What I learnt during my internship with Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail Ltd. -By Ritik Gupta from SCMHRD Pune

With its lifestyle brands like Louis Philippe, Van Heusen, Allen Solly, and Peter England or fast fashion brands like Forever 21, Pantaloons Fashion & Retail Limited has emerged as a pioneer in bringing iconic fashion brands to India. Since its launch of the first Pantaloons store in 1997, this Indian clothing retail chain has now weaved a strong network of 3,041 stores, presence across approximately 25,000 multi-brand outlets with 6,500+ points of sales in department stores across India. All in all, the Fortune 500 company, Aditya Birla Group is one of the big names in the industry, and working with one of its subsidiaries is a prestigious affair in itself. Here is an account of my internship experience with Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail Ltd. 

The selection process and a supportive induction 

For doing an internship with Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail Ltd., one has to go through 2 elimination rounds that test your capabilities. These are: 

• Group discussion 

• Two personal interview rounds 

The first elimination round is a group discussion followed by a personal interview with HR and then with another representative from the Sales division of the company. An important point to remember in the entire process is that humility plays a big role in clearing the interview rounds.

Talking about the induction, my mentor and buddy showed me the way in the initial phase, they helped me in understanding the functionality of different domains and how exactly things go forward. E-meetings with the top delegates of the firm made me feel ecstatic. The ease with which we could approach and connect with them was amazing.

A thrilling experience and major takeaways

I was fortunate to get an opportunity to work as a Learning & Development Intern under the Retail HR team. It was exciting as it involved understanding the learning of the workforce, intensive competitor’s bench-marking, and providing an improved L&D framework. My internship with Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail Ltd. helped me improve the ownership factor and performance within a limited time frame. In fact, I can go as far as saying that I have mastered the skill of doing my work way before time!

The major takeaway from the internship is that an in-depth understanding of the business is critical to maintaining the pace of the project. Secondly, it is necessary to have periodic discussions with your immediate superiors so that the project is executed on the intended lines. Also, these sessions pointed to me the areas that I needed to work on.

Overall, the entire stint with the company was great and impactful. The whole L&D team was a treat and helped me not to lose track of the project in this WFH scenario and worked towards giving the best results. They helped me to discuss and resolve the challenges in the project.