For millions of Indian students, the three letters “IIT” often feel like destiny. A dream. A make-or-break moment. And when that door closes, it can feel like the end of the road.
For Priyanka Vergadia, it was only the beginning.
An Indian-origin tech executive now serving as a senior director at Microsoft, Vergadia has taken social media by storm after sharing the long, winding journey that led her from repeated failures and heavy debt to the top floors of the global tech world. Her post on X (formerly Twitter) has struck a chord across borders, reminding people everywhere that success rarely follows a straight line.
In her own words, the story begins with disappointment and fear.
“I failed IIT twice. Took loans I couldn’t afford. Started as a Quality Engineer while my friends climbed faster. 25 years later, here’s the timeline: 2000: Decided to become an engineer from IIT. 2004: Failed to get into IIT. 2005: Failed to get into IIT a second time; reluctantly took admission in another engineering school. 2006: Started preparing for grad school in the US. 2008: Ran around trying to get a loan to go to grad school.”
For many, failing the IIT entrance exam even once can feel devastating. Vergadia faced it twice. Instead of giving up, she chose a quieter, less celebrated path - enrolling in another engineering college and slowly rebuilding her dreams, step by step.
What followed was not overnight success, but years of uncertainty, struggle, and self-doubt.
“2009: Graduated with an engineering degree in India. 2009: Moved to the US for grad school at UPenn, started from scratch in a new country. 2010: Struggled landing an internship, while all my friends had one. 2010: Clock was ticking on student loan instalments. 2010: Finally got an internship at a tiny startup. 2011: Finally landed a job at the same startup. 2012: Struggled through tech career beginnings as a QA engineer. 2013: Doubted if I belonged, took a leap into customer-facing engineering. 2014: Really felt like I’d arrived in my happy place, solving new business problems every day with engineering.”
Those early years in the US tested her resilience. A new country. Mounting loans. Watching peers move ahead faster. And the quiet fear that maybe she did not belong in the world she had dreamed of entering.
Later, she admitted, “The first few years in a foreign land were difficult,” recalling how internships were hard to come by while loan instalments loomed large. Yet she persisted - turning a small startup internship into a full-time job, surviving her early years as a quality assurance engineer, and eventually finding the courage to step into customer-facing roles.
Then, slowly, the story changed.
“2017: Google found me! 2019: Found this role called DevRel, found my love for learning out loud. 2020: Launched some cool zero-to-one products. 2021: Became a published best-selling author. 2023: Led Developer Advocacy for North America at Google Cloud. 2024: Microsoft found me to lead Developer Strategy for GTM! 2025: Earned Wharton MBA, launched another best-selling book, took the TED stage while building and leading a team with multi-billion-dollar impact. Story goes on. The entire time, one truth kept me going: I had to believe in myself before anyone else would. Failing IIT twice felt like the end of the world. But it wasn’t my destination - it was just the beginning.”
Today, Vergadia stands at the helm of developer strategy at one of the world’s biggest technology companies. But her message is not about titles or prestige. It is about persistence.
From a “Not-IIT” engineering school to the global tech stage, she believes success is less about brilliance and more about discipline, courage, and consistency. “Don’t give up on yourself. Your timeline is your own. Dream! Dream big! You can only achieve what you can imagine, so don’t hold back.”
Her story has resonated deeply in a country where exam scores often define self-worth. In sharing her failures so openly, Vergadia has offered something rare - hope without glamour, ambition without shortcuts.
And perhaps her most powerful reminder is this: sometimes, the dreams that come true are the ones that survive rejection first.
