From 20+ internships to a full-time role at UrbanClap: Sunmeet Singh Sethi
Sunmeet Singh Sethi is a computer science engineer by education who was apprehensive of coding all through the 4-years of engineering but curious enough to explore new things. He dived into the world of internships when these internships were not the new normal. He interned with Adidas, Pepsi, P&G, Teach for India, OLX, Wechat, Askme, Govt. of India, and a few of the Silicon Valley-based startups and founders.
Post engineering, he joined UrbanClap (now Urban Company) where he worked across Business and Engineering teams for 3 years and saw the meteoric rise of the company into a household name. He is an ardent food-blogger with 8 Million views across Zomato and Google on his food photographs and reviews. A half-marathon runner, Sunmeet is quite passionate about exploring new fitness goals. He is always inquisitive to learn and talk about startups, businesses, filmmaking, and human behavior. Currently, he is adding new dimensions to his family business and looking forward to his B-School journey.
How did you discover your field of interest?
‘Field of interest’ has always been a broad term for me. I feel with age, one outgrows interests. Also rather than the roles, the number of skills one could gain from them has always interested me. I always wanted to have a set of execution and entrepreneurial skills before I join a full-time role post my engineering. I started with sales & marketing internships with P&G, OLX, Pepsi, then switched to product and engineering internships with Govt. of India and a few startups and later on tried exploring the not-for-profit area with Teach for India. The mindset with which I got into each internship was always important for me.
The set of skills I acquired through my internships came into use extensively during my role at UrbanClap. Internships helped me in trying and then segmenting what I don’t want to do in the future which in-turn helped in creating pools of interests across different domains like Product Management and Consulting.
What were your key learnings from the interviews/application process?
“It’s not the answer but the process by which you get the answer that helps you crack the interview.”
The interviewers already know your answer but what they want to know is how you get to the answer and what your thought process behind the rationale is. Always think out loud during the interview process. It drives a lot more conversations than you could expect. For applications, you need to keep them short and consistent.
In a cover letter to companies, never simultaneously ask for internships or roles in functions that are diametrically different from each other such as Finance or Marketing. But be flexible to try niche roles in a particular function such as Brand Management or Social Media in Marketing. Internships are a strong talking point to show your interest or experience in a particular domain. Don’t get bogged down on not converting the opportunities you always wanted because the one which will come to you would make you learn more than the one you missed. You won’t realize it then but in hindsight, dots would make a straight line.
How did internships help you? (Improving problem-solving skills, etc)
Internships have helped me far more than I could have asked for. From instilling confidence in me to giving me a point to talk about in the interviews, I grew with each of my internships. Apart from the execution skills, functional area know-how, problem-solving skills and, clarity of thought, internships helped me better my communication skills in a large way.
The more I used to interact with a new set of folks in each internship, the more confident I used to feel for next time. It helped me channelize my time towards better opportunities, coveted internships, niche extra-curricular activities in college, and my food-blogging hobby. Starting young with internships gives one a headstart and a smooth runway for a better flight.
The most important ROI of such opportunities is the network one builds over time. The connections and friends you make help you evolve as they evolve with their skills and mindset and make you aware of the new opportunities in the market. Also, it largely depends upon how and what you extract from each opportunity. Post my engineering, I was even able to leverage the marketing internships experience to bag a full-time technology role at Infosys and Ericsson.
What advice would you like to share for aspiring interns in your niche?
- The moment you find things that make you come alive, make you want to do them every day, start. Try to find them as early as possible. The longer you beat at your craft, the more mistakes you allow yourself to make, the better you are going to be. Like most things, starting early has huge upsides. So, start young.
2. Be curious to learn new things and explore novel dimensions. This is the best time to experiment with the resources and opportunities you have at hand.
3. Apply for that internship you always wanted. Apply to the company you always aspired to be in. If you don’t ask, the answer is always no.
What was your journey transitioning to a full-time role at UrbanClap (now Urban Company)?
UrbanClap (now Urban Company) journey was just phenomenal. The UC team comprises of the best of the lot from each industry and function. From founders to senior management folks, all of them are quite approachable and work directly with you to make you grow into a better person. The confidence which got instilled in me with internships certainly helped me survive the high speed and vigorous approach of the company.
I was fortunate to be a part of high-impact and high-intensity roles that spread across the Business and Technology teams of the company. While interacting with service professionals, especially women, working with UrbanClap, I could see my work impacting their lives and empowering them into independent micro-entrepreneurs. The spectrum of learning I got with my role at UrbanClap is quite broad and I’m sure I couldn’t have got that with the other opportunities I had at hand post engineering.
Any resources that you feel could be helpful for students?
I’ll list a few of the resources I often find myself exploring and each time I explore, I learn new things:
Podcasts: Joe Rogan Experience, Naval Ravikant’s Podcast
Books: Mark Manson’s both books, Sapiens by Yuval Harari
Tweets: Naval Ravikant, Kunal Shah, Ankur Warikoo
Newsletters: The Ken, Finshots, LiveMint
Sunmeet is always up for good conversations and loves helping young students with queries around internships and career opportunities. Feel free to reach him on Twitter or LinkedIn.
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