Author: Tony Xavier

The New & Baby IIMs?

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It is that time of the year where I keep getting queries around X versus Y versus Z and there are two extremes between which most queries fall I want to give another shot at A-B-C despite having L, XL I am confused between new & baby IIMs and NMIMS/SIBM The hunger for an IIM depicted at both the extreme ends. The first one is a psychological problem for many and a real problem only for a few (if you want to me to write about why A-B-C or nothing is not a great idea at all, then let me know through the comments, and I’ll do a post on the same). The second one is at the other end where the visions of a tag blur every other sense of reality. In this post, I’ll try to go through criteria that you should use while taking a call involving admits from the new and the baby IIMs and other premier schools. But before that a bit of context on two ingredients necessary for a …

My 2 cents from a lifetime experience called MBA

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Over the past few years of mentoring there are always students who keep in touch even after they graduate from b-school. Some to express gratitude once they get their final placement, some to sort out their post MBA dilemmas and others just to have a nice chat about everything under the sun :-). Likewise this year a student of mine wrote to me, just after a graduated, saying that he felt investing in an MBA was the best thing he did and over the course of a few mails I asked him to do a guest post about his MBA experience. Given that a lot of aspirants who made it to b-schools will be debating the pros and cons, thinking about the cost involved whether it is worth it, the better schools you missed out on and stuff, this post is timely. Two years back I remember this student also being in the same dilemma. He was wondering whether it was really worth leaving his job at Ford to do an MBA. I felt he should …

DI-LR: Improving your core strength

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DI-LR, as we know, has been the nemesis of many a CAT aspirant over the past few years, and every serious aspirant asks me that — how do I improve my DI-LR skills. Over the last two years, I thought that it is primarily about two things — set selection and comfort with mathematical reasoning (many sets over the last few years have been based on Arithmetic and Modern Math concepts). But even so, I knew that to select the right sets and then solve 4 sets, one needs to solve the two easiest sets quite fast, and this pace would come from the regular practice of DI-LR sets (irrespective of difficulty level) and Sudoku. Even then I still felt that a lot was left to the “natural” capability of the student. There was nothing concrete I could communicate (apart from a 5-minute average for Medium Sudoku sets) like say a particular reading speed or a particular set of concepts.

IIMs versus FMS, XL, MDI and other top schools

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Now that the first round results of almost all the b-schools are out, we get regular queries about which b-schools to join. There is rarely any confusion about A, B, and C but after that, it seems as if aspirants are having a lot of trouble choosing between the IIMs L, I and K and other top b-schools such as FMS, XLRI, MDI, and others. How does one go about making the right choice between the IIMs and other top schools? One of the terms thrown around a lot these days is ROI.

How to choose between an HR program and a regular MBA

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I think I have said this in another post — India is probably the only country where people will be willing to shell out more than 20 lakhs for a product and at the same time be willing to accept whatever variant the seller decides to give them. What am I referring to here? When I ask students who have both BM and HR calls from XLRI, what their preference is, or what they would prefer between XL-HR/TISS and IIM-K/MDI, most are very clear — the specialization does not matter, all that matters is the brand; others start bringing ROI into the picture. I feel people put in more thought when choosing between a diesel and a petrol car! We are so crazy after elite institutions that we fail to even consider whether we will succeed/fail in or like/dislike a particular field. The objective of this post will be to give you enough information to choose the right program when faced with a choice between a premier HR program and other programs.

How to prepare for a CAT retake – Part II

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In the previous post, we discussed the mindset with which one should approach a CAT retake; in this post, we shall look at a few more aspects with respect to a successful CAT retake. Since each one of you readers will have a different back story with respect to your first attempt and there will also be some non-IMS students among you as well, the focus of this post will be a bit wider.

How to prepare for a CAT retake – Part I

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Most of the institutes have given out their calls (or at least most of you know your chances) and many of you might be planning to retake the CAT. For some of you, it might be a case of almost getting there but missing out because of one poor section or just missing out on the overall percentile. For others, the CAT-day might have been a bad day at the office and you knew straight away that nothing much was going to happen. On my first attempt, I fell into the latter group — I knew I was out of my depth when I saw the Quant paper, there was no way I was going to clear the cut-offs. This despite consistently doing very well in the Sims leading up to the test. I decided to take another shot since I was very clear that it was not out of my league. This post, in three parts, is for all those re-takers who are NOT hoping to get lucky next time around but want to ensure that …

CAT Preparation: Changing The Default Settings

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Every year a lot of young men and women toil away at this thing called CAT preparation. The most sincere and determined ones, come in full of energy and enthusiasm to do whatever it takes to ace this test and get into the hallowed portals of an IIM. But do they come in with a blank mind ready to understand what this test is all about and attune themselves to it? The answer as we all know is, NO. A CAT aspirant beginning his prep will be at the least 20 years old, long enough to start the test with a sizeable psychological baggage — a mental make up that stems from one’s experiences and successes with education & tests throughout school & college.