It was around 6:00 am on Tuesday the 19 September, 2006 when my alarm started off with the wakeup tune, the sound had hardly reached my ears, I jumped out of my bed with excitement. (This happend after almost a decade that, I wokeup in first ring of the bell). The first thing that, I did was prayer: "Oh lord lead me, guide me, and bless me, I am going for an interview with a company, I always dremt of. Please help me God".
Yes, I had the interview with the Best company on this earth Google. I finished all my daily routine and rushed to Bangalore airport to catch my flight to Hyderabad. (The flight tickets were booked by Google). Flying with the king of good times (Kingfisher Airlines) was indeed a great experience. The breakfast, the hospitality, the facilities, the captain of the flight, Airhostess….everything was a delight. It was around 11:00 am when, I reached Hyderabad airport. As informed by Sheela (HR lady at Google) the driver was waiting for us with sign board (GOOGLE Raghavendra and Ayaaz Syed), I met him and we were waiting for other candidate to arrive (Syed). Had a formal introduction with each other and started to the Hi-Tech city were the google is located. It was truly a great drive (30 minutes from Airport).
After reaching Google office we were told to go to 7th floor, Google reception. We then entered all our details (Name, place, from, to visit), the security guard then gave us the sticker which we had to stick on our shirt for the whole day. I was very excited to have the Google sticker on my shirt I was now part of the worlds best company. We waited in reception for the HR lady she greeted us and made us feel comfortable. The reception is very unique at Google. U get to see the real-time queries on Google search and Google Earth, i.e When some one on the globe enters a string in google search, it is displayed on the query board, same is the case with Google Earth. Aisha then told us that we have three rounds to go today, I was almost nervous to hear that 3 more rounds is a huge thing (FYI, I had already completed 4 rounds on telephone).
Then the real action was about to begin: The interview ( I am very sorry but I am not supposed to blog anything about the interview rounds and stuff). I could not perform very well in 1st round coz of nervousness, next 2 rounds were superb. After the interview, I prepared sandwich and noodles for my self.
I would like to give a snapshot of the Break Out (Googlers call canteen as breakout place) at Google and other unique things which are only avalible in Google in this Universe:
- The Brains (Talents known as employees of Google)
- Unlimited Choclates every where in the office
- The verity of soft drinks (from frooti, appy to Reb bull)
- The free food and chats served hot and fresh
- Loads of Toys and colorfull ballons....very colorful
- The Body massager
This will be a never ending list......
Finally we were dropped to Airport in the Google Cab. We returned back to Bangalore with the great hope to join Google near future...........Many rounds were again conducted on phone after coming back and documents are now sent to USA for final verification....it is October 3, 2006 (3:00 pm), I am still holding my fingures crossed waiting for a positive result.....
I have learnt lots of good things and lessons about the corporate culture from Gogle....Thanks to google for giving me the opportunity to attend the interview and thanks for the wonderful trip being sponsered....
