Dear MakeMyTrip,
I had been called to interview with MakeMyTrip for Director, Product Management (I guess) position. I was in touch with Shreya Jain from MMT HR.
I had a long travel starting late August & when Shreya had gotten in touch with me around the time, I was upfront to tell her that I have a travel & it would be tough scheduling interviews.
After a few pushes (from both my side & interviewer not available), I had a telephonic round was scheduled on July 16 (Thursday). It was taken by Abhishek Aggarwal, VP Product. It went on good I guess & I was called for an in-person interview. Shreya requested if I could make to Delhi (I am in Bangalore), the next day itself which was Friday. I had to push it to the next week.
I had to travel to my hometown Bhopal on Saturday & from there I was suppose to travel to Haridwar. We had multiple tickets to Haridwar from Bhopal as they were not confirmed. Guess you would know this practice as you are from the travel industry :-). Shreya confirmed that MMT will surely call me for interview so I canceled my Bhopal trip. Shreya also asked me what could be a good time for my onward Bangalore-Delhi ticket. I mentioned on phone somewhere around 7-8 AM would be good as Shreya has suggested that it would only take a day for the whole interview process to be done.
Shreya said that the interview could only be on Tuesday to which I agreed. She also sent me ticket on July 19 (Sunday). I thought it should be fine & did not really look into it. I also got a call from Shreya stating that I should keep enough time in the evening as it is going to be a long interview day for me.
On Monday, I noticed that the flight ticket is booked for 6 AM in the morning.
I am not sure if your travel guys are aware how far the airport is in Bangalore. On top of that, it is suppose to be a long interview day for me. I wasnt sure what your guys have been thinking. I raised a request to reschedule the flight to slightly later time to which I got a reply that it cant be done. I sent an email saying that I could see 2 different flights for the later time & I was told the flight cant be rescheduled.
I was told that the interviews that were suppose to start at 10:30 AM now has been pushed to 1:30 PM & rest of the evening interviews are moved to the next day. This was done so that I have time to relax after an early wake up & travel.
On asking if there is a guesthouse I could checkin, I was being told, there is none.
At this point, I was really frustrated with the insenstivity of your staff & I replied with the email below.
Much to my surprise, Shreya kept up with the hectic plan. For a moment, I start to wonder if this is usual process at MMT. But finally I had to give in as I had canceled my ticket to Bhopal & I had to be in Delhi to be able to keep up with my travel.
Unfortunately, I missed my flight post checkin on the travel date. It has happened to me for the first time. I called Gupinder, who is managing the travel & he suggested me to book a flight that would be reiumbersed. I had earlier asked for booking flight for myself but was denied. I was surprised to know that MMT has process of reiumbersement. I had intimated Shreya & others of this.
I reported on time on Tuesday at 1:30 PM. The interview went on till 7. I had been given an assignment on post assignment completion, I tried reaching both Shreya as well as Abhishek who was interviewing me but none of them were reachable. I also went to the reception telling the person about my status. I was a little surprised by the ‘unhelpful attitude’ where the person did not care much & simply tried calling both Shreya & Abhishek, giving up, saying they arent reachable.
It looked like I was pretty much on my own. After waiting for half an hour, I decided to go back. Unfortunately on my way back, my pre-paid balance got over. Since I was in roaming, my phone did not receive calls either. I could only understand its balance problem quite later. It seems I had another interview lined up for the day & because of the glitch, the interviewer who waited for me, had to leave as well.
The next day, again a few unfortunate things happen. I wasnt well but I tried sticking to the time. I had to come back midway & only by evening I was able to get back to replying to emails. I had to get on to my trip to Haridwar the next day so technically the interviews did not complete for me.
I had told Shreya that it is a month long vacation for me. Post vacation, I came back & sent emails about the reiumbersement. I spoke to Gupinder who was managing my travel. He told me he is no more with MMT & asked me to sync up with Shreya. Shreya told me she has forwarded my emails to the right person in a very cold manner.
Today when I followed up with her, I was in for a shock. Shreya thinks that I had been unprofessional by ditching interview midway & if I had decency enough, I would not ask for the reiumbersement. She said, she would process the reiumbersement as a favor & wants me to remember the favor all my life.
Conversation with Shreya on Phone
Shreya has mentioned that it would only by Friday she would probably process my reiumbersement. I am not very sure so I thought of writing this open letter. Some of my suggestions to improve the process at MMT are
- Please dont be frugal in terms of flight rescheduling & hotel/guesthouse arrangement for candidates.
- If you have not empowered HR to make such monetary decisions, please do so.
Hope this helps to improve interview experience at MakeMyTrip. All the best.
Sincerely,
Ashish Sharma
pocha.sharma@gmail.com
Ph - 9538384545
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Shreya reply to my email
Sep 2, 2:25 PM
I was able to use some help from a friend who helped escalting my woes in MMT to the head of tech & HR. I was plesantly surprised to see Shreya’s email response (she has not responded to my emails earlier & even requesting her to reply has not yielded any result)
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Accusation on phone call recording
Couple of guys on Twitter are visibly upset with my phone call recording of Shreya’s call.
I forgot to mention the reason why I have to record the phone call. Shreya wasn’t responding to my emails & the treatment on the phone call was pretty cold the first time. The second time, well, I just could not take it. The only way I could put up my case was to record the call, which I did.
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MakeMyTrip offical reply on Twitter
Sep 2, 7:00 PM
MMT replied to my tweet 5 hours back. They said they have sent a communication my way but I have not get any offical email from them except for the mail from the HR.
