VARC - I was able to attempt almost all questions. So, my speed was not an issue, but I answered a lot of questions incorrectly that ended up contributing to negative scores.
DI LR - I was not able to read through all questions in this section. First takeaway: I needed to work on my speed. In addition, I spent a huge amount of time solving difficult questions. Second takeaway: I needed to practice more sets so as to be able to understand which questions are doable and which ones would potentially involve more time (and therefore, should be skipped in my first iteration through the section)
QA - I could only get through ~15-17 questions out of 34. So, both my speed and technique needed a lot of improvement.
With this initial diagnosis, I understood that I needed a lot of practice. Essentially, my aptitude needed polishing (training the brain cells, as some would say). What worked for me was that my basics were in place - thanks to my engineering background - but I lacked speed and real-time test execution. To hone these skills, I purchased an online test series and started taking mocks July onwards. Also, these are some of the scoring topics in QA that you shouldn't miss out on.
Step 2: Work Through Mocks: The More, The Better
My next big advice would be to continue taking mocks no matter how you're performing. Something to keep in mind here, and I followed this diligently - Never give up after a bad percentile - Believe me, I've had my own share of 85s and 90s. Rather, one should analyze the questions that went wrong. I maintained an excel sheet that kept my error log in check.
There's no shortcut to improving your percentile: the sooner you start taking mocks, the better it will be for your preparation. I was not able to take all the mocks that my test series provided owing to my job responsibilities, but I never missed analyzing the mocks that I took.
Step 3: Getting From 97-98 To 99+: Work On Your Biggest Liability
Steps 1 and 2 had definitely helped boost my percentile from 95 to 98+, but I was still unable to cross the 99 threshold. That's when I analyzed scores of all the mocks I had taken thus far and observed VARC to be my biggest liability in most of the mocks. In not even a single mock, had I scored a sectional percentile above 93 in this section. That's when I realized: VARC was holding me back from scoring 99+. To really tackle VARC section, I turned to GMAT study material. I bought GMAT books and read through them. To my surprise, I found numerous mistakes that I had been making in my mocks up till now. I spent ~1 hour with GMAT books each day for a month and saw a drastic improvement in my sectional scores, specifically my accuracy in RC.
Step 4: Relax: Keep Calm And Execute
Before the D-day, it is very very essential to calm down and not worry too much about the paper. I tried to catch a good night's rest and reached my test center a little early with required documents to avoid the last-minute rush. I would strongly suggest that you have a good breakfast that can power your 3-hour peak performance. You may also carry water if allowed. Hydrated brain cells work better :)
As the timer starts, focus on getting each question you attempt, contribute to a positive score. Do not be afraid of move on from questions that take time to solve. Remember, it's about getting questions right and NOT getting difficult questions right.
I hope these tips can help kick-start your preparation for CAT. I wish all the aspirants success in their endeavours!
I'd be more than happy to answer any queries you may have. All the best!
Chat
Comments
Dushyant Shah
I appreciate that numerous students post about how they prepared and tackled the stress and everything else with the preparation.Being a commerce student its difficult to connect with those from an engineering background.I would love to read an article on CAT prep by a student with commerce background.
25 Apr 2017, 11.41 PM
+Read Replies (6)
Bhargavi k
Finally somebody with the same thought as me. Would really boost our spirits to hear something from a student with commerce background.
26 Apr 2017, 02.25 AM |
Bhargavi k
Did you have work experience? Or excelled at a sport or something? I have heard IIM-B looks into work experience and extra curricular activities a lot.
26 Apr 2017, 02.30 AM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Yes, I have 2 years of work experience. Also, I am one of the youngest educators on TED
26 Apr 2017, 02.35 AM |
Robin singhal
Hi Akshita, i would be having 40 months of workex till nov 2017, does iim consider this much experience
2 May 2017, 09.45 AM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
IIMs definitely consider this much experience. As I said, they select a good mix of students across work-ex, so you would find many freshers along with people who have ~3-4 years work ex. The curve is generally normally distributed with ~1-2 yr work ex being most common.
2 May 2017, 10.54 AM |
Akshay Kumar Gupta
can you please tell what to do for di/lr and how you used gre material for english ?
26 May 2017, 08.43 AM |
Sayali Karekar
I do appreciate you sharing your struggle and enlightening us with the way to crack the CAT, but I cannot refrain from cringing just a little bit at that start, please don't use "An year ago", it's a year ago. Don't want to offend you, I've tried to be as polite as possible.
26 Apr 2017, 01.16 AM
+Read Replies (5)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Thanks! Slight misstep from my side. All the best for your preparation!
26 Apr 2017, 02.22 AM |
Divyansh Modi
Mad about reading stories over InsideIIM, hugely inspired by people over it. Dream of becoming one very soon.! Caught in Enigma of Chartered Accountancy, wanna get out of it right away. Love public speaking, a funny speaker, and networking.
Doesnt matter as long as she keeps converting big ones..!! Kidding :p
26 Apr 2017, 01.08 PM |
Divyansh Modi
Mad about reading stories over InsideIIM, hugely inspired by people over it. Dream of becoming one very soon.! Caught in Enigma of Chartered Accountancy, wanna get out of it right away. Love public speaking, a funny speaker, and networking.
Hi Akshita. How about the idea of doing CAT and GMAT coaching together even if you dont have like 2 years of experience. GMAT so that its VA part can be useful in CAT and quant in GMAT.??
26 Apr 2017, 01.10 PM |
Sayali Karekar
Thanks for taking it positively, I just feel relieved. Thank you for your wishes, but my preparation time is done, I'm waiting for the admit results from colleges now :)
26 Apr 2017, 10.11 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Not a bad idea at all :) If it helps improve your scores and does not leave you with a feeling of lack of time for self-study, you should go for it. All the best!
26 Apr 2017, 11.50 PM |
Mayank Yadav
Graduates from iits and other renowned institutes are given priorities at final selection. Is dat true
26 Apr 2017, 02.59 AM
+Read Replies (2)
SHIV PRATAP
Student at SJMSOM, IIT Bombay. Majors in Marketing and SCM. Graduated from IIT Dhanbad in Mechanical Engineering.
Yes somewhat but it doesn't matter that non-IITians will be preferred less. Interviewer checks if you will be able to survive their rigorous curriculums or not. And also a MBA revolves around Maths and IITians are believed to be good at maths so that's why they are given preference. It's just my view because I too belong to this IIT community.
26 Apr 2017, 11.26 AM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hey guys, from my personal WAT-PI experience, there is absolutely no preference given to IITians over non-IITians, or to engineers over non-engineers. Please check out the shortlisted criteria for WAT-PI for IIM-A PGP and you will notice that general engineers have had the lowest selection ratio: https://www.iima.ac.in/web/pgp/shortlisting-criteria-for-pgp-2017-19-batch
26 Apr 2017, 11.47 PM |
Saif Ahmad
Thanks a lot for the strategy.
26 Apr 2017, 04.44 AM
Devesh Agrawal
Thanks a lot Akshita for suggesting these strategies. Are you joining WIMWI?
26 Apr 2017, 12.38 PM
Mihir Rajput
What are you 10th, 12th and college scores?
26 Apr 2017, 01.21 PM
+Read Replies (4)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi, 95%, 95%, and 8.3 respectively. Hope this helps!
26 Apr 2017, 11.48 PM |
GAURAV MAHANI
Hi Akshita That's Great, you have been consistent throughout. I wanted your views on my profile : 10th - 9CGPA/10 12th - 72.2% (Commerce with Maths) Graduation (BCA): 85.66% Whenever I come across people from IIMs, they have superb scores throughout. And I get demotivated with my scores(specially 12th). Can this be a barrier between me and BLACKIES? I am General, Male and BCA graduate.
9 May 2017, 01.13 AM |
GAURAV MAHANI
Please reply
10 May 2017, 10.46 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hey, Don't let your class 12 scores bog you down. If you score a high percentile in CAT, that will make up for it. Plus, your graduation scores matter more than class 12 and 85+ is very good. All the best! Aim for 99.7+ in CAT
18 May 2017, 01.20 PM |
Manoj Maran
These strategies are very helpful.... Thnkew for them..i am facing the same problem in varc can u tell me the which GMAT material you used during ur preparation... plz share if it is in pdf....
27 Apr 2017, 01.57 AM
SUMIT AGRAWAL
Hi Akshita if it is possible for you then please do share the the name of material(GMAT) you used for your VA/RC preparation..
27 Apr 2017, 04.16 AM
+Read Replies (3)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
I used Manhattan GMAT books for RC, Critical Reasoning, and Sentence Correction
27 Apr 2017, 12.41 PM |
Manoj Maran
Thank you.....nd once again congratulations
27 Apr 2017, 10.21 PM |
Manoj Maran
27 Apr 2017, 10.22 PM |
more strong
Hey ma'am, first of all congratulations on making it big. I request you to please share screenshot of your excel sheet you prepared during your preparation. it'll be very helpful for me and people like me to get an idea to how to organise my preparation. I'll be very thankful to you :-)
27 Apr 2017, 08.14 AM
+Read Replies (2)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
I don’t have the excel handy with me. I have tried to create a rough template below to help guide you: Column 1 ~~~~~~~~Column 2 QA – Numbers ~~~~~~3 QA – Geometry ~~~~~2 QA – Profit & Loss ~~~0 VA – Vocabulary ~~~~2 RC – Central theme ~~3 Column 1 refers to the topics tested in the mock; Column 2 refers to the number of questions I attempted incorrectly. This way you can track errors for each mock that you take. You can add more columns to your excel to add more details on the question type, level of difficulty of the question, etc. depending on what suits your mock analysis best. I hope this helps!
27 Apr 2017, 12.40 PM |
more strong
yes, thank you ☺
27 Apr 2017, 06.37 PM |
Kunal Mahanwar
What is your scaled score at 99.87 percentile?
30 Apr 2017, 12.40 PM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
187.36
30 Apr 2017, 10.40 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi everyone, Sharing the link to my latest post in case you'd like to find out which books/materials I used during my preparation: https://insideiim.com/books-that-helped-me-score-99-87ile-in-cat-2016/
2 May 2017, 12.27 AM
Deep Dave
Hi there ! Please can anyone share the Excel sheet format of analyzing of mock test !! if anyone have please share it on mail ... My id is : deepdave2094@gmail.com It would be helpful through out the preparation .!! THANKS In Advance.
12 May 2017, 07.37 AM
Saumya Srivastava
Hello, Akshita. I am a second year student pursuing graduation in the biology stream. I really want to know that will this background be a hurdle in getting me into a B-school? What should be my strategy in preparing for CAT?
17 May 2017, 02.50 AM
+Read Replies (2)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Your background would not be a hurdle :) For the books I used in preparation, read this: https://insideiim.com/?p=89632 For general strategies, read this: https://insideiim.com/?p=89542 For section wise strategies, read this: https://insideiim.com/?p=89757
18 May 2017, 07.43 AM |
Saumya Srivastava
Thanks!
18 May 2017, 10.35 PM |
Sarang Trivedi
Hi Akshita,Congratulations first of all for the admission!!Could you please share your sectional scores and the normalized marks.Also can you please share some tips for DI/LR as I found that the DI/LR sets in CAT were very much different which we used to come across in mocks.Can you share the strategy for that.TIA.
18 May 2017, 04.06 AM
+Read Replies (3)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
VARC - 62.54 (95.2%ile) DILR - 57.87 (99.78%ile) QA - 66.95 (99.87%ile) For section wise strategies, read this: https://insideiim.com/?p=89757
18 May 2017, 07.42 AM |
Sarang Trivedi
Thanks Akshita:).Actually you told about solving AIMCATS religiously right in DI/LR,but in CAT, I found the sets extremely different from those in AIMCATS.So how one can improve further?
18 May 2017, 12.33 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
I believe execution really matters in DILR section. I found the sets in CAT 2016 to be only moderately difficult than the ones in AIMCATs. So, I glanced the whole section, identified the relatively easier sets and solved those first. I went slow and focussed on accuracy more than speed. As you would see from my scores, I attempted 19 questions out of 32 in DILR and probably got all correct.
20 May 2017, 05.01 AM |
Ankush Kar
Hi,Akshita first of all congratulations for your admission into the top B-school. I am 3rd year B.tech student from Tier-1 college. i want to know your views on my profile . 10th(ICSE):-91% 12th(CBSE):-82% pursuing b.tech with current cgpa:-7.5 with these scores can i aim for the IIM's because my cgpa in b.tech career is not upto the mark THANKS in advance
23 May 2017, 08.21 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Ankush, you can definitely get through IIMs. I have batchmates at IIM-A who have a similar profile as you do. They scored 99.9+ in CAT 2016. So, you should also aim for a percentile above 99.7
25 May 2017, 05.54 AM |
Mohit Jindal
Hey akshita,first of all congratulations for your success.now my profile is 10th(cbse):-7 cgpa 12(bseh):-79.2% graduation(distance mode from delhi university):-50% mba(chandigarh university):-73% work experience-2 years can i get call from top iims or any other top colleges like fms,mdi if i get 99.5+ percentile in CAT? firstly reply for iim a,b,c,l than for other colleges. THANKS IN ADVANCE.
4 Jun 2017, 04.11 AM
+Read Replies (5)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi Mohit, It seems that you will have to score 99.5+ to possibly get calls from B, L, and K and maybe a 99.8+ for A and C. I cannot comment for FMS, MDI. Indore seems difficult as they weigh 10th and 12th scores a lot higher than other metrics.
4 Jun 2017, 01.02 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi Mohit, It seems that you will have to score 99.5+ to possibly get calls from B, L, and K and maybe a 99.8+ for A and C. I cannot comment for FMS, MDI. Indore seems difficult as they weigh 10th and 12th scores much higher than other metrics.
4 Jun 2017, 01.03 PM |
Mohit Jindal
i have one more question please so... which old iims they do not weigh to past academic records?
4 Jun 2017, 10.02 PM |
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
I'm not sure if I understand your question. Are you asking if there's any old-IIM that doesn't weigh past academic record? That's not so - each IIM weighs acads and work-ex. The difference lies in weightage. For that, you should refer to specific institute's website because they change weights for these metrics each year.
6 Jun 2017, 12.05 PM |
Mohit Jindal
ok...thanks for it..
6 Jun 2017, 10.43 PM |
Bhargavi k
Hi Akshita, My 10th, 12th and BCA score are 83%, 79% and 8 CGPA. I have work expo of 1.6 years. Will I make it to any of the BLACKIS? Should I even consider giving CAT with these average scores?
21 Jun 2017, 05.34 AM
Samridhi Grover
Can you please share....which GMAT bookd you used..
9 Jul 2017, 08.49 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
The official GMAT guide by GMAC
29 Sep 2018, 11.48 PM |
Abhilasha Kekatpure
Hey. Thanks for sharing your ideas. Coincidentally, I share the step 1 with you. And it's almost August now. Do I stand a chance now? With respect to preparations, I am done with quants basics, little with RC practice and same with DI LR. Also, can you specifically name the book that helped you with getting better at RCs?
29 Jul 2017, 09.24 AM
Prathvi Cr
Serious cat aspirant
Will it be a good preparation strategy if one studies or does the following : 1.QA section - (Mon and Tues) from only TIME QA material and nothing else ,solve all the problems in the TIME QA material and nothing else,solve the problems of AIMCAT 2017 mocks. Analysis of mocks. 2.LR and DI :(Wed and Thurs) from only TIME LR and DI material and nothing else,solve all the problems in the TIME LR and DI material and nothing else.,solve the problems of AIMCAT 2017 mocks.( Focussing mainly on AIMCAT mock questions-solving and resolving the same ).Analysis of mocks 3.VA and RC :(Fri and Sat)-from only TIME VA and RC material and nothing else,solve all the problems in the TIME VA and RC material and nothing else.,solve the problems of AIMCAT 2017 mocks.( Focussing mainly on AIMCAT mock questions-solving and resolving the same ).Analysis of mocks. Sunday: 3hrs for each section. Finish the syllabus and problems solving part by September 2017 and revise In Oct and November.Join another test series IMS or CL by mid Sept 2017.(already enrolled for AIMCAT) 4.HINDU newspaper for 1.5 hr/day and 20 words per day. 5.Regular TIME sectional tests. Please suggest if anything has to be added or has to be removed from the above plan( as only 4months are left out and it's only I recently started solving TIME materialso very less practice under my belt)
31 Jul 2017, 08.01 AM
Satvik Malhotra
Hey Akshita! How did you use your GMAT material for Verbal section? If you can elaborate this then it will be really useful for me. However,Thanks in advance.
16 Aug 2017, 08.54 PM
Farzad Patel
Can you please share your excel sheet?
16 Aug 2017, 09.12 PM
Anupam Shaw
Avid Reader, Budding writer and MBA aspirant
Hi Akshita As u said, tht u realized tht ur varc was the reason of not getting 99+. And gmat book helped u in getting tht. I wanna know the section under varc which helped u through gmat book.
17 Aug 2017, 05.04 PM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning
29 Sep 2018, 11.49 PM |
Sushmitha Ungarala
Hello Akshita! Hearty congratulations on your success!!...it it possible for a student to get into iim-b without any work experience ?
23 Aug 2017, 09.12 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Yes Sushmitha, IIM Bangalore takes in freshers as well. If your undergrad CGPA is high and your CAT percentile is 99+, you're more likely to get the shortlist. All the best!
29 Sep 2018, 11.59 PM |
Jolly Mongia
Which GMAT books did you use for VARC preparations?
24 Aug 2017, 11.26 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
The official GMAT guide by GMAC
29 Sep 2018, 11.57 PM |
surya akella
Hi akshita very much inspiring story can you please tell me if i also do have chances for old iims with 10th-9.4=89.3,12th-84.2 and btech-87.25% till now with department rank 2 in my college without any work exp?(GEM candidate from indraprastha university delhi)
16 Nov 2017, 01.23 PM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi Surya, You have good chances! Give your CAT prep full focus and attention. Aim for a 99+. All the best!
29 Sep 2018, 11.57 PM |
Sukanya Gupta
I am a mbbs graduate who wishes to pursue mba. I have not improved with rc even after trying hard and secured negative percentile in dilr in last attempt. How should i prepare for next attempt
6 Feb 2018, 06.58 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi Sukanya, I can completely understand how RC and DILR can be difficult to deal with. For RC, I recommend following official GMAT guide by GMAC. That helped me quite a lot! For DILR, I followed Arun Sharma's books and TIME modules diligently. Try to devote at least 1 hour daily to practicing questions on DILR to build that logic muscle for solving these questions. Write mocks and spend time analyzing your mistakes and practicing further. All the best!
29 Sep 2018, 11.56 PM |
Tandamalla Sreenath
Working as AEE in IRRIGATION AND CAD DEPARTMENT, GOVERNMENT OF TELANGANA
Good akshitha
11 Mar 2018, 05.56 PM
Shyam Pandey
hi akshita i have 2 cat exam experience but they were not good enough to fetch me a call from anywhere ,I have completed my graduation in 2017 and solely given my whole year for the preparation but unfortunately i didn't perform well. Now suppose if i give an another year for preparation without any work ex then ,will it not going to create a problem during my interviews this year, if i able to score a good percentile this time?
19 Apr 2018, 03.30 PM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Hi Shyam, I would advise you to prepare for CAT and other MBA entrance exams alongside a job. A job will not only provide you with relevant work experience but also make your CAT prep more interesting! You should aim for a 99+ percentile in CAT for a good IIM shortlist. All the best!
29 Sep 2018, 11.53 PM |
Spoorthi Kulkarni
Hey Akshita! Hope you are doing well! I just got into one of the top engineering colleges at Bangalore and I very badly wanna get into to top A, B, C IIMs after 4 years. How would you guide me further? Will it be fine if I directly write CAT without any work experience?
10 Aug 2018, 11.07 AM
+Read Replies (1)
Akshita Agarwal
Akshita Agarwal is an MBA candidate at IIM Ahmedabad, Class of 2017-19.
Yes Spoorthi, writing CAT without workex also works. You should ideally begin your CAT prep from 3rd year of engineering. There are 30-40% freshers in each batch typically.
29 Sep 2018, 11.51 PM |
Sanket patil
Thank you Akshita for sharing your stratagies. I had this one doubt in my mind regarding the consideration of UG score, i.e whether the average of all 4 years is considered or only the score of final year is taken into consideration as on our graduation certificates only the final year score and passing class is mentioned.
3 Nov 2018, 12.01 PM
Sanoj Kumar
As
Really you worked smart rather than hard work but I just want to say that continuity in our thrust to achieve something is more matter.
29 Nov 2018, 12.25 PM
Puja CHAKRAVARTY
Hi Akshita is it really necessary to have a work experience to get calls from IIM A B C please tell me
13 Jul 2019, 11.15 PM
Keyur Shah
BE Mechanical Engineer 2018 pass out and doing job since March'18 till today
THANKS A LOT FOR SHARING.....HOW U MANAGED PREP ALONG WITH 9 TO 5 JOB?
12 Oct 2019, 11.40 AM
Shubham Kumar
Plz. Give some light on,how to prepare for interview?
13 Apr 2020, 12.24 PM
Dr.Nithin M
Inspiring answer
13 Apr 2020, 02.40 PM
Sneha Roy
Hello, my 10 the % is 70 12% is 80. Currently I am studying at third semester sociology hons and I am not so very good at maths . Can I crack CAT for top IIM at once?...
1 Aug 2021, 12.55 AM