IIM Ahmedabad has declared the shortlist of candidates on January 2, 2015 for next phase of admission round comprising WAT & PI. 1249 candidates have been shortlisted for the final PI round.
Beyond any doubt, scoring a high percentile in CAT 2014 is the bare minimum requirement to remain motivated and hopeful of getting shortlisted by IIMs for second phase of admission 2015. But the thought that only high over all percentile score in CAT 2014 will suffice to convert the call after PI round is nothing more than living in a fool’s paradise.
IIMs look beyond your high overall percentile in CAT before offering you admission and therefore it is not essentially necessary that your 99+ percentile may make you eligible to convert the call after getting shortlisted for PI stage in IIM A, B, C, L, I or K nor it is mandatory that a 92 percentiler may not get a call from these top institutes.
IIMs have variable standards and percentiles to shortlist the cream of CAT toppers and high CAT percentile is only one of those important criteria. If a candidate doesn’t qualify on these prescribed standards, he may either not get shortlisted or even if shortlisted may not be able to convert the call in final admission round as each of them has specific weightage which facilitates the offer of admission in IIMs.
Apart from scoring high percentile in CAT 2014 with your knowledge, intelligence and smart way of attempting the test if you have following 5 key assets IIMs will welcome you at their campuses.
Balanced sectional percentile in CAT 2014 got you shortlisted
Your year long hard preparation for CAT 2014 with dedication should bring the desired fruits is what you always think. You might have gone for a drop year too or might have given up the job to prepare meticulously. All this preparation was meant to score high in CAT 2014. Out of the 4 topics i.e. Quant, DI, Verbal & LR you may be very good at the first two or the latter two or a mix of all.
With your very good mathematical skills and hard hitting efforts you are also able to score a very high percentile in Quant & DI section but lagged behind and scored an average percentile in Verbal & LR section of CAT 2014. The overall percentile is decent enough with 99 but there is a slip in sectional percentile. With 99 in Quant and 92 in Verbal, the percentile appears fine but for IIMs lagging behind in scoring a balanced high sectional percentile may not be an ideal situation as per their shortlisting criteria.
IIMs after applying their equated normalization system would prefer a candidate with fairly high balanced percentile of 90+ and 94+ in each section with overall percentile between 95-97 to a candidate with overall high percentile of 98-99 having greater deviation.
The candidate therefore, with 99 percentile with such deviation may not be shortlisted for GDPI by older IIMs unless he is very strong on other 4 points. On the other hand the candidate with 94 percentile (having balanced and fairly high percentile) may get shortlisted.
If you are shortlisted by IIM Ahmedabad, keep this in mind that apart from high overall percentile high balanced sectional percentile is very much important and your PI round may pose a few questions on your performance in CAT 2014.
IIM Ahmedabad: Looks for Excellent Academic Background
Not only IIM Ahmedabad, all the IIMs prefer a candidate who has a very good academic record right from 10th standard. Your academic excellence can pull you through in the final admission round. IIMA awards points on a scale of 100 in a range of 8 to 20 for scoring high marks in 10th, 12th and graduation. If you have a good academic record, you stand better chances of converting the call after getting shortlisted even if you scored less in CAT 2014
Work Experience: A good asset
IIM Ahmedabad awards weightage for relevant professional work experience to the candidates at PI Stage . A work experience of 2-3 years is considered the best period since no IIM gives any weightage to the work experience of less than 6 months. Work experience beyond 4 years onwards also has very less or no weightage and is not much preferred by IIM Ahmedabad.
Maximum weightage of 5 to 10 will be awarded for the work experience of 24 to 36 months. Important feature is that the quality of work experience will also be considered to award and improve this score.
Please however remember that varying work experience may also create problem as you will be required to justify the change of domain. So while writing about work experience take care not to contradict one thing to other.
Gender Diversity
Alarmed at the depleting number of female participants in CAT, IIMs have begun awarding direct or indirect weightage on a scale of 100 to girl candidates. While there is no direct weightage at IIMA the indirect weightage at PI stage to gender diversity would exist.
If you are a girl candidate, you may have better luck. But for others it can’t be helped since whatever gender you are, you are supposed to be throughout your life.
Good Written and spoken communication skill
Both these skill sets have maximum weightage in the final admission round and are the key factors to convert your call. Every CAT aspirant is unique and has his/her skill sets. The need is how to package and present them in GDPI WAT round.
You might have come across number of students who are bursting with knowledge but are more confused and are not able to express themselves coherently. There may be candidates who have great speaking power but find it difficult to pen down their ideas and thoughts in a natural flow.
IIM Ahmedabad needs such candidates who can develop good managerial skills, the ones who have clarity of thought and can write well, can convey the message in their writing piece with no ambiguity. With use of simple and clear vocabulary words they should be able to speak out what they want to say. Hence the IIMs need a person with good knowledge and intelligence who is smart enough to project himself/herself instead of a Shakespeare who may be good to become a professor of English but not a good manager.
Your experience with an NGO; your participation in spread of education and other contribution to social cause reflect your leadership skills. The questions based on such experiences must be answered with a positive attitude and optimistic view.
Please remember IIM Ahmedabad does not require any candidate with superfluous knowledge, a reflection to this fact will be your PI round at IIM Ahmedabad.
MBAUniverse.com experts suggest the candidates to prepare well for PI round, prepare a strategy, find out how many of the 5 needed assets to get into IIMs are available with you and what are the things where you can improve further to get through the last hurdle. The advice is not to get depressed and continue on the path of struggle to emerge a winner in final stage of admission round.
Related Article
IIM Ahmedabad Admission: Not all 99 Percentilers CAT 2014 Scorer to get call; know the facts
IIM Ahmedabad Admission short list for PI Stage on Jan 2; CAT 2014 Score 99 Percentilers can hope
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