First Step into the Corporate World

4 years ago, I made a choice; for good or bad, I wanted to be an engineer. The engineer I dreamt was very different to what I am today or what I will end up being after 6 months. Each year my view of an engineer became clearer. It was neither a bad profession nor was it perfect. I made up my mind; I need to 'earn' a job before doing my higher studies. 

Well I needed someone to hire me first. I had the opportunity to give many interviews but I struck gold only my seventh time! I got an intern-ship at Lattice Semiconductors this past week. It is not exactly 'gold' at least a golden opportunity to showcase my talent (or whatever is left of it). My friend Varun too made it through and interns at the same place.

Today was the first day at 'office'. Majority of my life, 18 years out of 21, I have been a student going to a school (except for 2 years in PU) for being taught lessons/subjects. Suddenly, I realized this was going to be different I was no more a student. I didn’t go to a school; I went to an 'office'. It was something new to me, few of my friends too, had already been-there, done-that. It always baffled me. How will it be? Will you get pampered? Will you get punished? Will you get appreciated? Nothing of such sort happened to me on the first day. 

First day, I was late to 'office'. I had to report at 9am but thanks to Bengaluru's traffic, I reached there by 930am. It was still cool, only few had turned up at the workplace. I think they had a wonderful weekend. Next, I was briefed about the kind of work what I might be assigned. This was the highlight moment, when I politely refused to drink a cup of tea. Now the 'real' work for the day began, reading the datasheets of the company's products. I didn't even read the 8051 micro-controller datasheet properly for my course!

Next up, lunch at 1245, looks like they already know PESIT's timetable, good for me. It was a 'Special Day' for the 'team' as the interns were arriving, so we go out for lunch at Silsila restaurant - pretty decent, but needs to get more customers.

I was back to the most-interesting work, reading datasheets.  Between 2pm and 3pm I fell asleep twice. The last time I woke up was when the tea was served. This time I couldn’t stop but drink the tea. Caffeine removes drowsiness or something like that. I suspect my mentor, saw me taking a power nap, we started to chit-chat. As we finished our tea, he told me to get back to work.

At 530pm I was still staring at the monitor trying to understand digital electronic concepts. A look at the watch reminded me of my satellite work which stretched onto 7pm some days. This was when my mentor made his way out. After 15 minutes my friend and I left the ‘office’ to attack the roads of Bengaluru.

How was the first day? Not bad, I was pampered but also warned of punishment, if things didn’t go right. I think the next 3 months will be a good experience to go through the intern world of corporate before making the jump. It was not even a peek into the actual ‘work’ that is done, but at least got an idea of what people in tall buildings do in A/C rooms in front of their monitors.