‘Hard work, works!’ With this guiding principle, I have cultivated the work-ethic of doing things not just in an acceptable way but in an exceptional way. My consistency in academics (second in school, among top 5% in high-school and top 15% in college) testifies my tenacity on my curricular pursuits. Even as an 8th grader, I remember our class project to write software code for identifying whether a number ‘n’ is prime. The teacher told us to check divisibility of ‘n’ by all numbers from 2 to (n-1) in a loop. However, I was not convinced and did my own calculations to figure out that we only needed to check divisibility from 2 to n/2. Despite not being the ideal solution, this exercise instilled in me the attributes to ‘learn, unlearn and relearn’, which I religiously believe in. Accolades won at National Mathematics and Science Olympiads and selection at Malaviya National Institute of Technology, one of the best engineering colleges of India, by scoring 99.99 percentile at All India Engineering Entrance Exam are all results of my diligence and ‘never give up’ attitude.
During my undergraduate, courses such as Industrial Management, Operations Research and Six Sigma introduced me to the world of operations which fascinated and hooked me in an instant. Industrial Management introduced me to the management aspect of an organization. Business functions such as Finance, Marketing and Operations were given a glimpse of. Operations Research was my first taste at modelling and using multi-variable problem mathematical methods to solve real-life scenarios. The formulation of real-world problems, such as the transportation problems, into a typical operations research problem and solving it using mathematical techniques such as Linear Programming, Simplex and Big M methods caught my eye. Six Sigma introduced me to the use of statistics towards the quality control aspect of an industry. Understanding concepts like phases of Six Sigma, ‘Supply Input Process Output and Control’ (SIPOC), Critical To Quality trees, and Hypothesis Tests helped me get more clarity towards improving the quality of the end product. I also undertook a Mini Project ‘Six Sigma in Manufacturing’ which dealt with the application of the aforementioned concepts towards improving quality of spark plugs manufactured for bike engines by reducing number of defects per million opportunities (DMAO). The experience taught me how an industry implements six sigma tools to ensure it delivers quality products. My undergraduate project ‘Simulation of Heat-Integrated Reactive Distillation’ won first prize in tech Expo. I simulated the process through ChemCAD, wrote codes and plotted extensive data-sets on excel, and successfully optimized it for total annualized cost.
Organization skills demand elaborate planning, meticulous teamwork, enormous ingenuity, and perfect execution. These attributes have progressively become my core strengths. As Joint Secretary of Literary Society at MNIT Jaipur, I conducted mock interviews with non-English speaking students to facilitate them for the recruitment process, and organized events such as ‘SPELLATHON’. For an event historically plagued by lack of interest, participation of 600 students was the highest in any event for the academic year. I did extensive marketing by using keywords like GRE and GMAT to attract students, by ensuring at least 10 online notifications to students and games such as ‘word of the day’ to generate online mindshare, and by pasting posters over the campus to create an offline impression. After the event, I treated assessing 600 answer- scripts as an assembly line problem. Since each answer script had 20 questions, I asked each of my 4 teammates to check 5 questions and pass it on to the next member in the chain. This approach ensured fewer quanta of data to be handled by each student, thus enabling us to announce results within 6 hours. This was my first ‘hands-on experience’ that helped me gain an insight into streamlining operations and delivering error free results efficiently.
After completing my undergraduate, I set out to explore a career in core engineering consulting and joined Tata Consulting Engineers (TCE) as a Graduate Engineer Trainee. TCE’s flagship training program - Young Engineers Development Program (YEDP) comprised of understanding Fluid Mechanics, developing Piping and Instrumentation diagrams (P&IDs), developing Piping Layouts on AutoCAD, Piping Isometrics and generating Bill of Material for Pipe Valves and Specialties in Excel. Undergoing this extensive training program helped me not only enhance my technical skills but also understand its applications to the real-time greenfield and brownfield projects. Working in professional environment inculcated skills like teamwork and gave me an opportunity to collaborate with some of the brightest engineering minds of the country with diverse experience ranging from a fresh graduate to thirty years. In recognition of my leadership, technical, and interpersonal skills, I was selected as Project Manager for the Model Project ‘Integrated Engineering Services for LPG Marketing Terminal’ to be executed as a part of the training program. Our project team comprised of twenty-five engineers from the Process, Mechanical, Electrical, Civil, and Instrumentation departments. My responsibility was planning a course of action for the entire project, ensuring availability and efficient management of resources and act as a liaison between the departments wherever necessary. I used ‘Wrench’ for scheduling the project as per our deliverables, listing them in order of their precedence and was able to generate a critical path based timeline for the project. From the technical perspective, I was responsible for generating Piping and Instrumentation Diagrams and developing Instrument Process Datasheets to facilitate procurement of various instruments. The thrill of navigating the project and applying analytical and managerial skills to catalyse the productivity of my team by concentrating on the relevant and doing things in an ‘optimised’ manner are the instances I cherished the most. Conclusively, I was successful in getting the best out of my engineers and delivered the project as per the desired timeline. Post training, I was deputed to Chemical Business Unit of TCE at Mumbai. I was assigned as a piping engineer (for a leading glass manufacturer as the client) on a green-field project of setting up a World Class Glass Manufacturing Facility. It involved working extensively on piping layouts, piping bill of quantity, rack piping arrangement, and pipe isometrics (involving 800 isometrics). During pipe designing, several considerations such as process requirements of the plant, expected product volume, distance traversed by fluids, cost of the pipes, are taken into account, all to maximize plant efficiency, while minimizing operating costs.
I believe that I possess the motivation, drive and preparation to set out on this arduous path and will uphold the reputation of ABGLP by performing to the best of my abilities in my academic and professional career. I look forward to being a part of the class of Fall 2020.
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