IBM Interview Questions, Process, and Tips for Freshers

Round: Test
Experience: Questions in the section were divided into 3 subsections one was data interpretation, another was number seriesand the third was quantitative.The level of the questions in the three sections was not very high but time constraintwas there. The quantitative questions were also very common and time was also enough in this section
Duration: 31 minutes

Round: Group Discussion
Duration: 30 minutes

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: First obvious question was Tell something about you. They asked my favorite Subjects. I told- C, DS, DBMS

C & DS - 10 min1.w.a.p Reverse "IBM" String ?2.w.a.p reverse number?3.sorting types? explain some sorting technique?4.which is best sorting algorithm?5.what is the time complexity of quick sort? explain procedure?DBMS - 10 min6.what is primary key? foreign key? composite key?7.what is normal form? explain?8.what are types of normal forms ? explain?9.what is join ?types of joins? explain with tables and outputs?10.write a sql statement to find MAX SAL of employee table?11.write in Relation algebra ? Tuple Relation ? Domain Relation? explain the above statement with these formallanguages?Networks : 10 min12.what is network?13.what is intranet? internet?14.what is IP? explain?15.what is LAN ? MAN? WAN? Explain with Example?16.what are layers? why it is useful? how you communicate with that layers?17.explain all ISO-OSI Layers? with an application ? example ?extra related to my subject (Information security) - 5min18.what is Cryptography?19.what were specially that you learned apart from your career which is related to subject?in technical they asked some H.R questions in between.20. why IBM?21. do u have any career options?22.what is your strength?23.what is your weakness?24.what is your hobbies?Project - 5-10 min25.Came to My Project : Here I Have a Chance to express all my ideas,they really impressed very much by the way of approaching the problems in the project.finally do u have any question they asked?26. what type of projects doing by IBM in various domains?27. asked about related to the company ?Wait for Next Round. Some One definitely call you .. I told, Thank You Sir.
Tips: Coming to the interviews stay cool & think aloud so that if u misunderstood the problem ,he will help uout

Round: HR Interview
Experience: H.R Questions : more than 40 min1.tell some thing about your self?2.why IBM?3.Why i need to select you?4.how your telling that you r best?6.what is your weakness?6.can u work under pressure?7.what types of works you did in Projects? did u worked under pressure at that time?8.if your manager is given more work what will you do?9.if the manager is critical & very serious ? then how can you do the work?10.how you can handle if nobody in your team is not accepting your views?11.if you had a situation where in your team going to fight? what you will do?12.what seems you that you differ from others?13.do u had a situation in real life,where misunderstand came between any to? how solved?14.in your point of view how the manager will seems to be?15.if he is not cooperative? then what will you do?16.if your team people not working then what is your responsibility?17.will you work , if u give more work?18.can u relocate?19.do u have any preference in work-place ?20.do u have any questions?21.I asked about Company Environment !!you have to be Confident in the interview.and they see whether this person is Suitable for this job/not .HR Finally told, OK. Mr.Sunil Kumar. We Will Meet You Again ,Thank You Very Much. ALL THE BEST.FINALLY I M IN IBM.Because of this Simple Mantra---- If You Think "YOU CAN " definitely "YOU CAN"-----

General Tips: Regardless of which company you are aiming for, C,DS,OS,DBMS are a must . You have to be very strong as theseare the basics for a CSE student and there are some companies which ask only algorithms and others cover all theCSE subjects.
College Name: NIT WARANGAL
Motivation: Initially I was disappointed as I couldn't get through some of the companies which I expected,I would get throughand finally I went for IBM Where Their Area of Work is in Multidimensional .So I felt I chose the right company &luckily(perhaps) I was selected.

Round: Test
Experience: We were called for the test at 12 pm and test began around 5 pm. Level of the test was medium with a time limit of 2 minutes per question.
Total Questions: 38

Round: Written communication
Experience: Duration of the test was 15 minutes approximately and in that time we had to draft a business letter. Out of 150 students who were there in my panel, only 50 were selected.

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: In this round, 8 out of 10 students were selected.
Duration: 15 mins minutes

Round: Other Interview
Experience: 1.)Favourite subject in class 10th/12th/Graduation ??
2.)Question on Circles and Theorems Applicable 2 it..!!
3.)Have you read any novels written by Paulo Coelho?? I told that  I have read The Alchemist & left The Zahir Midway..!!
4.)Is The Alchemist a fiction or a non-fiction??
5.)Which Novel Have you read recently??I told about The Sins of The Father..
6.)Who has written The Sins of The Father??Told:- Jeffrey Archer..!!
7.)Which Guitar do you play?? I told: Acoustic.
8.)What do you play??I told:Scales,licks,musical pieces,chords etc.!!
9.)Who is your favourite Guitarist??I told: Joe Satriani.
10.)Which series of guitar does Eric Clapton Play?? I failed 2 recall..!!
11.)What do you think about your performance in d aptitude test??
12.)If U r posted at Chennai..,will you be OK with it??
And, I was selected !!

General Tips: Be confident about yourself and try to present yourself in the best way possible.
College Name: NA

Round: Test
Experience: I got the job as PPO.The aptitude test was very simple.

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: It was technical as well as hr interview for us.It was an intern interview basically. So only questions in ds,os,c were asked.In C- about stack overflow,segmentation fault and things like that.OS- process states, about fork, how shell works.DS- he asked me to generate all possible permutations of a given string using strongly connected graph.Some small questions were also asked.I managed to answer most of the questions and it was not so tough.

General Tips: If you want to get into any good company the basic things to study arec,c++,ds,os,networking,dbms.If you are confident in these, you are all set to go for the battle.Study well.
College Name: NIT WARANGAL

Round: Test
Experience: We were given a paper which had 3 sections- mental ability,series and quant.Around 100 were selected from this round..Next we had a coding paper where we had to understand the code and give the output or what error.Altogether 38 were selected for 2 profiles- regular and extreme blue.Then each of the 38 candidates were interviewed and finally 9 were selected 7 for extreme blue and 2 for regular.

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: I had an interview for about 1 and a half hour..I had a shaky start, with me fumbling in the very basic questions of c,c++,os.  But i was quick to realize my mistake.Then the interviewer asked me how to get all possible combinations of a given string. I gave him a solution. He asked to take a different path.I gave him a solution in that path, then I gave many more. Not all of them were correct, only 1 or 2 were concrete. Others were just ideas in all possible directionsI don't know what impressed him but i got the internship opportunity and that too extreme blue.There was not much stress on HR round.

General Tips: As a matter of fact regular interns generally dont get a ppo, and if you happen to read this before the holidays, remember that you do not need to work extra hours. Make preparation for placements as your priority.They don't expect you to work that hard and will give ppo in most cases.
College Name: NIT WARANGAL

Round: Test
Experience: sec1 was a bit lengthy. sec2 was very easy sec3 had quantitative questions based on time and distance,time and work,%,avg,boat stream,profit and loss.Sections 2 and 3 had negative markingIn written test they selected 51 out of 70.
Tips: Try to read any one matrix properly and answer all questions of that matrix. Don't try to ans all matrix questions. It takes time.But if u ans 2 matrix questions (2*5=10qsns) correctly,it is more then enough.Solve RS agarwal number series questions (chapter odd man out and number series from RS Agarwal).One imp thing is that all aptitude questions were from previous years papers of IBM, which can be found on the internet. Go through them.
Duration: 31 minutes

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: After written test, they divided the people into groups (13ppl*4group=52) and send them to GD. After giving the topic, HR went out of the room so as to give time for us to think about the topic. He gave five minutes.GD went for about 10miutes .Everyone had to conclude the GD, i.e., they gave everyone a chance.After GD, they selected 41 out of 51.
Tips: Just speak imp points that count. Don't try to speak too much.
Duration: 10 minutes

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: The panel members were friendly.They asked only basics of c,c++,java,data structure(link list,stack,queue,tree), project,internship,os,dbms ,sql etc, difference between c++ and java,c++ features,why java is suitable for internet application,why java is better then c++,how to avoid multiple inheritance,memory functions like malloc, calloc, alloc, faralloc, realloc, write a code which shows all features of c++,some dbms questions etcAll questions were basics only.
Tips: It is better for computer students to go a bit deeper into their subjects... but for others, it is better to have an overview of basics of programming languages andtheir subjects.Whatever you answer,  answer perfectly and confidently.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: HR round was just a formality. If you are in HR, it means you are selected.One important thing is to keep some club certificates like lnd club as they may ask.

College Name: NIT WARANGAL

Round: Internship-based
Experience: I got selected for Xtreme Blue internship in my 3rd yr and got a ppo after my intern.

Round: Test
Experience: There were two elimination rounds one technical and one aptitude.First one was an aptitude round for 1 hr which had three parts,quantitative(25 question),analytical(15 q) and a general aptitude part(15 q).
Out of some 200 ,98 reached second round i.e. technical aptitude.
Total Questions: 55

Round: Test
Experience: Technical apti was also objective where we had 20 lengthy questions and had to answer in 35 minutes.In the first look questions seemed to be very lengthy and time consuming.It mostly tested my self confidence because there was a moment when i panicked and it took some time for me to realize that everyone must have been in the same situation.Out of 98 around 38 qualified this round and were called for the "interview".
Tips: Its pretty easy to get through this round if u are good at programming but is almost impossible without concentration.
Duration: 35 minutes
Total Questions: 20

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: They made me feel very comfortable which made me have my own pace of mind because of which i enjoyed my entireinterview process..I had two continuous technical rounds for nearly 1 hr 40 minutes out of which second was for some half an hour.They have gone into a few technical details like proc structures,exec implementation etc (in OS)

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: In the second round, they asked questions in C and C++Questions included:If you have reached maximum number of processes possible in a system,how will you create a new process, you are given an array of numbers and you have to tell if any two numbers add up to a given number in minimal complexity and a few such algorithmic questions have been touched on.
Tips: Go through C.A lot depends on how you answer "tell me about yourself".Try to use this question in your favour.

General Tips: 1) Don't panic in apttudei or interview ,no one wins in that case.2)A lot depends on how you answer "tell me about yourself".Try to use this question in your favour.
College Name: NIT WARANGAL

Round: through internship
Experience: I did my internship at IBM EB and I was offered PPO. I did not attend any interview at Campus.

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: It was a good experience and I have to say that interview was too enlightening.
Tips: Be thorough in Data Structures and Operating systems.Solve as many questions as possible on data structures .

College Name: NIT WARANGAL

Round: Test
Experience: It was a test of time management,speed and accuracy.
There were three sections
1.Manipulation of matrices 15 question (No negative marks,3 parts in this section)
2.Number sequences 20 questions (with negative marking . very simple,try to practice more questions and do at-least 12-15 Q)
3. Quant 12 questions (with negative marks, try to read question and solve them without pen)
I had written the same paper (model) for IBM internship, but fared very badly in that, so was cautious this time.

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: There were 12 in our batch. They asked us to introduce ourselves. Suddenly they said lets us hear each person's opinion separately and start the discussion. I was the last person to share my views.
Everyone said that education is necessary and supported..
i got points on both the sides (supporting and opposing), so as every body spoke for it, i spoke against the topic.
Tips: Do not use paper to write points in GD.
Duration: 25 minutes

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: No much technical was asked. They asked questions like-
1.Tell me about yourself.
2. I had said that i was interested in coding, and they asked an example, i explained it confidently.. this was the only tough program i attempted on my own,so I explained the algorithm.
3. He asked about my family details and my experience in NITW.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: The examiner started looking at my paper and said you attempt things which you don't know..
i said i attempted 12/20 in number seq and 11/12 in quant and i am confident that i have answered 10 correct in quant..
Then he said ok, I think he was convinced..
He then asked me about my strengths and weaknesses..
He also gave a chance to ask questions.

General Tips: It is totally a cool and lengthy process, be patient and confident..
I strongly feel if you have good communication skills you can easily crack interview, but practice a lot of num. seq, quant, speed calc..
College Name: NIT WARANGAL