ICICI Bank - Bandra Kurla Complex
As I was en route Pune from Raipur
to start my internship at ICICI Bank, I had no idea what to expect from the
days which lay ahead. Being a fresher, I feared that my concept of ‘the office
life’ would be far from reality. However, it was a necessary pill to be
consumed as an MBA course would be incomplete without getting a taste of life
at work. On the other hand, my internship at ICICI Bank could end up being an
enriching experience which could change my perspective on a lot of things. With
these thoughts in mind, I set foot into my office.
The first day began with a
meeting with my mentor who discussed what his team in ICICI’s Pune branch
looked into, what my project was about and what were his expectations from the
project. This was followed by a quick round of introductions with the team I would
eventually share my lunch and several rounds of ‘chai’ with in the coming
weeks. Thus began my story at ICICI.
The first week simply went in
figuring out how my office functions and how I could make any useful
contribution with my project to an institution like ICICI. As the days passed,
I started developing a better picture of what the project required. My mentor’s
ideas and experience helped a great deal in this process as did the insights
which came in from different members of the team. It was like trying to fix a
complicated jigsaw puzzle, which seems impossible but acts as a trigger to the
brain waves.
Each day of my summer internship at
ICICI was a learning. Getting to see how the corporate finance division of a
bank like ICICI functions was no less than a once in a lifetime opportunity.
Concepts which I had come across in the textbooks of Financial Management in my
first year at IIM Raipur started coming to life. It helped me appreciate the
practicality of those concepts better. However, my most important learning was
not concerned with understanding finance. It revolved around understanding
people and witnessing how leadership helps drive results. I learnt some of my
most important lessons so far on human behaviour through my interactions with
ICICI Bank’s customers and by observing my team members. These takeaways would
never become a part of my project report or my final presentation but they did
become a part of an important chapter of my life.
The internship on the whole
required nothing short of hard work and resilience. The period was filled with
crests and troughs, where the crests were indicative of those moments where I
felt I was closer to the project’s objective while the troughs represented the
moments when I felt I was away from them. As the internship neared its end, my
project managed to take shape and with a few nights spent burning the midnight
oil, it reached a successful completion. As I wrapped it up with a final
presentation to my mentor and the evaluating panel of ICICI Bank, I was left
with a mixed feeling of happiness and a want for more. I could not help but
feel that I could have done more and there were instances where I was surprised
I managed to accomplish certain difficult feats. Perhaps, it was a normal phase
to go through.
A significant chapter of my MBA
life had come to an end. However, it lay the foundation to a number of new
beginnings, some which I have already started exploring and some which will be
explored when the time comes. But there is one advice which I had received from
my mentor which I will carry forever, “Don't be afraid of taking a path less
trodden. Sometimes they are the ones that bring you closer to your life’s
goals”.
This article is written by Anwesha Dasgupta, of PGP 2013-15. She can be contacted at pgp13067.anwesha@iimraipur.ac.in
