NTPC Executive Trainee Interview Questions, Process, and Tips

Round: Resume Shortlist
Experience: The shortlisting was based on Resume and mainly on the CPI.

Round: Behavorial Interview
Experience: They basically chose if you are interested in the company or not.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: They were follow-up questions on each answer given. So, be prepared for that.

General Tips: 1. Know about the company, they are very keen on your knowledge of the company, basically shows how much you are interested in them
2. Read about NTPC being a ‘Navaratna’ and the only PSU in the Fortune 500
3. Do not mention your GRE score/CAT percentile in your resume, it is a cause of concern for them as it indicates you may drop for higher studies
4. Similarly, do not mention CPI on a four point scale in your resume.
5. Always be prepared with the information of the company before your interview. And use those points in your interview deliberately so that they know you know about the company and thus show your interest.
College Name: IIT- Kanpur

Interview preparation tips for other job seekers - Be confident..
Be positive..
Don't get nervous if you do not know the answer. Tell the panel what you know.
It is not expected from Candidate to answer every question.
But brush up basics of your respective field.
If you do not know really very basic question then interviewers will be uninterested in selecting you.
Be precise in your answer...

Round: Resume Shortlist
Experience: While preparing the resume I ensured that I write my points in a short and simple manner. My motive behind this was that the reader understands what I want to convey in just one reading.
Tips: Write all your points in a very compact manner. Mention all your activities, your achievements in sports, any distinguishing qualities like leadership and the likes. Also mention about your co-curricular activities in anti-chronological order.

Round: Test
Experience: For the written test of NTPC I searched on the internet and found numerous questions posted by many previous NTPC applicants on different websites. I solved these questions and also tried to understand a general pattern in the questions asked. However finding these questions was not straight forward

Round: HR Interview
Experience: Criteria for participation in recruitment process: 
The company shortlisted candidates based on their CGPA. At the same time it was specified that the applicant should have passed all the courses. Interview Round:  After the short listing process the company conducted only one round of interview. The interview panel comprised of 5 technical personnel and 2 to 3 HR personnel.
The panel began by asking me questions aimed at getting to know me. Unlike the other companies they did not ask me about my strengths or weaknesses neither did they ask me to speak about myself. They simply asked me stuff like ‘Where do you live?’ and some questions on my family background.
NTPC being a power company the technical questions were based on power system and generators. They also asked me to draw the leading phase diagram for generators.
I did not have a lot of clue regarding the last two questions since nothing of that sort had been taught in our course. Next they enquired about my internship. I did my second year internship at Vishakhapatnam in PLC (Programmable Logical Circuits). They asked me to specify the all software that I worked with and to name some other software that could be used in place of those presently being used. In my third year I did my internship in Italy, that internship was based on interfacing of smart grid. They grilled me heavily on that.

I answered the questions based on the knowledge that I possessed, for instance while I was asked a question “Why do you want to join NTPC?’ I answered it by mentioning the good points about NTPC, rather than why I am competent enough to join the company. Also they question you regarding your willingness to go and work in a remote location.
Tips: Have a strong preparation for technical questions. If you are from electrical then have thorough knowledge of electrical machines and power systems and specifically power system protection. Also have lots of knowledge about the company and its activities.
One should be well prepared to answer a wide array of technical questions particularly from motors, power systems and generators.

College Name: IIT ROORKEE
Motivation: The profile offered to me was that of the executive trainee. The company brought out an application form for those interested in participating in their recruitment process. Then I did a research about the company from their official website and also got some information through other websites which I stumbled upon while doing a random search on the internet.

There are some companies that pay a lot of attention to one’s resume whereas the others are interested in knowing your knowledge about the company. NTPC falls in the latter category. Consequently, during the subsequent stages in the recruitment process I was asked a lot of questions pertaining to the work done by the company.

Round: Resume Shortlist
Experience: The applicants were expected to first fill up an application form. In the application form we were asked to mention our achievements (especially in the field of technology or related to our curriculum). Some of the candidates got selected for the interview round on the basis of their CGPA.
Since I was interested in getting recruited in a core company consequently I had built a technical resume. I had earlier worked in the consulting sector in a start-up – I did not include that in my resume. I refrained from adding any phony or funky stuff which people usually tend to do if they have previously worked in a consulting company. I prepared a simple resume.
Tips: It is very essential for a person wanting to join NTPC to have a good knowledge regarding the company. NTPC is one of Asia’s leading power producing companies, consequently gaining information regarding the company isn’t a difficult task.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: The interviewers started by asking me some HR questions initially. After this they moved over to technical questions. Since the company is mainly involved in power generation, they asked me a lot of questions based on synchronous motors. They asked me to draw the graph and vector diagrams of the synchronous motors. Next they asked me questions about my internships. My internship project was based on distribution transformers; thus they asked me questions pertaining to transformer parts and transformer protection. Some of the questions were:
1) What are the different components of a transformer?
2) How is the protection of a transformer done?
3) How is the synchronous generating protection done?
4) How is the protection of an induction motor done?
5) What are hot spots and how are these detected in a transformer?

The topics taught during the 1st semester of 4th year are particularly important from the safety perspective. I had also done a project on harmonics; correspondingly they asked me questions like:

1) Why do harmonics occur?
2) What are the ways to prevent harmonics?
They also posed a situation that if I were to explain the motors and generators and the difference between them to a layman, how would I do it.

Further they asked some basic questions on relay and inter-conversion between delta and star circuits. They also asked me to specify my opinions on some subjects that are taught to us in the first year like biotechnology whose knowledge acquired in first year proves to be futile in subsequent years.
Tips: For technical questions be prepared for questions on motors, generations, transformers and power system protection.
For the HR question one need not do any specific preparation. However the company did enquire about each and every candidate’s family background. Hence be prepared for similar questions.

College Name: IIT ROORKEE
Motivation: One of my friends had done an internship in the company, from him i got to know about the workplace environment. Also I procured a lot of information regarding the company from some of my seniors who were placed in the company, they also assisted me by providing me with some useful insights regarding the recruitment procedure of the company.