait for me to call you one by one..wait outside please.."
now interviews are great fun especially after a gd like this..The reason being before such a gd there are 2 categories of candidates..
1.confident wiseass(cw)
2.nervous diffident(nd)
well after a gd like this both categories metamorphise into-
1.quivering wreck(qw)
well as all the candidates are of the same category the interviews usually proceed in a similar predictable pattern..
me-"good morning ________"
qw-"g..good m..morning sir"
me(chuckling heartily)-"how would you rate the gd?"
qw(weak smile)-"It.. co..could have been discussed with more varied perspectives.."
me-"really!!my congratulations, you hid your perspectives really well in the gd..care to share them now???"
qw(shaking)-"er...ahh...(gulp).."
me-"dont bother,I was just kidding,so you are an engineer?"
qw(thrilled..squeaking away)-"sir,yes sir, I have done my computer engg.."
me-"So, define the central limit theorem and explain its context with quantile-quantile plots".
qw(definitely gasping for breath)-"but sir..I havent done probability in such depth..."
me-"ok so you are an engineer who doesnt know math, fair enough..I trust you atleast know your core subjects at the minimum"
qw-"Sir..I...."
me-"ok write for me a program in java where you dynamically allocate memory to an array from the users input and store numbers in it"
qw-"Sir..its not possible..we dont have pointers in java"
me-"so you mean to say that I am wrong"
qw-"no sir..but.."
me-"so let me get this straight not only do you gape like a goldfish in a gd but you repeat that performance in the interview and when you do exercise your vocal chords you insinuate that my question is wrong..am I right?"
qw(almost paralysed and incapable of speech..)
me-"ok ____,great talking to you..all the best..call the next one on your way out"
and then is the crucial defining time-how many marks do I give the candidate..sorry folks..my professional integrity dictates me to be silent.oh shucks here's the next one..