WAT 2016 Preparation: 10 mistakes that may drag you down; must avoid

WAT and PI process for admission to 19 IIMs in their flagship PGP 2016-18 programmes has already begun and the WAT topics confronting the aspirants in 2016 are more focused on current affairs and economic development than they used to be earlier.

Higher weightage to skilful and coherent writing on specific WAT topics for MBA admission has been announced by IIMs in their admission policy 2016. While calculating the final scores after WAT & PI round, around 10 to 15% weightage will be awarded to your writing on the given WAT topic for MBA admission. A little more study and careful writing strategy while avoiding the frequently committed mistakes may give you an edge and take you through this 20-25 minute test.

The Written Ability Test (WAT) has become more favourite of IIMs in their personal Interview Round and as such WAT has now replaced GD round in almost all the IIMs barring one or two. Apart from the IIMs, other top rated B-schools like FMS have also done away with Group Discussion round in the final admission process as the GD turns out to be a fish market with more heated discussion which makes it difficult to judge the expression ability of the participants. Accordingly WAT topics for MBA admission are now preferred to GD topics by almost all the top notch B-schools.

10 mistakes; you should avoid in WAT 2016 According to Prof S K Agarwal, expert and mentor on CAT 2015 exam and WAT 2016 preparation, there are 10 key mistakes that candidates usually make while appearing in WAT. In fact, the WAT 2016 is not going to be unlimited length essay writing. You are supposed to give your best within the given time frame. So in 20-25 minutes, a coherent, thoughtfully written piece could be around 300 to 400 words but it should not lose track on the WAT topic in any paragraph or any line.

Following mistakes, according to the expert, if avoided can sure improve your writing skill and make you score high in WAT 2016.

No ambiguous thought When you begin writing, just think whom you are writing for? Who will read your essay? So begin with a clear thought and idea introducing the theme and what you propose to say. Please remember all the paragraphs must have distinct and clear ideas. No confusion in your thought process should be present in your WAT 2016. One paragraph one idea- must be the strategy, although all the paragraphs are supposed to be interlinked with continuity of thought.

Avoid Repetition How would you react if someone goes on saying or repeating the same idea in different sentences or in similar ones? A feeling of boredom and lack of interest would occur. Similarly, your reader will also not like such repetition in your WAT 2016 topic. So avoid it, since it conveys the message that you know very less on the given/chosen WAT topic.

Avoid irrelevant & heavy Vocab Vocabulary which is not required must not be used while writing on the given WAT 2016 topic. It might unnecessarily stretch your message and may have wrong impression on the reader who incidentally is your examiner. This, instead of elevating your ranking may affect otherwise.

Check the formation of sentences While devoting time for WAT 2016 preparation, practice more to form good sentences which may create interest to the reader. You may be knowing a lot about the WAT topic but if the formation of your sentences and paragraphs is not well organized, you may not hit the ball.

To make your writing more meaningful, practice more, emphasise on better and brief writing. Sentences must be presentable so that your reader is tempted to go through the entire essay in one go. You might remember reading a very interesting novel, story, article etc. the reading of which you didnt give-up despite the call of nature. Why? The writer was able to create that much of interest in you, with his/her writing skills. So take note of that.

Grammatical mistakes: Avoid the grey area In the hurry to pour out more ideas in the limited time frame for WAT, we make more Grammatical, spelling and punctuation mistakes. Despite knowing a lot on the given WAT 2016 topic, we might convey a bad impression on the examiner due to such mistakes which could have been avoided with a little careful writing.

Since Grammar is the foundation to your essay writing. Any mistake in the usage will not only change the meaning of your sentence but will also have disastrous effect. A hard working person, if written as hardly working person may convey absolutely opposite meaning.

It is suggested to build strong fundamentals before writing any long piece of say, 200-300 words. Errors in use of articles, nouns, verbs, modifiers, conditionals make the paragraph clumsy while wrong use of vocabulary words, especially in confusing /similar sounding words like imminent in place of eminent, birth instead of berth etc. make your piece of writing a laughing stock. So be careful about it.

Avoid beating about the bush A common mistake that we all make in WAT is writing beside the point and not remaining focused to the main WAT topic. This a typical problem and happens when you have not practiced well. You have understood the WAT 2016 topic and also have the ideas but dont know how to start with? Please do not beat about the bush and give a few seconds to outline the thoughts prevailing in the vast arena of your mind. Organise them and then begin to write. Questions may have words like Discuss, Describe, Analyse, Critically Examine so take a directional tip all these aspects are to be taken care of, while writing your essay.

Synchronise your ideas, write each point one by one There is no need to mingle your ideas ending up with a poorly written essay. Get a flow of them as a string goes through the pearls. However, you can add relevant quotes with acknowledgements to emphasise your idea.

Avoiding explaining in length This is a big problem. Sometimes we go on explaining an idea, a point etc. to more than the desired length. This happens in cases when the reader is not sure of his writing skill or ability to explain. So avoid this practice.

Write simple & short There is no need to write too log on your WAT topic making the essay too verbose. Be simple- You do not need to write fat vocabulary words, insert irrelevant figures of speech, proverbs. On the contrary, simple, well worded and concise sentences will have better effect on your reader. You could go for figurative language, use of idioms, use of quotations if you can use them skilfully otherwise they may do more harm than good to the evaluation process.

Avoid cuttings & cancellations While writing on WAT topic, please make sure that your statements should not nullify or crisscross your earlier made statements. Despite all the knowledge you have put in the writing, this factor will make you lose on merit in final selection round.

You may be skilled in writing, you have good vocabulary and know how to use figurative, idiomatic language with quotations but if the handwriting is poor (Since most of the examinees work on the computers, dont do much writing work, the MCQs have also added to the woes of eliminating writing skill), please note that your reader may not attentively read the essay on the given WAT topic or may not follow the message which you wish to convey in its true sense.

Prepare well So, Practice more. Purchase a note book of fairly large size, write down the probable WAT 2016 topics on it and begin practicing, at least, one a day. Once you complete writing on the WAT topic, read it again. Try to find out the mistakes, like punctuation; grammar; spelling errors in it. Find out how many cuttings and cancellations are there in one paragraph of the mock WAT, you have taken. Next time when you write on any WAT topic minimise them. In a few days, you will be equipped with fine writing skills with fewer mistakes or no mistakes.

WAT 2016 round in IIM Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Calcutta, Lucknow, Indore, Kozhikode, Shillong has already started as the individual and independent process. However, the WAT process for admission to 9 new IIMs namely, IIM Kashipur, IIM Raipur, IIM Ranchi, IIM Rohtak, IIM Trichy, IIM Udaipur and for 3 newest IIMs IIM Amritsar, IIM BodhGaya and IIM Sambalpur started as a Common Admission Process (CAP) on February 15, 2016 and is proposed to close on March 4, 2016 at the designated 5 centres- New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore and Chennai.

Your performance in WAT 2016 being co-ordinated by IIM Kashipur for 9 participating IIMs could turn out to be the key in getting admission offer from one or more IIMs as you do not have to re-appear to qualify the WAT round at least for these 9 IIMs. The final merit list will be generated for all the 9 IIMs by participating in single WAT 2016 session.