Singlemost Important Achievement

Have you ever done/achieved something that has made your life easy? The targets you wanted to achieve, the things you wanted to do got simple by achieving just one thing. I have done one such thing, and mind you I achieved that through lots of patience and hard work for a period of 2 years. Though I admit now that after achieving this goal, I might not have put the same efforts to achieve my next set of goals. Anyways, here is the story:

Everyone knows how difficult IIT entrance examination is. Right? I started preparing for the examination in 11th standard. I joined the famous Bansal Classes (BC) Institute. To my surprise I secured 3rd rank in the BC entrance test. Irony, an entrance test for an entrance test. I got admitted into the top batch and then started the tough journey. The toughest problem I faced during these 2 years was not the curriculum or the competition but the all time presence of my father in the institute, as he was employed as an Administrator in BC. I never felt the freedom of being on my own during that time. My father was more tensed than me, always. So the pressure of living up to the expectations was high.

Well, I survived and did well too. I secured All India Rank 97 in my first attempt. I was targeting a rank < 192 (my elder brother secured this rank) and 97 was a very much surprise to me as well. With the magic number 97 came lots of gifts and surprises. The first was the 5-6 days Apex Mumbai tour with ELITE top 100 ranked students. Then came the reward cheques from Bansal Classes, Apex and family members. I got admitted into Computer Science Department in IIT Bombay. During the third year, I got my summer internship in University of Toronto, Canada solely on the basis of my rank and little bit knowledge in Formal Verification discipline. Then came the job. I got the job offer from Oracle in my first interview itself. The interview was an average one and I would say I was selected primarily because I was from Computer Science Department (so indirectly the rank helped here too). In Oracle, I worked hard during my first two years and was promoted to the post of Senior Member Technical Staff (just alternative designation for Senior Software Manager). Though I feel Oracle is a bit partial to IIT guys , I might be wrong (and sincerely hope too).

My father got a lot too. You could definitely make out his smile and amplified chest after the results were declared. That 2 digits made him proud, me too. But now things have changed. I've started to realize that the rank is just not enough for me to get past everything comfortably.

Given the benefits I've seen from IIT Rank, I tried to take the advantage again and applied in US universities for MBA. So far I've been rejected in 3 universities and wait-listed in 1. Results for other 3 are on hold. The rank must have helped me to get the interview invites from the rejected ones as well but it is just not enough to get me in comfortably. Anyways, it has still played its part.

Hope is a good thing and may be the best of all. And no good thing ever dies (Courtesy: Shawshank Redemption). I'm still hoping to get my admission letter from at least one university. Someone please look at my IIT Rank !!! thats the best in my resume.