“One hell of an experience- strategies, friends and lessons for life!”

Bastab Chakraborty a.k.a Bassy is one of the first 2 interns hired at Internshala for Editorial responsibilities. A software engineer, a blogger, a book reviewer and an Android lover – Bassy is a multi-talented personality (rumors have it that he turns into Batman at night). Among his other achievements at Internshala, the significant one is that he did not let a new nick name, Chakby, given to him by fellow intern Sonal, stick. Those who know Sonal would agree that it’s an achievement indeed!

Bassy is now moving on from Internshala to join the dark side (i.e. Corporate World) and while we deep down wish that things go horribly wrong for him there so that he has to come back to Internshala but we’d pretend to be happy for him and wish him all the luck in the world :) The note below is his experience of working at Internshala in his own words.

“This is vastly a good bye note, to what has been fruitful four and a half month. In these roughly 135 days, I got to learn a lot. Specifically, how much crazy people can get when it comes to discussions about their graduate colleges, how much workaholic some can be, how much passionate one can be to contribute from across the seven seas and how dominating personality one can have – all under the vast umbrella of the brand called ‘Internshala’. I have worked under mentors who demand respect in every step they take. You got to respect them when you think hard about why they may have taken a specific step. You don’t just leave a fat paycheck to nurture a start up (the baby). The passion is too evident, and inspiring.

I was recruited by the founders of the young team at ‘Internshala’ for editorial work. After giving more than one phone interview, I was convinced that this was the start up I wanted to work for in the transition phase before I move on in life. I also took the chance because I wanted to get an experience of working with a start up and get to know the challenges and the work culture.

A question may arise so as to why I took the chance to work as an Editor when I am from a software engineering background. The answer is passion and a knack to practice the various interests that come from within. Leave that for a discussion we can have later on. Eventually, technical work also came in, and juggling both the responsibilities at the same time was quite fun.

If I look back, there is not much regret I can talk about. The way ‘Internshala’ has been growing could have worked out faster if we could have had an office space and the ability to meet everyone face to face. So much for virtual employer-employee relationships!

So yeah, this was an experience of a lifetime. The period during which I got into the company had been a crucial period of my life, and ‘Internshala’ helped me to become a better person, no doubt about that. The work-ethics, the managerial aspects of handling a company (however big or small it is, what matters are the insights), the growth strategies – we all had a lot to learn from the two mentors on top and personally I am truly indebted to them. If you ask me about the best part of my time with ‘Internshala’, it would be the friendship that we built among ourselves and getting to know interesting people from all walks of life. You can’t learn any lesson better than lessons related to life.”