My MBA Journey - Part 9 (Which coaching for GD-PI preparation of CAT)

While I was preparing the international b-schools’ applications, result of CAT was announced on 9th January 2009.And this was the biggest day of my life (till then).

To my surprise, I had managed to get shortlisted by few IIMs for their next admission stage :Group Discussion (GD) and Personal Interview (PI) .But as was expected, English section proved to be my roadblock (or saviour in another sense)in that I could not get GD-PI calls from IIM Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Calcutta (for people unfamiliar with CAT there are 7 IIMs : 3 mentioned above plus IIM Lucknow, Indore, Khozikhode and Shillong (IIM Shillong being the newest is not worthy of being applied (as I understood from my interaction with several CAT aspirants) and indeed many aspirants do not apply here)).

Now I was in real dilemma. I had my IIMs interview scheduled in February and March for which I had to prepare from scratch. I had 5 foreign b-school applications still remaining to complete in the same timeframe. I had to prepare for the interview(s) of foreign b-schools (I had applied/will apply to) as I was sure of fetching interview calls from at least 2-3 colleges. Lastly, I had to give sufficient time (or at least pretend of doing so :)) to my office tasks (if you forgot, let me re-iterate I was working in Adobe Systems).

This was a real challenging situation and an acid test for my time-management skills (thought of doing some self-promotion :) ).Getting into IIM was my dream .This fact combined with the situation that I was just one stage away from bagging the coveted admission offer made me decide in favour of putting my maximum energy for GD-PI preparation of IIMs.

But this does not mean that I put the b-schools’ application on the back burner. Because I had prepared the first 2 application pretty well, I could enjoy the leeway of not toiling as hard in other applications. As mentioned in my previous post, some essays are omnipresent irrespective of the b-school and I already had the answers to such questions ready (as part of my first 2 applications’ essays). I just had to put in the delta effort to write answers to the different questions and this was no big task especially after having survived the last few weeks.

And so I started on this multitasking phase.

Before I go ahead and share my GD-PI preparation, I would like to spend few lines on which coaching to go after for GD-PI preparation.

For GD Preparation:
If you are studying/working in NCR region: For GD preparation, go for TIME coaching as they undoubtedly are the best. I did join both Career Launcher and TIME but was dismayed with the immature, useless, time-wasting and below average way of conducting GDs and associated feedback at the end of the GD given by young and often inexperienced moderators at Career Launcher. At TIME, more often than not one is handled by experienced faculty whose feedback is exactly what is required to improve oneself (this is my opinion but please do check for yourself and do not take my word as carved in stone)

If you are outside NCR region: Best would be to shift to Delhi for 2 months (take leave from office if you are working )as getting an IIM call is no mean achievement and you would not like to give a half-hearted effort towards realizing your dream. Also at Delhi/NCR centres, the quality (and quantity) of IIM call getters is very high and so the level of competition and hence the improvement in your preparation would be exponentially fast. However if you are studying in final year of graduation or cannot shift to NCR for any other reason, do research considerably as to which coaching prepares you the best for GD in your local region.

For Interview preparation
Both Career Launcher and TIME are equally good. They conduct the mock-interviews professionally and feedback is also valid. However as a candidate you need to stretch yourself and your interviewers into giving you as candid and detailed feedback as possible. Tip: Take as many mock-interviews as possible before the actual interview(s) .This will only serve to better your interview skills.

Must attend coaching for all NCR candidates
NCR candidates have an upper edge over other candidates in that they have a fantastic teacher in the form of MALAY RAY ,guiding budding CEOs to crack the IIMs interviews and GDs. Malay Ray is a pass-out of IIM Ahmedabad (I guess his batch was somewhere in middle 1990s). He takes classes in Delhi region (about 15 mins drive from Noida) and I have only one thing to say for him: Absolutely brilliant way of teaching and must attend coaching for every IIM call getter. He teaches you everything from politics to India to World affairs to Philosophy to Economics to History to General Awareness .In short he prepares the candidate not only for GD-PI of IIMs but for his life ahead.

Students wishing to contact him can leave their email Ids in the comments section of this post (along with a small introduction) and I will email you his cell number (obviously with Malay’s prior permission).

I will end this post here (followed by Advice as always) and will cover tips and techniques for GD-PI in my next post.

Advice for students contemplating to start preparation for GD-PI:

• Do understand that your GD-PI preparation starts from the day you think about CAT. Do not wait for CAT results to be out to incite you to prepare .After CAT result, you will only have 2 months (maximum) before the d-day and you can simply improve/refine what you already possess. No coaching institute can give you a magical pill. Coaching institutes can only guide you but the actual work is to be done by you only. So start now if CAT is on your radar
• Working aspirants can consider their group meetings in office as a form of GD and act accordingly .Though the actual GD scenario at IIM would be drastically different (will cover in next post) but this is a way to start
• Read non-fiction stuff as much as possible. It could be Sports or Business or xyz topic but do read. This not only helps in GD while making your points but also in Interview (and also in RC section of English in CAT written test)

My MBA Journey -Part 8 (Preparing B-school application)

As mentioned in my last post, I started working on Cambridge and Oxford applications simultaneously. Although each school offers its own application in its own format, some of the questions ("essays" in b-school jargon) more often than not do appear frequently in most of the applications (wordings of the essays could be different).

From my experience, I can vouch for the fact that knowing the answer to the question “ WHY MBA” is extremely extremely important and I have seen most of the students faltering in answering this or lacking clear vision/understanding as to why do they really need an MBA degree. Plus there are many other questions which are also important. And so it is extremely important to know the answer to each of them very clearly (that would help you in your interviews as well).

If you try to directly answer a b-school essay before doing your homework, chances are high that you will end up missing/losing some of the good points. So before starting to prepare a b-school application (or even looking at the essay questions), kindly spend sufficient time to write down in as much verbose form as possible the answers to the following questions in a word file (the more the effort and time you spend here , the better will be the quality of your application and hence higher the chances of your selection)

1. Why MBA?
2. Why now? (or why not 5 years hence or 2 years ago)
3. Why this college?
4. Why are you unique? (or why should the college select you over others)
5. What are your short/long term goals? (or where do you see 5/10 years down the line)
6. What are your 5 strengths and 5 weaknesses?
7. Detailed summary of your key accomplishments/achievements in a) academic life and b) professional life
8. 3-4 leadership experiences in a) academic life and b) professional life
9. 3-4 mistakes in professional life and the learning from them
10. ......

(The list is long and if anybody wants the entire list (with some rough answers), kindly leave your email ID in the comments section)

Frankly speaking, preparing application is a bed of nails and the biggest nut to crack in applying to a foreign b-school.

This was the phase where I spent countless hours trying to figure out who really I am. I had to go through my entire life of 25 years to pen down each and every important /not so important incident that had happened in my life. This was the time when I felt like giving up; I kept on getting frustrated but still somehow managed to survive this atrocious phase.

Once I was ready with my initial list of answers to the questions mentioned above, I started to draft the answers to the essay questions asked in Cambridge and Oxford applications. Simultaneously, I made many new friends (b-schools’ alumni) via Orkut communities, LinkedIn and other social networking sites.

I kept on sending the drafts of the essay answers to my newly made friends and I was very lucky that many of them did send back the reviewed documents in time, again and again. This process started in December 2008 and went on until Feb 2009 when I filled up my last application.

Finally after about 50 days of gruelling hard work, multiple reviews of essays, endless communication with innumerable alumni and unthinkable irritation, I was able to finish my first 2 applications. Because I had put my best foot forward in the last few weeks (at least I think so), the journey ahead (as far as the applications of the remaining schools are concerned) was not as rocky and bumpy. There were some hiccups but otherwise I was pretty comfortable with the remaining applications. And this happens with each and every candidate who does the maximum hard work in the beginning.

Tips /Advice for students in the phase of preparing applications:

• Do connect to as many alumni/current students of the b-schools you intend to apply as possible
  
• Spend as much time as possible in preparing the 1st draft of every essay question
  
• Take the review of b-schools’ alumni/current students very seriously and do incorporate it in your next draft of essay answer
  
• Pray regularly to Almighty and do interact a lot with your parents (as only they are the ones in the entire world who will give you the best advice unselfishly )

PS: All those interested in some reference material on b-schools applications (or sample b-school essays), please leave your email ID and small introduction in the comments section.

My MBA Journey –Part 7 (Selection of international B-schools)

Until I had plunged into the next phase (which I will cover in this and subsequent posts) I had not discovered the real meaning of joy, irritation and hard work all at the same time. Now onwards was starting the real journey and what preceded was only the trailer.

It was already late Nov ’09, time was running fast and I had very little time to select the list of foreign b-schools. And the decision was a key decision as it would have a long-lasting effect on my career .Also, doing an international MBA needs huge investment (see point 3 below) and as this probably would be my last degree on my resume, the decision was all the more important.

For the last 3-4 months I was constantly in touch with alumni of some of the most reputed b-schools in the world who had been kind and gentle enough to give me precious tips on selecting b-schools. Alumni tips, suggestions from my friends pursuing international MBA, learning at MBA fairs and discussions with like-minded people on various forums on net allowed me to come up with the various reasons a student looks for while selecting or prioritizing a b-school:

1) Duration of the b-school
12 months programme (such as SAID, JUDGE, INDEAD and most of the European MBA programmes)
18months programme (CEIBS, NUS etc.)
>20months programme (LBS and most of the USA universities such as Harvard, Wharton, Stanford)

2) Reputation/brand value/ranking of the b-school
Students consider various rankings such as Financial Times ranking , US News ranking, Top MBA ranking etc. to decide on the reputation of the college prevailing among aspirants, current students, alumni and the industry. Plus there are many other resources on net/outside net which could help an aspirant decipher the real brand value of the college intellectual capital wise and most importantly in terms of long-term benefits.

3) Financial burden while pursuing the MBA course (probably the most important factor of all)
As mentioned earlier that international MBA is a huge financial investment. For example, tuition fee of 2 year DUKE MBA is 100,000 US dollars i.e. around 48 lakh rupees .Add to it other expenses and total expenditure would be around 70-80 lakh. Similarly 1 year Cambridge MBA (JUDGE) costs 35 lakh (tuition fee) + accommodation +food +travel+... and total would be around 50 lakh. So think twice before you finalize on the school.

4) Location of the b-school
Some students prefer to study (and marry a firangi girl :)) in US, others prefer Europe, some like Asian colleges etc.

5) Reputation of the college in the country in which the student wants to settle down
Suppose my home country is India and I want to come back to India after 3-4 years post-MBA. In such a scenario I would prefer a University which gathers higher respect among organizations in India than say a similar or even higher ranked college (as per the Global rankings) which is relatively less known among Indian professionals in India. For example Cambridge MBA (Judge) is ranked 17th while CEIBS in China is 8th but reputation of Judge in India far exceeds that of CEIBS.

6) Other factors such as faculty reputation, course content, specializations on offer, school strength, international student diversity etc.

Based on the above factors, I was able to come up with the list of the schools I would apply to after mulling over for more than 2 weeks. I had finalized:

In Europe: Cambridge MBA (JUDGE), Oxford MBA (SAID), Cranfield, Rotterdam, Lancaster
In Asia: NUS Singapore
In Australia: Melbourne Business School

Earliest deadlines of all were of Cambridge (9th January ‘09(round 2)) and Oxford (16th January ‘09(round 2)) followed by NUS (31st Jan ’09).Cranfield, Rotterdam, Lancaster and MBS had rolling admission.

So my strategy was:

• Prepare applications for Cambridge and Oxford simultaneously
• After 16th Jan (deadline for Oxford)prepare application for NUS
• After 31st Jan (deadline for NUS) , prepare applications for rest of the colleges starting with Cranfield

I was perfect with my strategy only that I had forgotten that CAT written test results would be out on 9th Jan ’09 and if I am shortlisted for GD & PI of IIMs where the hell I would get the time from to prepare for the same.

Anyway, completely missing the above point, I went ahead to prepare my first b-school application.

Advice for students in the mode of selecting b-schools: Always prepare a list that contains 2-3 dream b-schools (schools that you would join without an iota of doubt if offered an admission) , 1-2 back-up schools(schools that you would join if not selected in any of the dream schools) and 1-2 safe schools(schools that you would definitely gain an admission into).

My MBA Journey- Part 6 (Kinds of B-schhol application processes)

Because I had kept the international b-schools’ applications preparation on hold until the CAT 2008 exam, I had taken a very serious risk. Before I discuss the risk, let me spend few lines explaining the application process to international b-schools.

There are 2 kinds of application processes

• Staged process
• Rolling process

In staged application process, the application cycle is divided into rounds and each round has a deadline. If you apply by that deadline, your application would be considered for that round otherwise it will be considered in the next round. For example, ISB Hyderabad (in India) has 2 rounds: Round 1 and Round 2.Application process for admission to session starting in April 2009, opened in July 2008.Dealines for round 1 and round 2 were 15th September 2008 and 1st December 2008 respectively, This means all the applicants applying to ISB between July and 15th September (included) would be considered in round 1 and those applying between 16th September and 1st December in round 2.

Applicants applying in earlier rounds are always at an advantage (in the above case round 1 applicants would have better chances of getting an interview call than round 2 applicants). Reasons for this are:

• There is no fixed percentage of seats that get filled up in earlier rounds i.e. if the school gets high quality of students in round 1, they might end up filling more than 50% of the total seats in this round itself. So round 2 would have less than 50% of the total seats and hence more competition in round 2
• Every b-school has fixed the percentage (not made public) of students they want to select from each category of applicant pool (IT engineers, female candidates, international students, sports persons etc.). And if a b-school happens to get the required number of students for a particular category in earlier rounds, then it is highly unlikely that a student from the already filled up category, applying in later rounds, would get selected

To make my point clearer, let’s take an example.

Suppose total number of seats available in ISB for 2009-2010 session is 500 and ISB wants to select max. of 50 IT engineers. Now say 3000 people apply in round 1 and 3000 in round 2. Of 3000 in round 1, 100 are IT engineers and same is the case for round 2.Now it so happens that ISB is impressed with the quality of the candidates in round 1 and it makes offers to 300 students (i.e more than 50% of the total seats available) of which 30 are IT enginners.So the equation for round 2 changes to 3000 students vying for 200 seats (and 100 IT engineers for 20 seats). While the situation for round 1 comes out to be 3000 students vying for 300 seats (and 100 IT engineers for 30 seats).Even if the quality of students is better in round 2, students in round 2 would have to face a stiffer competition.

So the bottom-line is “Apply in the earliest round possible”.

Other process is the Rolling process which works on the simple methodology of “first come first serve”. There is no such thing as “rounds”. For example applicant applying on ,say, 3rd December will get his application decision earlier than someone who applied on 15th December who in turn would get the decision earlier than the 25th December applicant.

That means in both the processes, applying as early as possible ensures a better chance of getting an interview call/selection.

Few examples of b-schools following different models are (especially mentioned for curious minds :) ):
ISB (staged with 2 rounds)
NUS (2 rounds with rolling approach within each round)
SAID/JUDGE/INSEAD (staged with 4 rounds)
Cranfield/Lancaster/Rotterdam/MBS (rolling process)

Now I return to the risk I had mentioned in the 2nd line of this post. It was already November 2008 and since the application process for admission to the 2009 fall session had already started in September-October 2008 timeframe, I had missed the 1st round of almost all the foreign b-schools. And similarly for schools with rolling admission, I was getting late.

Not to talk of the fact that I had not started preparing my applications (biggest challenge in applying to a foreign-GMAT based b-school) which easily takes 2-3 months depending on the number of schools one is applying to and number of essays per application. To make the situation worse, I had not zeroed in on the b-schools I would apply to (which I realized later to be an extensive time taking task).

All this pertain to the fact that if I put my best foot forward I could be able to apply earliest by January 2009 and that means I would be placed in round 2 or round 3 of the b-school and obviously too late for rolling-admission based schools.

With no choice, I started on my next leg of the journey: selecting the b-schools.

PS: My advice for aspirants taking GMAT is to make sure you take GMAT early enough to have sufficient time to prepare and submit your applications in round 1 itself (Most of the schools have 1st round deadlines in late September/early October for classes starting in the fall next year)