How to prepare for Campus Placements?
- This is written from my experience of appearing for campus placements.
- The blog post is a general guide and NOT written considering a specific company.
- The resources and the preparation method I used worked for me, however it might not be the same for you. Read through, consider the positives, and take the approach that works best for you!
So lets get right to it!
⚙️ General Flow of a Company’s Selection Process
The number and type of rounds vary from company to company.
Online Round(s)
- 1 or 2 online rounds
- MCQ questions can be:
- aptitude, reasoning, verbals, and other cognitive skills
- theoretical knowledge of SDLC, OOPs, DBMS, networks, and OS
- find the output questions based on pseudocode/C/C++/Java
Group Discussion
- Tests communication skills and logical/abstract thinking
Technical Interview
- Resume based questions
- Coding questions
- Theory questions & other role based questions
Managerial Interview
- Interview by Managers or higher
- Test technical ability and team fit
HR Interview
- About understanding the candidate and whether they are the right fit for the job
❓ What to Prepare
Technical | Other |
|---|---|
| Predict the output questions (pseudocode/C/C++/Java) | Aptitude, reasoning, verbals, and other cognitive skills |
| Coding | Have a well prepared Resume |
| OOPs | Prepare a solid Self Introduction |
| DBMS, Networks, OS | Prepare for Behavioural Questions |
| SDLC | Research about the company before going for an interview (Cannot stress this enough!) |
| System Design | Prepare a few questions to ask your interviewer at the end of the interview |
📚 Resources
🧩 Aptitude, Reasoning and Verbals
There are various resources available online from where you can get questions and practice, Google! Practice commonly asked question patterns, this will enable you to solve faster ⚡ during the actual exam which is important given that you have to solve many questions in a short amount of time.
Important Topics in Aptitude
- Time and Work (Questions like how many men and women are required to complete the task, time taken to fill a tank by
xpipes, etc) - Number Theory
- Profit and Loss
- Ratio and Proportion (Questions like what will be the ratio of water and milk, if
xlitres of water is added, etc) - Percentages
- Average
👨💻 Coding
Most companies support Java, C++ and python in their online IDEs. The language requirement may vary based on the role.
I mostly used Raj Vikramaditya’s SDE sheet to practice a wide variety of commonly asked questions. Even though you may not get the same exact question, solving these questions will help you plan your approach and solve similar questions easily. Go ahead and watch his YouTube video before jumping into the sheet.
I also used to see company specific previously asked questions on GFG (https://practice.geeksforgeeks.org/explore/?page=1) before heading for the online round/interview.
An excellent resource to practice dynamic programming: https://leetcode.com/discuss/general-discussion/458695/dynamic-programming-patterns/
LeetCode and GFG are your friends!
📖 Theory Subjects
OOPs
Object Oriented Programming by Prof. Swaminathan J : I would recommend everyone to go through it, if you are new to OOPs or want to review the fundamentals.
Apart from these I went through various websites and read through commonly asked OOPs questions:
- https://www.edureka.co/blog/interview-questions/oops-interview-questions/
- https://career.guru99.com/top-50-oops-interview-questions/
- Differences between Procedural and Object Oriented Programming - GeeksforGeeks
- And a few other questions that I googled on my own
Note: I wouldn’t vouch for the answers provided on these websites. I would advice you to look at the question and search for an appropriate answer on your own.
OS, DBMS, Networks
Commonly asked questions can be found here: https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/most-asked-computer-science-subjects-interview-questions-in-amazon-microsoft-flipkart/
You don’t need to know each and every thing in these subjects. The commonly asked questions above provide you an idea of the topics that interviewers generally focus on. Concentrate on these topics, and prepare well either through your college notes (if you have one xD), or you can google and learn about them.
If you have a lot of time to spare and understand Hindi, you can go through videos on these topics by Knowledge Gate.
I practiced SQL from HackerRank, and solved almost all of the questions. Focus on aggregate functions, WHERE, GROUP BY, CASE, and joins.
SDLC
Know about the various stages of Software Development Life Cycle and fundamental Agile Terminology.
System Design
Have an idea on how to design a software end to end.
Know how to draw UML diagrams (Google or watch a couple of YouTube videos about it).
👥 Behavioural Questions/HR Interview
This HR interview Guide explains the intent behind several commonly asked HR/behavioural questions and the best route we can take to answer the question.
Remember to use the S-T-A-R approach.