A workshop on “Preparing Students for Job Interviews” was organized at Dronacharya College of Engineering, Gurgaon in collaboration with NITTTR Chandigarh through ICT on 9th September 2016. Forty two students from CSE, IT, ECE, ME, and CSIT Department attended the workshop.

The welcome address and the introduction was given by Dr. P.K. Tulsi, Head of the Department of Education and Educational Management, NITTTR, Chandigarh in which she discussed the various demands of IT Industries for hiring fresher’s.

Focussing on the Communication Skills for clearing interview rounds, Dr. P.K. Tulsi discussed that the selection committee of every organization seeks a candidate, who is self - motivated, has lust to learn new technologies, confidence, and good communication skills. Dr. Tulsi also discussed that Communication is the heart of every organisation. Everything you do in the workplace results from communication. Therefore good reading, writing, speaking and listening skills are essential if tasks are going to be completed and goals achieved.

Then, the speaker, Mr. Ramandeep Sidhu, HR Head, Aerospace discussed about industry expectations from Technical Graduates and Interview Skills. Mr. Sidhu explained about various approaches on a problem so that the interviewer can see creativeness, deep knowledge in a particular domain and the attitude to solve any new problem. He also gave example of various programming interview questions that are generally asked during the interview from the fresher’s.

Explaining about Job Resume writing, Mr. Sanmeet Sandhu, Thapar University, Patiala and Dr. Sunil Dutt, Professor, NITTTR Chandigarh explained that the statistics are that the average employer only spends a few seconds looking at a resume, so it is imperative that it makes an impression. In this increasingly competitive job market students need to have a professional resume that contains the right information, so that it will stand out amongst the countless other resumes that potential employers will be looking at, and gives candidate the best possible chance of getting their attention.

Discussing about the important points which need to be mentioned while writing resume, Mr. Sidhu said that the first impressions count, and the first impression that a potential employer will have of a candidate, is going to depend on how the candidate present resume. He also stated that the potential employer is going to be taking to glance at our resume, so it’s very important to make sure that all the years you have been studying are going to be represented properly in your resume.

Next, Dr. Vidhu Mohan, Former Professor of Psychology Department, Punjab University explained Pre and Post Interview Planning. She explained the students how to react, how to sit and how to manage one’s body language while facing interviews.

Dr. Mohan advised that one should never use words which are not relevant to him / her. She gave an exercise to the students to examine them. During her session she shared a presentation that contained the following questions for self-analysis:-

1. Who am I?

2. Interview Phase

3. Appearance

4. Timing

Then, a session on Group Discussion( GD) was taken up by Dr. S. P. Bedi, Professor, NITTTR Chandigarh, in which she discussed that the main reason for including GD in selection criteria is that effective teams need to work well together and that team cohesiveness depends on building strong relationships among team members. Then, Dr. Bedi gave few tips on group discussions. She also explained about using ice breakers and get - acquainted activities to help establish a positive, cooperative group climate, providing regular feedback to help the group to stay focused on goals, discussing one topic at a time, working through group conflicts rather than avoiding them, ensuring that all group members have an opportunity to state their views and clearly stating decisions so that all members understand.

In the end, there was an interactive questions and answers session in which attendees raised some questions and their doubts about the issues related to preparing resume and tackle interviews. It was very interactive and knowledgeable session for the final year students.

Some Glimpses: