The MBA at Wharton turned my life into a one-pointed quest: Find a summer internship. At any cost.
When you are an international student with zero bank balance, do you really have a choice?
Further, two things made my desperation worse:
1. Nobody was dying to hire an ex-cop from India — why would you?
2. I hated networking with passion. And without it, most companies wouldn’t even shortlist you.
So the only choice was consulting. I liked problem-solving, and they didn’t care about your background or networking.
Now, it was time to prepare for the consultant case interviews.
I am generally not diligent but this time I was obsessed. I started doing mock case interviews with my friends until I ran out of friends. Nothing was going to stop me.
And when the interviews started, I was ready.
I am sharing this because we often hear people say, “I did not even prepare, yaar. It just happened.”
We want the world to view us as a talented genius, not a hard-working grunt. Even I would love that.
But does it really matter? The only thing that matters is whether you got the job done. Success needs no explanation, only failure does.
Don’t fall for the vanity of ‘I am a talented guy.’ Put your talent to work — don’t sit over it.
If you take up a goal, bring the house down with your effort and intensity. That is all that counts. Talent is just a lottery you won at birth.
– Rajan
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