Protégé Mentorship: Data Science

Team ARP brings you another placement story with Gautam Gupta, a student of the Polymer Science and Engineering branch who got placed at Sprinklr. In this blog, he provides us his insights into his journey and getting into the world of Data Science and Analytics.

Introduction

What was your approach towards pursuing the field? (Initial Approach, Resources)

To start with, I talked to my seniors and friends who were already pursuing the field. I read several blogs on “How to start your career in the Data Science Field”. In the next couple of days, I had completed the courses that everyone suggested were the prerequisites for the field,i.e., Andrew Ng’s Machine Learning and Deep learning Course & Udemy: Machine Learning and Deep Learning A — Z, post which I started practicing on Kaggle. DS is not just about learning, rather more about practicing and applying the concepts. In my 6th semester, I took a Project On CNN. Although I was not able to complete it, I still learned a lot of things. After all this, it was just about learning new things, reading blogs on the state-of-the-art technology in Deep learning, and revising previous concepts.

What was your strategy to prepare for the Placement season?

Firstly, I made a list of all the topics I needed to study for the placement season which was:

1. CPP

2. DBMS

3. ML and DL theory

4. Probability

5. Statistics

6. Operating system

7. Networking

8. Puzzle

I made a strict timeline and divided my preparation period (start of the preparation to the start of placement season) into several phases with each phase having a couple of topics to be covered. For competitive programming, I started solving problems of the CodeChef DSA learning series because of topic-wise segregation of theory and problems, after which I shifted towards the Interview bit and code forces educational contents for practicing given the time constraint in the actual test.

EVALUATION AND HEADNOTE

Can you brief the selection procedure, your experience in it and tips for acing it?

1Test Sections and Experience

Test Pattern:

3 Coding Questions, needed to be solved in 2 hrs.

Test Experience:

First of all, the test was not easy and I was a bit shocked to see the test pattern, i.e., there was not a single question on ML and DL. 2 questions were on binary search (one of them is Painter’s Partition Problem) and one question was on DP + DFS. I had solved 2 out of 3 questions.

2 Technical Interview Questions and Experience

The interview had 2 Technical Rounds:

In Round 1, they mostly checked the Aptitude and the way of thinking. They asked 3–4 questions on CPP, a few Puzzles, and 1 question on Probability.

In Round 2, they asked me 7 CPP questions, about my internship and my Projects.

3HR Interview Experience

A guy from London was taking my HR Round so I was fortunate enough to have no typical HR question. I never felt like he was taking my interview, rather like a discussion between two friends. He asked me about my future goals, why I want to become a Data Scientist, what I expect from Sprinklr, and also a discussion on a few hypothetical situations that I may face in Sprinklr. Overall, it was a pleasant experience.

What all points can strengthen the resume?

For most of the companies, a decent CGPA along with some projects or internships might go. My suggestion would be to participate in Hackathons and technical events as much as you can.

Experience Buzz

What all points enabled you to have an edge in comparison to your other peers in that field?

I think probably it was a better balance between software engineering skillset and data science skillset which gave me an edge in comparison to my peers.

In case one’s interest doesn’t match with his/her branch of study, how should one manage to pursue it under the constant pressure of maintaining a good CGPA? How much do you agree/disagree with the fact that ‘CGPA matters despite not pursuing one’s branch as a Career’ & why?

A decent CGPA does matter because most of the companies do the initial shortlist for tests based on CGPA. But, in my opinion, it’s not that difficult to maintain a decent CGPA along with the extracurriculars. It just requires a little amount of seriousness and attentiveness in the classes.

-General tips for the readers:

Before giving tests for any company, do solve previous year questions and also get familiarized with the intern and placement process.

Don’t panic after the shortlist is declared for the interviews because it generally tends to extend.

Even if you are targeting a DS role, competitive programming still holds an important place.