Recently, I saw a video shared on one of the top X accounts where at least hundreds of people were queuing outside of one of the companies that was hiring.
The employment rate has been growing steeply, and this is the case everywhere in the world.
I remember back in 2015, I faced the same when I didn’t get college placements in a tier-3 college. For a complete month, I had gone through this in so many tech parks in Bengaluru.
It was a struggle. I repeat, it was an absolute struggle.
I graduated in June 2015 with a Computer Science and Engineering degree, and could only get a proper job in IT in December 2015.
During those months, I worked in a startup based out of Kolkata, where they promised to pay 6k rupees/month or $72.15/month. Extremely cheap by Indian standards and in the US, well you can see already.
Extremely desperate, I accepted, thinking I would learn something and gain experience.
I worked tirelessly there for 4 months, but never got paid. I was told that the startup would get funding and everything, but it was a sham.
There were times when there was nothing to eat and I had to borrow money from my parents. It was an odd feeling. Especially for Indian kids, whose parents put their heart and soul into their child’s education, and here I was asking for money after graduation.
I was appearing for interviews in Kolkata, going to every office possible, but difficult for fresh graduates at the time. I was naive enough to think that going to every workplace and dropping my resumes there would work.
Later in November 2015, I came to Bengaluru, and thank god, I had friends living there. This is because I don’t think I would have survived without an income in Bengaluru had I not had my friends there.
For those of you reading this who don’t know, Bengaluru is known as the Silicon Valley of India and hence, the living costs especially the rent is one of the highest in my country.
In Bengaluru as well, for a month, I roamed and went to every tech park where there was an opening. The city has more than a dozen tech parks and over, 67000 registered IT companies. It was a struggle.
I must have attended at least 30+ interviews within a span of 40 to 45 days. There were times when I cleared all the interviews and got rejected in the final round.
For one of the interviews, I was rejected for reaching 10 minutes late, and it wasn’t my fault, I started 3 hours prior, but the traffic in Bengaluru deserves its article.
Finally, I got offers from two multinational companies after several unsuccessful interviews.
I joined one of them in Trivandrum as they provided joining before the other. I was living with a friend in Bengaluru at the time, and he never charged me a single penny for the rent. Honestly, I was lucky in that way.
So I was desperate to get the job and I took the first bus to Trivandrum from Bengaluru and joined the company in December 2015. There was no looking back.
Well, I joined a new product company recently, which is a big deal as this was one of my goals for this year.
Guys, joining @Equifax as a Software Engineer – Intermediate.
— Vivek Naskar (@vivek_naskar) November 1, 2023
Today is Day 1.
The onboarding process is going on. pic.twitter.com/MVcBS2aiE6
Life works in mysterious ways. One time while searching for jobs, I thought of leaving a career in IT, and it was tough to make it. However, I never gave up.
That’s what I tell my younger sister and even the junior developers who get demoralized when they are stuck on a problem.
All we need to solve problems at work and in life. Once you can do that, you will be rewarded for your efforts.
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