Latest Posts

How to improve your QA percentile – Part II

In the first part of this post, we covered the first building block to achieve higher scores and percentiles on CAT QA — accuracy. In this post, we will take up the next one — selection.

QA is the section that gets the maximum attention of test-takers of all stripes, and there is always a litany of frustrations and queries that plague aspirants.

  • I am good at Math, I like Math, but my score just does not seem to go up!
  • Should one attempt the long Arithmetic questions?
  • I feel every problem is doable!
  • I get stuck for a long time with one problem without realising it
  • I realise there were many problems I could have solved when I analysed the test

The answer to all of these questions lies in the way you select questions and the way you navigate between them.

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How to improve your QA percentile – I

Unlike the other two sections, QA is a section that has a direct link to what you have done in school and college. Most of the topics that are tested on the CAT have also been a part of the school curriculum. This I feel is the biggest roadblock in front of test-takers wanting to achieve higher scores on the CAT Quant because high Math scores during X and XII exams do not automatically imply doing well on CAT Quant.

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The IIM Selection Criteria: Will I get a call from the IIMs?

Apart from the — how many questions should I answer to score a 99th percentile on the CAT — question, one of the questions that I get asked to answer most frequently, both from my students as well as people on Quora, is the one that is more or less framed as follows:

I have X% in X, Y% in XII and Z% in GRAD. Will I get a call from the IIMs?

Given the popularity of the question, I think a post on the same is more than par for the course.

If you want a short answer, just use this IMS Profile Ranker tool.

How to manage work and prepare for the CAT

With the mountain called the CAT now in sight, most working professionals will be wondering how to mount another challenge to get into the old IIMs.

The biggest obstacle in front working professionals will be juggling a job and prepping for CAT at the same time. Some of you in this situation will have decided to quit your job, hopefully only after having read my post on the same and having understood the implications of quitting.
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DI-LR: Improving your core strength

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. Read More