MSIMQA: A Throwback Journey

 In May 2014, I reached to new island “CG” after sailing boat from last 4.6 years on the ocean. I stepped ahead to explore it and meet the new people of this island. At first glance; It looked awesome place – Scattered towers, land covered with trees, beautiful path that connects these towers and greenery.

I finished my joining formalities and got the POC contact details from HR for further account related onboarding process. I called on that cell no. and other side – Amit G received it. He provided the access of the ODC and introduced me with Anand. Anand helped me to understand the area and introduced me with rest of the team member; primarily Aditi – I was the replacement of her.

My KT started by multiple people – Aditi, Mahima and Anand and after 3-4 days, I started working on small releases as a shadow resource.  Ashutosh returned from Goa after his marriage and bought some sweets for team. We interacted and further he introduced me with his team (Robin, Nikita and Salena).

Gradually, a small group formed and strong understanding developed among us. We were eating, roaming and doing masti together along with work. My journey in CG started with Celebration; just spending few weeks I got an opportunity to join the team lunch and events.

One side I was feeling comfortable with surrounding environment but on another side To & Fro waves started. New faces started replacing the existing member and existing one moving toward a new horizon. I would like to summarize that period with this statement “Wake up to the new dawn after fears of night before”.  

In April 2015, I got an opportunity to work on Equity side and things were going good with the existing team members but a pain of losing these members were in my heart. Since my DOJ, I got a good company and enjoyed good stint with them. Ashutosh helped me a lot to understand the basic things of Capital market and we spent great time – Discussion, having lunch, going for Snacks, 4:30 PM long walk and Idhar Udhar Ghumna Phirna.

Later a new team formed to manage this area. We worked hard and tried to meet all the deadlines. After couple of months; things streamlined and turned into green.  We divided our cubical on the basis of time zone (LN-NY-PARIS-MEXICO) and people were also working on that mode. Let me introduce my team here (Mayank, Smita, Meghna and Swati) – All are expert in their area but some are exceptional.

Our cubical was center of the MSIM area or can be considered as Heart of the MSIM because top side – RE team was sitting, Center – Equity and bottom side – S&M and AIP.  We together were a chatterbox; always talking along with work, testing the G.K of few people, trip planning, silent fighting and many more. Beside my cubical we had some plugin team – (Snehal, Yakshi & Sarita); they were timely joining us every day during our conversations or masti time.

Along with testing deliverable; I opted to take additional responsibilities to explore myself. These additional responsibilities provided me a great platforms e.g. MadFest, Floor SPOC, ERT Member, M8-Bus Monitor and many more to connect with great people within MS account or outside MS.  These platforms extended my friendship network to extreme level (around 200+ people; I know by name and others by face).

One side, I was a good person because of some good things but on another side bad for some hard decisions which mostly took during bus monitoring if people didn’t follow the rules & guidelines. I still remember the conversation b/w two people where girl suggested her friend to take M8 for Dange Chowk and he replied – No, bus monitor of that route is dangerous. Anyways all were the part of life – Best statement for this “You cannot make happy all the person at same time; some takes time or some don’t want to be”. Learn the things and move ahead that is all about life.

My journey with CG was awesome; got good platforms to explore myself and opportunities to interact with good people (which are part of my hobbies). Here sharing the few things which I would miss or remarkable forever:

Name	Best Things Of U which I would miss or remember forever
Amit G	First CG (Boss), Till late hours working passion, PPM & Clarity Detailed Email
Anand K	Cool Lead and Comedy Night with Kapil Sharma on YouTube
Aditi	First person whom I replaced
Swati V	F5, 11 to 6 Job timing, G.K, Crime Patrol, Manual Testing Ka Shock and Double promotion
Suvish N	Gym Lover, Good Cricketer and Round table discussion with bade log in U3 Pantry, Using Strongest Perfume after 5:00 PM
Mahesh G	Another Gym Lover, Birthday Cake – Fund Collector and Royal Enfield Lover
Lakshmipathi	Blue Dress at Yolo
Priyanka K	First Song sung for us in our cubical “Mera Dil Jis Dil Pe Fida Ha”
Nazneen	Pot Luck Organizer, Passive Replier (May be you are thinking a lot while replying)
Mahima	Always my Infy, Main Bhi Kahun-ga (instead of –gi), DDR Portal , SPOC and Bus Monitor
Sneha K	Best Pic with Salman Khan at MadFest Event in 2015
Swati P	OMS Dashboard
Priyanka M	Your Exit Clearance
Rakesh	Well Wisher Of Bhabhi Ji, Cartoon and Banana Lover, Hard Working Guy
Meghna	Ek Baat Kah Deti Hun, Online Utility, Mohini, Silent Fighter, Collection, SelFie, Swami Vivekananda, Equity Team, “Are Ank...Ankit” and Best Pal
Snehal	Vrat me Panni ki Awaaz, TV Serial Ki Dukan, Rani, 100 * 5 RS, Every day release & tension
Sarita	IM Governance & CMS/DMS, All time phone Pe Baat and muffler women
Smita	Our Trip Planner, 9 Baje Tak Rukna, Singer Taher Saha- Mankind Angel & Chicken Lover
Preeti	Zeal to learn Macro
Vikram	Different size Fans, Asking tough questions during meeting, small bottle & helpful Banda
Kirti	CMS/DMS Subject Matter Expert and Online TV serials
Geetanjali	CMS/DMS Subject Matter Expert and Pictionary lover.
Chintan	Another Gym Lover, Bacca Bucci Shoes and always book table at BBQ for team party
Ashish	Perl Scripter but did well in Manual Testing and Quora
Nikita	8:30 to 5:30 Job timing, Good Database: If u needs input about anyone then approach her
Robin	Riddle Quiz Solving Skill, NCFM Level 2 Certified, Bindas Bidu and Daily Quote
Mayank	K.V Katni (Badminton Events), Equity Leader, Great Advisor and Supportive.
Bhavna	Hats Off to your tolerance level, Good person and always supportive.
Mukund	Automation COE
Salena	Dream to make online learning website, Bindass Punjaban
Poorna	Capital Market BA, Great Punch-Line maker whenever he had funny debate with Nazneen
Harit	Always give Rock-Bottom looks like photo pose
Swapnil	Equity Automation Framework Designer, Writing Multiple Notes at his desk for reminder
Ashutosh	Best Pal, Great Advisor, Capital Market Guru, Kind-Hearted Person, My First MI3 Mobile booked by him, Best time spent with him in CG.
Shakeel	RE to aap se hi tha, hain and ab rahne wala hain J
Shadaab	Automation COE, Founder Of MSIMQA Fun Team and MSIM QA Second (Boss)
Prachi	RSA Token, Galat Jhuta, My First Basic Photography Trainer, Multiple LIC &  Vedhani
Neha N	Didn't forget her Old firm still using in MS Passwd, Dev To QA, WFH
Prateek	Football Lover and Mutreja's Fav

YouTube Details:

• Title: MSIMQA: A Throwback Journey
• Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXSPlPZC3ac

Wishing you all the best for future assignments and hoping will meet somewhere.

@PAR2016: Treasure Hunt

TCS-Maitree is a core central team within TCS which has started many initiatives to bind the people together through organization’s activities e.g. @PAR (Pune Adventure Race), Family/Summer/Health camp, awareness & environment related program etc. I would like to share my experience on Treasure Hunt game which I gained via @PAR2016. Previously I had experienced about this game in limited domain & format but after participating in @PAR2016 (12^th Dec 2016 – as Team B1 Pune Explorer 2); I would say -“This treasure hunt was truly amazing”. Going forward my mind will always force me to get the knowledge of your surrounding objects which we mainly skip it.

Sharing my first adventure experience in TCS:

Last Friday 9^th Dec, I was about to leave from Office then got a call from Sachin. He informed me about the adventurous game and checked my interest on it. It sounded good to me after knowing the format of this game which I have never ever experienced before, therefore I said “Yes”.  I got the instruction booklet on WhatsApp and also added into an internal group with experts.

Format and Important Rules:

• Formation of team (mandatory 4 members) where at-least 1 girl should be present in your team.
• Treasures are already placed anywhere in Pune, so find it and take the Selfie with that and upload it against the question.
• Two people will acts as a lead (primary and backup) and @PAR app should be installed on their smartphone. Password will be provided during start of the game at their WhatsApp group. Each individual team has a group on WhatsApp with Reviewer or ClueMaster ( who would help you if you use your life line)
• Two sets of questions will be revealed via Group 1 and Group 2 where timing for Group 1 (set of questions) – 8:30 AM and Group 2 (set of questions) – 12:00 PM.  Answers of Group 1 – acceptable till 1:00 PM and for Group 2 – till 5:00 PM.
• Two life-lines / per team available, if we use it then we will get -100 point for that question. e.g. Question 3 – Level: Medium – Point 200 and used lifeline & able to crack the puzzle so (200 – 100 = 100) will be credited to our account.
• Use your personal vehicles to commute to the place where treasures are placed; most important follow all the traffic rules and carry the mandatory documents & helmets.
•  Registration desks close timing - 7:30 AM morning, so team has to report prior to that.

Saturday 10^th Dec, Morning - most of the members of our group woke up at 4:00 AM and did their daily tasks and some searching on Google. I started my journey at around 6:45 AM; weather was too chilling; while riding bike - hands were getting frozen and whenever I was exhaling breath then adding an appearance of chain smoking. We decided to meet at Sahyadari Park at 7:00 AM but all reached at around 7:10 AM. Manoj was the first one whom I noticed at the entrance gate when I reached there. He was rubbing his hands to get back the blood circulation to normal state.

Sachin came by his car, along with some strategy. We parked our vehicles at SP2 basement and quickly went to registration desk to enroll our name where we got T-Shirts & Bags (with tag line: Are you @PAR?). We changed it and were waiting for 4^th & mandatory member “Ashwini”.  In a couple of minutes she also joined us and then we went to photography desk where our group photo was shot by experts J . 60+ team (approx.) had enrolled their name for this game.

We had our breakfast at Zunka, Cafeteria and decided to travel in a car where 1 person would drive the car and rest other would Google the questions in order to get the hint and also share the question in our closed internal group for others to crack it. We left office at around 8:35 AM and took Selfie for the first question. There was a trick behind this first simple question that was – Not to identify the people but to check the @PAR App operations whether uploaded pic was getting accepted by app or not J

After question 1 – Selfie photo, we moved ahead toward Aundh to take the shot with one of next questions which we cracked – Bal Kalyan Sanstha. After that – Saniwarwada, Kasba Ganpati, Phule Wada, Station, Neelyam theater, Blue Nile, Vijay Talkies , Sambhaji Park and then TCS – TRDDC (pune). We checked with security guard about any activities which were happening here. He replied “No” and said – 15+ people came here & asked the same question.  Time was around 12:30 PM then we had given secondary thought of TCS-Mangal Das office but it was tough to reach there in 30 min. Sachin drove his car very well and we just entered into the gate at 12:50 PM.

Till that time Group 2 (set of questions were also revealed) and we circulated in our group to get the expert reply.  We opted TCS Mangal Das Office at last because there were some activities involved in that puzzle for which we would get some rating from activity coordinator. At around 1:00 PM our turn came and activity was – Acid Test: Four Bricks, 3 lanes and 4 team member had to cross the acid river without touching their feet into the acid river. For this task we got 3 min only; no time for planning and strategy. We were puzzled and stucked in between lane 1 only. Activity time was completed - Got “C” rating and uploaded the Selfie pic with coordinator.

We were totally exhausted; Back paining while sitting in the car from last 4 hours and also too much hungry. But Sachin looks too much active among all. He was our true captain & perfect pilot who drove his car in the zigzag, narrow & broad lane of Pune with lot of patience; along with dealing good people on the road (I hope you understood what I am trying to say – In pune while riding your car, we could see lot of good people blocking your road by their bikes . If anybody wants to gain this experience then please drive your car during 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM at Hinjewadi road (especially from KPIT to Wipro circle))

We decided to take rest prior to start solving the group 2 puzzles and had Khakhra, moong dal & ladoo during our lunch. NFS (Need For Speed and Need For Solution both required because answers for Group 2 set of questions would be closed at 5:00 PM) Trip 2 started at around 2:15 PM with clueless direction and covered Aga Khan Place, Tribal Museum , KEM hospital, Parwardhan Samadhai, Ferguson College, Abhyankar Path, Pune Station and then St. Mary Church (near bishop school).  Out of 11 questions we attempted to cover around 8 questions but were not sure for few questions whether submitted answers were right or wrong.

2:15 PM to 5:00 PM: 2 hours 45 minutes – Painful & direction less path and also high time to face the weekend traffic. We reached St. Mary Church, near bishop school just 7 min prior to 5 o’clock and submitted the answer that was our last attempt. We thanks to all the experts who were actively involved thought out the day to crack the puzzles and moved ahead toward Sahyadari Park to report back because it was mandatory.

5:00 PM to 6:00 PM: 1 hour – Lucky window was still opened to answer lucky clue 1 and 2.  Lucky Clue 1 – Take a Selfie with PMPML Hinjewadi – Airport bus and Lucky Clue 2 – Take a Selfie with Honda Navi with valid no. plate.  During the return journey, we were keeping our eyes on the road to capture these clues atleast in order to get the points to compensate the 3 questions which was not attempted by us in group 2. The way we were keeping our eyes on road looks like – We were from Income Tax department team and going to raid anyone whomsoever we found with that unique bike J #DemonetizationEffect.

By chance, we got this lucky bike near Shivaji Nagar– Honda Navi with valid no. plate for lucky clue 2 and submitted our response. Then moved ahead to capture Lucky Clue 1 – PMPML Airport Shuttle Bus, honestly speaking – We could see this bus very easily everyday but on that day we didn’t notice from Shivaji Nagar to Hinjewadi Phase 3.

Someone said correctly – “You won’t get the simple things easily, when you need it urgently”

We reached office at around 6:10 PM and stopped our car in the front of TCS Sahyadari Park Office and had a great tea at Tapri. 6:15 PM reported back to SP; parked our car at SP1 basement and then had a heavy snack and moved ahead to Auditorium for the final result announcement.

Results announced and didn’t fall in top 3 but the best part was that we attempted to crack all the puzzles and reached beyond our comfort zone to chase it. We did our rough calculation after validating submitted answers with correct and I would say – We would be falling under top 10 out of 60+ team.

This treasure hunt game had made my day and gained wonderful experiences which would definitely help us in upcoming @PAR2017.

Here we go: (Some Lamhe)

YouTube: Link : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-LPQ1bHoDk

Prior to close this space; I would like to hats off to below parties for providing me the opportunity to participate in this game.

• Team B1 Pune Explorer 2 (Sachin, Ashwini, Manoj & I), special thanks to Sachin for driving the car throughout the day (covered around 240 KM) with great patience and zeal. Also Great Team efforts !!
•  WhatsApp Group @PAR2016 (Sudhir, Vaibhavi, Girish, Nidhi, Yogesh, Varsha, Deva, etc.) : Thanks for supporting us throughout the day and helping us to crack the puzzle.
•  @PAR2016 / TCS-Maitree Team : Thanks for organizing this wonderful game and executed it successfully with great strategy.
• Other Team : Thanks for taking our few shots and also leaving your foot-marks which helped us to follow you, vice-versa :) 

Shuffle of Characters

I would like to depict my IT journey with this phrase “Shuffle of Characters”.  This phrase has forced me to think all the events which happened in my life from past to current state and time to time these events left some sign for me which I was not aware.

Prior to start penning downs the instances; I would share something related to Destiny & Luck. Destiny is predetermined course of events and mostly people believe that god decides & plan the events at the time of our birth; the things that may happen in our life at particular time. Whereas luck is something, which influence the path of our destiny. Sometime luck may help us to reach our destiny and sometime it will also stop us from reaching our destiny.

In 2007, during college time there was a race to secure the job and I was also part of it. We were eagerly waiting for the mass recruiter firm “TCS” to come in our college. Each individual had prepared himself / herself a lot with BARRON word list and all the previous placement papers were downloaded & covered.

2 days prior, we got to know that due to changes in schedule – Day 1 Company would be “CTS” instead of TCS. At the ground root, all the students were puzzled and were thinking what to do now. There was no option left, so all jumped from BARRON to adopt different pattern. We all studied day and night for 2 days and prepared at some extent.

Day 1 came, we all joined the queue at around 8:45 AM and waiting for their turn. My turn came at around 10:45 PM, my mind was saying that till then recruiter would be exhausted & I would be rejected by them definitely. He interviewed me around 45 minutes and asked all the questions – schooling / college projects and coding. Next day, List disclosed and out of 1200 – around 300 students were selected.

Joined CTS and got testing project which was just opposite of my choice. I was looking space at Development side because got good hold in coding during college time and also computer science graduate. But accepted it with this hope that something good ahead planned for me… Waiting for me…

In 2013, I got an assignment for 7 months to work at client location – Park Street, London Bridge near Thames River.  During that time, we delivered the testing solution for Industry Account Switching and working on another major programme. My college friend who was in Glasgow; visited London during Diwali time and we decided to explore Canary Wharf and Greenwich. While covering the lane of Canary Wharf, we did some photo shoots. But coincidentally he took one shot which defined my future milestone.

In 2014, I moved to new firm – CG and got MS account. For me, it was a new world from payments domain to Capital market and looks complex but I accepted this challenge. Honestly speaking, I like challenges and following simple concept – If we have dynamic approach then everything would be easy. One weekend, I was taking the backup of all the photos which I took from last 1-2 years after reviewing one by one.

Then I noticed the below snap which I cropped it and uploaded here, else it would be tough to recognize the background word (Watch the background clearly then you will notice something). This shot was taken in 2013 (8 months before) and I got the MS account in June 2014.

Now due to business changes in 2016, I moved to the firm which was supposed to come in 2007.  That’s why I opted this phrase “Shuffle of Character” : C.T. S  to T.C.S because of the logical events which happened during my journey.

At last, I would like to say that – Life is short and for each individual destiny has been defined; do your best then positive vibes will support you to go ahead. Moment will come on your way and leave some sign about your future… so keep your eyes open :)