Scaler Academy Review: How it helped me (an Electronics Engineer) land a job in Software development.
I am a final year student pursuing Bachelor’s Degree from The LNM Institute of Information and Technology (LNMIIT), I am describing my journey from having ECE branch to getting an offer as a Software Engineer at Samsung.
First year of college is all about fun, making new friends, participating in many new events and doing a lot of things. Nobody realizes how quickly first year comes to an end, neither did I. Most of the subjects were common for all the branches in the first year, and I didn’t realize that there would be much difference between the subjects taught to me and other students in the future.
In the second year, we were introduced to our core subjects. I tried finding some interest in Electronics, but, unfortunately, there was nothing interesting enough for me to invest my time in. I then started talking to my seniors about the different fields where I can pursue my career, and what if I don’t want to continue in the Electronics domain. From them I got to know about the roles as a Software Engineer, Product Analyst, Data Scientist and few more. One more important thing I learned is that getting into some good product based companies we first have to clear the online coding round. This requires that we have a basic understanding of topics like arrays, strings,stacks,queues, and so on.
Then in my third year, I started looking for these particular topics on the web, randomly picking questions from topics and trying to solve them. When I was not able to solve some problems, or not able to understand some concepts, I used to Google my doubts. I usually found so many different articles which sometimes made me more confused about the topic. It was difficult to properly plan something and then strictly follow it. Solving random questions from random topics, and not arriving on solutions, or not understanding the solutions or not the intuition behind a problem, was at times very discouraging, and it happened many times. At this point many would have given up, and I completely understand the situation and how people get there, but not getting discouraged and working hard is what makes all the difference.
Now coming back to my journey, almost at the end of my third year, I was very much worried about my placement. Even after solving so many questions from a particular topic, I was not confident enough, because I did not know if I completed that topic entirely, or was there something important which I missed. Then I got to know about InterviewBit Academy from my friends. They told me that there is an entrance exam for this academy and it guarantees you get an offer from a good product based company. After research I found out that it offers you a 6 months long course starting from the basic topics and take you to an advanced level.
I gave the test for April batch (Batch 1) and did not get selected, but I kept practicing for a month and gave second entrance test which was in the month of May and did not get shortlisted in that batch too. Then I went for an internship in Kazakhstan (Arcelormittal, Temirtau), where I tried solving at least 2–3 problems daily mostly from InterviewBit website itself and then I gave the test for the third batch which was in June and fortunately got selected in this batch. The entrance test is moderate, not too easy and not too tough. I think, if you have practiced solving problems for at least some weeks or a month, then clearing the entrance test won’t be tough.
First week is the introduction week where we were told about the flow of the course, and also we were informed about our minimum CTC. We were also given one week time during which we had to decide whether to be part of IB academy or not, if you feel that your CTC is very low and you are worth more, you are free to leave. Mine was certainly above my expectations and I was happy with it. The minimum CTC is decided based on a number of things, but I think it mostly depends on how well you perform in the entrance test, and also maybe on your resume and your achievements. It is only after you get a good offer from a company that you are liable to pay an amount upto of 3 lacs, also you don’t have to pay the entire amount all together, you will have to pay 17% of the net salary (not CTC) every month, it will become more clear with the picture below which is from the website itself.
Now suppose you get some offer which is below your mentioned CTC — you don’t have to pay anything. It is a 6 months long course, and once the course is finished then they will keep referring you for the next 6 months, if you don’t get an offer above your minimum CTC within 6 months of the completion of the course (not from the date you joined academy ), again you don’t have to pay anything. Also, suppose your minimum CTC is 10 Lpa and you get an offer of 12 Lpa, it is not like they will stop referring you. If they find you a good fit for some company who is offering even higher CTC, say 15 Lpa, then you will get referred there too. Payment calculator is also provided on their website where just by entering your fixed income per year (not CTC) you can calculate how much you need to pay to the academy per month.
For example, suppose, you get an offer and you fixed gross is 7 Lpa, then you need to pay 9,916.67 per month for two years which means your are effectively paying 2.38 Lacs.
The classes of the academy started from covering the basic topics like arrays, strings, which, I personally think, are very important as most of us have done these topics on our own and might have missed something important which we might not be aware of. I am pointing this out, because I have seen most of my friends who skipped on these topics, later had some doubts which were covered in the classes. Basically, I would recommend all who are even experienced in programming to pay equal attention to the basics. Now some of you might be thinking about the clash of the timings of classes with your college Academics — there is no clash, as the classes of InterviewBit Academy are mostly at night between 9–11 p.m. In the classes you are mostly taught the concepts related to the topics and the intuition behind the problems. Classes are very helpful, the teachers teaching the concepts are really very good, most of the teachers are working professionals themselves from companies like Amazon, Directi, Google, and many such big companies. That means they also have been through the same process I was in, like preparing for coding rounds of big companies, learning the concepts, managing time, prioritizing things. I don’t think there can be someone better to guide you other than the person who have already experienced the same.
Every class took me one step further into programming and not only the classes. After almost every class we were given some time to solve questions after which we had TA sessions where we can clear all the doubts regarding the questions. We were also assigned Mentors, who are working professionals in big product based companies, with whom you can schedule sessions and directly interact, ask for guidance in almost any field and they also take regular mock interviews — this helped me build my confidence. My first two sessions were not good, I remember not being able to solve even easy questions, because I got nervous, but I got to know, where I need to improve. It really helped me a lot in actual interviews. If I had made these mistakes in an actual interview I would have been rejected.
So all these sessions and the flow of the course is made to take you from basic level to an advanced level. I would also briefly mention the flow of the course which was followed in my batch and also, please note, that this is not the exact flow of the course, it may vary from batch to batch. The course starts from teaching arrays, maths, pointers, bit manipulation, strings, sorting, Hashing, Backtracking and then the topics related to the data structures are covered like linked list, stacks, queues, binary tees, segment trees, then we were taught Dynamic programming, Heaps, Graphs etc. The questions given after each topic cover almost all the concepts these topics, I used to feel confident enough after solving most of the problems given in the assignment of that particular topic. After this we were taught some important concepts of OS, DBMS, CN which are generally asked in interviews and currently we are being taught system design. I was told that after sometime I will be given an option to choose between two profiles i.e. Full stack and Back-end and my further course will be based on the profile I will choose. All the details are freely available on the website, anyone who wants can check it there themselves.
So that is all about the course of InterviewBit Academy, now the most important part comes — how and when they start referring you into companies. First of all, it mostly depends on your performance during the course, you must have solve a minimum of 70% problems given to you as assignments and also the solutions are available. Solving 70% questions is not tough but I would recommend you to solve them on your own or take help of TA’s and teachers rather than directly looking into the solutions. Secondly, it also depends on mock interviews taken by your mentor, as mentors tell the academy team about your performance and whether you are ready to sit for an actual interview or not. Don’t get discouraged if your mock interview with your mentor did not go well, in fact, what I believe it is the best thing that can happen to you — just think if you would have done the same mistakes in an actual interview. You get a chance to schedule a mock interview with your mentor after 15 days, so you get enough time to prepare for the interview and these kind of sessions are really very helpful, they give you a feel of how you to perform well in an actual interview. Everyone prepares for the online round but how you perform in a face to face interview is what matters in the end and sessions like these can really lift up your confidence and you get to know about where you need to work upon.
One more thing, which I would like to mention is that I got a campus offer not through Interviewbit academy, but the major reason why I got this offer is Interviewbit academy. This course made me capable enough to crack the online round of most of the companies, even before Samsung I cleared the online round of two more companies but unfortunately did not get the offer.
For me learning from such good professionals, not only the teachers, TA’s, Mentors and the entire team who put so much effort to get us an offer from good companies, was completely worth it and I would highly recommend all the students irrespective of their branch or even working professionals who want to get into a good product based company to definitely join IB academy.
I hope this helps to all who are willing to be a part of good product based companies, keep working hard, becoming better every day and all the best.
