continued from last page....
November 18th
I reached the exam center early, & the tensed faces there removed what little nervousness I had. On seeing the same pattern of 75 questions I broke into a smile as I had an inkling of what was coming next.
Started with DI, but everything was different from aimcats, & I soon realized that the logic was very easy in the sets.Changed my set strategy of attempting sets completely to solving a chosen few questions(ones with smaller calculations) from many sets, but wasted 1-2 minutes on the wrong question. After 50 minutes I knew I hadn't done very well as my calculation speed had always been slow, but at least it hadn't been as monstrous as the aimcats & I had been able to solve all the DS questions.
Moved on to VA , & here again it looked like alien territory.With 5 RCs, my strategy of attempting the entire section went out of the window, & it somehow seemed even more ambiguous than the aimcats.I Decided to do something which I hadn't done in any paper.Gave VA only 45 mins & attempted 20 questions, hoping that I would still be able to still clear VA & 55 mins in quant would help me clear it.
Again, got a big shock, with geometry having only one question. But still attempted carefully thinking that a high accuracy in 55 mins will help me clear the cutoffs.
Came out blank, had no idea how I had done. Everything depended on how fast others had managed to do their calculations in DI, my accuracy in quant, & of course, the VA keys.(I never used to have a track of how many I was attempting in quant & di)
Soon found out that the only section in which I had definitely done well was my weakest section-DI...getting 50.I not done well in VA according to the keys...getting about 25. 10 marks hung in the balance in quant & I wasnt sure about an answer I had marked.Removing those 10 marks & the answer, I was getting 27(which could go upto 42).
The entire next month went in speculation of cutoffs, va answers, & quant questions as the iims had managed to make even that ambiguous.I knew I was on the border for 98% getting about 102...but I personally thought at that time that more no. of test takers this year would mean cutoffs going higher than last year.
On the day of the results, I was in hostel, & got a call from my Dad(from whom I had carefully hidden the fact that results were coming that day). He had found out about the results...& they were :
QA - 32 (95.60 %)
VA - 35 (98.23 %)
DI - 50 (97.41 %)
Overall-117(99.26 %)
Jumping with joy was an understatement at that time.On checking from the website I had calls from C,I & K. Other factors making sure I didn't get a call from L & B, & I had missed A by 0.04 %ile.I was a little disappointed, thinking that I might never again get a shot at A, but was still happy & intent on trying to convert the calls I had.
The Gdpi Adventures
I Enrolled in TIME again, and soon the feeling of joy dissapeared. I had no problems with speaking, but there was no content whatsoever.My GK was pathetically weak (near zeros in IIFT & snap testament to the fact) & I had never seen a newspaper beyond the sports page.
I put in a lot of hardwork, reading a year full of subscriptions of magazines, spending hours on wikipedia, studying subjects which I hadn't looked at during engineering, & watching CNN during whatever free time I could get( even had to sacrifice my near-shoulder length hair :))
Attending some mock gd's helped iron out flaws(my habitual bunking disorder didnt help) & I was ready for my interviews.
The GD & interviews were really fun.I had a great time & by the end of them I was satisfied(which was also because I was never grilled much on acads) with whatever I had managed leaving the rest to the profs.
After much delay,results came yesterday.First got a boot from C in the morning,& then ,after what seemed like the longest wait of my life...got into K...
Never really thought about going to an IIM...ever...didn't jump for joy & dance around this time and it still hasn't sunk in yet.
All I want to say about cat is that it gave me a 2nd chance to prove myself...& with some luck on my side I've managed to do a bit of that.
I have really enjoyed the last year, made lots of new friends, & have found out more about myself than the previous 20.
I just want to thank everyone here at PG who have prepared alongside me this year....even though I was an almost invisible participant, I've read almost each & every post. You all have helped me more than you guys know, & for someone preparing almost entirely on his own, PG was the only support I had.
Thanks again, and all the best to everyone...
cheers...
hi everyone....
here i am...speaking my experience with CAT....or rather CAT's experience with me..... am a bit nervous honestly....
CAT has been a life changing and opening phenomenon that happened to me when i needed it the most to happen. I can very comfortably say that I was the in the most dire need of something to challenge me out from the kind of life I was leading and with the kind of beliefs I was having. CAT provided me the way to lead life.
All emotional....but that's exactly how I feel for this journey of my MBA preparation.....
I was stuck, yes I call it stuck in my engineering education of Electronics and Communication, with no clear way to go for, with nothing to look forward for. I was within the impression of completing my BTech, after which I'll work with a big multinational company and then I shall get promoted and then eventually get married and everything shall be happily ever after....GOD...that's how I was before this angel called CAT happened to me....
I joined CAT preparation classes so as to get an idea of what does this so called aptitude test means, which all the seniors used to say is compulsory to get through for campus recruitment. Hence i enrolled for PT education...yeah u heard it right....but in ahmedabad.....it has a big name...though i understood what it is actually...later....
And then they say started my love affair with CAT, how much i found myself engrossed in it without actually realising it. I used to love doing everything that it required me to do. The verbal classes, the maths,logical solving ability, everything. Infact, honestly these were the things I had always wanted to do, but just couldn't find a way where I can actually utilize them. The application of mind at the right places so as to get the desired answer, moreover applying your reading skills to test, all these were things I always looked forward to.
That was one of the reasons, I never enjoyed my BTech, because the kind of application it required out of me,I could never provide it with that.
So all in all, I had found something pleasant, something beautiful,enchanting,exciting,thrilling and engrossing.
I went on solving CAT materials whenever I could, and the most beautiful part was that I never solved them with the feeling of wanting anything in return from it...I did it because I found it relieving...and because that was something that gave me soothingness I required after my brushes with my BTech education...
So from November 2006 to May 2007, it was PT education and solving their materials....in between I did try to check the pg...but didn't find it up to mark for myself...
Then from June onwards the prac cat of PT started....and I panicked....because i got 98.xx %.....i was like there's something wrong......i cannot be getting this high %ile at first go....with all over India people making such gung-ho about %iles in 98 or 99.....hence I decided to enquire about what should be done....
luckily for me....a senior of IIMA came to deliver lecture at PT and showed me the way by telling how he used to practice maximum number of papers by getting them xeroxed or anything......then I came to know about AIMCATs....and enrolled for it......also I enrolled for CL's peagus series....and as i decided mon-fri--->COLLEGE....sat--->CL.....sun--->AIMCAT....and that's the exact schedule that i rigolously followed from July to October 2007....and man.....THOSE WERE THE BEST DAYS OF MY LIE.....
I used to go for my college mon-fri 9am to 4pm...and then in the evening it used to be my cat practice sessions....on saturday....I used to reach college at 11am for a single class..then leave at 1pm...reach CL at 2 pm....give me mock cat by 4:30 and then used to take the 5pm bus to home...
on sunday...i used to reach the centre by 10am...coz i didn't have a bus later on sunday.....and the aimcat used to start at 11am...used to finish by 1:30pm....then either i used to attend pt classes from 2pm to 6pm or used to take the state transport bus home...and then off to sleep....wow.....that experience was something....I am ready to go about it all over again....just for the sake of fulfillment it used to give to me....
The only time when I again panicked was when my exams approached in october 2007,I knew i cannot be following the same schedule herein...hence I had to collect the paper from the centre and give them at home....My exams luckily got over on 1st november...giving me odd 2 weeks to prepare myself mentally....
During this period, the initial one week I wrote a paper daily, but in the last one week, I was not able to...so I decided not to pressurize myself but to relax and so watched as many movies possible....
On 18th...just went in with the same kind of feeling as of aimcats....telling myself all the right things I could......After the paper...had the same kind of feeling like I had for other AIMCATs....that I did all that I could have done but could have done better......
After the intial discussion my QA and DI score came out...which were not great but not so bad...so everything depended on my VA score...just like the same for all....
to be continued...............
FLASHBACK - I guess an IIM was always on the back of my head since I'd heard of them. Right since I was a kid old enough to know what CAT was and what the IIM's were, I'd imagine myself studying and passing out of one of them. The biggies. But they'd always remained dreams. Always on the back of my head.
I was happy...no...I was content with my job. It'd been 2 and a half years and I wasn't really looking to go anywhere. I was satisfied. And the IIM's still remained dreams. Still on the back of my head. Until Jan 2007 that is.
I had a few major upheavals in life. Personal and professional, and I took a few days off, just to contemplate my life and where I was headed, and my goals, and priorities and everything else that a confused, depressed, unmotivated, directionless guy looks at when he realises the world isn't his playground anymore and that time's catching up and life's moving on.
Not that I was always the same way. I was usually cheerful, happy go lucky, flirty, jovial, witty, a loose cannon if you may. Thats how my friends would've usually described me. But a few twists and turns, and there I was, the complete opposite. And I realised, that this wasn't who I was. I'd never considered myself a quitter, no matter what. No matter hwo bad the circumstances, come what may, I was going to turn my life around. 360 degrees, yes sir. So there I was, on 10th Jan 2007, sitting in Marina Beach in Chennai, 11:00PM, deciding to do my MBA.
I usually considered myself pretty intelligent (I know it's not modest 😃 and I know some of my friends might not agree) and thought I'd ace the exam. Easy. How many questions had I solved for people who came to me after writing their CAT exams and I'd taken a look at their papers out of curiosity and tried solving a question or two here and there and gotten it right. So I joined TIME, attended a class or two and decided I was too bright for them. So stopped going. And waited for their AIMCAT's to ace them. Come May and came the first mock cat. Went in confident. Answered what I could and came out smiling. I got 85% ile. Damn!!!
I realised I wasn't god's gift to mankind. And got depressed again. (Dont worry if it sounds pretty frequent. Those were troubling days for me - for lots of reasons). I decided to channel all my depression, all my anger, all my frustration into my preparation. Decided that I would not quit. Come what may. I have to prove I am better. Opened my TIME books for the first time. Asked around for help from people. Did a lot of quants. Joined PG. Never posted much since I didn't have much to add, but read most of the posts.
This suddenly gave me focus in life. Now I had something to achieve. My preparation took my mind off its sad track. I started doing better in office. Started attending TIME classes more regularly. And started brushing up on everything in quants. I was happier if not thrilled. I was back. Now if only I could prove myself.
Come mid June and TIME starts off with it's AIMCAT series. Write the next one. I'm much better prepared this time. Score in the 90.xx range. Better than before. Still not up to what I thought I was. Now it's an obsession. Gone's my happiness and gone is my sorrow. Gone is everything else but a goal. I have to get through CAT. Come what may. I stop concentrating at work. The only efforts put in being swiping in and swiping out. Since I work nights there wasn't anyone to monitor me. Buckle up and spend the entire morning and afternoon studying. Getting only 5-6 hours of sleep a day. My week is now Sunday for the AIMCAT and wednesday for the result. The results show a bit. My AIMCAT's start improving. Going up to the 95% range now. Still not good enough.
I kept missing the quant cutoff. I did well in verbal though. Got country rank 2 in one of the AIMCAT's in verbal. Haven't cleared a single quant cutoff yet though. Ashamed to call myself an engineer. Back to basics. Split up chapters. Grind through Arun Sharma. Mug up basic formulas. Didn't even remember the area of a sphere. 10 AIMCAT's to go. For the first time, clear the Quant Cutoff. On seventh heaven now. But surprise...miss the VA cutoff. Hell, still don't have a single AIMCAT with all cutoff's cleared. My percentile's up in the 97% though now. But there's something lacking.
Put in more efforts. Read faster. Crack puzzles. Solve the sudoku. Stop giving a damn about office. And then, 9th AIMCAT, there I was, in the topper's list for the first time. Page 5. But still in there. Cleared all cutoffs. TIME analysis says its good for a single call. Percentile up to 98%. And since then on , a regular occurence. Cracked the toppers list a few mroe times, but still missing cutoffs in Quants occasionally. AIMCAT 1. One more week to go. Have taken leave from office. Nervous as hell. Last AIMCAT. Write as I would've written the CAT. Pretty content but still nervous. Can't wait for Wednesday. Come wednesday. Cleared all cutoff's. Cleared the 99 barrier. Tenth rank in the City (Chennai). Pretty happy. But the feline's still to be belled.
NOVEMBER 18th 2007. Can't forget the crowd. The rush, the tension. Reached early. Very early. Wrote the CAT. Spread my time equally. Did exactly what I practiced in all the AIMCAT's. Was satisfied with what I did. Came home and realised I could've done another 6 questions with no effort at all. 24 marks down the drain. 12 marks not attempted in QA, 12 marks not attempted in DI. VA was a roller coaster depending on which website I checked. Frustrated but helpless. Couldn't say anything. Just had to wait for the results. I knew I wasn't a quitter. So what if I missed 6 sitters. I'd still done enough I thought. I had put in the effort I thought. I had gone through PAIN for a year and more. This shouldn't have happened, but there wasn't anyone to blame but me for not looking at all the questions carefully. Anyway I won't quit I thought. I will do better. If I miss this CAT, I'm going to 100 percentile the next one. Here I come CAT 2008 i thought. Lets wait for Jan 8th. If I'm not in, I'm putting in a fight to remember. That's what I thought that day.
MAY 2nd 2008. Can't stop the smiles. Can't stem the tears. As I sit and write my experience over the year and a half. 6 Calls. 6 Converts. It's finally time to be happy. IIM's here I come.
Another BLACKI. I will never quit I said.
Really it's a dream come true writing about my story on this thread. I wanted to post about my journey but very well decided to wait until I had all my results and looks that i was correct 
History
Well my father has a transferable central govt. So I had my schooling all over the country. I wasn't the "studious" type of guy at any point of time in my life. Anyhow I completed my class Xth & XIIth with odd 87% & 74% respectively. I didn't get through any decent engineering college in my 1st attempt so took a drop for an year. Next year too I couldn't get through IIT. I joined DA-IICT that year and no regrets. It's one of the best thing that has ever happened to me.
PREPARATION PHASE
Well I had CAT at the back of mind since 2nd year of my Engineering but hadn't took any concrete steps in that direction. I did join IMS correspondence course at the start of my 3rd year. I didn't want to join a classroom coaching because I knew that aptitude can't be learned/developed by sitting in a classroom listening to some guy. Also I thought 15-20k is way too much for some guy teaching me unitary method & percentages. Started studying enthusiastically but it all died down within a week-10 days. Anyways books were eating dust and life in 3rd year moved on. I guess the turning point came after the placements.
I had 3 offers (from Infosys, TCS & Mindtree respectively) but I realized that I didn't want to get into IT industry. Then I decided giving a serious thought to CAT. So I started preparing seriously for CAT from June 2007. Joined TIME test series. My first mock was AIMCAT 0814 i.e. by the time I had joined I had already missed 6 of the mocks. In first mock I scored a 95%ile with missing sectionals in QA & DI by single mark. Was pretty pleased with the start I had got. As my preparation progressed I realized that I was pretty strong in VA, good in QA and really pathetic in DI. I am not an avid reader of book's and all but thanks to my ex-school I was in habit of reading newspaper daily ever since I was in class 7th. Anyways I think that IMS material was very good for clearing fundamentals but the practice problems were childish. Several of my friends had joined TIME class room coaching. I also used to borrow material from them and practice. One point I would like to make here is the numbers of hour you put in for CAT preparation doesn't matter at all. I had several of my batch mates in college who would spend the entire day in library doing the booklets & sheets they used to get from coaching. Even during the engineering classes I would notice a few guys/gals sitting at the last bench mugging up cue cards. Hell even I didn't used to pay attention to what the professor was talking about but this habit was something I really despised. And finally when results came I don't think anyone of them made through. Point I want to make the preparation something you enjoy, please don't convert it into a mundane routine job. Anyways as for me I would spend 10-15 hrs a week on preparation. It wasn't like fixed 2 hrs a day . Some days no study and someday 4-5 hrs. Sundays were spent going to TIME test centers and giving AIMCATs.The picture was still the same. Used to rock VA and used to get rocked in QA,DI. QA was still better but DI was a complete disaster. Also I noticed that I wasn't a big fan of speed. If there were 30 questions in each section I would attempt around 10-15 and If there were 50 the number of attempts would go around 15-20. Anyways my percentiles used to hover around 75-85 %ile with a spike around 95% ile in every 3-4 mocks. Also had lows of 41 & 52 %ile. But anyways I never lost faith in myself. I had this feeling that I'll perform way better on C-day
So I stopped giving mocks after AIMCAT 0803. Didn't gave 0802 because I was sick and didn't gave 0801 because I didn't want to shatter my confidence before the real thing. :poketounge:
C-DAY 18th November 2007
Reached the center around 45 mins earlier with a few friends. We were sitting and chatting idly sitting under a tree while a few people were frantically going through their notebooks and a few were having photo sessions with their friends .
Well after a long wait gates were opened and I went into the center. Had a lot of water and it started to show its effect as soon as I sat down on my seat. Took me 15 minutes to find out where could i relieve myself. Finally when I found it out I was greeted with a long long line of people in queue :-(. Anyways relieved myself and came back and sat on my seat.
The procedure started with distribution of OMR sheets. 120 or 135 bubbles with 5 options each. I thought god...I am screwed. Next came question paper. Got so happy on seeing good old 25+25+25=75 & 4:1 marking scheme. The guy signaled to open our papers and with trembling hands I opened it. Unlike most guys I didn't use to follow a fixed strategy. The sole goal I had when I used to write a paper was solve each question as it comes and NEVER overspend time on a question even if It felt like a sitter or was something I had before. But I did used to go through paper in fixed pattern of QA-DI-VA. So with CAT 2007 paper in my hand I started with QA. And here is the bummer...first 10 minutes had passed and hadn't solved a single question. Pressure was getting to me but was keeping hard to keep my focus. Finally after 20 minutes managed to fill 3-4 bubbles. By the time I had finished my alloted time to QA my confidence was rock bottom. I had managed to solve around 8-10 questions in first pass. Next came DI, couldn't make head or tail of the first set. Immediately said pass to it. Next sets seemed easy. Thankfully most of sets were about number crunching which I loved . So after finishing with DI had this feeling that I was back in the game. Next came VA. The RC's seemed so tiny compared to ones I had been doing in the mocks. But once I started reading them my head went into dizzy. Couldn't make any head or tail out of them. So said them tata bye bye and jumped to VA questions. Here too options were way too close to call. Any how finished with VA but wasn't really confident. Now I had entered buffer time. I had option of either going for VAfor doing a few more QA questions. Decided to go with QA and managed to solve a few of them.
Came out with a fixed feeling. Didn't went through the answers posted my various coaching institutes.
Result-Day
Well came 8th January 2008 and CAT results were out. My result read:
QA-28.00%-93.17%ile
DI-56.25%-95.53%ile
VA-33.00%-97.67%ile
OA-39.16%-99.16%ile
"Sorry your name does not figure in list of any IIM's"
Obviously was quite sad. But out of blue IIM-K came out with some additional list and I had my name in it. Wasn't aware of it and luckily it caught eye of a friend of mine who promptly informed me.
And rest is history
Other Calls
IIFT-Kolkata (waitlisted)
XIM-B (Rejected)
NITIE-PGDIM (Rejected)
FMS MBA-FT (Rejected)
MDI-PGPM (WL-133)
MY 2 PENCE'S ON CAT
Well for cracking CAT you don't need to be a stud. If even an average guy like me can dot so can anybody in this world if you have willpower, dedication and some luck :-). There will be failures but important task is to not let them take you down with them. I would like to quote lyrics from a song by Fort Minor:
This is ten percent luck, twenty percent skill
Fifteen percent concentrated power of will
Five percent pleasure, fifty percent pain
And a hundred percent reason to remember the name!
P.S: Here is my IIM-K interview experience:
http://www.pagalguy.com/forum/cat-an...ml#post1014191 ( IIMK GD-PI Experiences)
here i continue with my story.....
So after giving CAT...it was quite a chapter that has just finished in my life...for the next 3-4 days....all i did was to sleep and check the ongoing discussions on CAT...and in the next 3 days...I was supposed to give IIFT...well that was another story because I feel IIFT people tricked me as they didn't clearly mention the sectional cutoffs were there or not...anyways....
I was never hopeful of going to IIFT also...
then later...I realised and found myself to be absolutely empty and drained...i was not able to understand what are the other things to do in life except writing mocks and analyzing them or discussing them with others.....still life continued....I learnt meditation in between....which was nice....and then I gave SNAP...which was frankly easiest of the lot....
I was getting used to life without CAT prep.....but then I realised...I was loosing something...I was missing something...something in my behaviour and thoughts was missing the spark....then I realised that actually I am addicted to CAT....and again I started with the preparation...though this time it was with nothing in mind.....
And then came XAT..which again I gave with the same attitude....may be a bit more calm I was.....and later FMS on the second sunday of 2008...which proved to be a disaster because of various factors in the ahmedabad centre....
RESULT TIME::
when the results came on 8th Jan 2008, I was in my training of final sem...and I can tell you nothing else was on my mind from 3pm onwards....I was all the time rushing up and down...trying to check if one website can open and I can see my results....but nothing came of it...and then I got the SMS reply telling my score...I still have it....I'll delete it after this.....
QA....91.3
VA....88.5
DI...98.5
OA...98.07
and I knew that all the doors to IIMs are closed.....well that was honestly heart paining...but also not heart shattering....because I knew I was good but not the best...and there were many who were definitely better than me and deserved it much more than me....so I accepted it gladly and then started looking for other options....
I also decided to go for GMAT....also downloaded the GMAT prep software...and was ready to go for a job for the next 2 years...when XLRI save my day....
I say save...because in that one week between CAT and XLRI results...I realised that I will never be able to do a job again...after what I have experienced with the CAT preparation...I can never go back to doing the technical stuff in any form....and hence I was greatful to XLRI...also I got call from MDI...
(hadn't applied to any other lesser colleges...yeah SIBM was there...but then inspite of converting it...I didn't go for it....)
and then began another important phase of CAT preparation with me.....from the very beginning....I was confident for GDPI...somehow...maybe because I am confortable speaking about myself..maybe because I am a bit talkative....maybe because I am a gal...and an aggressive one..as others say....don't know....but yeah I knew I am confident for GDPI more than that for the tests....
but during this preparation...I was rewinded back to my theatre classes...where one had to express oneself to the best level without showing too much efforts.....the preparation made me look into myself as a separate human being who can tell me my +ves and -ves....I found it quite enjoyable....I started seeing facets about myself which I could never see....I could view myself the way I had never thought of.....
again all in all....a life fulfilling experience....
I write all this with great hopes in my heart that the experience and journey I had with CAT for last 18 months till now....will be something that shall be with me for the rest of my life as a hope that there are good things in life to live for and to look forward for....
with all the best wishes to everyone.....I am off for XLRI....BM...
thanks to each and every person who helped me in some or the other way....thanks people....it was a rewarding journey with all of you....also...reading a few posts above mine...I feel touched,humbled and deeply choked.....I do feel I didn't lose anything in life....if I did....I lost to so many others who deserved it much more than me....
take care....
IIM The acronym every B-Schooler aspires for in India. I being not too different from others had similar aspirations, desires and dreams. Oh yes, forgot to mention the common full form of IIM is Indian Institute of Management; but I came to know of another full form during this journey, which will be eventually revealed to all J
Ummfrom where to startlet me go back to April of the year 2000. It was the time when my sister made it to the wellJoka land
It was the time when I was preparing for my engineering and already made my mind to make it to an IIM. First two and a half years of engineering went fine but its generally in the third year when one starts thinking about what next! Then I joined Career Launcher in Delhi in my fifth semester and little did I know that I was not the only one aspiring in my batch. I met junta of NSIT there. The classes started and very soon I realized the weakest link for me to the ultimate goal the VERBAL part. Anyhow, my senior gave me this wonderful advice to taking CAT in the third year to get a feel of the exam. I liked the idea and finally took it. And yes, at that time, CAT had no rule which barred people taking the exam who are not in their final years. I think it is coz of people like me that they thought of this rule. Its good to be a reason which made IIMs take a policy decision
CAT No. 1: Year 2002 in November
It was a normal 3 section paper in which I had no pressure to perform. The paper went fine and it was the first time wherein the percentiles were to be revealed. Moving to the results, QA was 99.5 % with an 86 odd in DI and some 65 in verbal. This clearly told me where I had to work on as if I didnt know it before.
Jan 2003 Oct 2003 The time when all of my friends, classmates and everyone and anyone was a CAT aspirant. It was good to be in excellent company and I think that competition forced me to prepare for the exam which eventually I think I did.
CAT No. 2: Year 2003 in November
Was I nervous??!! I WAS. This was the day, the time, the 2 hours which are going to decide the future for me. I still remember how the exam went. The sound of opening the sheet, the answer sheet being filled, the sweat, the tension everything is still like a movie in my mind. Anyhow, in the end I was quite happy with my performance in DI and QA J Also, I knew that I had did well in Verbal because 2 RCs which I attempted in the exam were luckily from some of the test mock papers of the institutes.
But then disaster stuck as soon as I crossed the gates of the school of my center my mother telling me, Amit, CAT is cancelled. The paper got LEAKED last night.
I was like noooooooooooooo, its difficult to give your best again. Well, with no option left in life, I started preparing for my semester exams.
Forgot to mention this, 3 weeks before CAT, I had a disc collapse in my back which forced me to take bed rest for 2 weeks which meant no studies, nothing but I think that did not have any adverse effects on my CAT preparation.
Ah yeahhad that CAT not cancelled, I would have never joined PaGaLGuY.
Year 2004 has come J I had already done the greatest mistake of my life by filling just 3 forms CAT, XAT and MDI. The XAT exam was next and so much verbal focus, I knew it was difficult to clear it. But then trying was important, which I did and eventually failed also. But since CAT was still there, I thought to myself that I still have a chance to make it to my dream school.
CAT No. 3: Year 2004 in February
After been there already, I was not as nervous
but yeah, pressure to perform kills you. The exam was little on the tougher side but it went fine. In this internet age, the solutions were out by the evening but I had decided not to check till the next day.Next day, I started checking my paper. As always, I started here also wit Quant. The performance was sufficient enough to clear the cut-off. I dont know what prompted me to check verbal next. I did and was amazed to see my score and was already jumping in my roombut hang onstory is not over yet.
I checked DI then and my world came crashing down. I attempted 4 caselets and got 2 of them ABSOLUTELY WRONG!!! I scored a single digit in DI; it was something I was not prepared for..why why why!!! After not able to make it in IIT-JEE because of Maths then, again DI did me in.
Crying made me no better and I knew that it was bye bye IIMs and MDI.
The results came out as expected and I was prepared for it. Some of my close friends had all six calls or single calls or some calls atleast. Most of them made it and then we parted on our different paths in life.
I joined HCL Technologies in Delhi in July and was sure of cracking it this time. Some intelligence which I did this time was widening my B-School list IIMs, XLRI, NITIE, MDI, SPJain, IIFT and FMS. This meant I had to take 4 exams this time and that too with my job. Also, somehow I got a really good project in the company which required me put in a lot of effort there. I could have avoided work but somehow its in my nature not to give 100% which is entrusted on me. That year, I went to office for 29 days in October, 2 days off being 2nd October (Thanks to Gandhiji) and Dusshera (Thanks to God Ramchandra); else I would have been in office then also. Adding to this was a family problem which required me to spend 3 months nights in hospitals as my grandfather was ill. When I look back, I wonder how I managed all this. Oh one more thing, my sister wedding plans was also underway which required my inputs and participation too.
CAT No. 4: Year 2004 in November
The exam time came. CAT, XAT, IIFT and FMS. Results: calls from IIM-L, MDI, IIFT and NITIE. I was confident of converting one call atleast this time. CAT percentile overall was 98.94%. Also, this was the time when PaGaLGuY shot to fame with that result link getting exposed and all 😉 This was the first CAT in which differential marking was introduced.
Jan 2005 MDI interview, my first B-School GD/PI experience. Somehow managed the GD and went in the interview. Interview was okie-dokie. With next 3 interviews in March, I had loads of time to prepare for them.
Feb 28, 2004 MDI results are out. Not selectednot even in the waitlist..am I that bad. Maybe yes. With around 10 days to go, I left no stone unturned to prepare for the GD/PI. Next interview was NITIE in Mumbai on 8th March, 2004 (which was my birthday too J).
March 7, 2004 Disaster will be an understatement with what happened. I slept with a little back pain but just could not life myself up from the bed. The pain in my lower back was killing me and even lying straight was not helping me. We rushed to the hospital and I was diagnosed with slip disc. 3 weeks bed rest, no movement nothing. My NITIE was next day, IIFT in 3 days and IIML in 10 days. No way was I going to miss them.
I had to get admitted in the hospital and doctor did not allow me to move at all. This meant, all pleadings for attending interviews for NITIE were waste. IIFT also went by and I sat there who could not do anything about it just cry a bit
ok..not a bit but a little more.I had my mind, come what may I will attend my IIM interview. When doctor heard the word IIM, he also became a little soft and said that try to get it postponed as much as possible. We tried our best but date was still within my bed rest period. With a little change in is heart, he allowed me to take the interview.
The GD was bad for me as the pain was still there and it was bad. I had to wait for nearly 3 hours for my interview and this aggravated the pain. Somehow, I braved it and faced the interview panel.
It was an above average PI but performance in GD was still enough to ensure that I dont get in.
The results came and I was waitlisted at 107. This is when I joined PaGaLGuY and my first post was on the IIM L thread. After months of praying and tracking the WL day and night, it closed at 102!!!
I applied for a transfer to Mumbai to stay with my parents and take care of my back. Eventually the company did transfer me and here I landed in Mumbai. I joined the TIME test series and was doing pretty fine but the office culture here was really bad. For the first six months from July to December, there was not a single day when I did not contemplate resigning.
CAT No. 5: Year 2005 in November
I added one more exam in my list JMET. Exams came and went and somehow I screwed ALL of them. CAT 97 %ile, XAT 99 %ile, JMET 500+ Rank and similarly all. All but one FMS. Had calls from both the courses and went to Delhi for the interview. MS GD was average, PI was also average. Then came the FT day. That time, people having both FMS calls did not have process the same day, unlike today. Since I had become quite visible on PG, I met many familiar people. GD was excellent and PI was also good but FMS thought otherwise. My name did not figure in both the list, not even the waitlist. This was the very famous 1:1 ratio batch of FMS: mg:
One interesting thing about XAT. Had a 99.9+ in both DI and QA but 86.80 or something in Verbal. Basically I missed the verbal cutoff by .01% L
With 2 years work experience already in my kitty and entering my third year, GMAT option was also available. (just hang on for a bit, the other IIM is coming now J ) In April, I registered for a June date for my GMAT and also joined TIME classes for CAT preparation. I knew it was NOW or NEVER. PG was a really big help for GMAT and after 3 months of study, I scored a 710. This is where I found the other IIM which stands for Indian IT Male
Most of the applicants from India fall in this category and no wonder it is really difficult to get in US B-Schools when being an IIM ;)Had plans to apply to 3 schools only ISB, CMU Tepper and Goizueta Emory. The application process in these is a pain but in the end, it is quite insightful. One comes to know so much about oneself
Coupled with this, I was attending classes in TIME and going to my job also. Somehow, I stuck the right chord in Mocks and was posting on PG big time. I earned the label of sophisticated spammer which I still disagree to I am and never was a spammer ;)Oct, Nov 2005 Had interview calls from all 3 schools ISB, Tepper and Goizueta. CAT day was also coming. I was done with my ISB interview (which was very very arbit) and Tepper interview over phone before CAT. The last interview was scheduled in Mumbai in December as a part of the World MBA Tour. Both the US B-School interviews were pretty straight-forward Why MBA, strengths, weakness etcetera etc.
CAT No. 6: Year 2006 in November
The 5 options paper for CATman I had seen it all
Started with Quant and killed it. Moved to the most arbit verbal paper ever and then did DI. When the solutions came in the evening, verbal had left me hanging..well almost. Btw, SP Jain was out of the hit list.Dec 2006 Jan 2007 > Worst time of my life. Rejects from ISB, Tepper and Goizueta. CAT result out. 100%ile in QA, 95 in DI and 82 in verbal. It was over for me. With just 5 days to go for XAT, I had no option but to give it my best. It was verbal and verbal and just more verbal.
7th Jan, 2007 In the XAT paper itself, I knew that finally verbal is cracked. Meanwhile, JMET had given me a rank of 39 and calls from IIT B, D and KGP were on J MDI also found me suitable for college, even NITIE thought the same
20th Jan, 2007 The evening before the FMS paper. Just went online for something and saw the XL result link. With all my confidence, I punched in my roll number and saw the line Sorry. WTF !!!! how how how.then clicked on the scorecard link. QA 99 something, Verbal 95.42..scorecard is not over yet..DI 77 %ile This is just not possiblegave up all hope of MBA.
continued...
Finally comes the news I was waiting to hear all my life. 13th March, 2007 2230 hrs. A friend of mine called from FMS and here it was - WL 1
FMS it was. MS was WL 7. Btw, I attended my MDI and IITB interviews after my FMS convert. Though, people advised me against it but they had taken a lot of my hard earned money so I decided to take them.Well, in the end, I had all converts - FMS (both), JBIMS, IITs (all 3), MDI and NITIE. It was Delhi again for me.
I resigned from my job and then decided to utilize my time by teaching in TIME. This is where ARKSS Sir (ARKS Srinivas, TIME Director, Mumbai) said to me, "Amit, CAT ek baar aur likh de." I was like no, never sir. I was tired of writing it. We left it there.
July came and I was in here - FMS J Met some of the sharpest people in the country and some awesome faculty. After one month of grilling, I called up ARKSS and told him that FMS is not chill at all. And people, I am serious. During that phone call, again the CAT thing came up and he said "Mere liye likh de." I told him I can't do it now anymore, no time to study and all. He somehow convinced me to fill the form and I did it. Just filled the form and no prep. No test series. There was no time in FMS. Initial work there, then summers, then exams..everything was packed. And whatever time I had in life, I ensured that I sleep well
CAT No. 7: Year 2007 in November
CAT was on the 18th and our first semester exams got over on the 15th evening. 15th and 16th were spent in chilling out in life and 17th was taken away by room cleaning. The only sane thing I did on 17th was sleeping at 2230 hrs 😉 Next day, I went to the exam centre which was nearby to the hostel, thankfully. From there, I called ARKSS again and told him that I still don't know why I am doing this. Finally, the paper started and it was exciting to do Maths after so many months. Did QA, then Verbal and finally DI. Came back to the room and slept. In the evening, got up and checked the score. QA and DI were fine but as always a 20 in verbal according to TIME keys. My score varied from 15 to 25 depending on institute keys. In either case, I was not clearing cut-off for verbal according to any of the institutes. So, it was over.
Life moved on, then came the day of the results. However bad one performs, there is always a desire to check the result (ok..i have it
) The link given on the CATIIM site was not working from the hostel. Then I came to know about the result by SMS thing. I SMSed and received the following reply. QA (%ile) 99.98 with a score of 70
DI (%ile) 99.97 with a score of 76
Verbal (%ile) 96.40 with a score of 30
OA (%ile) 99.99 with a score of 176
YES YES YES I HAVE CRACKED IT !!! Calls started coming in and had all 6 calls. I was elated. But then, I had another problem. What will I say in the interview. FMS is awesome, why should one leave it. I had no clue what to do. The interview schedule came and the forms too. Took a lot of help from ARKSS for the same and prepared for the interview. I knew what to prepare - MBA acads and why chuck FMS for an IIM.
The first interview was IIML. A pretty decent GD and average PI. Next was IIMK. An average GD and bad PI. Indore was next but had a very important class to attend in FMS so decided against it. Btw, both K and L asked about FMS.
The Big One was next - Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. And man, I was nervous
The essay was fine and PI was a dream one. They just could not believe that someone wants to leave FMS and come to IIMA. I think I did a pretty decent job there and rest of the questions varied from work experience to MBA Acads to general stuff in life.IIM Calcutta was next. A decent case study discussion followed by stress interview. Was asked Maths, Sub Prime, Telecom War, Quiz, FMS and everything.
Bangalore was the last one to be held. The date clashed with my second semester exams of FMS and it must have taken like 10,000 calls to them to get it shifted. Finally, it was shifted to the evening slot of the same day with my exam in the morning and another exam the next morning and interview sandwiched in between
The case study was the Scrablous one and the group was quite decent in discussing the stuff. I was last to be interviewed. It was HORRIBLE. It was so so so bad that they would have left a seat vacant in the college rather than taking me.With interviews over, summer internship was something which was coming up. But, Supreme court had other plans. I was also a part of the waiting pain but had no window to vent out the frustration coz it was a secret I wanted to keep. Btw, my FMS classmates came to know about it somehow in January itself. I know who did it but have not done anything to that person J But I still have time to do it
May 1 was about to dawn, I slept without much tension in life. Was woken at 7 a.m. by a friend's call informing me about IIMB results being out. I checked and as expected, did not get through. I had to go the office and was on my way. Meanwhile, another friend called me and told me to check the WL of IIMB. He checked for me and no; I was not there L as expected though.
I reached office and realized that Wi-Fi was not working on my laptop (Murphy's Law at its best). I went to IT guys and they needed "some" time to fix it. Just then, another person called me to tell me about IIMC results being out. I sat on the IT guys head and wanted my laptop back up and running. After 20-25 minutes of patience, laptop was handed back to me.
First thing I did was, checking the IIMC result. Opened the link, entered my details and my heart was beating fast as never before. And there it was. CONGRATULATIONS!!!
Just could not believe. Tears of joy tricked down my eyes JJ I was IN..FINALLY IN!!!!Got through L and K too but surprisingly A ditched me. But no issuesJOKA I AM COMING
I want to clarify 2 things regarding which I have been receiving a lot of PMs.
1Is FMS not good? - People, it is an awesome college; I just took CAT for the heck of it and my stay in FMS had nothing to do with it. So, please don't get me wrong here. Go ahead and join without battling an eyelid.
2.Justifying interview panel about leaving FMS and going to IIM - The answer was a very planned out one and was structured in a way so that no cross questioning was possible..thanks to ARKSS sir again
Some of the quotes which I had heard over so many years are really true
1.Patience pays
2. Efforts never go waste
3. Samay se pehle aur kismet se zyada kuch nahin milta and the likes.
But my personal favourite is the one which my cousin said once she heard the result - "Finally, CAT ki aatma ko shanti mili"
People who want to read it patiently can download the PDF
I always wanted to write in this thread, but didnt want to do it until I actually felt so from inside, and I really feel like it now!! I have had a long journey to the institutes of my choice. It all started somewhere around the third year of my engineering, the engineering itself wasnt very challenging and I was sure that I was worth much more.
So, I decided CAT it should be, moreover, the more I introspected I found that a person like me would be a better fit in a management job ( though this remains to be seen !!)
I enrolled myself at IMS and crawled along with my preparations. I could always pick up Maths and DI easily, and English also was pretty decent, so was not facing any problems whatsoever. But, this feeling of mine itself was the biggest problem, I was to realize this quite late.
I fared decently in the mocks, infact had percentiles between 97 & 98 in 7/8 mocks. And, moreover there was hardly anyone I knew who did better. So, in short I was satisfied and content before the D-day (CAT 2005). The D-day came and went, as expected I did as per my preparations. I managed 98.6 ( that was never going to be enough for IIMs !! )
The Mistakes I made --------------
I never was in touch with the real competition, and so was satisfied with whatever I did, the writing was on the wall, I was good but not good enough.
I never really strived to achieve anything and had no gameplan whatsoever( I was basically casual towards my preparation)
I had calls from IMT-G and TAPMI, I converted both but decided to wait. Meanwhile, I had landed a job with HSBC. I decided to go for it, and give CAT again.
It was a new environment, and new work culture ( infact I should say first work culture, whoever works in an Engineering college??), I prepared again, was doing well in the mocks again, got a score of 99+ for around 50% of my mocks. This was satisfying, but again I think I was missing one basic thing, on the D-day its a 1/0 game, you have to be the best, not just almost there.
Anyways, the D-day came again, and it was only after CAT I realized where all I could have done better.
I strongly felt I lacked the following ------
I definitely had good strategies for the tests and patterns I had given , but a new pattern totally stumped me.
I didnt push myself that extra little towards the end, remember the difference between the ordinary and the extra ordinary is the little extra.
I was gunned down completely in this CAT, managed a meager 95% with just around 80 in English.
I was confused and doubted myself for sometime, but luckily by then I managed calls from FMS.This helped me get my confidence back to some extent, but I knew one thing for sure, its a perform or perish battle out there in the middle.
The FMS interviews came and went, I was shown the gate in both the programmes (FT & MS) , partly because I myself didnt like the idea of screwing up CAT time and again, which robbed me of the fire during my interview preparations, and partly because I myself wasnt convinced about clearing the interview. In between somewhere I had gone kaput in my XAT as well, managing a 88 something percentile.
Well, it was going to be tough to start from here. But, I weighed my options , and decided to go forward with playing another season.
I had highlighted a few points for myself this time around ---------
I could be good at a couple of sections on a particular day, but for CAT I need to be good at all sections ( one can manage with not being good, if and only if he/she is excellent :p)
The interviews are not mere formalities, you need to convince the panel that you are good enough.
So, I started off this time, with a much broader horizon, I knew where I faltered previously, and my very aim was to keep all factors in my favour. I joined TIME test series and was offered IMS ( due to my FMS calls ). I was moving along and was lucky to have friends with whom I could share & learn new strategies (especially English where I would be a little confused at times). Besides, I actually got into the PG mode big time only this time around. It helped me in being face to face with actual competition and continuously raising the bar for myself. I was keeping decent pace, but I knew I would need something more than just being an average performer.
Simultaneously, I was offered an onsite trip to London from HSBC. The timing couldnt have been more close, I was supposed to leave in September and comeback by mid October ( later on the trip was extended to leave me with just about less than a month before CAT). Nevertheless, I decided to go for it, and made sure I was going to steer my preparation properly. I was a regular at PG, and gave mocks on weekends ( after downloading them from esnips.com ------ got this extremely useful link from PG somewhere ). It became quite hectic at times with the weekends being all packed with trips in and around London. The fun and frolic was exciting and the preparation was demanding. I managed to strike a balance and could see the scores in my mocks going up steadily. I knew I wouldnt have a better chance again.
There was one more factor pushing me quite hard, it was the work pressure. I was determined not to do stuff which I didnt want to do, this drove me harder.
I struggled, I trudged, and I survived. I took a break from office before my CAT, 16 days or so, and came the D-day once again.
I saw the paper, it was 3 sections/75 questions, I had prepared well for this pattern, so was happy. In between somewhere, I felt lost, but battled it out till the end, but had no inkling of what this would lead me to.
I checked my scores later on, Maths and DI seemed ok, but my English scores were coming out to be pathetic according to the keys. Came January 8, with no real expectation from the result, I reluctantly kept refreshing the browser, until it finally decided to show me my scores. And to my surprise I had done it.I had belled the CAT !!!!!!!! It was 99.58 overall, with balanced scores, and ironically English was the biggest contributor!! That day uptil midnight passed out in a haze.with so many people congratulating I was completely lost in the moment.
I had managed calls from A,C,I and K !!
Simultaneously, I started getting my other results as well, got 99.41 in XAT (calls from BM and PM IR ), calls from SIBM and SCMHRD, and FMS calls finally !
My confidence no doubt had risen, but it was only one half of the battle won. The interviews need some more dedicated involvement. I was coasting along in my success, until I had this really dreadful mock @ TIME, Pune. At the end of the interview I was told that I may be having 4 IIM calls, but with my current standards I wouldnt make it anywhere ---- it was like a shot gun fired into my temple at point blank range ---- the interviewers were blunt no doubt, but I see it was all for my good. In short, I was thrashed in, out and center !! I had heard of people from PG having multiple calls and converting none, I was clear in my head I didnt want to set up any such example.
So, started my next phase of intense preparation. I kept myself off from office, and focused real hard. PG provided me with the necessary inputs as and when required. It was going to be now or never !
One by one the interviews came and went, except for a few I felt I did reasonably well everywhere. The results were there for me to see in the end -------
Calls IIM A,C,K,I , XLRI (BM & PM IR), FMS (FT & MS), NITIE, MDI (all 3 ), SCMHRD,SIBM
Converts IIM C,K,I, XLRI (BM & PM IR), FMS (MS), NITIE, MDI (all 3 ), SCMHRD,SIBM
Waitlisted FMS FT (wont convert this one 59 )
Rejects IIM A ( had a thoroughly disastrous interview )
So, finally will be joining IIMC@Joka !!
I would advise all you people out there to build your strategies properly, realize your strengths and weaknesses and believe in yourself !!
Well.. i wanted to write in this forum a long time back but then decided to stay away till the final results come lest i look more of someone with all gas and no substance... so today i sit down to write my experience..
CAT.. this word was first introduced to me by a friend of mine in 12th standard just as a remark... i never thought much about it thinking that i want to go into a technical job just as everyone else... perhaps i was more than satisfied with the way my life has gone, i have always taken life too easy .. prehaps the biggest reason being my able to get good enough marks without much effort... so why work hard when you can work smart? most of the engineers will find this motto too familiar...
Then i joined college... made a few good friends... and it was during a discussion with one of my friends that i first realised that i do want to do MBA... we got into an argument where i told him that its possible to achieve success in technical field too and earn money .. "so why do MBA?" .. to which he replied..."Aye you can go and spend the next 2 years working while i will go for MBA.. but after 2 years when i pass out, i might join your company as your boss and not the other way around"... this simple statement shook me... is it worth living a life where everyone is like you?
So i choose to give CAT... i enrolled to PT for the regular course... studied what was given to us but never putting in the heart needed for it... i listened to all the various strategies that were told .. about choosing the section you are more comfortable with and doing them first... applied them... and saw noticeable results... but something was missing.. as far as being able to solve problems, i was not that bad but when it came to mock's, i was unable to perform upto the level which i thought i could achieve...
CAT 2005 came.. gave the exam and was totally stunned... got a percentile of 95.67... with 99.6 in QA but 75 in both Eng and DI.... got call from IMT and convertd it.. but then the dilemma came... should i or should i not? in the end it was a picture that made me realize "in order to fly you must leave the ground"... i choose against IMT much to the dismay of my friends and family...
I took up the job that i was offered during campus in college.. so i came to bangalore to work... but i still wanted to give CAT... so again enrolled for PT's test series with self prep.. CAT 2006 came.. i sat and gave it.. to my utter dismay, i totally crumbled in the exam.. could only secure a meagre 90%ile.... not even worth an IMT call.... Ironical isn't it? got a good enough firing from all quarters for not taking up that offer a year ago...
i was totally broken.. distraught.. i looked aroung myself and i could see that all the people i know are achieving something but i am still at the same place.. what went wrong? why did i fail? maybe i am not as good as i think myself to be... it was a period of self-doubt... and i looked around myself for support .. but could not find anyone to stand by me.. to support me... it was at that moment that i realised that i was wrong to look outside for support.. the only mistake that i made in the last 2 years was that i looked upto others for support but never inside myself... it was then i choose to discover what i am truly.. not what others assume or want me to be...it surprised me how muh strength i had inside me.. the confidence you get when you realise your true potential is amazing...
i again rolled for IMS correspondence... this time i made a slight change... every exam that i gave, i went thru my mistakes .. usually all that one does is to see how a question was solved.. i went a step further... i did see the solution but i also made it a point to see why my method failed? and why exactly did i choose that specific way to solve it? what made me do it? .. in the beginning it was annoying but later it did help me a lot especially in RC where i tried to see the difference in my logic and the solution's logic... and as for the startegy to approcah the paper? well it occured to me that strategy is nothing but a way to boost your confidence and not a way to solve the paper... so i will only trust myself and not follow any strategy... my friends used to joke that my strategy is that i do not have any strategy ...
an important driving force for me was the lack of time that i had... it never occured to me that i might not have enough time to become someone.. i was speaking to a friend of mine who was worried about her parents marrying her off... there was one particular statement that shook me inside out.."Frankly speaking i am not sure how much time i have".. it stuck me that i am wasting my life on petty issues that are of no concern .. it was then that i choose to go all out... if i need to start, then it better be now..
CAT 2007 came... went and sat in the exam room.. that one line kept going thru my head.. and instead of panicking, i found it soothing .. calming my nerves.. i knew that if i am able to solve the first 2 questions, i will be able to get a good enough confidence boost to run thru the paper... and that is what i did.. it took me 10 min to solve the first 2 questions(which incidentally were from QA).. and the rest of the paper was a dream... i knew that i have done good...
Continue...
Result came.. got calls from BLACKI... but then came another problem.. i was not sure how to deal with interviews as they have always been my biggest weak point... then i met a person who gave me a simple mantra... do not take interview as a QA session where you will answer the questions.. take it as a discussion.. you will never fail...
but one more issue arose.. i was never good at cramming thigns especially facts and figures 'cause there was never anything to understand in them... but interviews did required me to do it... so should or should i not ? i choose to not cram them.. because i thought doing it will be doing injustice to what i am.. i do not want to hide my true self behind some phoney wall of information.. its an MBA college and if they want to make an informed decision about whether i should be given admission, let them make it on the basis of my personality, on the basis of what i can achieve and not on the basis of what i was/am or what i speak...
IIM B's interview was the best interview i had ever given for it was the only interview where they choose to question my belief's and to see how i think, how i react when questioned.. how i react when i am proven wrong...
the final results came and i got thru IIM B,C,I,K... L is waitlisted and A was rejection...
so i am going to Bangalore... lets see what future has in store for me...
PS. the jist is that all that is required to crack CAT is not how much knowledge you have, its how much trust and faith you have in your ability... its not the toughest exam because of the level of questions, but because we assume it to be that hard.. try to see it as any other simple exam and you will see that it's not really that hard to crack it..
Lancer
Hello !
Slightly more than a year ago, I'd started thinking about what I'd say when I posted in this thread. A few days later, I was thinking whether I would ever really have the right to post here.
Disclaimer : I do NOT mean offence / to deride / look down upon ANY b-school. I personally think that all the places I applied to are good. Otherwise, err, why would I apply there ? :eh:
Warning : This is a really really long one.
Early Days
It all really started in April 2005. I was walking the long walk from the college parking to the classrooms with my classmate. Suddenly, he turned and looked at me with a lot of excitement and said, 'You know, Amey got into IIM A. I gave him an ok, so what? look. IMA didnt sound like that big a deal to me. He repeated his words a bit incredulously after seeing my reaction, and I suddenly stopped in mid-step and repeated each letter carefully. He got into I-I-M-A ??? My friend nodded, and I thought 'Woah! people I know get into places like the IIMs.' At that point I wondered, why not me? And thus started an epic journey which has brought more twists and turns than I could have ever imagined.
After completing my engineering, I joined an automotive major - the best offer on campus, quite a feat in those days of heady IT recruitment. But the april incident was still fresh in my mind..
The first, amateur attempt.
I started preparations for CAT eagerly. Unfortunately, being a trainee, we were rarely at one location for more than a fortnight. All the moving around did no good to my preparations, as I couldn't attend a mock test series. I studied a lot, but I was naive about the way CAT works. Engineering had made me used to putting in the hours whenever required, without much thought to the mental aspect of it - the strategy, the planning and the way to condition your mind for the exam. These might sound big words, but I've worked as much on this as on the actual concepts during my subsequent attempts at CAT, and I personally believe it's more about this aspect than knowledge, something which all the coaching instis tend to miss out on, IMHO.
I solved a lot of papers, but I had nobody to compare my performance with. PG wasnt big at all then, and I had just a vague idea about it. Anyway, as I was living away from home, I had no access to the net, and we didn't even have a fixed city where we worked, forget a fixed workplace, so there was no chance of accessing it at work either.
Botched !
I was pinning all my hopes on CAT, and that's where I screwed up CAT. I'd screwed it up even before I gave it. Not through lack of prep, but because I made it everything in life. 20th November 2005 arrived. I solved the paper confidently, and came out feeling that I'd definitely done well. I had a good number of attempts in all sections. I had a blast all day, and decided to check my performance in the evening, with the coaching class keys. The first section was quant, and within 10 mins, my dream was shattered. I had attempted 24 marks worth in quant ( out of 50 ), and was getting only 5. I had made the most inane mistakes, mostly out of over-confidence, some because of the pressure. I knew that as low as the quant cut-offs might go ( they were calling that year's quant the toughest ever ), it would not hit 5. PG or not, I could tell that much. Within minutes, I fell from a high to an incredible low. I still remember those moments. Boy, how many times after that has CAT and the IIMs made me reach that same rock bottom, pathetic state. I broke down and cried. My parents didn't know what to do, they'd never seen me like that before. They tried to console me, but nothing worked. I just could not bear to think of what would happen. And yet, that was reality. It was 9 pm already, and I had a bus to catch at 11 to the city I worked in.
A few months passed by miserably, and the situation at my workplace took an unexpected and unpleasant turn. The company had suddenly had a change of heart, and had decided to place a large majority of us trainees onto the production lines. Within the manufacturing sector, managing a production line, especially in an OEM is one of the most stressful, thankless, tough and generally unwanted job around.
I managed a decent score in CAT ( 96.xx ), which surprised me a bit, but also made me realize that cracking CAT was well within my grasp, if I treated the paper with a bit of respect and toned down my confidence a tad. I think the confidence curve is a very steep bell curve. You over or under do it a bit, and it's very likely that you get a sharp decline in performance. You just have to be confident enough to approach it with a carefree attitude and take certain risks in those 150 minutes, but not enough to start believing that you can crack it whatever happens.
Mauled at MICA
I got a MICA call with this score. I decided to use this opportunity to check out the A campus. One look at it, and I was hooked. There was something in the air, something intangible and indescribable. A few hours into it, and I was telling myself, whatever I do, one day I am going to deserve this, I am going to deserve to breathe the air I breathe here. My friend ( the same one who's result started off this journey ) took me on a tour of the campus, and it was love at first sight. The breathtakingly beautiful architecture, the rich red colour of the bricks, the play of light and shadows in the corridors, the famous view of the library, the famous stairs near the dorms.... And all along, I couldn't dare to meet eyes with the people around me. I simply felt I was on a space I didn't deserve to be on. I know it sounds stupid, but that's the way it was. All along, there was one line going through my head... I'll be back, when I deserve it. My MICA call was a disaster. It was an out and out technical interview, and unlike many of my future B-school interviews, including the ones which I finally converted, the panelist refused to understand that there was little point in asking me technical questions. Ten minutes into, I was curtly stopped in mid-sentence, thanked and asked to leave. MICA, however, was another place which really felt like I belonged to. Unfortunately, the people on the other side didn't agree for a while. :D
I returned home rather scarred by the interview experience. I'd never been mauled this way before. However, I also returned with a hell lot of thoughts swirling about in my head.
A different path.
Suddenly, one fine day, I got a call from a friend with whom I'd trekked a lot in my engineering days. We'd worked together in an informal NGO he'd founded in Pune, a bit of environmental conservation work. He'd always been of the entrepreneurial bent of mind, and he had an idea which sounded like a dream opportunity to me. We, alongwith 5 more crazy fellows, decided to start off our own adventure tourism firm. All of us were outdoor freaks, and highly experienced in leading treks in the sahyadris and himalayas. The adventure tourism market in Pune and Mumbai was huge ( and still is ), and we thought that we had a great chance to find a niche location for ourselves in this market ( and this analysis turned out to be spot on 😃 ).
Thus was born our company. A few weeks into it, we had our first major hiccup. It was a sign of things to come in the near future, but there was no way I could have really seen it. It was our very first programme. I was leading it, and we were ascending a steep slope en route to the top of a fort. A recent wildfire had burnt down the grassy slopes, and clumps of burnt grass were the only things holding down the baked soil. Half way up it, things got decidedly tricky, as suddenly the clumps started coming off. Having trekked the sahyadris extensively over the last few years, this situation was not very difficult for me to handle; all it involved was keeping a calm head and making sure that the next hold was secure before leaving the previous one. There was a bit of trial and error involved, but that was ok. I was in the front, and my father, who was a participant, was right behind. Suddenly, he lost one of his holds, and with it, his nerves. He shouted for me to help. I had a 30+ kg sack on my back, containing the rations for the entire group, which prevented me from quickly turning around, as the sack threw my body away from the slope if I tried to turn. However, I managed to reach down and give him a hand. He was, however, panicking, and suddenly lost all his other holds, and was left hanging on to my hand. Within seconds, his hand slipped out of mine. He screamed and slid down the slope, rolled over and then continued tumbling down, side over side, head over heels, bouncing off the rocky incline. I saw his entire fall between my legs, and watched him roll over and beyond a rock patch out of my vision, over a hundred feet below. My own father, going down, down, down like that in front of my eyes. Sheer panic gripped me, and I lost my head and with it, my holds. I slipped 5-6 feet, and almost joined him, when all the years of experience of trekking suddenly made the difference. In a moment, I calmed down and dug my fingers and toes hard into the crumbling soil, deep inside, as if nailed to the slope. I hung on there, literally for life, panting. I gave myself a few seconds, and then snapped out of it. I had a job to do here - protect the 30 odd people below me who were now in various stages of outright paranoia. I found a good hold, turned around, and sat down. There was a serene smile on my face, which I was later informed, had freaked out the people immediately below me. I couldn't do anything about my father, as there was no way I could descend - the slope below was full of people stuck halfway with nowhere to go. Thankfully my colleagues, the co-leaders, were at the end, and had already started the rescue process. There is this thing about me... in times of extreme stress, I suddenly tend to snap into an incredibly calm frame of mind. It has come to my help on multiple occasions, most of the times when if I'd hadn't kept my head, things would have been undoubtedly a hell lot worse than they ended up being. I sat down and started giving instructions to the rest of the group. I asked them to calm down and have them specific instructions on how to find good holds which could let them hang on comfortably for a while. Slowly, one by one, I managed to get the entire group into stable positions. We all watched as my colleagues threw a rope and got my father up, covered in blood and bruises, barely conscious. One by one, each of us stuck on the slope was helped up to the top of the ridge we were ascending, a position of relative safety. I then scrambled down the slope to reach my father. After the fall I didn't know what to expect, and frankly, I was expecting the worst. He was taken into emergency medical care. After falling down over a hundred feet, he'd come out with some bad bruises and a slightly rattled mind. I couldn't understand how to thank god.
What a start ! We lost a potentially big long term contract with an IT firm which we were close to signing. Unfortunately, a few of their employees had come as participants and they went back, understandably, very very shaken.
The following week, I was supposed to lead a wildlife camp to a tiger reserve in eastern Maharashtra. I was so traumatized by what had happened, that I thought of pulling out. I don't know what made me go, and I did. The camp went great, the only problem was that our bus had a major accident while returning. Within a week, I was again moving people covered with blood to safety, this time with a blood covered face myself. The fact that our group consisted of 5 school kids and one pensioner did not help in reducing the hysteria. I soon had 5 sets of crazy parents going hysterical in Pune while my colleague and I tried to make sure that first aid was administered, that some sort of transport could be arranged to the nearest hospital and that nobody ran off with our luggage. We were in the middle of nowhere, with 3 young scared girls and surrounded by a crowd of over a hundred people, and a pensioner who'd got a head injury.
What a start !
Things, however, started falling into place after that business wise. I however, was unhappy with the way things were moving within the business. I had very different ideas of running a business. In our eagerness to do what we loved, and the typical immaturity and over confidence of 22 year olds, we'd left out what, in retrospect, was an incredibly dumb thing to do; discussing the way we would run things after we started off. I quickly started realizing that it wasn't making sense to me to continue in this this way. That was when CAT started coming back to my mind. I started channelizing my frustration into CAT.
One very important thing my venture taught me was the value of money. I was in severe financial trouble then, and the only way I managed to make ends meet was because I stayed with my parents. I could barely manage enough funds to buy all the institute forms. I realized how easily we take money for granted. Money is, of course, not the most important thing in life by a long margin, but it takes a state of penury to really understand the fundamental necessity of it. Things were so bad that at most of the time I was wondering where I'd get money to keep going. I completely stopped eating out, telling my friends that I'd had dinner before coming. Coffee shops, with their exorbitant rates, appalled me ( they still do, actually, but I've stopped being a cheapskate now that I can afford it ). As rough as it was, I honestly believe it did me a hell lot of good.
continued....
The End ?
The next 1 hour is blanked out from my memory. I do not remember anything, except for an all-pervasive feeling of hopelessness. I was sitting on the bed when my parents came to console me. After the tears stopped flowing, I uttered my first coherent sentence.
'I am not going to IMT-G.'
My parents, of course, realized that this was no moment to argue with me and did not oppose it. They thought reality would seep in and I'd move on. I, however, had not spoken this sentence emotionally. I left the house and went to see my gf, and my first sentence was the same. Again, there was no argument. I was clearly being left alone with my thoughts, quite understandably at that.
I had a long talk with prem_ravi that evening. I had got to know him over the last few months, after we'd got IIM calls. He himself had got dinged in A, his sole call, and yet he had the heart and magnanimity to console me. He called me that day and almost every single day after that till I was ok. He kept telling me that this was a freak result, that I was much better than this and that I should not give up. I didn't believe him, but listened to him out of politeness. Prem has been my constant source of strength and motivation since then. Thank you, prem bhai. You have no idea how much you've helped. I can't express it in words. :(
The days moved by as reality started sinking in. 5 IIM calls. 5 rejects. How did I manage it? Was I really that bad? Should I just accept what had come my way and consider myself lucky for that? Should I move on? IMT-G was undoubtedly a good place. A thousand thoughts, a thousand doubts, a thousand fears, a thousand 'what-ifs'. Everything I'd planned ahead of this assumed that I'd convert something and take it up. I had plans of marrying and settling down with my gf immediately after my MBA. So many stupid plans so long into the future.
The most difficult part was coming to terms with reality and starting the job search. All I had was an engineering degree from a not-at-all famous college and a career path which even the most liberal of people raised their eyebrows at after understanding. I couldn't even submit my resume on job sites properly, their drop down menus and limited choices couldn't explain a career choice like mine. I went all out in my job hunt, emailing and calling up anybody and everybody who didn't positively hate me. When people asked me in casual conversations about what I did, I replied with a frank 'nothing' and made it amply clear that I was looking for a job. After a bit of networking, I got an interview call. For 2 hours, I was ripped apart on mechanical engineering. I had started dreading anything related to mechanical engineering. As expected, I got dinged.
No. Once more, I shall fight
Then, one fine day, out of the blue, I got a call from a friend. Things moved quickly, and within 3 days, I had a job offer. Best of all, it was in marketing, and in the mechanical field. A perfect way to enter the job market again. The package was ordinary, but I didn't deserve more with the way my career had moved. I was not going to IMT-G. My parents tried a lot to convince me to go for it. A lot of friends were shocked that I was turning down a prestigious college like that. After the job offer, however, I was very clear about what I was going to do. I went into the job in full earnest. June, July and August flew by as I immersed myself into the job and into CAT prep. The job was not rigorous time wise, but was challenging otherwise. I enjoyed the experience thoroughly, and was lucky to get a boss who was just about incredible. There's no other word to describe him, really. For a change, life was moving smoothly :)
Err, didn't mean to fight this way :|
September. Got a bomb. My girlfriend wanted a break from me. We had been having problems for a while, and she couldn't take it anymore. Although I was against it, we decided to go on a break for a month. I was heartbroken. I gave up studies and just went through the whole of the month of auto-pilot. As it usually happens in such cases, for some inexplicable reasons, my mock scores went up. I, however, had almost lost all interest and just went with the flow. Life was playing games again with me :sneaky:
October. After a lot of talking and sorting issues out, we were back. I couldn't have been happier. Life seemed sunny again, and I attacked CAT prep with a lot of gusto. Along came the much feared slump again, this time a month late. This completely freaked me out. I completely believe in the bell curve theory of performance. IMHO, performance also follows the natural cycle of ups and downs, and most of the times you cannot do anything about it. Luckily for me, I had worked so hard on quant that I performed decently in it even during the lean phase. DI, however, was a different ball game. I kept hitting lower lows. I just couldn't attempt more than 10-15% of the paper. TIME , then, decided to push up the level of their DI sections, which did me little good. I kept botching up paper after paper, section after section. Panic set in, again. However, I had last year's experience, and I knew that I needed one good day to get me back in form. As much as I had hoped, IMS' mock sim in the first week of November did not provide me solace like last year. I screwed up that too. Now all I had was 1 more mock, and then CAT.
Time to get cracking again
For the nth time in life, my tendency to stay completely calm and in control during crunch situations helped me. I managed to put all the defeats and frustrations of the last few months behind me. After coming out, though, I realized that I might have under-attempted the DI section. Within hours, even before checking my scores, I had a feeling that I'd miss out on ABC this year. Now, the question was, how accurate had I been in DI? One question here or there and I'd end up with 0 IIM calls. With shaky hands again, I checked my scores that night, expecting the worst. I had completely overrated the Quant section, getting a 51 when the expected cut-offs would be in the low 30s. I had made some horrendous blunders in DI, but a few questions that I'd hurriedly solved in the last few minutes came good. 41. ABC was out, almost definitely. The question was, was it good enough to get atleast a lower 90 percentile? 39 in verbal, with 3 different coaching class keys. If these scores were indeed what I ended up with, I reckoned I'd get somewhere around 99.6 to 99.7 overall, with something similar in quant.
Mini D-Day
December went off in a blur of work. On D-day, 8th January, I had flown down to Delhi for an important presentation. I was nervous as hell. The minutes slowed trickled past. Just as the presentation got over, I got a call. 99.72. 92.31 in DI. Oh, this was going to be tight. Suddenly, it hit me that the IIM A dream was over. Those moments from IIMA went through my mind as I told myself to stop being silly and wait for the rest of the IIMs. I knew I had a good shot at LIK. So many emotions - hope, despair, anxiety, fear passed through my mind as I peered out of the aircraft window at the tiny orange lights distributed randomly below.
I woke up next morning to the beep of my mobile phone. Groggily, I tried to make sense of the words 'Your IIM calls are LIK'.
The game is on again.
This time, I decided to concentrate on the interviews. I was fairly confident of the GDs, and knew that performance in a GD was not as important as the interview. I tried to have as many mock interviews as possible with different people. With each interview, I grew in confidence; I was getting the common feedback that there didn't seem to be anything wrong with my interviews. January passed by quickly. The IIM interviews were earlier this year; with IIM L on 9th February, K on 12th and I on 21st.
But somebody's changed the setting to 'Toughest' when I can't deal with 'Novice'
'I think we should separate.' 1st February 2008, evening. The one thing I dreaded the most in life had happened. 4 hours on the phone, trying to plead, cajole and everything else. Slept past midnight, exhausted after crying my heart out. Woke up at 6 the next day, we were going to meet, the 'we need to talk' kind of meet. 5 more hours of intense emotions and heart-wrenching pain. She had had enough of me, after 4 and a half years. It was my fault, I had goofed up and was paying the price. Again, the rest of the day has blanked out from my memory, other than a mock interview that I gave at TIME 2 hours after the 'talk'. I went in a barely-able-to-prevent-myself-from-not-crying state, all disheveled and in an absolute state. It was the best mock interview of my life. I had never believed I could feel this much pain for so long. Each second dragged its feet, each action and place brought back memories. The weekend was over, and with it the time I had set aside for some crucial brushing up of acads. Monday morning brought a new horror, that of having to concentrate on work. The IIM L interview on Saturday loomed perilously close. I had no idea how I was going to give the interview and what I was going to do. The thought that I'd break down in the middle of the interview horrified me. The week flew by and Friday evening saw me listlessly packing my bag for the next day.
Stupid, stupid me
'Is there anybody without an Admit Card?'
A single hand rose from the last row of the 30 strong group. Me.
'Sorry, we cannot have your process without it.'
A sickening feeling filled me. They were asking me to leave. My 6th IIM call. Even without an interview.
'Please get it and come back tomorrow. We will have your process tomorrow.'
I almost ran out of the waiting room shamefacedly. How could I forget? I pulled off my tie and threw it in my bag, angry at myself for such a stupid error. Stupid stupid stupid.
I went the next day for formality's sake; I knew they wouldn't pardon stupidity like that. They did assure me that it wouldn't matter during the interview, but I didn't believe it.
IIM K. After a few questions on mechanical engineering in which I tackled ( or, more appropriately, tried to tackle ) graphs and force diagrams, and on my venture, the panelists saw my Hindu articles. They praised it a few times and said that I could leave, leaving me slightly bewildered. ( GD/PI Experience : http://www.pagalguy.com/forum/cat-and-related-discussion/28500-2008-iimk-gd-pi-experiences-5.html#post991375 )
A wild experience !
IIM I. A question on economics, which I answered at a very basic level. Not satisfied, he asked me whether he could ask me about history. I shook my head, history was probably my worst area. A little exasperated, he wondered aloud, 'What should I ask you?' I think I must have given an answer which he wouldn't get very often. 'Wildlife', I ventured, a little hesitatingly. 'Huh? I don't know much about that. Ok, anyway, let's see what you know.' The interview ended 15 minutes later with the statement and question 'Your interview is over. We are done with grading you. Now for curiosity's sake, why don't you make a career in this field? You are so passionate about it.'
I walked out with a smile on my face, probably after a long, long time.
XLRI-BM, 28th February. The best interview I've ever given, by a long long margin. Last for around half an hour and I came out with a really good feeling.
XLRI-PMIR, 3rd March. The most horrendous GD I have ever been through. I was shaking my head in frustration through most of it. We went ff on a tangent, and all attempts to bring the group back were unsuccessful. In the interview, argued with the panelist about a point and stuck to my view. Came out with mixed feelings.
Dj vu ?
Everything, everything was going like last year. Bad interviews. Bad results - had got rejected in SCMHRD after what seemed like a decent interview which had ended a tad too honestly - was asked what other calls I had, and I listed out all of them - LIK, XLRI, MDI. The interview ended soon afterwards.
.....continued
This could easily win a puy award for the most nonsensical "All I want to
speak about cat" post..then why do i waste your time as well as mine here??
maybe writing is therapeutic.. but mostly its coz i do feel deep inside
that there are lots of people like me.. and my story and its lessons would
be very very useful
The very first time I thought of takin cat was when i was a grand old fella
(all of 22)!!There was this good influence (GI) , a puy who was hell bent
on cracking DA EXAM..started off thinking.. CAT toh crack ho hi jayega
(rofl)..wrk was not so hectic.. so used to spend time at office doin maths
puzzles (was sure maths was my weakness, which coincidently it was)..mocks
came and went..I must have held the distinction of not having learnt
anything from it at ALL.. no strategies.. no planning..same mistakes time
and time again..always in the range of 97-98 perc..most smart people would
have seen the writings on the wall.. CAT ese to crack nahi hone wala..but
not me!!!..I always felt that CAT 2007 maths will be damn easy.. n there is
no need to work so hard (pls dont ask me why) By now, you must be quite
sure that either I am extremely stupid or extremely over-confident.. I am
neither.. just plain LAZYYYYY.. CAT 2007.. what do u expect???.. was
creamed.. managed a 94 which was way below my average.. That really broke
me.. I mean.. this was the only exam that I had prepared for..what miracles
could happen in the other exams??XAT was next.. had stopped preparing aeons
ago.. just went in to have some fun.. as expected did quite well in the
logical section n verbal(my speciality).. but quant was another matter all
together.. the result?? VA 99.9, LR 98.3 andddd.. wait for it.. QA.. a
whopping 19.19!!! (for the uninitiated, we are talking percentiles here) OA
was 97.. that was a hoot..I had officially given up ..The last exam of the
season.. FMS..was so zonked by my performance(s) that I decided not to take
it.. no point there..In comes GI, I would be eternally grateful to him, and
convinces me to give it a shot.. there was nothing to lose anyway,(yeah,
except my XXL sized ego)
n XAT itself had given me a lot of confidence.. no, really!!..made up my
mind.. not time wasting tactics in the hall.. no moments of diffidence..
GET WORK DONE..plain and simple..
Exam over.. had a good feeling.. but after all the disappointments, was not
too sure..After a looong wait for the results.. I finally made it to
FMS!! unbelievable, but true!! Yoohoo!!
In synopsis:
a) Acche logon ke saath accha hi hota hai
b) DONT GIVE UP--EVER
c) Everybody is the same - in terms of capability, what makes the
difference is hard work and a belief that you are bigger than any exam
d) And last but not the least, once you have identified your weakness, do make it a point to work on it :)
Regards
Pojo
P.S-->pls dont groan ppl.. bahut efforts ke saath aur introspection ke baad likha hai
..........deleting
So here goes my quite ordinary story of ailurophobia.
Prequel:
JEE 1999 season: An over confident JEE aspirant (signature taunt "aankhe bandd karke bhee JEE doonga to crack kar loonga") gets horribly sick one day prior to JEE. Sits for the exam to test the hypothesis. Blacks out in middle wakes up and finishes somehow. Phobia of exam debacles starts. BTW somehow this takes me to AIR 958 and a seat in Chemical Engineering in IIT Kharagpur.
Chapter 1:
CAT 2002 season: After some eventful years in IIT, I find out that I ain't too technical. My propensity towards the "why" rather than the "how" is a major deficiency in getting more than just above-average grades. Decide to go with the herd and sit in for CAT. Preps are good. Counted as one of the few supposed "sure-shots". Top ranks in TIME AIMCATs. The day before CAT yes fall sick this time upset stomach due to some good ole "maaru" khaana. Enter the test-centre all squirmy and jittery. At about 30 minutes into the game, ask permission to go out to the preening invigilator. Told that this is not allowed. Ask nicely. Refused nicely. At 45 minutes from start, decide this ain't gonna be pretty 😐 turn in my OMR and walk out. Still don't know how much I scored that time.
As was required by the situation get a job and start working.... Choose to work in the Project Management milieu (management bug leaves a long lasting mark). Batchmates start what I used to call (and still do) "saalana jalsa", i.e. CAT-mania. I myself, consciously refrain from the same.
Chapter 2:
CAT 2005 season: By this time, I had started seeing some sense in the "saalana jalsa". Bought the form as an afterthought, fill it up as a dare, send the same by mistake, and conveniently forget all about it. Other than once in a while coaching sister of girl-friend in Quants. Just a way to make inroads into the family 😁 . On D-day go to the exam-centre. This I believe was the year of Derrida. I go in smiling and walk out laughing. The reason can only be known by those who had to great fortune of sitting for CAT 2005.
Some months later, the CAT results come out. As was expected didn't make it in fact didn't even check the results. GF checked my scores was 96.xx or 97.xx. And yes she herself gets calls from B, C and K. She makes it to B & C, and joins C. This gets me thinking.
Chapter 3:
CAT 2006 season: This time there was a seriousness lacking last time. But not that much. You see I am incapable of too strong feelings. So every Sunday, TIME mock-takers see a new species of wild-life. Shaggy beard, ponytail, khaadi kurta and a perennial smirk of cynicism. And wonder of wonder, the wildlife gets 99.xx the first AIMCAT. The season continues from 99.xx to 90.xx I see 'em all. I put the max preparation I can, I analyze my papers on the same Sunday. And from Monday to Saturday forget all about 'em. A month before CAT, my boss asks me "So, why aren't you taking leaves as every one else?". My answer is quite factual. "Sir I shall be taking leave from 15 days before CAT". Boss agrees (very good boss
). I tried to prepare as much as possible developed cold feet and decided I am gonna come a cropper. Brain decay is irreversible you see. And on D-day, I do as well as can be expected. Come result time. 98.xx with some 90.xx in verbals. Wonder of wonder, IIM-B beckons. So, I turn to PG to find out how I can cope with the newest "wonder" . I learn a lot, make quite a few friends. And find out that I like economics. Special mentions: Chango for his jumbo's profcalculus for his answers Anarchy for his questions amrutesh for his attitude rani for her Hindi. CATCALL for his genuine smiles and tati for being himself.The GD/PI at Bangalore was was a learning experience. I learnt that there are some stock questions whose answers you are meant to prepare. I must have dozed off when this was mentioned in various forums and classes. It is not enough to know about your technical background, your job, your sector, and economics, and current affairs. You are supposed to have a stock answer for "tell me about yourself". Other questions you can answer wrong. THIS you have to answer. I walk out, knowing fully well the results. Start punishing my liver from the afternoon, and continue till next morning, and try to forget. Results are as expected. Waitlisted and did not convert. My perennial smile vanishes for quite a long time.
Chapter 4:
CAT 2007 season: TIME people give some rebate to last year call getters. That may have been a reason that I decided to give this another try. I give very few Mocks though 4 or 5. Nothing much to write back about. I post a few scores on PG. And find that this time round there are humongous scores all around. Give CAT as a matter of fact. As expected 97.xx.. But wonders never cease. Lucknow gives me a call. I could attend only one weekend class of TIME. Get in two mock interviews. Ask them to grill me on the HR questions. They are very understanding, and give me a few tips. GD/PI in Hyderabad only. I believe I was the most loose-limbed that day. In fact, when I went for a smoke nearby and matter-of-factedly asked the manager regarding their chain of hotels, he asked "You want a job?"
That really de-stressed me even further. What happened later was fun. Check out my post at http://www.pagalguy.com/forum/cat-and-related-discussion/28339-2008-iim-l-gd-pi-post977776.html#post977776 . Results: Accepted by HeLL.
So my suggestions are few and simple if any one needs 'em that is:
- Prepare for CAT seriously it saves a lot of heart-burn later on.
- Prepare for GD/PI especially "why MBA" and "tell me about yourself". It saves a lot of liver-damage later on
- Before the actual GD/PI relax completely if required FORCE the manager of Hotel Basera, Hyderabad to ask you whether you want to join their esteemed organization 😁 . This actually helps you to be yourself inside and THAT really helps you spend about Rs 7 lakhs or more in the coming 2 years with all the attendant heart-burn and liver-damage
I had written about my MBA season on BBLT, but decided to add one post here as well.
First Attempt , 2006:
The first attempt was in all fairness, very bad. I had just done with my graduation and I was not really sure where I was going. I decided to attempt CAT (my parents wanted me to join the business ASAP). I joined classes and test series - which didn't do much good considering I was not very serious. The result was me getting a paltry 60.xx %ile. I decided to attempt again and this time for serious.
Second Attempt ,2007:
The second attempt was better. I was at home helping out with the business, exercising and for once studying properly. I started with basics (8th,9th and 10th textbooks I solved end to end) and then graduated to material from two different institutes. I took the test series. Was faring badly at first, but then kept persisting. I had a revelation and found that DI and Verbal were going much better. Quant was one section that still troubled me - the result of a mind block. I continued with papers and sectional tests. With as much preparation I could take, I headed to Pune which was my base camp for the exam season.
Pune and the exam season:
I landed a week before CAT. Was fortunate to get a good college (Wadia with its awesome crowd). D-day, my friend dropped me and had a smoke before the exam. I entered the college. Shortly my friend left and I was left on my own. I was surprised to find myself so calm and with that I went to my seat. The paper itself was a revelation. I found the paper to bring out an unusual good feeling about the paper. I attempted the Verbal and DI sections real nice and felt confident of scoring really high. Quant was unusually tough - and that was an understatement with my mind block and all. I did as best I could and waited for the coaching centers to release their versions of the answer keys. I calculated the scores and I found that my quant was pathetic (scored a mere 7). DI and Verbal were much much better.
With CAT out of the way, I went ahead with SNAP,XAT and NMAT. NMAT and SNAP were easy but I was more inclined towards qualitative questions. I did my best to attempt as many as I could. NMAT was additionally tough what with all the crowd around me. ( I was the only guy in two rows of girls ) XAT was tough. I was not really sure how my sections went and I wrote a rather long essay. Again my quant was real bad. With the exams out of the way, I resigned myself to the results.
Results and Post Results:
My scores were as follows:
CAT - 90 odd with 56%ile in quant. XAT - 95 with 56%ile in quant. Geez! Didnt clear SNAP and NMAT cutoffs. With the relatively poor results I ended up with only three calls. The GD/PI left me optimistic with the exception of one. I converted one college but decided I should aim higher.
With this season done (and to be forgotten), I decided to attempt again. I also decided that I will not settle for anything less. I am yet to reach my glass ceiling. One more thing I learnt is that two years with my family business doesnt help. If I wanted to do MBA might as well do it properly and not settle for anything less.
So here I am, 2008 season aspirant looking to change my profile for the better. I decided to work outside and attempt again, so that I would get to do MBA from a college that I would want to goto...
Cheers and Goodluck. And remember, its never too late!
Vivek.
Finally the day has come when I am getting a chance to write in this thread. This thread is revered as the most sacred thread on PG. It has been inspiration to thousands including me and now it feels just too good to explain.
Like how sehwag would have felt playing with sachin, sachin would have felt on meeting bradman..
The story begins:
The thought of doing higher studies came to my mind in my college. The aim was to prove to myself that I was better than what I am currently doing. The time when I joined my college IT industry was at its bottom in 2001. The thoughts of not getting a job and being a burden on my parents used to disturb me. So, the limelight given to IIM students attracted me also. I knew it wasn't easy but also knew that every good thing is not easy.
I was prepared to put in the hard work. I was ready for sacrifices. And I did those, in terms of putting in hours of study on CAT material starting from April 2005.
I stopped playing in those cricket games, missed those parties and preffered to remain at my place so that I can get some extra time. I did not want to lose my grades because then in IIM interview I might face a problem because e I didnt have work-ex. At the same time didn't want to risk the placements. Those were the real hectic times. But CAT prep helped a lot in my placements, everytime I used to beat the best in the placements, though my interviews didnt go that well.. CTS was the first company and Oracle was finally where I joined.
In the meanwhile, the mocks before CAT 2005 seemed to go well. I used to score well 97-99.5 percentiles in CL mocks.
On the CAT day, I was all prepared. I was sure that I will get in and clear it. There was a little surprise to see differential markings and then those 2.5 hours just sailed. I was worried about my English and little bit about quants.
And finally when the results came, I saw 98.2 percentile with an 86.5 in quants. VA was 95.3 and DI 98.7
I was lost, felt like breaking somebody's jaw.. :robot:
Then I was little settling down when all of a sudden I get an MDI call letter sent to my house. I never checked the MDI results on site 😐 The interview was 15 days later at IIMB. I thought of skipping this first, but then went in after some compulsion. The best part of the whole experience was the IIM campus. I knew if I had to do MBA its IIMs. But still attended MDI interview and then didnt check results for long and later one day I found the reject. The learning I got from there was that if I can have a good work-ex it will be even better for me while doing MBA.
This sets the tone for next year.
The story revolves:
I analyzed those failures a lot. Went to various sites and read people experiences. Read about what use an MBA would be. In the meanwhile I was introduced to PG by my friend kannan (mirchikris on PG). For me, it is still the best place to discuss anything.
But what I learnt was the dedication which some of the senior guys in PG were putting. Puys like prem_ravi, amitnitsian and UDT and DT members of 2006 were really doing awesome work. This year I was fully learning on my work and trying to involve in PG offline activities.
Wrote CAT again, got a meager 95 percentile with a very bad percentile in VA.. around 70 percentile. Other two were above 95. But I wasnt expecting much.. This year brought out a different person in me. I felt like those profs were right. I could understand the value of work-ex. Things which I cudnt have learned in college. :xmas:
continued.....