So yeah, today was the best day so far for me. 🎉
I had to visit the office in Mumbai, where I'm working as an intern. I had plans and discussions lined up with the upper management.
For this, I had to catch an early morning 3:50 AM train. Got just 3 hours of sleep, woke up at 1:15 AM, and left for the station in another city (BRC) at 2:15 AM. Boarded the train at 3:50 AM—a 4.5 to 5-hour journey. Reached Mumbai at 8:30 AM and then headed to the office in Lower Parel. 🚆
I was a bit nervous because my friend and I were about to discuss our security contributions over the past five months. In the morning, I messaged the director to let me know when he was free for a discussion.
Around 10:30 AM, he called us in. We started with our presentation, showcasing our contributions. But he quickly realized that the presentation was secondary—we were here for a bigger discussion. 😅
We reminded him that our internship was ending in a month. Back in December, he had mentioned options: investing in our previous company, offering us full-time positions, or letting us explore other opportunities. During that time, we had received an offer from another company’s founder to join them. But we had committed to completing our internship first.
We shared this with him, saying we weren’t planning to start our own company yet since there was still a lot to learn. He was happy that we were considering joining full-time.
Then, he started asking deeper questions: ❓ What do you know about our company? ❓ What are your ambitions and goals? ❓ What do you want to do in life?
For the first question, I explained the business case of one of their major products. (Big thanks to L—I got to know about that product even though I hadn't worked on it directly.)
We also shared our vision: improving Indian cybersecurity, especially in FinTech, Healthcare, and Government sectors. These industries do security assessments mostly for compliance, but real security is often ignored. We backed this up with real-world examples, including database access to government and healthcare companies. 🛡️
Our presentation was technical, so the director called in the CEO and CTO. This was my first time engaging with the CEO, and he turned out to be a chill, cool guy. 😎 He was impressed with the vulnerabilities we had found and mentioned that they were now prioritizing security.
After the CEO and CTO left, we had a deeper discussion with the director. He shared the company's journey, how he and his two sons built it. One son (now CEO) manages sales, while the other (who sadly passed away four years ago) was the tech genius. Since then, they had onboarded the current CTO to handle technical aspects.
He spoke about his vision of making the company India’s #1 RegTech/AML firm, expanding internationally. He valued the trust and relationship we had built.
Even if we didn’t join, he assured us that we would remain connected. He needed trustworthy people in his company.
After this 2-hour discussion, he invited us for another meeting with the CEO in the afternoon.
Lunch break! 🍛 Met with the dev team, had a good time.
3:30 PM - Quick follow-up meeting
We discussed some open security issues in their product. They wanted us to work on them. We also mentioned that international companies use dark web records for customer screening, which they weren’t currently doing. The director said they lacked experience in that area but were open to learning.
He also mentioned connections with NFSU (a top cybersecurity & forensics university in India). If I ever needed anything there, he could help.
5:00 PM - Final meeting
The director finally asked: "What are your salary expectations?"
We got nervous. 😬 He told us not to hesitate—he was ready to invest in the right talent. He assured us that regardless of our decision, we would still grow personally and professionally.
So, we told him: 💰 The market range for our skill set is ₹8-12 LPA 💰 Our expected salary was around ₹8 LPA
He then offered us two choices:
He explained the company’s ₹1200 CR valuation and advised us not to take ESOPs unless we planned to stay long-term (which he assumed we wouldn’t 😆).
He told us to take our time and decide.
Final thoughts: 🎯 Hard work pays off 🔗 Building strong connections matters
Back to March Go to Journal Go to Home