Congratulations on qualifying CAT. If you have been shortlisted by IIM’s and other top schools, or indeed if you will be shortlisted by those schools which are expected to release dates in the coming days, Career Guru has an important message for you.

A critical part of the selection process at the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and other premier business schools is the weightage given to the PI process (differs across IIMs and is as high as 60%): Group Discussion (GD), Personal Interview (PI) and Written Ability Test (WAT) – this is what it all comes down to. They play ‘decider’ in final selection. If we look only at PI, most of the top IIMs have allotted around 40% weightage (IIM-A has 50%) – and therefore no matter how good your CAT score is, one botched minute in those 20–30 minutes of an interview, can be the difference between success and failure. After CAT results, once you are called for PI process then everybody is at the same footing. The real question is how do you differentiate yourself and gain competitive advantage amongst the selected and called for cohort of students? Would it be you who goes to IIM or the next person who is getting interviewed? Now that’s the real challenge! We have curated and created a special package for you to ace this stage of CAT Selection Process.

The creators of this course have had the experience of interviewing thousands of students for IIMs and other top B-Schools in the world. Its not designed by Ex-IIM students who have themselves gone through the interview process only once in their lifetime, once upon a time. It’s designed, curated and delivered by professors who have been on the other side of the table – taking interviews after interviews after interviews, one year after the other. Our experts have one simple objective in mind – applicants should take PI and related steps very seriously, in fact more seriously than the CAT – because this is where final selections are made. We have interacted with tens of thousands of students who would even drop a year (or two) and spend lakhs of rupees to prepare for CAT, but don’t spend even 10% of that time, effort and resource on preparing for the PI process. That’s wrong. Do not loose out, do not fumble, in this last but most critical and deciding step of what has been a long, tough and expensive journey so far. Remember, the difference between ordinary and extraordinary is the ‘extra’.

Remember, competition does not end with the CAT, it starts with the CAT!

• PI is a tough nut to crack, due to its unpredictable, individualised nature. Many MBA candidates prepare well for this round, go through requisite current affairs, journals, business magazines and newspaper editorials, but fail to make it to their dream institute. Knowledge is not enough – you need the right approach and the right mentor to help you reach your goal. All your hard-work will be fruitful only IF you can convert the interview call into an admission offer. We will handhold and mentor you to achieve that ‘IIM Dream’.

• Prof. Abhishek Mishra (ex IIM-A) and Prof. Swati Mishra (ex IIM-L) would like to invite you to the world’s most sophisticated and powerful PI preparation program. Their four-step program has been curated by and will be delivered by former faculty members of IIM-Ahmedabad, IIM-Lucknow, MDI, and alumnus of Harvard University, MIT (USA), University of Cambridge, Oxford University, Carnegie-Mellon, Duke University, University of Michigan, London School of Economics etc.

• In the words of Prof. Abhishek Mishra, “Dr. Swati and I have been a part of the interview process of IIMs for many years and have participated in countless interviews. We realised that there is striking lack of learned guidance and focused preparation. The institutes that are offering interview preparation largely have online mass production delivery model with readymade questions and answers – the problem is that everyone receives the same inputs. In fact, during interviews a joke amongst professors is “guess which coaching institute or website the interviewee has prepared from” and mostly the answer is right because they all have similar answers. Quality inputs, informed training, rigorous effort and personalised mentoring and feedback for improvement is missing. Cookie cutter and made-up answers which coaching centers and online classes teach you, will not cut it. Remember, everyone has access to internet!!

• Professors who sit on interview panels at IIMs are looking for originality and are making continuous assessments of your fit with the institute, course, career and the life you want to make. You need to differentiate yourself from the rest. PI tests Attitude. Your aptitude has already been tested by CAT. We are no longer guided by or impressed by your CAT scores – that’s your gatepass to the interview”.

• Prof. Swati adds: “What differentiates us from others is that we have been a part of the fraternity that has undertaken numerous GDs, WATs and PIs at IIM and many other leading MBA colleges not just in India, but around the world. We have a precise understanding of what an interviewer is looking for. Many coaching centers have mushroomed in the country – these include offline as well as online centers, some of which are run by ex-IIM students. But one must understand that the students have faced the interview only once and have had only one experience with the process. How can someone guide you based on just one experience and that to on something which is very background specific and individualised? Its like watching a movie – only once in their lifetime – and then trying to teach everyone else how to make a movie”.

About the Program

We have developed a proprietary four-step in-depth Personal Interview Process preparation program.

• 1: Training

  Start with an orientation session for students who have received their CAT score. This session is followed by preparatory session on “How to Crack the IIM Interview”, which would be delivered by former IIM faculty members, senior industry experts and our panel experts from top universities around the world. On the first day, students get to learn from our expert panel who have interviewed thousands of students for such admissions. For any other course, a session of this stature and expertise would typically be enough; however, our team is dedicated towards walking with you till the last mile. We don’t leave it at just teaching, training and counselling. We do that and then we do the next step. We put Learning to Action.

• 2: Mock interviews

  On the second day, students will get a personalised, realistic interview panel, exactly like the panel they will face in an IIM interview, and will appear for an in-person 30-minute (max) interview conducted by former IIM faculty members, in an actual IIM-like setting. The panel will comprise experts who will ask you questions specially crafted for you and which if they were sitting in the interview panel at an IIM, they would have asked you. Remember the faculty expert on the panel has been in real life interviews for hundreds of students. We take this step very seriously. We have a proprietary methodology which comprises of hundreds of variables and attributes that we match to your strengths, weaknesses and your CV before we even meet you in person. This is a huge extra effort that we put in as part of the interviewing panel. We believe in going the extra mile to ensure your success. After all, if we don’t prepare well, we can’t coach and mentor you well. A good teacher always prepares harder than the students!

• 3: Debriefing

  This is the most critical step. This is where we add maximum value to your candidature. We have put in advance effort before interviewing you, we have taught you what to do, we have interviewed you in detail, now is the time for feedback. Each interviewee will receive a detailed debriefing, spending as much time as is required for personalised analysis and guidance. All interviews will be video recorded, analysed and candidates will get personalised face to face feedback where they can see for themselves what we are advising and why. This process is entirely one-on-one as we feel there is exceptional value in face-to-face mentoring and coaching. The debrief will enable us to scientifically identify your strengths and weaknesses, analyse your personality and attitude, and make bespoke/custom recommendations. This step will help channelize your thoughts and co-develop clarity on how to face an interviewer and answer questions correctly and confidently. We will also help you with personality-related aspects, body language, clothing, appearance, temperament, how to make a first impression and to comfortably sail through the entire interview. You will learn the skill of how to get the interviewer to ask the question that you want him to ask. We will even tell you how to answer a question that you have no clue of!

• 4: Continuous Support

  This step is our commitment to our students. Students will get continuous support from mentors. We value you as a person and would like to walk along with you on your journey to success. We understand this is not just an academic journey – its emotional and aspirational. We will always be welcoming if you want to come back and talk to us about anything in your life and career. It is not a contract that we are entering into, but a relationship. We are here to nurture. If you can’t visit us physically, though we would love to see you face-to-face, please feel free to get in touch via any online medium (WhatsApp/Skype/Google) and we will be happy to connect. On request, we can conduct follow-up mock interviews.

Through this effective four-step process, we believe we can plug the gap in the market that is created by conventional coaching set-ups and online courses as they fail to provide proper guidance and personalised solutions. Candidates who ace IIM interviews are always better prepared than the candidates who appear unprepared and are thus unable to convert an interview into admission. Let us help you ace the most important interview of your life!

To confirm your participation, fill this form and someone from our team will get in touch with you. For queries, email us at ask@gocareerguru.com or call us on +91 9721799999