Students’ Speak: Step by step guide for Pre-Placement preparation

By: Sachin Kuman Singh

Pre-placements are one of the most significant events for engineering undergraduates. Sachin Singh offers an insider view for the placement drives in the top engineering institutes and shares tips for pre-placement preparation.

Pre-placement is one of the most important events for engineering students, in some cases, becoming the foundation for a successful career. In this article, I will first share the complete process, starting from placement notification to offer letter and then I’ll share the tips for successful pre-placements.

Top institutions such as IITs, NITs and other top private universities have particular training & placement departments that deal with different organisations/ companies regarding the placements and organizing a visit to their campus. Be it vacancy announcement for different courses and branches or deciding the venue and time, it is all based on consent from both the parties.

The placement cell publishes the notice with the complete details about the organisation such as eligibility criteria, eligible branches, CTC, date & time of test and venue. The notice is issued generally two to three days prior to the drive and in some cases, a night before.

The various tests to be conducted during the placement process will depend on the kind of organisation/ company, their norms and the number of students. The tests may include general aptitude, group discussion, HR interview, technical interview, and in some cases, psychometric tests. Usually, if the number of eligible students are more than companies/ recruiters will definitely go for GD round as it is an elimination round.

After the written test (aptitude, logical reasoning), the names of the students who have qualified for further rounds will be announced. In most cases, all the rounds tend to happen on the same day—written test followed by GD and finally interviews. However, it is a rarity that they announce the selected students on the same day. Organisations/ recruiters generally announce the names of selected students after two to three days after the placement drive. They send the emails to the respective students (depends on placement cell when they want to announce in some cases).

It may take from a week to one month for receiving the hard copy of the offer letter which includes details such as CTC, joining date, location and other terms and conditions of the organisations. The complete process and the arrangements are taken care of by the placement cell. They maintain the record and track both students who are placed and those who are yet to be placed.

The pre-placement preparation depends on various factors such as the kind of profile you are applying, whether it is a sales profile or BPO or it is completely a core one. Moreover, if it is specific for IT or core branches, you will have technical questions and it will be mandatory to score sectional cutoff marks in that particular section. One thing is common in all placement drives, i.e. appearing for the written tests comprising aptitude, verbal reasoning and logical reasoning. If you clear the test, you will go for further rounds or you will be eliminated from the drive and the results are published usually after an hour or two of conducting the tests. If the number of students are less, you will be directly called for the interview round.

The basic topics for aptitude and reasoning you must prepare include data interpretation, quadratic equations, distance and time, probability, sequence series, seating arrangement work and time, permutation and combinations and these topics are similar for almost all the tests. You need to practice them regularly or else you will get confused when you see the questions.

For the technical part, you need to prepare the basic concepts and topics related to your own subjects from previous years. If possible, glance at all the topics that you think is important according to you. For coding rounds, you will have to build and run your code in the given timeframe. You may need to write one or two complete programs if you are sitting for good software companies. So prepare according to that and consult your seniors frequently because often these questions are repeated.

I would only suggest that you just prepare yourself with the basic stuff that you have studied during the duration of your course, cover some latest updates for the general knowledge assessment and I think you will make it to any good company. Start your preparation from day one, get to know that what companies are going to visit but don’t develop a mind-set that you should only participate in the placement drive for companies which you like as later it may be possible that you have nothing in your hand. All the best!

About the Author:

Sachin Kuman Singh recently completed his Bachelor of Technology in Civil Engineering from KIIT, Bhubaneshwar. Currently, he is working with Simplex Infrastructures Limited as a Graduate Engineer Trainee. He is also a state-level athlete.