Hi! I am Radhika Balasubramaniam, a final year dual degree student from the Energy Science and Engineering department. During my time here I have tried out internships in various domains including core, data science and consulting. I was an internship coordinator in my third year. I also spent a semester studying (read travelling) in Switzerland last year and haven’t stopped talking about it since :P. Other than that, I am drawn to anything artsy including painting, writing and crocheting. My most recent internship was in the Energy and Climate Advisory at PwC.
Apping for Internships:
I was looking for a summer internship after my 4th year. I was quite confused about which field to pick, especially considering how it might look on my placement resume. After a previous data science internship, I wanted to explore a different field to see if it was a better fit for me. I was initially applying to a few consulting firms, FMCG and energy companies. After a point though, I got more desperate and sent requests to all possible companies from core to VCs, FMCG, consult and think tanks.
I started apping in February, and it took me about a month to get the hang of it and do it in large enough numbers for me to get responses. I mostly used LinkedIn, but email work too. I had a common note drafted for each domain (it was just a brief introduction about myself and what my past experience in the field had been). I also maintained a sheet with the names of everybody I contacted and the status of each contact.
The ‘Dual Degree x Internship’ struggle is gradually fading out as most departments have started offering BTech. degrees. Still, for our batch, most of us had to go through the apping process. Apping can be a humbling experience because it involves filling countless workday applications, reaching out to as many people as possible and many rejections. However, it is important to keep trying.
I found that simply applying to openings on LinkedIn mostly ended in rejections. A lot of companies have openings that they do not publicly post and hence, reaching out to their employees would be your best bet at getting those roles. If you have any family, seniors or IITB alumni at the firms you would like an internship with, I suggest you step over your pride and reach out, because they can help you cut the line straight to the right people.
If not, even reaching out to people at the post of managers and above helps. Most people are quite helpful and after a bit of conversation would certainly give you a referral for the role.
How did you find out about this internship and what made you pursue it?
Well, this internship found me rather than the other way around! I remember getting a call out of the blue in March, asking me if I were still interested in interning at PwC. After almost 2 months of cold mailing people my resume and sending LinkedIn connections, I didn’t even know which one of the people I had reached out to had referred me, but I was glad some nice stranger had vouched for me.
I was relieved to get that call from PwC because it was a consulting role with the Energy and Climate advisory at PwC. It seemed like the perfect intersection between core and non-core and I decided to take it up.
About the selection/interview process:
Since I got the internship externally, the interviews were more of a formality. The firm’s requirement needed to be immediately filled. I had the first informal call which gauged my general skills and interests. After that, I had 2 rounds of interviews, a technical round with the Director, where they asked me simple questions about my previous projects, some basic discussions on energy(solar PV, wind, hydrogen, etc.) and some energy economics-related questions (NPV, IRR). Other than that the classic, “Why consulting?”, “Why PwC?” questions were also asked. The HR round involved discussions about the duration, stipend and other procedures. There was also a basic aptitude test round which I gave after the interviews (normally it would be conducted before).
So other than resume preparation and basic knowledge from my courses, I didn’t have to prepare for anything more.
Work Allotted:
Most of my work involved researching specific topics of the project and compiling that information into slides. I had to gather and analyse data related to the project and draw some conclusions. Some projects involved financial modelling which required basic Excel skills. It was mostly working with MS PowerPoint and Excel. I also tried to bring in a bit of Python to help with forecasting the energy demand which was previously being done on Excel.
Since many clients were government companies or renewable energy developers looking to understand the regulations in place, my work had a legal aspect as well, where I was going through lots of petitions, regulations and legal acts to find precedents and data. Being a part of a small team of 4 at the Mumbai office, I was given a fair amount of responsibility and my opinions were valued. I even had the chance to tag along to client meetings sometimes. Working in a big corporate office had its perks with freebies and many office parties that helped better interactions.
I found the work to be really interesting. I got to work on multiple projects simultaneously major ones related to public-private partnership models and renewable energy curtailment risk evaluation. I picked up quite a lot in 2 months, from government bidding processes to virtual PPAs, green credits and how the DISCOMs and the grid operate.
Challenges
Initially, it took me some time to understand some terms frequently used in the documents I was referring to, but after reading a lot of them, I caught on. Presenting the information concisely on slides to keep it short and clear was also a bit of a challenge, but the work itself was not that difficult.
Another major struggle was the daily commute to the office. Taking local trains to a prime location like Dadar during peak rush hours combined with the monsoon was a nightmare. It was bad enough that it now makes me consider location as a more important factor in deciding on a full-time job. With a combination of working from home on account of ‘heavy rains’ and figuring out better travel strategies, I got through.
Tips for juniors
A word of advice: don’t lose hope. Whether you are trying for an internship through the PT Cell or externally, keep applying and something will eventually click. Things have a way of working out in the end. Focus more on the domain you would like to explore and the type of work offered so you can learn as much as possible before starting a full-time job.
It’s also a good idea to keep documenting all the work you did during the internship so you can refer to it later (in case somebody asks you to write a blog about it) or even forward it to your manager if it would help them.
Feel free to reach out to me if you ever need help with apping or finding internships!
