CAT Exam

New Verbal Aptitude Sample Question for CAT 2016

2016-05-13T23:36:00.000-07:00

Hello CAT 2016 Aspirants.

Those who are interested in participating in the upcoming Common Admission Test (CAT) 2016 examination for the MBA (Master in Business Administration) admission across India are requested to take a note on the following sample questions. The following questions are the sample Verbal Aptitude Questions for the CAT 2016. Make the most of it.

Directions (Qs. 1 to 6): Choose the best answer among the listed alternatives.

1. One major obligation of the social psychologist is to provide his own discipline, the other social sciences, and interested laymen with conceptual tools that will increase the range and the reliability of their understanding of social phenomena. Beyond that, responsible government officials are today turning more frequently to the social scientist for insights into the nature and solution of the problems with which they are confronted.

The above argument assumes that

A. Social psychologists must have a strong background in other sciences as well as their own.

B. The social scientist has an obligation to provide the means by which social phenomena may be understood by others.

C. Social phenomena are little understood by those outside the field of social psychology.

D. A good social psychologist is obligated principally by the need to solve inter-disciplinary problems.

(a) B (b) C (c) A (d) D

2. Once a company has established an extensive sales network in a foreign market and therefore has achieved substantial sales, it seems that these markets should be treated in a very similar fashion to those in one's own country. It is therefore in those countries where only initial sales and representation have been developed where marketing methods will have to differ from domestic activities.

The above statement assumes that:

A. Sales network can be the same in both foreign and domestic markets.

B. Extensive sales networks are preferable to less developed ones.

C. Larger markets abroad are more adaptable to domestic marketing methods.

D. A study of marketing should consider the adaptability of advertising campaigns in different countries.

(a) A (b) B (c) C (d) D

3. Equality of opportunity has long been prominent as a goal in many countries. In Europe and America there has also been advocacy of more equality of income - the results after taxes of what a person gets for his efforts and the yield of his property. Many western politicians believe this concept of equality should be implemented in developing countries in order to speed economic development.

Which of the following, if true, could weaken the argument above?

A. In a poor society, total income is so low that if it were distributed equally, no one could save enough to provide resources for investment.

B. The marginal dollars in the hands of people with large incomes provide less utility than those with lower income.

C. High achievement in many societies is due to equality of incomes.

D. Equality of opportunity is not necessarily synonymous with equality of income.

(a) D (b) B (c) A (d) C

4. In 1985 there were 20 deaths from automobile accidents per 1,000 miles traveled. A total of 20,000 miles were traveled via automobiles in 1985. In the same year, 800 people died in airplane crashes and 400 people were killed in train disasters. A statistician concluded that it was more dangerous to travel by plane, train, and automobile, in that order.

Which of the following refutes the Statistician's conclusions?

A. There is no common denominator by which to compare the number of deaths resulting from each mode of travel.

B. One year is insufficient to reach such a conclusion.

C. More people travel by car than any other mode of transport, therefore, the probability of a car accident is greater. D. The probability of being killed in a train disaster and as a result of a car crash is the same.

(a) A (b) B (c) C (d) D

5. Product shipments of household appliances are expected to rise to $17 billion next year, an average annual increase of 8.0 percent over the past five years. The real growth rate, after allowing for probable price increases, is expected to be about 4.3 percent each year, resulting in shipments this year of $ 14 billion in 1987 dollars.

Each of the following, if true, could help to account for this trend EXCEPT:

A. Increased consumer spending for durable products

B. Consumer disposable income has increased.

C. The consumer price of electricity has decreased.

D. Individual tax advantages have decreased.

(a) C (b) A (c) D (d) B

6. Each year's increase or decrease in the trade deficit (merchandise imports greater than exports) is calculated in relation to the previous year's. In 1976, imports of private vehicles were 10 percent higher than in 1975, while imports of vehicles including commercial vans was 15 percent higher than in 1975. That 15 percent increase was one and half times the increase recorded in 1975.

If the formation above is accurate, which of the following must be true?

A. In 1976, the increase, if any of commercial vehicle imports was smaller than the increase in imports of private vehicles.

B. In 1976, the increase, if any, of commercial vehicle imports was greater than the increase in imports of private vehicles.

C. In 1975, more commercial vehicles were imported than private vehicles.

D. The average number of private vehicles imported, in 1975 declined.

(a) A (b) C (c) B (d) D

Directions (Qs. 7 to 10): Choose the correct alternative.

7. Somebody told you, ___________?

(a) Isn't it (b) Wasn't it (c) Didn't he (d) Didn't they

8. ___________fast.

(a) News travels (b) News travel (c) A news travels (d) The news travel

9. She __________in the morning because she gets up late.

(a) always has to hurry (b) has always to hurry (c) has to always hurry (d) has to hurry always

10. There is _____________.

(a) hair in the soup (b) hair in soup (c) a hair in soup (d) a hair in the soup

Thanks for your effort to solve the Sample CAT 2016 Verbal Aptitude Questions. If you are still in search for the right answers, see below:

Answers:

1) B

2) D

3) A

4) A

5) D

6) B

7) C

8) A

9)A

10) A

Click here to view CAT Data Sufficiency section Sample Questions

CAT & XAT 2016 Data Sufficiency & QA Sample Questions

2016-04-22T22:40:00.000-07:00

Practicing any of the previous year question papers will certainly give you some overview idea of how to clear the same at its best. Getting admission with IIM will be the major ambition for most of the MBA Aspirants. You can certainly achieve the same dream with the help of XAT and CAT Examinations for sure. Hope you know, this year CAT 2016 Examination notification will be unveiled by mid of June 2016. We help you to prepare accordingly for the upcoming CAT & XAT 2016 Exams by providing the sample questions to sharpen your brain. Make the most of it.

Data Sufficiency & QA Sample Questions for CAT & XAT 2016

1. A man has 9 friends: 4 boys and 5 girls. In how many ways can he invite them, if there have to be exactly 3 girls that should be invited?

a. 320 b. 160 c. 80 d. 200

2. In a watch, the minute hand crosses the hour hand for the third time exactly after every 3 hr 18 min and 15 s of watch time. What is the time gained or lost by this watch in one day?

a. 14 min 10 s lost b. 13 min 50 s lost c. 13 min 20 s gained d. 14 min 40 s gained

3. I sold two watches for Rs. 300 each, one at the loss of 10% and the other at the profit of 10%. What is the percentage of loss(-) or profit(+) that resulted from the transaction?

a. (+)10 b. (-)1 c. (+)1 d. (-)10

Direction for Questions 4 to 10: Each question is followed by two statements, I and II. Mark the answer as

a. if the question cannot be answered even with the help of both the statements taken together.

b. if the question can be answered by any one of the two statements.

c. if each statement alone is sufficient to answer the question, but not the other one (e.g. statement I alone is required to answer the question, but not statement II and vice versa).

d. if both statements I and II together are needed to answer the question.

4. What is the ratio of the two liquids A and B in the mixture finally, if these two liquids kept in three vessels are mixed together? (The containers are of equal volume.)

I. The ratio of liquid A to liquid B in the first and second vessel is 3 : 5, 2 : 3 respectively.

II. The ratio of liquid A to liquid B in vessel 3 is 4 : 3.

5. What is the cost price of the article?

I. After selling the article, a loss of 25% on cost price is incurred.

II. The selling price is three-fourths of the cost price.

6. What is the selling price of the article?

I. The profit on sales is 20%.

II. The profit on each unit is 25% and the cost price is Rs. 250.

7. How many different triangles can be formed?

I. There are 16 coplanar, straight lines.

II. No two lines are parallel.

8. What is the total worth of Lakhiram's assets?

I. A compound interest at 10% on his assets, followed by a tax of 4% on the interest, fetches him Rs. 1,500 this year.

II. The interest is compounded once every four months.

9. How old is Sachin in 1997?

I. Sachin is 11 years younger than Anil whose age will be a prime number in 1998.

II. Anil's age was a prime number in 1996.

10. What is the number of type-2 widgets produced, if the total number of widgets produced is 20,000?

I. If the production of type-1 widgets increases by 10% and that of type-2 decreases by 6%, the total production remains the same.

II. The ratio in which type-1 and type-2 widgets are produced is 2 : 1

We hope you tried your best to get the right results. Thanks for your try. If you still unable to get the correct answers for the above given previous years and sample QA & Data Sufficiency Questions for the CAT & XAT exams, refer the given below answers.

CAT 2016 Sample Question Answers for Data Sufficiency & QA Topics:

1(b) 2(b) 3(b) 4(a) 5(a) 6(c) 7(a) 8(d) 9(a) 10(b)

To know about MGU CAT 2016 admissions visit this page:

http://www.cat.examsavvy.com/2016/04/mgu-cat-2016-exam-admissions-official.html

MGU CAT 2016 Exam & Admissions Official Dates

2016-04-08T21:16:00.000-07:00

Mahatma Gandhi University (MGU) situated in Kottayamhas officially released their Common Admission Test (CAT) 2016 entrance examination dates. According to the official release, the upcoming MGU CAT 2016 Examination is scheduled to conduct on May 21^st and 22^nd May indeed. The MGU CAT 2016 entrance examination is scheduled to conduct for the following courses admissions such as,

Master of Arts (M.A)

Integrated Ph.D (M.Sc + Ph.D)

Master in Law (LL.M) and

Master of Tourism Management (MTM)

Educational Qualifications:

In order to apply online for the MGU CAT 2016 Entrance Examination, the candidates has to possessed with the following educational background, which is simply unique for each category and as follows.

For M.A Programmes:

The candidates should have a Bachelor's degree in the faculty of Social Sciences from a recognized university or institute.

MTM Programme:

The candidates should have Bachelor's degree in the relevant degree from a recognized university or institute.

LL.M Programme:

The candidates should have a degree in Law from a recognized university or institute.

Applications Fees:

The application fees for the MGU CAT 2016 examination is applicable as follows,

Rs.500 for General & OBC Candidates

Rs.250 for SC & ST Candidates

Important Dates:

The candidates has to be follow the following important dates to attend the MGU CAT 2016 examination.

The last date for the submission of MGU CAT 2016 Online application ends by: 6^th May 2016.

Hall Tickets download will be commenced from: 13^th May 2016.

MGU CAT 2016 Examination Scheduled on: 21^st May 2016 and 22^nd May 2016.

The declaration of the MGU CAT Exam 2016 is expected on: 2^nd June 2016.

How to Apply for MGU CAT 2016?

The candidates who are willing to apply for the MGU CAT 2016 Examination is asked to visit the official website.

Click Here to Apply for MGU CAT 2016 Online Exam

To learn strategy about CAT exam please visit our previous post at: http://www.cat.examsavvy.com/2011/08/strategy-for-cat.html

IIM Kozhikode Final Placements 2012

2012-07-21T08:58:00.000-07:00

FINAL PLACEMENTS 2012: A Test of resilience

Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode completed the final placements for the 2010- 12 batch. 135 companies participated in the process and made offers to a batch of 317 students across Finance, Marketing, Operations, Consulting, General Management, IT and HR sectors. Amidst recessionary pressures, IIM Kozhikode strived to carve out a niche for itself as India’s leading B-School by placing its 14th batch in reputed companies like Deutsche Bank, Nomura, Goldman Sachs, ICICI, Deloitte Consulting, HUL, ITC, Cognizant, Arvin Meritor, Ingersoll Rand and many more.

A number of new companies hired from IIMK resulting in an increased number of first time recruiters. These include companies such as Amazon, Zynga, Maruti Suzuki, Flipkart, Texas Instruments, Dell, Reserve Bank of India and UB Group. Many companies offered senior managerial roles to students with relevant work-experience.

The average salary per student witnessed a rise of 7% over last year’s figures.

IIM Kozhikode successfully completed placements despite concerns of global slowdown and an increased batch size

The PPO Advantage:

The silver lining of this year’s placement was the significant increase in the number of PPOs offered to students. From 18 PPOs last year, the number increased to 51 PPOs offered to students across verticals. Industry stalwarts like Colgate Palmolive, P&G, HUL, ITC, Deutche Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra, Airtel, JP Morgan Chase, Citi Bank, Standard Chartered and Reliance Industries preferred the PPO route.

Vertical Wise Offers

Finance

In spite of the fact that Finance sector suffered the most due to recession, IIMK was able to add new companies to their portfolio. Along with the regular recruiters Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Nomura, Citi Bank, HSBC-GR many multinational financial institutions such as Societe Generale also started recruiting from IIMK this year. Investment banks offered the highest salaries to the finance whiz kids of the institute.

The Indian banks were equally aggressive; hiring the best talent from IIMK for several financial institutions like RBI, ICICI Bank, Yes Bank, Indus Valley Partners, SBI Caps, SBI General Life Insurance, Futures First, ICRA etc.

The roles offered ranged across Corporate Finance, Treasury, Risk Management and Investment Banking.

Marketing

IIMK once again established itself as the favorite destination for both FMCG and B2B marketing firms. While HUL, ITC, Pepsi and HCCB led the FMCG offers; 3M, Asian Paints, Airtel, Idea led the B2B and service marketing verticals. Indian marketing giant Amul visited the campus for the first time offering marketing roles to a few students.

In the broader marketing domain, firms like Pfizer, Videocon, Arvin Meritor, GSK Pharma, Dell, FEI Cargo, participated in the placements process. Ingersoll Rand recruited from IIM-K for the first time and offered roles to 4 students.

General Management & Consulting

TAS recruited for the first time and gave offers to 6 students, the highest across any IIM. Besides TAS, Reliance Industries Ltd., Reliance ADAG, L&T, Mahindra & Mahindra, Olam International, Thomas Cook and Manipal Group offered roles in General Management.

On the consulting side, McKinsey, Gallup Consulting, PWC, Deloitte, KPMG, Cognizant Business Consulting, Wipro Consulting Services, HSBC Consulting participated in the placements process.

IT / ITES

IT companies recruited in numbers with Capgemini, HCL, HP, TCS, Wipro, Mindtree and Aricent leading the pack. Along with IT services firm, product companies such as Facebook, Yahoo, Microsoft etc showed interest in IIMK students.

E-Commerce

This year e-commerce came up as a significant vertical showing the growth of online retail in India. Amazon, eBay, Flipkart, Yebhi.com, Zynga were some of the leading e-commerce giants that recruited from IIM Kozhikode for the first time bringing in a new hope and optimism in an otherwise slow economy.

Operations

The operations vertical also witnessed a few big names in the industry recruiting from IIMK. P&G, Airtel, Asian Paints, Tata Motors and Amazon are few of the names that offered roles in Supply Chain Management, Procurement, Logistics and Service delivery.

Strategy and alliances

An increased number of senior profiles were offered by the medium capital companies and SMEs. Roles of Chief Strategy Officer, Executive Assistant to the CEO and other similar leadership level roles were offered by companies which wanted IIM Kozhikode students to drive their organization towards higher levels of growth.

Corporate speak:

"The professional manner in which the recruitment process was conducted is highly commendable. It was well planned and coordinated. There were no delays and waiting. The placement team was very cooperative and understanding. We had a good time at the campus" - Madura F&L

Public Sector:

PSUs made their presence felt on campus through the regulator RBI and financial behemoth UTI. Oil and power sector PSUs also visited campus recruiting some of the best talent from IIMK. ONGC, PFC, Power Grid, Bank of India were the other preferred companies for students who wanted to start their career in the government sector.

Entrepreneurship: In pursuit of dreams

There were many students who decided to join start-ups like Sports Cradle, Global Environment Concern, Neudesic and Heckyl to venture into the unexplored territories and test their entrepreneurial abilities. Students from IIMK were willing to experiment with going for better roles than bigger brands.

Corporate speak

“Our experience with IIM Kozhikode was excellent with the quality of candidates and the process. We were delighted to see absence of any pressure to take a decision on a student under time constraints. Not only could I talk to a candidate but also let other leadership team members talk to the candidates at ease. In the end, I am very confident of the decisions taken, even though we were hiring MBAs from campus for the first time. We will certainly increase our numbers next year.” - Idea Cellular

The Alumni Network

The Alumni of the institute played an integral role in this year’s placements by ensuring participation of some of the best companies in the industry in the placement process. Several alumnus having senior roles in companies personally accompanied their companies to IIM Kozhikode to assist in the on-campus recruitment process.

SME Advantage:

IIMK also tapped the growing SMEs which are looking at expanding their business into new markets. Firms like AVT Consumer products, Arbitron and Suntec recruited students for their marketing and corporate strategy verticals. International offers were given by a few firms in the marketing and operations verticals. IIM Kozhikode had several first time recruiters. Global Environment Concern (GEC), Innovation Labs-Customer 24*7, Xchanging, V2 Solutions Pvt. Ltd., String Infotech, Arbitron etc participated in the placement process.

Corporate Speak

“We were extremely satisfied with the efficiency with which the process was conducted and the quality of the students.” TATA Motors

IIMK Coordinate CAT 2012

2012-07-21T08:55:00.002-07:00

IIM Kozhikode (IIMK) to Coordinate CAT 2012

On behalf of Indian Institutes of Management, CAT 2012 will be coordinated by Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode. CAT 2012 will be conducted from October 11, 2012 to November 6, 2012. The test comprises two sections that are separately timed. Each of the sections will be 1 hour and 10 minutes (i.e. 70 minutes). There will be 30 questions in each section. The sections are (a) Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation (b) Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning. Once a section ends, aspirants can no longer go back to it. Aspirants will be presented with the section on Quantitative Ability & Data Interpretation first, followed by Verbal Ability & Logical Reasoning. Some important dates are given in the following Table.
Activity

Date
Voucher Sale 30 July - 17 September 2012
Registration Window 30 July - 19 September 2012
Test Dates 11 October - 6 November 2012
Results 9 January 2013

2IIM's CAT Personal Interview (PI) Classes at Chennai

2012-07-05T11:33:00.002-07:00

Personal Interview Training by IIM Graduates

100% of our students who got GDPI calls from the IIMs in 2004, 2005 and 2009 converted their calls into final admissions. 80% of our students converted their IIM GDPI calls in 2006 to 2008.Cracking the CAT or the written tests of some of the best B Schools in the country is a feat in itself. However, that is just one of the most difficult stages that you have crossed in your race to securing a seat in the IIMs. The next two stages are equally important. Having cracked the written test, you should leave no stone unturned to convert the PI calls into one or more IIM admissions.

Most B Schools do not have the Group Discussion as an elimination round. All students who are invited to take part in the GD will also be interviewed. And of the two, Personal Interview plays a bigger role in deciding a candidate's suitability for the program. Not that one can neglect GDs, but PIs play a larger role in the selection process.

2IIM's Personal Interview Training Program

Each participant will go through a series of 3 mock interviews. The interviews will be conducted by a panel comprising graduates from the IIMs and other top B Schools who are presently working in various capacity in the Indian industry. Feedback will be provided and progress monitored over the course of the series of interviews.

The first of the three interviews will last for 45 minutes to an hour followed by another 45 minutes to an hour of feedback. A specific set of areas that the student has to work on will be listed and provided at the end of the first session. A reasonable amount of time to work on these areas will be provided before the next interview is scheduled.

The second interview, in addition to checking if the performance of the candidate has improved in areas identified in the first interview will check the candidate's preparedness comprehensively and provide feedback.

The last and the third interview will hone any rough edges and polish the candidate's answers to improve his or her chances of succeeding in the personal interview.

Faculty

The faculty comprises graduates from top B Schools such as the IIMs with industry experience.

Fees

Rs.3000 (Rupees three thousand only)

How to enrol?

Drop into our office at

14-B/1, Dr.Thirumurthy Nagar 1st Street

Nungambakkam (Near Ranjith Hotel)

Chennai 600 034.

Or drop into our learning center at

2IIM - IIM CAT Preparation

C/o Ascent Education

I floor, New # 237, Old # 110, Kutcheri Road

Opposite Witco Showroom

Mylapore, Chennai 600 04.

Or call us at +91 - 44 - 4500 8484 or 3912 4040

Or send an email to prep@2iim.com

Intensive Coaching Class for CAT 2012 starts June 30, 2012

2012-07-05T11:32:00.000-07:00

2IIM's Intensive classroom course for CAT equips you to be better prepared for facing the exacting testing standards of CAT, the Common Admission Test to some of the best B-Schools in India which includes the IIMs. Our MBA Entrance coaching classes for CAT are conducted in Chennai, Mumbai and Bengaluru.Our CAT training program is highly effective. Year after year, many of our classroom students join top 12 premier management institutes in India that include IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta, IIM Lucknow.This intensive course for the CAT is aimed at those who are very serious about cracking CAT 2012. The program is exacting and is aimed at increasing your chances of success in CAT.

CAT Course Schedule and Details

Registrations for the Intensive CAT 2012 Batches starting on June 30, July 1st and July 2nd are on.

A weekend batch starts on June 30, 2012 at Anna Nagar. Classes on Saturday evenings 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM and Sunday mornings 9 AM to 11 AM. The class duration will increase to 3 hours each session, i.e., 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM on Saturdays and 9 AM to Noon on Sundays after the first 4 weeks. Call 99626 48484 or 93800 48484 to sign up.

A Sunday only weekend batch starts on July 1, 2012 at Mylapore. Classes on Sunday afternoons from 1 PM to 7 PM. Call 99626 48484 or 91766 38484 to sign up.

A weekday batch starts on July 2, 2012 at Velachery and has its classes scheduled early in the mornings from 6:30 AM to 8:30 AM on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Call 99626 48484 or 91766 28484 to sign up.

Drop in or call us to register for the batch.

Fees

Rs. 14,900 (Rupees Fourteen Thousand Nine Hundred only).

Advantages of joining 2IIM

Smaller batch size and dedicated tutors will provide personal attention that enhances learning. Batch size does not exceed 20 students to ensure that you get personal attention.

Tutors are B School graduates from top B Schools in India including the IIMs. The Program Director and Quant Tutor is a 100 percentiler in CAT and an IIM Bangalore graduate. One of the core quant faculty members is an IIM Calcutta graduate.

Updated courseware to supplement the classroom sessions. Courseware prepared by IIM graduates.

Results: Our students have secured 99.9% in the CAT and have secured admissions to IIM Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Calcutta and other leading Business Schools in the country.

CAT Course Training Methodology and Course Structure

The course curriculum of our CAT coaching class starts right from the basics, be it Math (Quant) or English (Verbal). The level of competency expected in CAT is proficiency in Class 10 Math and first year graduation English. Though CAT tests your competency in basic Math and English, the proficiency expected is very high. Factoring this characteristic of CAT, our classes start right from the basics to ensure that your fundamentals are really strong. Subsequently, emphasis is placed on building speed while maintaining accuracy.

1, 2, 3s...

2IIM's CAT course believes in leaving no stone unturned. For instance, our classes in the quantitative reasoning section start right from "Number Systems" and guide you through all the relevant topics including geometry, permutation combination and probability. Over 25 different topics will be covered as part of these math sessions.

The concept classes, in addition to strengthening your fundamentals in different Math topics, will also focus on tougher math questions and teach you shortcuts for many of the oft repeated CAT questions.

A, B, Cs...

Familiarity breeds complacence. Most of us think we are comfortable with the English language. We speak, read and write in English. However, seldom have we adhered to the rules of English grammar, thanks to our daily "lingo." Our English classroom refreshes these basic rules and teaches techniques to answer CAT type Verbal and Comprehension questions.

Verbal ability and reasoning classes include Sentence Correction, Paragraph Jumbling, Vocabulary, Reading comprehension and Sentence Completion modules.

Practice makes perfection - Tests, tests &, tests....

Clearing the Common Admission Test (CAT), is not about knowing everything. In fact, hardly anyone attempts all of the 60 to 75 questions during the two and half hours. The key difference between those who clear CAT and those who do not lies in not how much one knows, but in being able to identify the right kind of questions and to solve them as quickly as possible.

Our CAT coaching program includes

Speed Tests that are designed to help you consolidate concepts learnt in class across the different areas, viz., Mathematics (there is a speed test for most of the important Quantitative Reasoning topics), Sentence Correction, Paragraph Jumbling, Reading Comprehension, Data Interpretation (DI) and Data Sufficiency.

10 Full Length CAT Comprehensive Tests that will be administered in the classroom. Some of these tests will be analysed in the class. Detailed explanatory answers have been provided for these tests. These tests are representative of past CAT papers.

10 Full length CAT Prep Tests will be provided to you as take home tests when you sign up for the course in addition to the 10 CAT Comprehensive Tests administered in the classroom. Detailed explanatory answers are provided for each of these tests. These tests will provide you additional practice to help you gain speed and master strategies.

You will be provided with a login id and password to take 10 full length Computer Based Online Mock CATs in September 2012. These tests have comprehensive explanatory answers to all the questions and analysis of your performance in comparison to all students who have taken the online test in the year.

Periodic individual counseling and group counseling on test taking strategies will be held to assist you achieve your goal.

CAT Study Material

2IIM's CAT Study material covering all sections tested in the CAT will be provided. The study material has been prepared by the core faculty comprising graduates from the IIMs. The study material is constantly updated to reflect recent changes to CAT. CAT Course Material

GD-PI Training

The intensive contact CAT training program includes a 4 week intensive weekend training for GD and PI which will commence in January 2012. 100% of our students who got GDPI calls in CAT 04, CAT 05 and CAT 07 from the IIMs converted their GDPI calls into IIM admissions. CAT GDPI Training Classes

How to Enrol?

Drop into our office at

14-B/1, Dr.Thirumurthy Nagar 1st Street

Nungambakkam

Chennai - 600 034, India.

Or call us at (+91-44) 3912 4040 or 4500 8484

Mobile : 99626 48484

Our Learning Center at Anna Nagar is located at

2IIM - CAT Preparation

Ascent Education

Shop 5/1, II Floor, AD-2

II Avenue Main Road (Opposite to Hi Style Showroom)

Anna Nagar (West), Chennai - 600 040

Phone: +91 - 44 - 4269 3565

Mobile : 93800 48484

Our Learning Center at Mylapore is located at

2IIM - CAT Preparation

Ascent Education

I floor, New 237, Kutchery Road (Opposite to Witco Showroom)

Luz Corner, Mylapore. Chennai 600 004.

Phone: +91-44-4501 2141

Mobile : 91766 38484

Our Learning Center at Velachery is located at

2IIM - CAT Preparation

Ascent Education

II floor, Kanya West Wing

48/1 Velachery Taramani 100 ft Link Road

Ramagiri Nagar, Velachery

Chennai 600 042.

Phone: +91-44-2243 3200

Mobile : 91766 28484

Landmark : Opposite to TCS Velachery; above Benetton and Levis Showrooms.

Or send an email to prep@2iim.com

Thanks to the RTI Act, IIM B has made it public that your CAT scores do not have a weightage of more than a fifth when admission decisions are made by the institute. IIM B always had placed a premium on academic prowess that spanned much more than the 3 to 24 months preparation that students do to crack CAT. They did and still continue to place a lot of importance to a student's long term performance starting from Class 10. So, if there is anyone out there in class X and has a long term aspiration of cracking CAT, then make sure that you score well in your board exams as they matter as much as your CAT scores will 5 to 7 years from now. For those, who have crossed the 10th, 12th or graduation bridges (especially for those amongst us who crossed the bridge not so colorfully), hopes of graduating from an IIM need not come to an end. IIM Calcutta, at least till the recent past did not place much emphasis on your previous academic record. In fact, the Admissions Committee Chairperson has gone on record a couple of years back that CAT score is sacrosanct and a high CAT percentile is certain to get you a GDPI call from IIM Calcutta. I can vouchsafe for that claim. I have had classmates who had scraped through their graduation. A gentleman with a 5 CG from IIT Bombay was a classmate of mine. Another gentleman who is presently the CEO of a fast growing IT company barely managed 61% in 12 standard board exam (Tamilnadu State Board) and graduated with a 59% as a BA Sociology graduate. The trend continued much after I graduated from IIM C. A gentleman three years my junior graduated from IIMC. Before joining IIMC, he graduated from Calcutta University with a B. Com degree. He had an aggregate of a little over 45% in his graduation. Very recently, a student of mine with a 6.5 CG from BITS Pilani made it to the IIMC. However, at IIMC he made a vow to be among the top 20 and made it to the top 18 and is presently working for a world renowned Business Consultant. So, for all those who cannot go back and correct your scores at school and college level, there are still few IIMs left that give adequate credit to one's CAT scores. A 99.7 + percentile is likely to land you calls from a few of the IIMs, IIMC including, I hope. This is probably your only chance to redeem past sins should you aim to seek an admit from one of the IIMs. I wish you all success in your CAT endeavors.

2012-07-05T11:29:00.000-07:00

Well.... all of us have read this. Top salaries of fresh IIM graduates have touched $200,000. It may not even make sense to convert the salary into Indian Rupees - as the figure almost looks mythical. However, it is true. Without delving into the depths of how many students from the IIMs manage to get such salaries, whether it it CTC or gross pay or take home etc., let us look what does that mean to you as a CAT aspirant.

1. Making it to a top B school such as an IIM a year earlier makes so much of a difference to your career. Look at it this way. Let us say, you are 25 and you expect to work till you turn 60. Each additional year of work with an MBA means so much in furthering your career on a fast track - whats worse - some of these job openings do not exist without a top ranking MBA degree. So, crack CAT soon. Crack it this year. It is better not to postpone somethings.

2. Well I am going to contradict myself. The career paths and astronomical salaries that are talked about are typically reserved for students of the elite institutes. So, do not do an MBA or a PGDM from any random Business School. Let us say, unfortunately you get only 97 percentile in CAT this year and have managed an admit only from a not so very popular XYZ Management Institute - it might make sense not to take that admit and slog another year to crack CAT and get an admit from one of the elite institutes such as the top 3 or 4 IIMs, XL, FMS etc., Remember - most people DO ONLY ONE MBA in their lifetime. Even if your MBA education is delayed by a year, do not settle for anything less than the best.

3. What does it take to get there?

Thankfully, IIM A has given some clarity on what you should aim to get in each of the sections. A 25% net score in each section with a overall score of 33.33%. This alone will not guarantee you a call. However, one is unlikely to get calls without this score. So, if you are practicing your Mock CAT Tests right now, make sure that you set targets that are a little more than what IIM A has stated so that you are well equipped to crack the cut off on the D day.

Best wishes for all those who aspire to make it to the top IIMs this year.

CAT scores count for no more than 20%

2012-07-05T11:28:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the RTI Act, IIM B has made it public that your CAT scores do not have a weightage of more than a fifth when admission decisions are made by the institute.

IIM B always had placed a premium on academic prowess that spanned much more than the 3 to 24 months preparation that students do to crack CAT. They did and still continue to place a lot of importance to a student's long term performance starting from Class 10. So, if there is anyone out there in class X and has a long term aspiration of cracking CAT, then make sure that you score well in your board exams as they matter as much as your CAT scores will 5 to 7 years from now.

For those, who have crossed the 10th, 12th or graduation bridges (especially for those amongst us who crossed the bridge not so colorfully), hopes of graduating from an IIM need not come to an end. IIM Calcutta, at least till the recent past did not place much emphasis on your previous academic record. In fact, the Admissions Committee Chairperson has gone on record a couple of years back that CAT score is sacrosanct and a high CAT percentile is certain to get you a GDPI call from IIM Calcutta.

I can vouchsafe for that claim. I have had classmates who had scraped through their graduation. A gentleman with a 5 CG from IIT Bombay was a classmate of mine. Another gentleman who is presently the CEO of a fast growing IT company barely managed 61% in 12 standard board exam (Tamilnadu State Board) and graduated with a 59% as a BA Sociology graduate.

The trend continued much after I graduated from IIM C. A gentleman three years my junior graduated from IIMC. Before joining IIMC, he graduated from Calcutta University with a B. Com degree. He had an aggregate of a little over 45% in his graduation. Very recently, a student of mine with a 6.5 CG from BITS Pilani made it to the IIMC. However, at IIMC he made a vow to be among the top 20 and made it to the top 18 and is presently working for a world renowned Business Consultant.

So, for all those who cannot go back and correct your scores at school and college level, there are still few IIMs left that give adequate credit to one's CAT scores. A 99.7 + percentile is likely to land you calls from a few of the IIMs, IIMC including, I hope. This is probably your only chance to redeem past sins should you aim to seek an admit from one of the IIMs.

I wish you all success in your CAT endeavors.

CAT - In defence of the CAT As CAT 2010 draws to a close, we will soon be hearing a lot of

2012-07-05T11:27:00.002-07:00

As CAT 2010 draws to a close, we will soon be hearing a lot of feedback on the quality and consistency of the exam, the technology, organization, etc. It is about the same time that we will hear people saying that the CAT is a pointless exam, an exam that tests unnecessary skill sets, and an exam that is needlessly too difficult. People will tout examples of various calculation-intensive questions friends of friends of theirs saw in the paper and feel vindicated about their claim that the CAT is a very computation-heavy random exam designed to test unnecessary things. You will probably also hear the inevitable "Why is it necessary to do 24.5 * 35.4 in 10 seconds to be a good manager".

Most of the people who say this know little to nothing about the CAT, and at any rate have not spent enough time either thinking about the paper or evaluating it. They are happy to accept the established stereotype and help it along.

My colleagues and I have been taking the CAT almost every year and can state unequivocally that the quality of the paper has improved with time. There are 3 key myths that people have been spreading about the CAT

1. It is a calculation-intensive exam: On an average, about 5 out of 40 questions in Quant + DI are of this type, and one can skip this and still score 100th percentile in CAT. CAT was calculation-intensive in the late 90's, it has tested application heavily in the past 10 or so years.

2. CAT does not test relevant skills to be a manager - also stated as "Why should someone know Set theory to be a good manager?": At some level, CAT is an entrance exam designed to test basic intelligence. Any academic performance is a signal that the student can potentially do well. So, the CAT is looking for a signal of intelligence. Around two lakh students of diverse backgrounds take this exam every year. One needs to find something very basic to use it as a proxy for intelligence. Testing numerical ability, problem solving ability and comprehension ability are probably the best proxies available. What would you rather test - general knowledge, science, subject-knowledge? Anything else pales in comparison. Also, remember, CAT is not an entrance exam to be a manager. It is an entrance exam to get admission into a school that will train you to become a manager.

3. Some questions in CAT are too difficult: This is a problem that has come about because of a specific characteristic of India - one of large numbers. CAT needs to make a distinction between the average and the good. But if this were the only distinction that CAT needed to make, a consistent and simple paper would suffice. But the CAT also needs to make the distinction between good and really good and really good and exceptional. Remember, they need to devise a mechanism to distinguish the top 0.2 percent within the top 1 percent. This suggests the need for creating "men and boys" questions. Questions that demarcate the exceptional from the merely very good. Any paper where the really good students can attempt 55+ out of 60 students within 135 minutes clearly indicates that this is not too difficult. If the paper is peppered with simple questions, the exam just tests just speed, and not understanding. A slightly tougher paper that requires a high level of application is required for getting the top 0.2% from a sea of applicants.

Most people will agree that it does not require a genius to crack CAT. It just requires loads of application, good decision-making ability and adequate preparation. Sounds like a good test for finding managerial talent to me :)

Now, finally to the point that irks people the most, why should calculation-speed be a factor at all? When the whole globe does not really rate calculation-speed, why does India (CAT) cling to this notion? The answer again, is straightforward. India still believes it is a critical skill set. And the CAT is trying to find the best proxy to select smart Indian kids. Why should the CAT not test what India finds important. If anything, the CAT has been doing a lot to de-emphasise this feature. Over the past 10 years, the number of number-intensive questions have fallen sharply, and rightly so. India is moving on, and the CAT is setting the pace. CAT cannot move on all on its own, then they will end up getting all the wrong candidates.

So, there goes my defence of the CAT. I am sure the IIMs wont care much about giving their viewpoint. So, here is my version of how they might have done it.

Having said all this, some things irk me a lot. The complete lack of consistency in the paper is an issue that CAT needs to address. More importantly, the CAT needs to be error-free. Especially now that they have multiple sessions. The CAT was not error-free this year. Far from it. And god knows how they treat the wrong questions. I cannot think of a single fair way of treating error-filled papers. Hope they improve on this.

CAT can now be taken through the year - What does this mean?

2012-07-05T11:26:00.002-07:00

Now, it is more or less official. The CAT exam is set to be conducted through the year. If not from 2011, this is set to happen from 2012 onwards. This is a significant shift from the CAT, and coming close on the heels of the shift to computer-based exam, this changes the CAT market substantially.

Why have the IIMs done it?

The IIMs have tried to make three transitions over the past 3-4 years - paper-based to computer-based, once a year to round the year and to try and create a separate entity to run the exam. All three suggest that the IIMs want to make this a broader standardized test, rather than being purely viewed as an entrance exam for the IIMs. Historically, more than 100 universities have used the CAT, but many among these have used multiple exams (CAT, GMAT, GRE, JMET, etc) for selecting students.

The IIMs are eying a larger share of this market and want to remove the timing constraint in taking the CAT exam. Last year, 2 lakhs students took the CAT. If it is made a round-the-year exam, that number could easily go up another 30-40%. Add to this the fact that there would be many students that would be attempting the CAT more than once a year, this is great news for CAT. A large number of professionals find it difficult to plan for the CAT. Now, with more freedom to choose the dates, a large number of these will start writing the exam.

How are things different for test-takers?

Freedom to select dates on which you can take is always a boon. One can account for everything from foreign assignments, exam schedules and superstitions when selecting the correct dates. But, in every competitive exam, any change is likely to be a zero sum game. This change, I believe will be a disadvantage to freshers and a boon to experienced candidates.

Experienced candidates are usually the ones that struggle to plan well in advance, struggle to set aside 10-11 months to prepare for the exam, and generally end up not putting in enough preparation for the CAT. Now, anyone shifting jobs will want to take a 6-week break, prepare for CAT and take it at the earliest (somewhat similar to the GMAT). More importantly, the CAT scores will get de-emphasized even more and profile, experience will matter more.

Scoring 99.94th percentile in a once-a-year CAT might more or less guarantee a seat in one of the top 10 univs, but scoring a corresponding score in a round-the-year CAT will be less of an achievement. This de facto implies that profile, experience, academic background, etc matter more. Indian schools might become similar to the global ones in that, they will start with a CAT cut-off and then shortlist based on profile, rather than shortlist based on CAT scores. This will be disadvantageous for fresh graduates. This will also be disadvantageous for candidates with a standard profile (such as an Engineer with 3 years of experience in Patni/Polaris).

More experienced grads will prepare for this, more of them will prepare better, and for many of them the experience will count for more. So, freshers might not be the happiest bunch due to this change. Having said that, India is probably the only country that allows so many freshers to do an MBA. Globally, students with zero experience doing an MBA is the exception rather than the norm. So, this shift towards selecting more experienced candidates was also always coming, I guess.

How does this change the preparation pattern?

The content does not change at all. One needs to prepare for the same quant, DI and verbal. But, a 12-week intense routine will probably be the preferred route, rather than a 15 month course of low intensity. Till 2000, students used to prepare for less than 4-5 months for the CAT. Only after these coaching institutes realized that getting college students early is very lucrative, did the cycle of preparation slowly expand to 15 months. This is probably an overkill. Students will start opting for the short burst rather than the low-intensity momentum-killing build up. More experienced candidates will want to prepare over a 12-week cycle, more diverse candidates will want to give it a crack. Fresh grads will probably still prefer the 12-month routine, mostly because this will ensure the ground work is done if ever they want to take the CAT 2-3 years down the line. Hopefully, some newer players will emerge in the test-preparation space :)

All in all, this is good news, one can plan for CAT better, the IIMs are set to make more money, and quality of paper should improve further. Who knows, the CAT might begin competing with the GMAT outside the Indian market as well. I am among few people who believe that the quality of the CAT exam is excellent (barring the few errors). If they manage to cut the error-rate, we could have an excellent test on our hands. Probably worth marketing it globally.

Admissions into IIMs - How important is work experience in getting an admission?

2012-07-05T11:25:00.000-07:00

There are many versions of this key question. How do the IIMs rate work experience? How much does it count for? All other things being equal, will the IIMs always prefer experienced grads? How much more should fresh graduates score in order to stand a chance?

Like many of the research reports, let me start with a disclaimer. I do not claim to have any inside knowledge on how the IIMs process applicants, and most of what I have to say is based on anecdotal evidence.

There is no objective normalization process for accounting for experience

The IIMs most likely do not have a scoring system for awarding points for work experience. It is my belief that the selection committee goes in with an idea of how they want the batch to be structured and conducts interviews with this backdrop.

As in, IIM Bangalore might say tell the selection panel, we would like to have around 60-80 fresh grads, 60-80 grads with 1-2 years experience and around 50-60 grads with more experience than that. Based on this, we have called 300 freshers, 300 1-2 years' experienced grads and 200 very experienced candidates for the interview.

So, after this kind of plan is made, effectively, the groups are more or less competing within each other, and therefore there is no way someone can make a statement like "if you have 4 years experience, you can get in with a score that is 1 percentile point lower than someone with 0 years experience". It is quiet likely that the mean and median score of shortlisted fresh graduates is higher than that of heavily experienced candidates, and this is what we mean by saying that experience counts for something.

Does 1-2 years experience count for much?

Not really. The guys with less than 24 months of experience constitute a high proportion of any batch, and any experience less than 24 months rarely counts for much. These candidates are unlikely to have picked up any great understanding of either their industry or organizational dynamics to make a huge impact.

Does the type of experience count?

All B-schools price diversity (some more so than others), so a different profile always counts for something. A lawyer/ doctor always has an edge over a software professional in our country. There is little doubt about this.

Will the IIMs shift towards more experienced candidates

With a shift to round-the-year exam to be conducted by an external agency, the IIMs will inevitably begin to value profile and experience more. So, this trend is likely to happen

Will the IIMs shun fresh graduates?

Extremely unlikely. No matter which position an institute holds, it will be keen on attracting the best talent available. So, if one IIM shifts towards picking only experienced candidates, then it will effectively lose out on fresh talent. As a talent pool, the fresh graduates compete favourably against other groups. Among the top 10 of any graduating class, one would usually find more than 70% of candidates with 0-2 years experience, with perhaps up o 40% being fresh graduates. There is limited statistical evidence to suggest that fresh graduates do not get value from an MBA. A large number of companies prefer to recruit fresh grads for internships and prefer to select fresh grads for entry-level positions. So, any one IIM, if it chooses to change its profile will end up losing out on talent. So, unless there is a concerted effort from the top 20 B-schools in India, the dynamics cannot change overnight.

I think India will slowly shift towards taking in more experienced candidates into their B-Schools. But this shift will be slow and more or less synchronised across institutes.

Will personal interview and GD be more difficult for fresh graduates?

The short answer is Yes. Fresh graduates have less to talk about themselves, less personal experiences to count on and refer to, will likely have had few opportunities to make presentations to anyone and are generally a little raw. Experienced candidates are naturally better-equipped to handle one-on-one sessions and group discussions. This is why fresh graduates should spend more time preparing themselves for GD-PI and should focus on presenting their case well.

Bottom-line

If you are a fresh graduate, do not let this talk of experienced candidates standing a huge advantage get to you. You are effectively competing against fellow fresh grads for the seats and in any case, you have likely done better than an average experienced candidate in the CAT exam and that should count for something.

If you have 1-2 years of experience, this is not a game-changer, so make sure you have enough talking points about your job.

Belief in Self - That is ALL the difference

2012-07-05T11:24:00.000-07:00

At the risk of imitating Mr. P. Chidambaram, I am going to seek the help of a tamil verse from the book Thirukkural, written by the poet Thiruvalluvar

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Vellathanaya Neermattam Maandhar tham

Ulla thana duyarvu

The meaning of this "kural" is - if you have seen a lotus, it will go up when the water rises in the tank and go down when the water level fell. Like that, the rise or fall of a human is based on his behavior and thoughts.

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Many an youngster is daunted by the fact that the CAT is written by 200,000+ students every year. Out of these, only 2,000 students make it to one IIM or the other. Only 15,000 students make it to a Tier - 1 b-school. The youngster conveniently concludes "I do not have a halo behind my head. I do not belong to those 2,000 students. Heck, I doubt if i even belong to those 15,000 students".

Think about it for a moment. Did those 17,000 (2,000 + 15,000) students make it to those b-schools because of a halo behind their heads? Were they differently built? Did they study in schools that the other 180,000 youngsters did not go to? Were the opportunities available to them as kids vastly different from the ones available to the other 180,000? Definitely not.

I think the ONLY difference was that the 17,000 students believed in themselves and believed in their ability to work hard while it was not the case with the other 180,000. Rather than write pages and pages of gyan, let us look at an real life example.

Year 2001: Our protagonist, X, is in his final year of college. As is the tradition amongst his batchmates, he also decides to write CAT. He does not prepare for it. Performs poorly. Arrives at the convenient conclusion that he is not 'CAT material' (whatever that means)

Year 2005: All along, X had not even given CAT a second thought - even though he always wanted to do an MBA. His colleague at the same office, Y, mentions that he had taken the cat in 2004 and is attending interviews at the IIMs for his admission.

That is when it dawns on X how naive he had been. He had let go 4 valuable years without even trying to figure out what it takes to crack the CAT. Y mentions that he had been preparing for a year for his CAT and it was not all THAT difficult. That is when it occurs to X that ALL it takes is preparation and a belief in self and anybody would be able to crack the CAT.

X starts preparing for the CAT exam in the same year. Keeps at it. Does not let go of his target. Cracks the CAT and goes on to study at an IIM in the city whose name starts with an A.

To this day, X is thankful to Y for having changed his mindset; for having opened his mind to the untapped opportunities; for helping him realize his dreams.

This is the real life story of one of our students. Last we heard about this guy, he helps CAT aspirants reach their goal.

There is an X in each of the 180,000 students who did not make it to a tier - 1 b-school of their choice. The X in this story was lucky to have bumped into Y. Are you one of those 180,000 X's? Do you still have to wait for the CAT to happen to your friend for you to start believing in yourself?

Our firm belief: It is not a matter of ability. It is a matter of self belief.

All the best ! God Speed !

CAT 2011 - Thoughts based on CAT 2010

2012-07-05T11:22:00.000-07:00

CAT 2010 results were released a few days ago, and it is time to think about what we have learn from the results. I have categorized my thoughts into two categories.

Opinions that have been reinforced

1. CAT is not an impossibly tough exam. A number of diligent non-genius candidates have done really well. (All the evidence I am going to refer to is anecdotal and not based on any survey.). Thorough preparation, lots of practice and good planning should be enough to get candidates close enough. The final ingredient is perhaps a little bit of luck, but we cannot budget for that. The previous post on Self-belief holds good even now.

2. CAT rewards preparation from first principles: Quant, DI and verbal have all become more application-intensive and CAT 2010 has continued on with that trend. There is a higher bias towards non-formulaic questions. In maths and verbal, intuition and deeper-understanding is getting rewarded vis-a vis blind formulaic learning. As my boss never tires of saying - Intuition can be built with practice.

3. Balanced preparation is a must: With competition this high, one cannot afford to say my strength in quant should take me through. A few of our students learnt that lesson this time around

New pointers that CAT 2010 has shown us

1. Quant level across the country is pretty high: 15 years ago, \a student needed to just now a bunch of formulae, and need not have been conceptually sound. 6-8 years ago, when CAT made a shift towards more application-intensive questions, it was sufficient if one was conceptually sound. And you could get away without much practice. You always had time to derive 1-2 formulae, do trial-and-error and build hypotheses, verify with bunch of examples, etc. Now, the luxury to do all that is disappearing. A student almost needs to pick the right method to solve a question straightaway. No time for any trial-and-error business. One needs to have basics sound and practice gazillions of questions. The more different kind of problems you can lay your hands on the better.

2. To crack DI, one needs to be good at DI and LR: One out of two wont go. There are some tough DI passages and tough LR questions that you are better of leaving. The option of "I will kill DI and leave all LR questions" will not work

Those of you who are preparing for CAT 2011 and beyond, best wishes.

CAT Format changes - Some additional points

2012-07-05T11:16:00.004-07:00

The format for CAT 2011 has changed. The key changes are as follows

1. Only two sections now, instead of 3. We will have one verbal and one quant section only, with 30 questions in each section. The DI-LR section has been split mid-way and been apportioned into quant and verbal. Quant will now contain - math + Data Interpretation while verbal section will include Logical Reasoning.

2. Timing raised to 140 minutes (from 135 minutes). The big change here is that now the time limit is two water-tight 70 minutes. A student can no longer apportion timing as he/she pleases. The exam will now comprise two sections of 70 minutes.
What are the key implications for students?

1. Only two section cut-offs to worry about: This simplifies life
2. Time management becomes much easier
3. Balance across sections will get rewarded: Earlier students weak in verbal could just spend five more minutes in the section and compensate for this. With water-tight sections, this kind of time-shifting is ruled out
4. Verbal assumes more importance now. The widespread perception is that CAT was still a "quant" exam. This change in format could lead to increased importance given to verbal.

What has been left unsaid?
This part is pure conjecture. These are the things I expect to see.
1. In the verbal section, the LR questions will be more like CR questions (Critical reasoning questions). We will see more questions that resemble mini-case studies and fewer questions that are puzzle-based. In my view, the verbal section will have 9-11 qns from RC, 3 each in sentence rearrangement, sentence correction and sentence completion, one puzzle that has 3-4 questions and 5-6 questions based on arguments, hypotheses etc.

2.The puzzle based questions will still feature in the quant section. The DI-LR section is effectively getting squeezed out a little in this format-change, in my view.

What trends will be seen?
1. More skewed percentiles: The guys who are really strong in quant/verbal are now going to ace this section without worrying about hoovering up time for the other section(s)
2. Candidates with balance will be at an advantage.

How should preparation style change?

Focus more on RC. Spend more time on critical reasoning and case-study type questions. CAT used to have these kind of questions about 10 years ago. They used to be called as Analytical reasoning. Dig up those archives and have a go.

If you are reasonably strong in the basics, forget about building speed doing random (baseless) speed-building exercises. Multiplication speed, reading speed are all going to matter less. The examiners are effectively saying - "I give you 2.5-3 minutes per question. If you can think clearly, you will never be hard-pressed for time"

Longer-term, where is this going?
The path has been laid out. They want to make this an exam that can be taken more than once a year. A more standardised test, a test more in line with global practices (GMAT, GRE), test that isolates quant and verbal, are all steps to ensure that they can make this a through-the-year exam either in 2012 or 2013.

Importance given to verbal ability has increased: Verbal accounts for 50% of the exam now, up from 33% previously. Being merely quant-strong will not be enough to crack this exam. Students need to look at Sentence Correction and critical reasoning more aggressively

Stamina will count for a lot now: In the past editions, students had the advantage of changing sections mid-way, front-loading reading components, shuffling within a paper, etc. Now, a student will spend 2 hours before starting the exam, then spend 70 minutes doing quant, and then start the first verbal question. By the time you near the end of the verbal section, you would have spent more than 220 minutes staring at a computer. If you are the kind that gets tired reading RC passages, then you will have to work a lot on improving stamina.

The other point that emerged from discussions is the fact globally exams are converging on one pattern. India is moving towards lowering primacy given to DI/LR exactly at the point of time GMAT/GRE are increasing importance to DI. So, perhaps we are reaching a middle-ground where patterns are beginning to converge.

CAT 2012 Preparation plan

2012-07-05T11:16:00.000-07:00

With only around three months to go, it is a good time to think about the overall paper. We also need to keep in mind the changes in format. So, have given below our ideas of how the paper might be structured.

Caveat alert: This is our view of how they might structure CAT and might have absolutely no link with how CATIIM is thinking about it (Always good to get the disclaimers in early. This is the one thing they drill into investment bankers). With that out of the way, let us get to the sections.

This post focuses on quants. Will follow up with a verbal specific post

Quants

We would look at this as three segments, of about 10 questions each

Segment I: This is going to be the section that covers simple quant topics - Averages, Percentages, Profit & Loss, Pipes Cisterns, Simple Interest -Compound Interests, Shares, Progressions, Ratio-Proportion, Speed-Time, Races, Mixtures, etc. There should be around 10 questions in this segment. Almost all questions in this section will be do-able but time-consuming. Student should shoot to get 8-9 of these in about 30-33 minutes. Even if it takes more than 3 minutes per question, it could be worth it.

Take your time but get it correct

Segment 2: This is the set of concept-heavy questions - Number Theory, Geometry, Permutation-Combinations, Inequalities and perhaps a bit of Set Theory. These will be slightly non-formulaic questions. But these will help you save time in case you have the fundas right. Should shoot to attempt 6-7 of these in about 13-15 minutes.

Pick the correct questions and solve them really quickly

Segment 3: 3-4 questions of pure DI, 2-3 questions of DI presented in unconventional format, 3-4 of Data Sufficiency etc. Attempt 7-8 of these in about 22-25 minutes. In this segment DI will be time-consuming, DS will be hit or miss.

Overall, shoot to try 22-23 questions. This number should be good enough to hit 99th percentile +. There are two big mistakes that one should avoid.

1. Getting lots of practice for simpler topics, ignoring No.theory+Geometry: This is absurd. Get problems under the belt for the simpler topics, study from first principles for No. Theory and Geometry. One should know the basis for each formula, not just the formula. You should know how to solve problems like the ones seen here . And be clear on concepts in geometry

2. Skipping simple-topic questions because they take more than 3 minutes to solve: 3 minutes per question is good speed. If you understand a question based on Speed-Time and can definitely get it right in even 3.5 minutes, go for it. The concept-heavy topics are the ones where you should shoot to save time. Do not be in a mad rush for speed in the questions from the simpler topics. You HAVE TO get these correct. So, no point making some silly error here.

how the verbal section of CAT might be structured

2012-07-05T11:14:00.002-07:00

This post focuses on how the verbal section of CAT might be structured. To get our thoughts on the quants section, and on caveats, check out this post .

We break-down the verbal section also into 3 segments

Reading Comprehension - 9-12 questions: This section's importance should go up slightly in the newer format. Usually, we see 9-10 questions, this could creep up to 12 questions in some papers.

Sentence Correction, Sentence Rearrangement, Sentence Completion: 9-10 questions: Traditional verbal sections. These can be done reasonably quickly, but error rate could be higher. Pick the best ones and have a go. The crucial take-away here is - Do NOT be in a mad rush to run through your RC passages. Take time over RC. This is not a speed-reading exam.

Newer type questions: They are saying Logical Reasoning, we think it is more likely to be what is termed as critical reasoning or analytical reasoning: First up, let us clarify the definitions.

An LR question will usually be of the type - 4 houses - blue, red, green, yellow with four residents - engineer, doctor, teacher, painter, with 4 cars - Santro, Innova, i10, BMW. The engineer does not drive a santro and does not stay next to the doctor etc

The critical reasoning question will be usually a mini-case study with an inference-type question at the end of it. Example

Sachin Tendulkar's test average in matches India loses is 15 runs lower than when India wins a match. This clearly demonstrates that Sachin's performance clearly drives India's performance. Which of the following, if true could undermine above argument

A. Average of most batsmen is lower in losing causes than winning causes

B. India has won most of its matches at home

C. India wins only high-scoring matches, etc

These used to be called Analytical Reasoning questions and were fairly common in the CAT exams of late 90's early 00's.

The big difference of the change in format could be the fact that these kind of questions make a comeback.

The final 9-10 questions could easily be 3-4 LR, 3-4 CR, 1-2 Fact, Inference, Judgement type questions.

So, while preparing for this section, focus on sentence construction and error-types, get some practice for analytical reasoning questions and remember to read slowly.

IIMs to give an extra bonus to non-engineers and girls

2012-07-05T11:13:00.000-07:00

First, let us have the facts, which have as ever been embellished by TOI (Someone's idea of earning a salary is based on offending all groups of people. To begin with, the heading is 'graceless').

All the six new IIMs and the ones at Lucknow and Kozhikode feel it`s time to rebalance the gender scales in office spaces. So while IIM-Rohtak will give 20 marks to each girl and another 20 to a non-engineer, IIM-Raipur will add 30 marks to the overall scores of each girl-non-engineer. IIM-Lucknow has decided to grant five marks to each girl and two to non-engineers.

Across the board, almost all IIMs have decided to give a boost to girls and non-engineering candidates.

What does this imply?

Obviously, this makes things easier for girls and non-engineers. The bar for quant cut-off at least will now be much lower. I would argue that a 98th percentile overall will still leave you in with a shout if one is a girl, non-engineer.

The implication for engineers is more interesting. Not only will engineers have to focus more on verbal ability, they will have to stress on quant as well as the pool of seats available to engineers would have now shrunk again. So, the engineers will have to get more than 99.3 percentile in quant to have a shot at the IIMs.

What should one focus on?

Nothing much changes. Engineers, please do not assume that VA alone will matter. You will effectively be competing with the world on VA and with fellow engineers for Quants. Given that the engineering entry just got tougher, both need to be good. As we have mentioned in an earlier post, one should focus more on Critical Reasoning questions now.

What else has changed?

Almost all the IIMs are veering towards having a "writing" section in the second round. Again, perhaps part of the overall convergence that Naveenan had mentioned. So, keep this in mind for the post-CAT preparation phase.

Just another word of caution, do not get caught up in the inevitable diversity vs. merit debate that will spring up all around you. That is an important debate, no doubt. But, whether you are an engineer or not, scoring well on that debate gives you pish-tosh in CAT. Accepting some frameworks and chugging along is an absolute necessity to crack things in India/anywhere. So, have an academic interest in this debate, but do not get completely consumed by it, at least until CAT.

That said, those of us who have finished our MBA (including yours truly) can continue to pontificate and so, will be discussing this issue in future posts.

Diversity or Merit

2012-07-05T11:12:00.000-07:00

Some of the IIMs have clearly stated that they are going to give a boost to girl candidates and non-engineer candidates. B-Schools have always rated diversity very high and informally nudged things around here and there in order to get balance. I am of the view that the diversity-drama is a bit of a sham, a bit overcooked and is very unfair to both the "boosted" and the "boosted at the cost of". This post is an attempt at busting some of the myths

Engineers all have uniform opinions, so you get no 'other' view on things

What humbug. This is one of the most convenient non-truths. Quality of the input/view is way more important than the mere diversity factor. If you are discussing astrophysics, would you have a sportsperson on the panel because he might have something different to offer. I have had some of the most wonderful discussions with fellow engineers. And been irritated by the fetish for difference from fellow B-School grads (these could be engineers also). If you are watching test cricket on TV, would you choose a panel that has Richie Benaud and Harsha Bhogle or one that has Mandira Bedi and Charu Sharma. High quality discussion brings to light diverse views. Not the other way around. Do you think intelligent engineers are blinkered? What gives one the right to assume this.

Are there not even 500 good girls who can get into the IIMs. How anti-women are you if you say that girls should not be given a boost

The most important and the least-debated aspect of this whole issue is how patronising the above conjecture is to the girls. The best ones who would have anyway gotten in will now be seen as being among the ones who got a boost thanks to the system. The ones arguing against this kind of "boost" are not the ones who are saying there are not enough good girl candidates around.

On the contrary, I firmly believe that there are plenty of good girls around. I also firmly believe that they can get in, compete and do well without anyone offering them any extra help. Some of the girls who were my classmates were very good. I would love it if the country stopped patronising them in the pretext of helping them.

Everyone stereotypes. Next time some girl gets into an IIM, I am sure everyone around will go - Yeah, so what your chromosomes probably played a bigger role than your grey cells in getting you there. Which is so sad.

BA English and B.Sc Maths grads can be very intelligent too

Of course. I am not denying that. Only to test this, you have designed the CAT exam. The CAT exam is not a maths test, as everyone is made to believe. Worldwide, math and verbal ability have been taken as proxies for gauging intelligence. India is no different. The maths level tested in CAT is at best of the standard X level. As a signal of smarts, the exam is a pretty good proxy. If the examiners so believe that it is not a good enough proxy for smarts, they should change the entrance exam. Design it in such a way that no group is at an unfair advantage. Randomly adding marks at the end of the whole process is just backdoor entry.

All arguments be damned, we are conducting a social experiment because we can:

This is what the IIMs are telling us, in essence. The merits of diversity have never been demonstrated. We are just adopting received wisdom from everyone because it is convenient. All of education (especially in India) is a signal. A degree conveys the ability of a student to grasp/perform rather than the knowledge he/she might have gleamed in college. Engineering colleges are tougher to get into (the good ones. the ones that actually try to teach engineering), tougher to survive in, and tougher to get out of. The IIMs are effectively telling the kids to not go through this rigour if they want a better chance at getting into the IIM.

The worst affected are going to be the guys in the IITs. Poor sods. They crack JEE and believe they are getting into an elite crowd. Little do they know that at every level, they are going to be discriminated against due to their presence in this elite crowd. Some joker at IIT with a 99.6th percentile will end up with no IIM calls because he would not be bringing in diversity into an IIM, whereas a non-IIT engineer with 99.4th percentile will still get a call. All because the non-IIT engineer will bring more diversity. Ha. The joys of rightful discrimination.

IIM Cal probably has the best policy. Power to them.

CAT 2012 - Thoughts based on CAT 2011

2012-07-05T11:09:00.000-07:00

CAT scores are now out, and this is a good time to think about what we have seen from the results. We had published something similar post CAT 2010. Many of the takeaways mentioned in that post hold good now as well.

Opinions that have been reinforced

First-principles based preparation is a must.

We had discussed this last year as well. Almost all questions are application-intensive, and few can be answered using a blanket-formula. So, forget the shortcuts and the word-lists, learn from the basics. This means that if you are going to a coaching center for aiding your preparation, it is important to go to a place where the quality of teachers is very high. Oversimplified preparation can take you till 75th percentile, but not any further

Journey from 90th to 95th percentile is tough. 95th to 98th and beyond is tougher still.

This bit is obvious, but still important because one needs to get a reality check before pinning all hopes on CAT. If you have given it your all and ended with 85th percentile. It is probably time to refocus, aim for a 95th percentile and join some good college once you get that. The number of good B-Schools in India tops 50 and a 95th percentile could still get you a great college. Also, when you are preparing for CAT, do the basics well and early, make sure you have enough quality to hit 90th percentile-ish consistently, and then restart and fine-tune preparations for the final climb. Do not sit back and do the same things over and over again.

Importance of good profile has gone up

You would have heard stories of how someone who had flunked n papers in engineering managed to get an admit in IIM Cal in spite of all this. That era is slowly disappearing. You can no longer say - "I have skeletons up my cupboard and in order to get away from that I want to do an MBA" (I know that feeling. I had that same feeling 10 years ago :-)). Focus on academics, clear that paper you hate, make sure you do well in your job. All those things matter. And all those things matter more now than they ever did.

New pointers from CAT 2011

Reading is uber-critical

We cannot over-emphasize this point. The guys who have the reading habit have a healthy advantage in CAT. Not only the RC section, almost the entire verbal section barring LR are going to be far easier for guys who have a habit of reading. Importantly, these sections are getting tougher to prepare for. There is no great way to "practice" for sentence rearrangement, paragraph completion, word usage, or fill-in the blanks. These are not grammar dependent, not vocab dependent. Ability to sift through these types of questions gets built with months of reading practice. So, if you have CAT in mind, set yourself a target of reading for at least 2 hours each day. Forget everything else, this alone will improve your score significantly. Read anything. What you read matters less than how much you read.

Cracking LR is a hygiene factor now

For guys not extremely comfortable with English, the thinking behind the verbal section goes like this - "If I can crack all 9-10 questions in LR and get some 5-6 other questions correct, I should be through." Good point. Some merit in this. But remember, a lot of people are going to go with the same strategy. Merely cracking LR will still leave you with too big a gap to bridge. Some of our students who cracked LR out of shape ended with 80th percentile-ish in verbal. Not bad at all. But if you want to climb above 90th percentile, you need to get going in the English section as well.

On the lighter side, age is not a barrier for cracking this exam

As someone who teaches for CAT, I hate it when people tell that they have been out of touch of math and have not studied maths for n years (especially when n is less than 5). One of the guys at 2iim got 100th percentile in CAT 2011 and he is on the wrong side of 30. So, there is no excuse for guys with 5 years experience telling themselves they are out of touch with math. For solving questions on percentages and averages, you do not need to be a 20-something.

CAT Aspirants from IITs - What should be the plan?

2012-07-05T11:07:00.000-07:00

Had been to a panel discussion on "cracking CAT" held at IIT Madras. Some interesting points were discussed. Just thought it would be a good idea to share those. Lot of the stuff pertains to an IIT audience; hence the title. Having said that most of what we discussed would apply to anyone who is strong in quants and is slightly worried about verbal.For IIT-ians it is probably a better idea to NOT enroll into a course 15-months before CAT Till 2000 (the year I took CAT), preparation for CAT used to start at the beginning of the 7th semester, roughly 4 months before CAT (back then CAT used to be held in Dec). Then the CAT training industry happened and preparation cycles expanded - slowly inexorably, painfully to 15-months. This kind of preparation cycle kills momentum - especially for IIT-ians.

Most CAT courses focus on quant preparation. So, if it is a 180-hour classroom program, then 120+ hours will be on quants. The quant-level tested in CAT corresponds to syllabus from standard VI to IX. So, your teacher will be discussing profit&loss and linear equation for most parts - several notches below JEE preparation. Odds are that you will enrol for the course in a bout of enthu and start skipping classes from month 2 onwards, and completely forget about the course by month 4. Empirical data suggests that this is what 90% of IIT junta do. Whats the point?

IIT-ians quant level will be higher. You will not get much value from sitting in a class that teaches basics. You need good-quality practice and may be some discussion with a teacher who can push you that little bit further. Cracking CAT is about momentum, intensity, sharpness. Many graduates across the country need help with geometry, number theory or permutation & combinations. But if one has cleared JEE, one should have little trouble navigating quants.

The second section is a verbal section, not an English section

Among IIT-ians, the general feeling of unease regarding this 'second section' is very high. English is not a comfort-zone area for a lot of "quants" guys. Bear in mind that this section is a verbal section, not an English knowledge section. This is just another framework to test how sharp you are. That you are strong in a quantitative framework need not imply that you should be at a disadvantage when it comes to non-quantitative framework.

Worldwide, examinations are designed with a simple quant + simple verbal framework only because this is considered a good proxy to test intelligence. This is why the tests focus on averages,percentages and the like (rather than differential calculus and vector algebra). Correspondingly, for the verbal section the focus is on reading comprehension and basic reasoning, and not on identifying past-participle and gerund.

The JEE is a good exam only because it is a great signal of intelligence. If you have cleared it, then you should tell yourself "If I am good enough to have the smarts to clear a very tough quant-framework exam, I should be good enough to clear a far-simple non-quant framework exam".

Looking at it another way - one-third of verbal is Logical Reasoning, which should be straightforward. One-third is stuff like Sentence Rearrangement, Paragraph Completion and the like - for which there should be no particular advantage to any group of students. And the final third is reading comprehension - which does not require specific English knowledge as all questions are going to be based on the passage itself.

So, IIT-ians do not need to enroll in a course, need not bother with excessive quants preparation, the verbal section is also easy - so, does it mean they just cool their heels and go for the CAT exam?

Of course not. Just have a different schedule for preparation. Make sure bulk of preparation is based on tests for the quantitative subjects and not based on a classroom course pegged at a very mild benchmark. As for the verbal section goes, there is ONLY ONE THING that IIT-ians need to do (for that matter, anyone needs to do) - Read. Students' ability to get the crux of a 300-word editorial is fairly poor. And this is an essential skill-set. This does not get built with so called RC practice. Comfort level with comprehension is built by reading, and pretty much nothing else. Read lots, read lots of different stuff. Read from magazines, websites, sports sites, newspapers, fiction, non-fiction, editorials. It does not matter what you read, or from where you read.

Beyond this, take practice exams, fill the gaps in quant, DI and LR. Work on intensity and stamina. Do not fall into the guilt-trap and enroll yourself into a course 15-months ahead of the exam and kid yourself saying you are preparing for CAT.

CAT is going to become an on-the-fly exam

2012-07-05T11:06:00.000-07:00

CAT has seen quite a few changes recently. It turned online in 2009, it turned online without glitches in 2010 (could not resist the dig even though I think the CAT is a great exam), became a partial linear on-the-fly exam in 2011 and could soon become a round-the-year exam. Now, what does all this mean, and what are the implications?

What does this mean?

A fixed form method of testing is a method of testing where all applicants write the same exam, get to see the same set of questions and are given percentile-based scores after the scores are computed. An on-the-fly exam is a paper where different candidates are given different questions but overall percentiles are calculated post normalizing the scores for varying levels of difficulty (on a per-question basis). A completely on-the-fly exam would probably be one where questions are dynamically selected from a database based on some dynamically changing parameter(s). This changing parameter is usually the candidate's performance in the exam up to that point. This is popularly known as the adaptive testing model.

Why this shift from fixed-form testing to on-the-fly testing?

To start with, the fixed form testing is simpler. One paper for all applicants ensures fair testing, removes randomness, and provides an ideal benchmark. But it has certain constraints - two very important ones stand out.

1. The most important is the fact that it is difficult to design an exam that tests the varying levels of capability of a large applicant pool. Because it is a single instance exam, it can become too tough for a section of the audience so there is no real metric to distinguish between 60th percentile and 20th percentile. On the other hand, it might be too easy for the top quartile, so there is not much to choose between someone who scored 90th percentile and 99th percentile barring a few details here and there. Now, CAT is under pressure to make a distinction between top 0.1 percent and top 1 percent, top 1 percent and top 3 percent, top 3 percent and top 10 percent and so on. A single instance exam can never give you that kind of fine-tuning.

2. The exam happens only once a year. The logistical challenge is significant. More importantly, students find it difficult to take/prepare for this exam.

The on-the-fly test removes both these constraints (at least partly).

Sod all this technical discussion, what does this do to my preparation?

This is the key factor. This change in testing algorithm alters a few key aspects of preparation, especially practice test-taking. Some conventional ideas get turned on their head.

1. Selecting the easy questions and getting them might not take you all the way: One needs to select the easy questions and get them right, there is no doubt about this. But, very often you will find that this alone is not enough (especially to step up from the 96-97th percentile range). Questions from any CAT paper can be broken into three bunches -

Easy - About 12-14 questions from each section

Do-able but not bleeding obvious - 8-10 from each section

Tough ones, either conceptually or because they are time consuming - 6-8 ones

Because of the differential marking built into the system, any student is going to get rewarded more for getting a few of the tougher ones correct. So, every easy question needs to be nailed. But beyond this, students need to get a majority of the middling ones and at least 2 of the tough ones. Otherwise you will be knocking on the neither-here-nor-there 96th percentile range. It is important to learn the tougher topics from first principles. So, one needs to be either conceptually sound so that you can hit the tricky ones, or frightfully quick so that you can hit the time-consuming ones. Just skimming and doing all simple questions well will just take you close (but no cigar)

2. Need to focus on how well you are selecting questions in your mock CAT series. However, as a candidate you must not only focus on how many easy ones you missed, but also think about how many of the trickier ones you should equip yourself to tackle.

Your score is going to depend not only on how many questions you attempted, but also how you did on the tougher ones. Simply skipping the tough questions in each topic will make sure that you never cross a certain threshold as far as your score goes.

What should one do?

Preparation plan does not change much. Take many mock CATs. Whenever you are analyzing a mock CAT, see if there are some questions that you should have attempted but could not. Revisit the theory to re-equip yourself. Post every mock CAT, you should revisit the topics to plug the gaps.

What should one not do?

Please do not take mock CAT scores seriously. Mock CAT percentiles are one of the most misleading statistics in all of CAT preparation. Take plenty of mock CATs to get a feel for the exam. But please do not take the percentiles seriously. There are too many students who consistently score 99th percentile in one or the other mock CAT series, but end up with a 95th percentile in the overall scheme of things. There is no great mock CAT series provider out there in the market who has managed to capture all the moving parts. Take mock CATs from more than one provider. Get the experience. But do not take the scores seriously.

Most people would be starting their CAT preparation at about this time. We often get asked whether the time is sufficient. I will give a further blog post on this, but the short answer is "Yes". Most definitely Yes.

Is it ok to start CAT Preparation in June?

2012-07-05T11:04:00.000-07:00

The short answer is Yes.

The syllabus covered for CAT is very straightforward. Maths syllabus is equivalent to what is seen in 6th to 9th standard text book, and basic reading comprehension and sentence structures in English. The exam is tough because the questions are very application-intensive and because there are ~2 lakh people fighting for ~6000-12000 good seats. An aspirant can start by June, comfortably finish all the portions by August, or latest early September, take 20 mock CATs and be ready for CAT by November. This exam is as much about momentum and intensity as it is about knowledge or application. The intensity with which one prepares in the last lap will be a bigger determinant than how long you have been poring over basic formulae.

So, why do people start 12-months before CAT?

This trend of starting 12 or 15-months before CAT started recently. When I took my CAT, we guys used to start preparing in August (reluctantly). Now, I took my CAT in 2000 and back then the CAT exam was in December. But even adjusting for that, we guys used to prepare for barely 3-3.5 months. But we threw in a lot in that final lap. Many of my friends hit 30 mock CATs before the exam. Back then 70% of preparation used to be about taking practice exams. (Most of us would have been shocked if someone had asked us to prepare for percentages for 5 weeks)

The most important driver for this change has been the development (over-development) of the test-preparation industry. It really helps the industry if college-goers start enrolling themselves for courses 12 or 18 months before the exam. Less than 5% of this brigade takes the exam seriously. Any trainer will tell you that the longer term batches are the worst preparing. Students start missing classes and denude themselves into believing that they are geared merely because they started very early. 12 months into the course, the average attendance levels are less than 10% and when the time is perfect for starting preparation, these long-term and uber-long term batches lose all momentum.

I am starting preparation now, what should be the plan?

To start with, do not tell yourself you dont have a chance because you are starting late. Cover topic by topic for maths for the next ~8 weeks. Read something for at least an hour each day. Spend 2-4 hours each week on DI and/or LR. Run this schedule for ~ 8weeks during which time you should have also taken 2-3 mock CATs. In this first phase, do not worry about time pressure, speed, overall percentiles, etc.

By middle of August, you would have seen most question types, and covered most topics in quant. From here on, take one mock CAT every week and fill whatever gap areas you have. Identify gap areas based on your own gut feel and from what the mock CATs tell you. Have this as the plan for the next 6 weeks. During this phase, you should start building intensity. Plan part tests and exercises in short bursts. Mix up topics and ensure that you avoid concentration lapses. You should create a package like 10 questions in Number Theory, 3 selected passages from Economist, TIME and NYtimes, one DI grid and one LR puzzle from the web in 45 minutes and test yourself at breakneck speed. This phase is like strengthening muscle by muscle before a tournament.

Final few weeks, take mock CAT, review mock CAT aggressively. Repeat. Fill gaps if they still crop up and be as relaxed as possible.

I started preparation last November, what should I do now?

This is quiet simple. Restart now. Create a plan to aggressively ramp up intensity.

New CAT Exam Format – 2011

2011-08-17T07:14:00.002-07:00

CAT 2011 will have two sections instead of three. The first section will consist of questions relating to quantitative aptitude and data interpretation. The second section will comprise verbal and non-verbal reasoning and logical reasoning. The number of questions have been reduced from 75 to 60. Each paper consists of 30 questions each. Also, the time limit of the examination has been increased from 120 minutes to 140 minutes since last year. Candidates will have 70 minutes to answer 30 questions of one section with the help of an on-screen countdown timer.

The papers are to be attempted one after the other. After a student completes one paper, he will not be allowed to redo it again. The number of days on which the test will be conducted has remained the same. CAT exam in 2011 will be conducted from 22nd October to 18th November, for 20 days. Students can choose any day they want, by pre-booking the date subject to availability.

The CAT 2011 will provide a 15-minute tutorial before the test begins. The test will be conducted across 36 cities, including the newly added Jammu, Dehradun and Bhilai regions. When the online CAT was launched in 2009, thousands of MBA aspirants were at a disadvantage because they had no practice to the new format, little experience of computer based test and further faced technical glitches. Around 18,000 applicants had to re-write the test, which triggered off protests and bad publicity for the IIMs and the test conducting authority.

In 2010, the IIMs and Prometric joined hands to produce an immaculate test across 33 cities. But the number of test takers reduced, this however might see a change this year.

Currently, there are 13 IIMs in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Kolkata, Indore, Kashipur, Kozhikode, Lucknow, Shillong, Ranchi, Rohtak, Shillong, Tiruchirappalli and Udaipur.

The key to success, therefore, lies in two important parameters:

Accurate Answers:

The CAT test evaluation involves negative marking also. Every student will be awarded 1 mark for a correct answer and will pay a penalty of 1/3 mark for each wrong answer. Hence, it is important to get a lot of correct answers and as little wrong answers as possible.

Selection of Questions to Answer:

There will not be sufficient time to answer all questions on the CAT, so one must choose the questions to answer in a smart fashion. It is wise to answer all questions one knows and half the questions one is doubtful of, and not answer any question about which one is clueless about. Effective Time Management:

Since all the questions cannot be answered given the short time duration, along with smart answering, the students must also be efficient. Students can take around 2 minutes for each question; if it is a question that the student knows very well, then he can complete it within 2 minutes, and use the time saved on a more difficult question. CAT is all about performing under pressure and managing time efficiently during the test. The ideal preparation period should be around 5-8 months.

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MGU CAT 2016 Exam & Admissions Official Dates

IIM Kozhikode Final Placements 2012

IIMK Coordinate CAT 2012

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CAT can now be taken through the year - What does this mean?

Admissions into IIMs - How important is work experience in getting an admission?

Belief in Self - That is ALL the difference

CAT 2011 - Thoughts based on CAT 2010

CAT Format changes - Some additional points

CAT 2012 Preparation plan

how the verbal section of CAT might be structured

IIMs to give an extra bonus to non-engineers and girls

Diversity or Merit

Top B-Schools and other related questions

CAT 2012 - Thoughts based on CAT 2011

CAT Aspirants from IITs - What should be the plan?

CAT is going to become an on-the-fly exam

Is it ok to start CAT Preparation in June?

New CAT Exam Format – 2011