Last two posts are about evidences. While this would be another story that reinforces that conspiracy is about getting me wife of their (CIA and IB/RAW) choice. In USA I had written about how colleagues (of Evident Software) were used in different point in time. In India, when I returned from USA in 2006. After a gap more than 4 months joined a startup Ismart Panache, based in Gurgaon in December 2006.
I joined Ismart Panache as Test Lead, on a project of iMetrikus (now http://numerahealth.com/). We were building the team those days.
Loosing Pranav Prakash –
This guy was selected as junior QTP guy and joining date was known in Feb itself as 25th March, 2007. One day Raj informed he would not join and we have to look for options. I decided to talk to the guy directly. Pranav said he was all set to join Ismart Panache, he had even told his manager and company. At that point, his position in existing company had become awkward. He also mentioned company (Ismart Panache) was not willing to pay compensation they had offered before. The amount he mentioned was 4.5 lakh. I was upset but hadn’t talk to anyone in company about it. I was thinking to talk to Raj about this. Later, same day Mamta came to me and told me, “It’s good you talked to Pranav and did good PR of company.” She further assured that she would negotiate with Pranav. Later it was intimated (Raj or Mamta) that he was not joining.
A meeting was called, participants were Vinay, Mamta, Anjali, Raj and me. Vinay said something like ,”There are two positions for device tester,two positions for automation and two positions for mobile tester.Ramesh is hired as automation guy. You (anjan), test lead are suppose to be automation engineer as well. In that scenario why not hire a junior person in team. That person will do device testing.”
I argued,”If we get another automation guy he can be trained to do device testing as well with minimum training. Other way around have huge learning curve.”
Vinay replied ,”why not hire a junior/fresher who has programming aptitude as well.?”
I replied ,” If budget is a constraint I can live with that.”
Vinay,” It’s not just budget, next year at the time of review you will have to elevate the designation of the team members. At that time, you can’t afford to have all team members at same position. If you have all at 3 years experience it will be headache.”
I,” I don’t have resume of all the team members (existing ones). But I can live with a fresher with aptitude or junior programmer.”
Vinay asked Raj ,”can we transfer Mahensi to iMetrikus team?”
I was expressionless and Raj replied in negative.
Vinay to Mamta ,” Pass Anjan 20 resume you have of juniors,they are available as well.”
After meeting, Mamta passed 20 resume. I short listed 4 resumes and passed (emailed) those to Anjali and copied it to Mamta and Raj. No response was received.
There was rule in place that HR will short list resume and pass it to Raj and me. Then we would (Raj and/or I) shortlist it again. Interview of only short listed candidate will take place.
For 3 consecutive days when I left office at 5:30, on midway to home Anjali called to inform that 2 candidates were scheduled to be interviewed and I needed to conduct it. Those resume didn’t fit any of the requirements and neither were sent to me for short listing [this is important]. When I made a point in team by telling them,” if I leave at 5:30, I will get interviews in evening from home”, Anjali stopped this kind of request. [For some reason Anjali wanted me to keep busy and at least one team member informed her about my comment, possibly? or may be I was bugged as I have narrated before].
Later when I enquired about 4 short listed candidates. Anjali informed none of them were available.[Vinay had informed all of them were available] Then I sent 4 more resume out of remaining16 .
In meantime, Raj asked me to interview few junior/fresher candidates face to face. [I don’t know who had short listed them]. One day there were a girl and boy with similar resume. After interview I told Raj, If I had to choose one of them, I would prefer boy over girl. Raj said for him its other way around and asked to explain reason for my preference. I replied aptitude score card. Later none of them were selected. The other day, on very short notice Raj asked me to interview a girl. That girl had written many programming language in her resume. I didn’t recommend her. When Raj asked for reason , I replied ,”She has mentioned lot of programming language in her resume. But she is not even level2 in any of them.”
Raj pointed out but she had good aptitude [May be cooked who knows]. Finally candidate was rejected.
When I asked Anjali, what happened to 4 resume out of 16 , what Vinay had called available. She replied with different reason that none of them were available. I sent remaining 12 resume and requested to find the availability of those candidates.Anjali informed non-availability of 11 candidates, I am not sure what her comment was for remaining 1 guy.
Points
- Vinay changed requirement from automation to fresher
- 20 resume which was supposed to be of available candidates but none were available [or none of them were asked??]
- To keep me busy, I was handed over interviews after discarding the process and candidates for which we had no requirements
- When I complained about evening interviews in team, it (evening interview) stopped. Possibly someone informed to Anjali?
- From Vinay to Raj, they were pushing for Fresh/Junior Girl candidate.
Names of people who were used above
- Vinay Singh – He did hire me,He was Assistant Vice President at Ismart Panache
- Raj Narayan – He was senior than me and peer in another customer account at Ismart Panache
- Mamta Diwan – She was senior HR executive at Ismart Panache
- Anjali Kukreja – She was HR executive at Ismart Panche
- Mahensi – was a female team member in Raj’s team.
- Pranav Prakash – was the guy I had selected for automation testing, Ismart Panche didn’t give him offer
