Telecom Mania in USA!!!!
Ever since I was a small child I always wondered what I would be someday, engineer, doctor lawyer or ????. Considering myself a perfect emblem of a middle class family in India I also did what everyone else does and that too in fashion “ENGINEERING”. I wouldn’t lie, but on my way to Bangalore from New Delhi and traversing the two day long journey on the Karnataka Express made me really sick but what made me sicker was the fact that all the other ASS***** on the train had better ranks than me and everyone likes to kind of rub it in when they assure you “Don’t worry, u shall get a seat of your choice!!!!, Hmmmmm anyways I am not sure if they were convincing themselves or me. Anyways, moving forward years passed by and I was finally a Telecom Engineer without a job, (BLAME IT ON THE RECESSION OF 2001-2002). After sweating it out for months on end and after being rejected by every software company on the block (which eventually all my telecom engineering counterparts got through) I had started to consider myself a failure when one fine morning I saw an Ad on the paper which said “Telecom Engineers: Join our course and get a guaranteed job!!!), I said WOW and dressed, shaved and started my journey towards my guaranteed job just to find out that it was a one year course in Mobile and Optical Technology essentially a PG course.
Since money was a big factor for me and my family and considering that I could not even fund my exams and applications for Masters in USA at that time, I decided to join Amity Institute of Telecom Technology and Management and not let a blank year dominate my resume. I joined the course with a very heavy heart and with a ray of hope that maybe this would turn around my bad stint of job searches. Soon days passed by and so did months and then the tide changed, I was the First student to get placed from that course and not only that ,I was the first student to have three offers from different companies but I was the only one handpicked by Mr. Ashok Juneja ( Director – Bharti Televentures) from a Telecom Events fair. My first job in Airtel Enterprise Services started with a bang and with a package much more than my classmates were making at that time, and from that very day I was never a failure again….
I worked in Airtel in the Business Solutions Group and soon found myself designing complex Enterprise solutions for clients like American Express, Eicher, GE, Ranbaxy and LG to name a few. The biggest challenge came after 8 months when our group was faced with three large tenders of Bank of India, Oriental Bank of Commerce and Department of Income Tax. I remember working on Saturdays and Sundays till 11 in the night when my father used to call me and ask “R u coming today or tomorrow “. But I kind of enjoyed each moment of my learning curve and soon found out that I was doing very well on my job. I remember the day when Mr. Najib Khan (Our General Manager for Business Solutions Group), came upto me and said “Son we have done it, we are L-1 in DOIT. It was perhaps one of the happiest days in my life since the tender was roughly worth 750 crores. After working in Airtel for about 20 months I felt that I was at the end of my learning curve in that company and started looking for greener pastures. Soon I found myself in a different city (Pune) and in a different setup (a regional office as opposed to the Head Office) and in a different company (this time Tata Communications)….
I worked in Tata Communications as a Solution Architect for almost 3.5 years and grew from a Senior Executive level to a Manager Level. In Pune also I was lucky to work with very good Enterprise customers like Honeywell, Symantec, Bajaj Auto, Persistent Technologies, Cummins and Idea to name a few. I did very well in TCL and exceeded my own expectations at times w.r.t the business point of view. However I must say I was very lucky to have a very good supervisor (Mr. Srinivas Rao and Mr. Jaideep Mishra) and some very good colleagues who always helped me and made me feel a part of the team rather than just someone from a different department. However all the time, one thing kept pegging me and that was the fact that I was devoid of a Masters Course in Telecommunications. With the elevation in one’s profile comes in more money and with all this comes more expectations and responsibilities towards your company. Even though I tried my best it took me 5 years to accumulate money for my education and to finally prepare, write the GRE and TOEFL, apply to different Universities and finally make a conscious choice between which Universities to Choose from United States of America. This is where my REAL BLOG starts !!!!!. I am not going to go in-depth of what my profile was or how good or bad I did in my career but I will definitely try and post my views which would make any of you ( I just hope some ardent telecom aspirant is reading this ) make a better and a conscious choice about where to apply and which college to choose from, But for that my friends you will have to wait for my next BLOG!!!!!
