Vivek Agarwal scored 93.4 percentile in CAT 2023 and is creating this page as a reference for future applicants who will clear the CAT exam or any other major exam in the future and want to prepare for GD PI or WAT but do not have many resources or a network that can help them prepare like Vivek does.
Vivek says, “I didn’t have many resources, but I prepared with whatever information I could find online. Later, I realized that applicants like me share their interview experiences in groups, and edtech giants use them to discern the trends of questions asked in interviews. Hence, I decided to share those experiences on this website, which could help you understand the pattern of questions asked in interviews and design your preparation plan accordingly. One request: if you find this helpful, please consider sharing the website and refrain from copying and sharing it elsewhere.
Keep these five things in your hand, as what experience says:
- Current affairs (Refer it through business and economics)
- Knowledge about your state and city. (videos on internet)
- Civics (politics) and position holders name
- Academics
- General HR
Click here to explore those interviews
The MBA interview, a pivotal moment in the application process, serves as a platform for candidates to showcase their potential beyond their written credentials. It’s a dynamic exchange where intellect, ambition, and personality intertwine. Candidates must articulate their career aspirations, demonstrate a deep understanding of their chosen field, and convey how an MBA aligns with their goals. Beyond the academic and professional journey, interviewers often seek glimpses of leadership, adaptability, and problem-solving skills. The interview is not just about answering questions but also about forging a connection, presenting oneself authentically, and leaving a lasting impression that distinguishes the candidate from the rest.
Page 6
The interview experience is listed down:
1.IIM Shillong Interview – Mumbai
Slot 1 pm (Started at 2.20)
Time – 20-25 min
Two male panelists around 40 years age
Extempore – Fade away
P1 – You are working in BEL, so with this budget your industry should be happy or sad?
Me – Answered regarding the percentage of defence budget as compared to GDP and it’s same almost, but new orders are expected
P1 – Tell in specific about the recent budgets and what benefit it is giving to defence industry
Me – Earlier a lot of parts were imported, which we are making in house , owing to Make in India project.
P1 (interrupting) – But that’s only a fancy name
Me – Every PSU undergoes rating every year where a significant point is allocated for indigenization
P1 – We are procuring Rafael from outside, why can’t we assemble it in India
Me – We can do that sir, by taking transfer of technology from them we can assemble in India also
P1 – But what if they deny to give ToT?
Me – We have our own indigenous facility of research in DRDO and we already have made many systems, so it won’t be a great task for us.
P2 – So, you handle around 100 people. What is your daily activities in office?
Me – Explained my day at work
P2 – Are they your direct reportees?
Me – No, under me there are 4 supervisors and under them are labourers
P2 – What challenges do you face while handling them?
Me – Told about difference in mentality, high absentee rate
P2 – Don’t you think war is man-made to generate revenue for defence sector?
Me – No sir, war is very unfortunate thing and no-one sensible will pray for that
P2 – But in Russia – Ukraine War, Israel Palestine war, no-one is trying to stop
Me – I will differ sir but South Africa approached ICJ and order is already issued to stop such activities by Israel
P2 – But they are still continuing it right?
Me – Yes sir
P1 – I see you are a mechanical engineer, so how will you make a class 5 student understand gear?
Me – gave the basic purpose of gear to control speed and direction of car (forward and reverse)
P1 – But what is the need of gear? If I want to cruise at full speed only and control in times of need?
Me – Can’t recall sir
P1 – What is the use of Carnot engine if it doesn’t exist?
Me – It’s used as a reference to compare the efficiencies of other engine
P1 – Can Carnot engine have efficiency of 100%?
Me – It have the maximum efficiency for a specific source and sink temperature but not 100%
P1 – Why?
Me – As to transfer heat from source to sink, some energy is wasted.
P1 – I think that will be it Ranit. Thank you so much. Please have a toffee if you want.
Me – Thank you so much sir.
2.IIM Shillong Interview Experience (5th Feb, 2024)
CAT %ile : 97.86 %ile
Profile : 97/97/90
Workex : 13 months
P1 – female professor around 50s
P2 – male, extremely young – could have passed for a student
Extempore topic: Elephant in the room
P2 – Tell us about your profile
While I was answering, P1 was going through my entire folder and got ahold of my transcript
P1 – What did you do your engineering in?
Textile and Fibre Engineering
P1 – Wow and your elective courses are quite interesting! Do you remember anything from econometric methods.
Unfortunately, I can’t recall much ma’am
P1 – No worries, you have done a course on financial accounting and compliance for startups as well?
Ans – Went on to explain the course, how beneficial this understanding was for me, etc
P1 – If you are the VC and I am a startup founder, what are some of the things you would check?
Ans – Talked about business model, USP of product/service, market size, etc
P1 – Can you talk about current problems in terms of sustainability in the textile sector?
Ans – Answered in detail, they seemed a little impressed
P2 – What is your stance on fast fashion
Ans – Answered taking examples of H&M, Zara and some measures on using sustainable materials
P2 – What are some sustainable materials used?
Ans – Talked about natural fibres and advent of Khadi, talked a bit about reusable technical textiles. Apologized for not knowing the exact materials
P1 – No worries, how important is yarn selection?
Ans – Talked about chemical and physical properties and selction based on the properties of the final fabric (anti-wrinkle, anti-wicking, etc). Type of yarn selected affects the dyeing and chemical finishing method used, etc.
P2 – What was your role in your company? What was the type of engagement with team members? What was the hierarchy like? How did you conduct research? What were the expert agencies you connected with?
Answered as per my work experience in strategy consulting – this part went by quite easy
P1 – Why Bangladesh being a smaller country is before India in the apparel industry?
Ans – I answered why India’s products are not competitive in the market. What can be changed in terms of supply chain efficiency. “Unfortunately, I am not aware of the exact growth drivers of the apparel market in Bangladesh”
P1 – Okay, do you know anything about the Interim Budget with respect to textile sector?
Ans – I cannot recall anything specific to textile sector but I do know that there is increased allocation for domestic manufacturing and production under ‘make in india’ and also for the PM Mudra scheme which encourages startups by provision of low interest loans without collateral. This can increase startups in the domestic textile sector.
P1 started talking about my hobbies suddenly. You have many accolades in basketball. What is this certificate for IIT BHU for?
Ans – Explained
3.exp
1. Introduction
2. Asked 5 Indian classical dances and 5 western ( I mentioned that I have been dancing since I was 7)
3. A few questions on work ex
4. Marketing vs selling
5. Pakistan’s economic situation – this was weird because as soon as I mentioned that it has a huge debt, they cut me off and said okay that’s all
4.IIMShillong Transcript
5th Feb 2024 , Mumbai, Morning Slot
Profile:
10th: 93
12th: 88.4
BSc #Statistics: 81.25
MSc #ComputerScience: 86.4
Workex: 28 months in the #financialsector primarily in #analytics functions
CAT: 99.16
Extempore topic: Staying ahead of the curve
Talked about what the phrase means, how nokia became obsolete, how apple revolutionized the smartphone market with the iPhone, took more examples with the M1 chip and vision pro AR/VR headset. How India can implement it by adopting AI in all sectors. A personal example of how DBS asked it’s employees to embrace generative AI to improve efficiency.
2 Panelists, Both Male, 25 minutes duration, they let me complete most of my answers and the flow was more conversational
Q: Tell us something not mentioned in your form
Q: So you’re based in Mumbai but are originally from Kerala, what difference do you see in the politics of Kerala and Maharashtra?
Q: India was left leaning for a long period of time, why this recent preference change to right leaning parties?
Q: When AAP came in it disrupted the existing political scenario, if you were to take Kejriwal and put him in Kerala, what impact would it have?
Q: What do you think is lacking in Kerala?
Q: Kerala has high literacy rates but poorer infrastructure, Gujarat has lower literacy rates but better infrastructure, is education really necessary for progress then?
Q: You would have done object oriented programming in your masters, if you had to take a time machine to go back to the 80s when OOP was not popular and you had to market OOP to the general public through television what is the tagline you would come up with and how would you explain OOPs benefits to the general public?
Q: In Regression what is necessity of creating dummy variables when dealing with a categorical variable?
Q: You worked at Bharti AXA and were pursuing Actuarial Science, what was your reason for leaving it?
Q: Tell us about your roles at Citi Bank and DBS Bank?
Q: Were you involved in Collections or only marketing and analytics?
Q: What role are you looking to join post your MBA?
Q: Tell us 2 strengths and 2 weakness with examples from your work experience?
Q: What is your opinion on Crypto? Should it be regularised in India?
Thank you, have a toffee.
5.SPJIMR Interview Transcript –
C1 – Fresher for Finance, graduation in BMS (last year)
C2 – CA with 2 yrs workex in FP&A
C3 – Bcom with 1 yr experience in Payments
Panelists – 2 Female professors (P1,P2) and 1 Male Alumni (P3)
P1 – Be relaxed, we are going to have a conversation with some questions from our side. We have your forms, introduce yourselves in brief.
P2 – and please end the introduction with why MBA in brief
C2: Tell abt myself and answered to how MBA will compliment my skills as a CA.
C3: Tells abt himself and a Research paper that they
published on cash burning by startups
C1: Tells abt herself, likes to be a leader in several activities and how led the case scenario with Unacademy in her college – go into exams like CAT or professional trainings/courses
P3: asks C1 abt the case scenario and then what is the mkt size of both – exams or professional courses
C1: couldnt answer the mkt size properly but mentioned the size for courses is small but still they advised for it as already big players in CAT and tests business.
P1: Asks C2 abt Direct and Indirect taxes and give 2 examples of each
C2: couldnt accurately give the definition (Panelists laugh “not at all correct”) but gave 2 examples of each
P1: Asks C3 abt his research and what methods they used
C3: by Analysing such other real life startup cases but gave a tricky example – Jio in Telecom, panelists didnt co relate
P3: Asks C3 what could be the reasons of delayed payments (in his job)
C3: explained with giving the payment terms
P3: Asks C2 what will happen if there is a delay in payments
C2: Explains that the working capital will go down
P3: Do you know the concept of Negative WC? And where is it seen
C2: explain the Negative WC but couldnt give example (Ans FMCG)
P2: Asks C2 abt his job as FP&A and then abt Transfer Pricing basics
C2: Explains them
P2: Asks C1 abt her projects in college and which one was fav and why. C1 answers it
P3: Asks C1 abt recent news on Paytym, passes to others, C2 answers it
P2: Asks C3 to say his view on Wework as a startup burning cash in beginning
C3: explain the diff in India and US
P2: Asks C1 abt HDFC and HDFC BNK merger, C1 was just aware of it, passes to others and C2 explains it was reverse merger with synergy
P1: asks C3 why investors stay with cash burning and loss making startups
C3 couldnt convince her, passed to others, C2 explains the importance of valuation and talks abt methods of valuation
P1 asks C1 abt Operating profit and how is it important
C1 explains with giving some examples
Done
Panelists ask to leave
Verdict: C1 and C2 (BMS fresher female and CA) move to 2nd round
6.IIM-FABM Interview:
Place: IIM Ahmedabad
AWT- currently in India rising violence by friction show and movies and at the same time people who consume friction show say that , it reducing violence in society in several countries.
Q. Give argument and counter argument on that ?
Interview – P1: 1 male ( Veenit Virmani 45 +)
P2: 1 Female 35+ (Devasmita Chakravarty)
1. Asked meaning of my name and which place I belong to.
2. How I travelled to Ahmedabad and where you stay ?
3. Asked about how you related to the agriculture?
4. Which type of crops grown in your field and your area ( because I said that I did farming)
They asked a lot questions on chilli crop ( because I said)
5. Asked me what is your favourite subject but they didn’t asked questions on my favourite subject they asked plant pathology (He asked me what is the causal organism of karnal bunt disease I said I don’t remember at that time and he asked what is 1+1 I said 2 sir then he said you have learnt this in your primary school and it has remembered but you learn pathology in your graduation before 2 year and you didn’t remember)
6. Asked about my university and how they promote sustainable agriculture ?
7. Difference between Poisson distributors and binomial distribution of probability
8. Give me the situation where we can use median and where we can use mean in agriculture.
9. He asked about why not we grow gm crops why others countries do ( he asked me cross questions on it).
10. What is recession and Ashis you know that this time is recession is going so how will you pay your installment if you will not get placement offer ? (Around 5 minutes went on this)
Questions on ABM or other colleges which offers ABM course ?
Gave chocolate .
They both have asked me a lot questions and wanted to ans in deep.
IIM A
4th Feb
AWT : About communication apps like Telegram and WhatsApp , are they becoming a nuisance in life
Background-CA
Q : You are working in Mumbai , why here for interview
Q : What is your current role ?
Q: what is discount rate ? What would you use as discount rate ?
Q: what is cost of debt ? How would you compute ?
Q: If it is an old debt , what will
You take as Kd ?
Say a bond was issued 5 years back , would you still take interest as Kd ?
Q: How would you compute Ke? What’s the beta of your company ?
Q: What is capital budgeting ?
What is terminal value ?
Q: how would you compute ? Wrote it down ?
Q: what is it called ?
Q: have you heard about interest capitalisation ?
Why is it done ?
Q: what will happen to the interest value ?
Will it be depreciated ?
Q: what is DTL ? Is it a source of finance ?
Q : will you consider it in WACC ?
Q: Questions on my AWT
If you have to do a statistical survey how would you do
Q: tell me the hypothesis , objective and conclusion
Q: what would be the sample population , derive it from the total population
Q: how will you select population
Q : what questions will you ask ?
Q: how will you interpret results ?
He drew a non linear graph and asked me what it means
Q: asked about correlation , regression , statistical tools etc
Q: write the equation of the graph
Q: graph of log x
Q: do you know polynomial equation
Q: what is the recent news you read
Q: what was the issue on zee Sony
Q: do you have any question for us
Take a candy
7.IIM-L INTERVIEW EXPERIENCE:
5th Feb 2024
Slot – 12:30P.M
Profile – 10/69.6/8.91
CAT percentile – 99.2
Work ex – 2 years(July’23)
2 member in panel, both male.
Started around 2:50 P.M
WAT Topic :
Modern technology has made us less humane.
No HR questions.
Asked about my work and what I do.
Explain the project currently worked on.
Explain any past project you worked on.
Asked me about any Newspaper I follow.
Questions on current affairs like Budget and Politics.
Few questions from Acads including types of testing.
Total time – 12 min
Panel was super chill.
8. IMT Ghaziabad Interview Experience
I got the afternoon slot for WAT/PI. After doc verification, our WAT started at 1pm. The topic was “How can AI improve governance and public services”. We got 30 min to write 300 words for the topic.
After that, PI process started. There were 4 panels with 2 panelists in each, 1M and 1F. I got panel 3 and my interview started around 4pm.
F panelist started first.
Q. Where are you from? Who is the CM of the state? What is the population of your state?
Q. Today(3rd Feb), PM has announced to give Bharat Ratna, who is that person?
Q. What are your hobbies and your role model?
Q. Which is your dream company and why?
Q. Which book have you read recently and tell more about the author.
M Panelist followed then
Q. Why you didn’t go for the job after graduation in 2023?
I answered I was working in father’s business but he was not convinced.
Then, asked why you want to do MBA if in future you want to expand your business?
I answered but he kept repeating the same question again and was not convinced.
Overall, a pretty smooth experience.
9.IIM-L INTERVIEW EXPERIENCE:6th Feb 2024
Slot – 8:30AMCAT percentile – 98.13
Bcom FinanceWork ex – 4 years PSU (July’23)
2 member in panel, both male.
WAT Topic: something in the line of usefulness of degree in India
No Acad and workex questions
I had opted for both PGP and PGP- SM
Questioning more in the part of SM
Why SM?If u were the SM of your company what will you do and follow up questions related to the answer( i was not able to answer properly so any one who opted for SM should be prepared)
Asked about hobby and questions related to it I mentioned bike riding so he asked me about the cc of bike what it denotes? The price range of the kind of bikes I like?They asked about the share price of the company and should he buy it at that price?
He also asked what mutual fund I would suggest?
Total time – 12 min
Panel was chill.
10.6th February | WAT | IIM L : ethics in artificial intelligence
Click here to explore more interview experiences #7
