Internship Diaries #46

Vaibhav Agarwal

Reserve Bank of India

I got an opportunity to do my internship from Reserve Bank of India, Lucknow. The Reserve Bank of India is the central bank of India, which controls the monetary policy of the country thereby controlling the supply of money and ensuring price stability. I was offered to choose a topic of my liking from a vast array of topics including financial inclusion, corporate debt, deepening of financial markets in India, Non-performing assets, foreign direct investment etc. 

Considering the impetus of the present government on the make in India initiative and the trillion dollar requirement of the infrastructure sector, the current environment called for a more focused approach towards improving foreign direct investment in the country and thus my topic of research for my internship was FDI in Emerging Market Economies: Determinants and Impact. Nine countries were identified as the Emerging market economies for this research work including BRICS countries along with Malaysia, Thailand, South Korea and Indonesia. Secondary data was collected from websites such as World Bank, IMF, DIPP and various government websites. The focus was on determining the factors responsible for FDI Inflows in India. Various factors were identified and a conclusive regression analysis was conducted to statistically establish there relevance to FDI inflows in the country. Also, Foreign Direct investment inflows in India were compared to corresponding inflows in other countries. Scope of further FDI inflow in India was established and it was seen that India is better poised as compared to other Emerging market economies to receive future FDI inflows. Also, using statistical analysis and past data, we tried to establish the future Inflows in India. As part of my final presentation, I got to submit my research findings to my mentor and also I got to give a power point presentation in the presence of the Regional director of Reserve bank of India, Lucknow.

As part of my internship, I got to work closely with some of the brilliant minds in the organization. These are the people who are largely responsible for steering the current economic and monetary direction of India. The insights I got into the macro economic factors that go into deciding the monetary direction of the country was a great learning experience. RBI has a great working culture where people are supportive of each other and always encourage a free flow of ideas. People there are always happy to share the immense knowledge base that they have developed over the years. Working in Reserve bank of India was without any doubt one of the best experience of my life.

Internship Diaries #45

Varun Yadav

Cashkaro

E-commerce was an enticing word for me since the very beginning because the way it disrupted conventional market of buying and selling is revolutionary. After having an experience of 30 months in TCS, I wanted to work in some startup, having business in the same domain. Luckily I got this opportunity through cashkaro.com which is a India's No.1 Cashback and Coupons website. Cashkaro helps their members save on their regular online purchases at leading Indian and International Brands. Cashback and Coupon partners include your favourite brands like Myntra, Amazon, Snapdeal, Flipkart, Jabong and 500 more. I worked in cashkaro as an Intern for two months. Where I got to know the key challenges that a company faces in its early phase of life and various other aspects like how analytics, public relations and customer support are helping companies to develop an ecosystem for themselves.

I was working in Analytics department of cashkaro. My key responsibilities were

•  Automation of reports using R environment and language

•  Developing price comparison strategy for different categories of e-commerce

•  Generating and analysing Insights using Google Analytics

As I had an inclination towards analytics and big data. So I learned R during my MBA first year, as it was needed to do market research and other related analysis in different academic projects. I used R to automate the weekly and monthly reports. I was also actively involved in generating and analysing insights using google analytics tool. Which gave me quite good knowledge of e-commerce industry and how customer behaviour and their buying patterns vary with offers and discounts. Price comparison was another key area in which I was working. In price comparison, you can compare price of product across different websites and it gives you the best deal along with other available options. Which is quite unique feature and incorporates different-2 algorithms to compare products and give you the best deal.

My experience in cashkaro was really good, work culture is conducive for new ideas, innovative solutions. Being a startup it focuses on healthy work environment among employees and inculcating teamwork spirit. So I must say cashkaro helped me to understand e-commerce sector and various tools, technologies and latest developments. People say there is nothing like free lunch and the best part is you get free lunch in cashkaro.

  

Internship Diaries #44

Varun Chauhan
Toshniwal Equity Services

I did my internship with Toshniwal Equity Services which is a stock broking and investment consulting firm located right in the heart of Dalal Street and Bombay Stock Exchange. Internship started with a lot of expectations from our mentor and CEO of the company Mr. Jay Toshniwal. We were expected to work not only on financial aspects but also consult on minor but vital aspects of the company like operations and marketing.

The title of our project was Financial Statement analysis and Stock price movements. First week started with through learning of broking operations. In this we learned about how the flow of information/order happens from a retail customer to other retail customer via exchange and vice versa. We were amazed to know the robustness and fool proof check measures enforced by sebi and exchanges. Also we got to know deeper insights into the stock markets. 

We always reckoned BSE to be bigger than NSE but actually the position was reverse. In the second week financial aspects of our project started, we understood technical and fundamental analysis of equities. We did our technical analysis on Technical Analysis Software. Many other software are available in the market which provide technical analysis. We were required to make algorithms so that best scrips (stocks) can be retrieved and transaction can be executed on basis of these calls. Fundamental analysis was done of cement sector which included 6 major cement companies of India including ACC, Ambuja, Birla, Heidelberg and Ultratech. Additionally we worked on understanding the management discussions and their interpretation in financial terms. 

We also gained experience on core corporate operations of the company by attending Annual General Meetings of Reliance and Hindustan Unilever in subsequent weeks. Our next task was analysis of Nifty Junior, Nifty 200 and Nifty from Feb ’15 to July’15 and to come out with stocks which were resistant to such fluctuations. We also worked on updating client portfolios on moneycontrol.com which was an arduous task but this was also successfully updated by us. Our last assignment was revamping the website of the company, which included coordinating with the vendor on all aspects of the website including content and design. The website was successfully revamped with full email access services running all over the company. We also shared our knowledge on how technology can be used to further improve the core operations of the company. This was my internship experience.

Internship Diaries #43

Swastik Gaurav Drona

EKO, Gurgaon

Serendipity it was when I was selected for my summer internship at EKO in Gurgaon. The excitement of first work experience in a corporate world was at its high since the final list of shortlisted names for the internship at EKO had my name. It was time for me to leave my cocoon and explore the plethora of opportunities of the corporate world.

The most difficult task even before the internship had started was to find a place to live in Gurgaon, being one of the most expensive cities and us being students it was a hard nut to crack. Thanks to the online renting portals such as housing.com which provided us with lots of contacts of the brokers which finally led us to a good place to rest our backs.

Then came the most awaited day, the first day of our internship. We properly dressed in formals reached the sharp 9 in the morning. The office interiors were amazing, it was literally beyond our expectations. All the green plants had proper place in the office, bean bags lying around, dart game hanging in middle of the office, white boards all having some data, small tasks and big targets, an eye catching CCD coffee maker and for coffee lover like me it could be the best thing.

We were asked to sit in a separate cabin which was looking very appealing as each cubical was beautifully decorated with the personal interests of the employees. Then came a sparkling smile to end our wait and I mean it, it was worth waiting as the company’s HR manager Miss Pooja entered the room we all greeted her good morning ma’am, but we saw some unexpected expression on her face, all of us were perplexed, she noticed it and then we were explained there is no sir or ma’am culture at EKO and gradually with her personal experience at EKO and HR skills she charmed us with the beautiful experience she had working at EKO.

The next day we were assigned the projects and fortunately I got the operation’s project with my batch mate as a team member. The project was to define a new age customer experience and define a superlative channel for the E-value process. The projects sounded interesting and gradually working under Mr. Deepak Singhal our mentor and simultaneously with Mrs. Mugdha Bhargawa it felt like working in a homely environment. Our mentors were extremely supportive both professionally as well as in personal life. Their was no time boundation as well as attire code for us which created a very comfortable working environment for us.

Till now it was just the silence before the storm which was followed by turbulence of work pressure of study and analysis of the company data. When you sit on huge chunk of data either you ruin the opportunity to extract diamonds or you end by satisfied with some silver. With help of both our mentors and the whole operations team which was extremely cooperative as well, we at least managed to extract gold i.e. gave some fruitful results of the data analysis. It was followed by meetings with our highest business providers and customer care center of EKO where we tried to drill to depths of customer issues. The trust which our mentors showed in us motivated us to do better and better with course of time.

Time just flew by in the two months of internship and at last it came to an end. But wait it was not over yet the last week of ours was booked for parties and I mean ample of wonderful parties by EKO. It was a wonderful experience and I would recommend the coming students to give it a try at EKO and I assure you will not be disappointed. 

Internship Diaries #42

Raghvi Kumar

Middle Earth HR

Since the day I joined MBA, my aim was to make a remarkable carrier in field of Human Resource and my dream got its way through a remarkable internship at Middle Earth HR. This company was found by alumnus of IIT Roorkee. This company has 30 bases in 7 different countries, and is headquartered in Hyderabad. It offers numerous HR certification courses for professionals to increase their competencies and provides HR consultancy to other companies. My role here was – “Product Development for a Certified HR Analyst”. 

My work included Market Research, gaining insights into trends, customer requirement and analysing the present course wares. After an exhaustive research I came up with few findings which were implemented. Then my work included studying courses on HR analytics and preparing a full 2  day courseware on HR analytics for Middle Earth HR, which included a 350 slide presentation and 250 page word document. 

My work in middle earth will be going live this October, as they are launching new program for certified HR Analyst. I was awarded with GREAT/BEST Project award for doing this work. Company culture was good and people were dynamic. Hence it was a good experience working at Middle Earth HR. It was a true learning experience.