How I got Internships at Swiggy, ShareChat, Koo India & HovAR Labs in my 1st, 2nd & 3rd Year of Engineering in India and my Preparation Strategy ?

Hey all 👋

This time I’ll try to cover the most asked question by all of you. In case you don’t know me, here’s a summary.

• BTech. CSE — 2023 Batch
• Google WE Fellow — Cohort 2
• Founder & Senior Developer at Peer Programming Hub
• Former AR/VR Intern at HoVAR Labs — 1st Year of Engineering
• Former SDE Intern Koo App, Swiggy — 2nd Year of Engineering
• Former SDE Intern ShareChat — 3rd Year of Engineering
• Incoming SDE Intern at Amazon — Summer Break between 3rd and Final Year of Engineering

How I got to know about the opportunities?

• HoVAR Labs — College WhatsApp Group
• Koo App — Approached the recruiter on LinkedIn
• Swiggy — Came across the opportunity on LinkedIn
• ShareChat — Approached the recruiter on LinkedIn
• Amazon — Applied directly through career portal

My Strategies

• Always be prepared for interviews . If a recruiter asks you to interview you in an hour, and you have been preparing for the profile, then you must appear for the interview.
• Do NOT reject yourself. At least apply. The worst that happens is that you won’t get selected, which you yourself do when you reject yourself. So, just apply and start preparing.
• Do NOT underestimate the 1st and 2nd year of Engineering. Seniors would say that you can start preparing for the interviews from the last semester of 2nd year, but trust me it makes a big difference when you start preparing from the first year itself. The major difference is that you focus on work and stress is next to null, which increases your efficiency a lot.
• Be Consistent. I have always been an advocate for consistency in programming and it really matters. Coding 1 problem a day for 2 years regularly v/s coding 5 problems a day for 2 months isn’t same.
• Practice good communication skills. This is an underrated topic of discussion, however the way you interact with the people(your recruiters or your network) has a huge impact on the upcoming opportunities.

Preparation Practices

Fun fact : I never did random problem solving on Leetcode or never followed any Interview Prep Sheet.

• I always attempt virtual contests on Leetcode and upsolve them(solve each question again after the contest gets over). Besides, I do it regularly maintaining a streak with my friends. If you find it difficult to participate in the contest and upsolve it on the same day, you can even distribute the 2 tasks on 2 consecutive days, but do NOT start a new contest before finishing the previous one.
• Use Leetcode Discussion tab efficiently. Again it’s an underrated resource, but if you have an interview within the next 5 days, then just go for Leetcode Discussion tab. Type the Company’s name you’re interviewing for & the profile you’ll interview for. You get so many past interview experiences, which are really helpful.
• This one is completely based on my personal experience, different people may have different opinions. Competitive Programming helped me a lot. Though, it’s been a while I participated in any Codeforces Contest, but appearing for an interview and participating in a Codeforces Contest give me similar vibe. In fact, when you discuss a problem with the interviewer in terms of efficiency, it creates a really positive impact.

That’s all from my side. I hope it helps.