Friday, September 23, 2016

Diversity and your B-School Application

Diversity and your B-School Application




               It was another 10 A.M. Tuesday morning class at the famed Vidya Hora Lecture theatre at the ISB, Hyderabad Campus. We were halfway into the “Responsible Leadership” lecture delivered by professor Harris Sondak with stellar credentials from University of Utah. The topic of study was “Ethical Dilemma at Work”. Well I am more of strategy and technology person and had very little clue what was going around me, especially given that I slept around 5 A.M. in the morning burdened by the deluge of cases, assignments, and resume pressure. Typical day at ISB! Prof Harris had asked us to write about a time when we had to face the problem of ethical dilemma at work. Just then Anurag had something to say about it. Anurag has worked as the captain of the ship for 17 years and a very interesting story to share. As the captain of the ship once he had to take the hard decision of whether to let his chief sailor go so that he attend his dying mother and cancel a voyage. Cancelling the voyage was going to be detrimental to the company’s fortune. Anurag might have ended with disciplinary action or worse. The sailor in question was a critical asset and the only specialist who could handle the ship. It was poignant story and as he narrated his state of mind in words, tears ran down his cheeks. How could he possibly deprive a son the chance to attend his mother in her last moments? If captain let him go, the entire journey would have been at risk. He took one of the most difficult decisions in his life. He let him go and with the help of a junior person took charge of the ship. One wrong decision and the lives and the fortunes of the company was gone. But he trusted himself and above everything else he knew what a mother means to someone. The class listened to him in pin drop silence. In the end there was a resounding applause for his brave decision and standing ovation. 
                     As I look back to this class, I remember nothing from what the professor taught us. I asked few of my class mates and they too didn’t remember what exactly was shared in class without looking at the notes. I am sure 10 years down the line none of the class notes will mater anyway. But I bet you, none of us will ever forget the look on the face of captain as tears escaped his eyes despite all his valiant efforts. None of us will forget the lesson that professor was trying to teach us – what it means to take decisions under pressure. I can’t think of a better way we could have learnt this and perhaps this is the reason why ISB and for that matter all top B-Schools around the world value such experiences.
         I am equally certain all of us on either side of the B-School admission process have had some experiences that have come to define who you really are. As B-School aspirants you must demonstrate these experiences. Come to think of it. What was more important? Captain’s story or the lesson that we all learnt. I say each of the element is equally important. A good story hooks the reader in and the lessons learnt define the things you value most in life. If you ask me, that’s what am admission committee member tries to see. Can you enrich the class not just by your expertise but also by your experiences in life? What values do you hold closest to your heart? Who or what are the things that have inspired you to achieve frontiers that make you different? Each one of us is different in some ways or another. It is exactly this difference that contributes to diversity in a B-School. Don’t think that just because you don’t belong to an exclusive group of people you offer no diversity. Your experiences make you diverse. And you must be a good story teller to bring out those experiences.
What are these experiences? Does it need to be a big bang process that you initiated. Not necessarily. It can be anything - A speech delivered at a regular toastmaster event that helped you overcome stage fear, a brave decision that you took at work that helped you gain the trust of your colleagues, how you organized your soccer team to face a daunting opposition – anything! Write it like you mean it. Any good essay is first written from heart and then cross checked for grammar. If it is botched up, trust me admission committee members can see through it. Write your own story.
There are three elements of a good essay.
1.    It is your story – I know what Lincoln did. I want to know what you did.
2.    It is easy to follow – remember each experience is unique. Use the words that display true emotions. Don’t be bombastic. Use the words that correctly display your emotions. I don’t want to look up a dictionary to understand what you want to say.
3.    It has lessons that you truly value - What values do you bring to the class?
Follow the STAR framework: Situation – Task – Action – Results. It is easier to follow and makes an impression. Above all don’t forget to tie the lesson learnt to the question that the topic of the essay is trying to ask. Never answer the wrong question. Best of luck!


Saturday, March 12, 2016

How to Read an RC Passage on the GMAT.

Reading comprehension is one of the most challenging section on the GMAT. It is not just about reading a dense passage to answer a few questions; it is particularly challenging when you do that under exam pressure, given that you cannot skip a passage. In the following article I have tried to summarize the strategies employed by me and a few others I know who have done really well on this section of the test that is- scored in excess of 700 on the test. In addition to that I have tried to incorporate expert views on reading actively, primarily sourced from "MyCollegeSuccessStory.com" and from the works of
Katharine Hansen.

To quote her on active reading,

"Experts agree that active reading techniques result in improved comprehension and retention. If you are not actively engaged in reading, you won't learn or retain as much. 
It's natural to simply read a chapter from beginning to end, but it's not the most effective way to read, learn, and understand the content you're reading.
Most experts recommend active or critical reading. If you're not doing something to be actively engaged in your reading, you will probably find that you have to re-read before the test, maybe even multiple times. You won't learn or retain much if you simply read."

          The first and the foremost thing to understand about the RC section is that the questions are of limited genre and can be neatly classified as follows

a)  Detail Questions - or as Byju's classes call it- Data based Questions: These are the simplest types of questions and is based on the passage with little or no inference required.
For Example, the questions staring with ,
 "According to the author,…."
"According to the passage…"
b. Detail cum Inference Questions - These questions require you to make an inference about an issue raised in the passage. But the questions are localized- they are from a particular line in the passage or may be more than one line but all from a specific paragraph and not the passage on the whole.  
   
For Example, the questions staring with,
 "What does the author suggest when……”
"What can you infer from…"
"What does the author mean/imply in the…"

Two things worth noting here are-
1.       The question is not from the passage on the whole but must be answered based on the context of a particular paragraph within the passage. Let me elaborate on this point a little. It may happen that the author introduces an idea in the first paragraph, gives an opinion supporting the idea in the second and ends up negating the idea and comes up with a new idea in the fourth. A inference question may be asked from the second paragraph in which the author actually writes in favor of the original idea. In the answer choices, choices that oppose the idea is wrong. You can easily eliminate those answers.

2.       There is a difference between what the author implies and what you infer in terms of scope. The author's implications are severely limited to the scope of the passage or the paragraph, while your implications enjoy the freedom of a broader scope.

c)     Pure Inference Questions- These are the most difficult types yet not so frequently asked on the GMAT. But if you are raking in scores above 40-41 in VA, be prepared. These questions cover broader scopes and are not limited to a particular line on the passage. In fact you must clearly understand what the author intends to imply in the passage and make an inference based on that trail of idea or opinion.

For Example, the questions staring with,
 "What can be the Topic of the passage…."
"What can be the author's response to a situation in which…

d)  Structure questions - Based on how the passage is structured.
e)   Tone questions -  These are the easier ones on the GMAT RC sections and you can always expect to find one in the 12 odd questions that are devoted to test the reading skills of  a test taker. I have covered this section in one of my blogs and will post a blog in the tone question soon.
f)    Main theme/central idea - This is the most important of all the questions as you are sure to get one or two main idea questions from each RC passage.

Surprisingly all the questions that you can ever expect to find on the GMAT comes under one of these categories. This is one of the benefits of standardised test you may say. Further, you can have a strategy to deal with each of the types separately and efficiently. My own experience and the experiences of those who have taken the tests using these strategies indicate that you can gain an accuracy in excess of 80% with these highly mathematical approach to RC. However this is a topic for another day and probably the third and final step to solving a RC passage based questions. The first and the foremost step is to actually read the passage. Now to be able to read a 3-4 paragraph passage and answer these 5 different types of questions using a separate methodology for each of them, all in under 7 minutes, requires not only skill but practice to be comfortable with them. And the process starts with reading the material in such a way that you achieve the following objectives-

1.    Understand the overall gist of the passage
2.    Understand the flow of the passage
3.   Be able to go to the exact section of the passage from which a question is asked-      remember you cannot underline and you, in all probability, will have to reread the section  from which the question has been asked.


 Therefore the onus is on us to really read the passage quickly and maximise your understanding of it. With this background let us try and understand what makes an efficient reading strategy.


1.     Active reading- this is one of most important rule to reading a passage. As Dr Katherine Hansen points out, it improves comprehension and retention. But another hidden advantage is that it actually improves your reading speed. This observation may be contrary to what most of us may have come to understand. But it is in fact true. Reading actively involves engaging with the passage. The first step to reading actively is that you consciously tell yourself that-"Hey this is a wonderful passage and I am going to understand this" instead of saying, "What the hell, why am I supposed to read about some obscure scientific discovery in the neuron activity". You might say that this is bound to increase your words per minute. Well here is the thing. By the time you are done with first passage you will be able to predict what the next passage may be or the way a passage is structured. Take for instance a passage that begins the following lines

"For long neuroscientists have hypothesised that … ".

If you are engaged with the passage or reading actively, this line should immediately trigger the following response from you- Oh the author is talking about something that has been understood in a form that has stood for a long time. Probably he is going to present the reasons for the hypothesis. Then the argument may move towards negating the findings or the inference of the finding followed by proposing a new idea or supporting the idea with fresh evidence. Believe me most of the time a typical GMAT passage falls into the structure outlined. (It should be clear even from the first para that the tone of the passage is analytical/argumentative). Now that you know the flow you can read faster by expecting what is going to come next. What if the passage doesn’t follow the pattern. Well no problem. You again see clearly that the author is deviating from what you were expecting. This will help you decode the twists and turns of the passage. If you can understand the flow, the deviations, and figure out where the author says what, believe me half the battle is won.

This, in my humble opinion, is the essence of good reading skills. You must anticipate what comes next. If you can do that your speed will increase and comprehension will be improved.

2.     Knowing what you can skim through - This is covered extensively in the Byju's reading principles by the brilliant, and effervescent Santosh derived largely from the seminal work of Norman Levis in his famous book "Reading faster and better". I recommend anyone starting with his or her preparations for the test to go through that book at least once. It is bound to be a truly transformational experience. Let me provide the gist of the book for completeness of this blog. Understand what the author intends to say , don’t worry about the background details. For example, in the passage introduced above, what the neuroscientists have hypothesised from long isn't as important as what the author wants to conclude. The main theme is the most important part, arriving quickly at it is the most important objective of reading a passage in question. Now how is that connected with better reading principles, don’t we know that already? To answer that let us put on the author's shoes. If you wanted to present an idea, how will you go about it? The most obvious choices are- you state your idea and then go on to justify it or you start with background information, state existing theory and then arrive at your point. So by concentrating on the author's main idea you can skim through the rest of the passage.
3.     Philosophical Passages - But this is not an easy strategy especially when you are dealing with difficult passages with intricate logic such as those in philosophical passages. Although they follow the same overall idea, understanding the trail of thought in itself is a challenge. But there is something really interesting about the philosophy passages. The whole idea of a paragraph in a philosophical passage is, more often than not, written in pain simple English! Concentrating on reading principles elucidated in the norman lewis books and/or following Byju's reading strategy, you can start loving the philosophical passages. The most important tenets of the principles are-
a) In a cause an effect sentences - concentrate on the effect, forget the cause (see how we just ignored a good part of the sentence in favor of the crux)
b) Look for the structure words such as However, Hence, Yet, but, so, etc. You normally expect the author to make a serious point there. These words are there for a reason and they indicate either emphasis (So, Hence) or change of track (but,yet,etc)


So, the idea that you should get from the discussion is that the whole passage can be treated mathematically. The way to answer the questions is once again very methodical and mathematical. However that is a topic for another day. Cheers!

Sunday, December 27, 2015

Road to ISB..(and Carnegie Mellon)

Road to ISB..(and Carnegie Mellon)

Beyond the GMAT hype

                It’s interesting to think that I have come a long way in a year or so when I truly began my preparation for GMAT. Back then I used to think (as I am sure most of us think) that GMAT score is the road to a great school. Little did I realize that every step beyond the GMAT hype will be a challenge in itself. I mean, come to think of it. When you study for the GMAT, you are competing with yourself or, as I liked to think, trying to outsmart the famed GMAT algorithm. But once you are done with the GMAT, you compete with otherswho come with stellar profiles and very similar GMAT score. Just to make sure all of us are on the same page. You apply to schools after you have taken your  GMAT test. The schools may accept or reject your application. If accepted, you will be called for an interview. Post interview  you may be accepted or rejected. So what separates a good prospect from a great prospect for a school. Believe it or not the GMAT score is just a part of your entire profile that the school considers. There is a lot more to it. Your extracurricular participations, your on the job achievements, and your participation in the society really stands to differentiate you from a sea of applicants with similar profiles. If you have had a stellar career growth, your chances of being accepted increase. As I come from a PSU background, my chances of an extraordinary or even anything but ordinary was zero by hundred. So I had to perform well within my role to differentiate myself from others coming with a similar profile. The fact that my work involves not just a lot of mathematics but also decision making helped. You need to excel, or at least perform better than a rub of the mill guy(or girl), to carve out a space for yourself. This is especially true I believe for people coming from an IT background. Your engagement with society matters too in the eyes of Adcom and also for your overall development. While you are preparing for the test, don’t confine yourself to the luxury of the four walls of your room. Go out, get involved - An NGO or any other organization that appeals to you. Another piece of advice that I would like to give to those eying a seat at the most coveted colleges in the world is invest in yourself. Develop a personal brand that shows that you really takes yourself very seriously. For example, take the online courses from Coursera, Udemy, etc. to learn stuffs that you would want to do or are interested in. I took a few courses and they asked me about it during my interviews! It worked I guess. Most importantly get your basic application right. The essays, the goals, plan A and even plan B after an MBA. I was fortunate to work with some really good people in this regard. Perhaps the best help I received was prior to my interview at the Tepper School of Business from the guys at interviewbay. The mock interview with a Harvard graduate,Brad, was an eye opener in many ways. I did not have the luxury to invest in those big consultants that claim to virtually guarantee you a place in the schools, so I guess I had to play it smart. In the end, I was interviewed by the Tepper School of Business, ISB and IIM B. Not a bad return on investment I would say. I got into Tepper and ISB. I don’t know about IIM B. Probably they dinged me; I am not sure. And for very personal reasons I chose to attend ISB in 2016.
But having said all that, I will not like to take anything away from the importance of GMAT- especially for Indians because on an average we score quite high. So a fairly good GMAT score becomes a given for us. So for all those aspiring to be in that class of 20XX photograph in your dream school work on your profiles as well as GMAT. Best of luck.
Anyone who would like to reach out, I will be happy to help you until I begin the chapter 2 of my life. I can be reached on ranjan.rahul885@gmail.com.

Edit: It turns out that IIM didn't ding me after all! What an irony! I tried my hand at CAT a couple of times. Needless to say, i performed hopelessly. Probably I was under a lot of pressure to perform. And when I least needed it, they turn up with an offer- EPGP nonetheless.


Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Averages and Mixtures Demystified - Road to GMAT Q51

Averages and Mixtures Demystified

Most of us must have at least once in our lives spent some time on the see-saw with our friends. How about using them to solve the problems of Mixtures and Alligation, and Averages. Yes, you heard it right. Math is fun after all. Let us rewind our lives to the point when we used to have fun on the seesaws.



I was quite skinny when I was young (don’t ask me what I look like nowJ). Consequently, I had to use the long handle to balance the “normal” guy on the other side.


Fig

·       
In fig 1,

 a)   A is heavier than B (that’s me).
 b)   L1=L2

Clearly the see-saw is unbalanced.  In order to balance the seesaw. Either B must go further away from the support or fulcrum, which essentially means going out the frame, or A must come closer to fulcrum. See fig 2. 



What is the underlying physics behind this? The equation that governs where one needs to sit in order to balance the seesaw about the support is
(a)  x (L1) = (b)  x  (L2)…………….  Eq (1)
Where
     A, B= weights of A and B respectively
     L1 and L2= Distance of A and B from the fulcrum. 
Now, you can think of the fulcrum or the support as the point where the average weights of A and B is balanced. Let’s call the average weight as ‘M’. If either the length or the weight of our guy A is increased. The equilibrium is disturbed. B must move further from M to maintain M at the same place, or increase his weight in some way to maintain Eq 1.

Now what does this all have to do with averages or mixtures?

Well, we can use Eq 1 and its implications to solve problems of averages and mixtures. Let’s focus on averages first.


    Consider this problem

Q1.) What is the average weight of a fruit bag containing 1 orange of 100gms and 1 apple of 200gms? (Consider the weight of the bag negligible)

It is easy to solve average M= (100+200) /2 = 150gms 
Let us use the graphical implications of the problem. M=150;






And the equation= L1xA=L2xB
                                        Or
                                   50x1=50x2;
What if we didn’t know the value of M? can we still use Eq 1. Well that’s the plan!
                                           (M-150)x1= (200-M)x1
=> 2M=300
=>   M=150


Are we making matters difficult for ourselves? No, we are making it easier. How? Let’s me add complications to the question we just discussed.

Q2.) What is the average weight of a fruit bag containing 10 orange of 100gms and 5 apple of 200gms? (Consider the weight of the bag negligible)

Using Eq 1.  



(Why 200-M and not M-100 you may ask? Well Average can’t be greater than the maximum value of an individual element)
  ð  (M-100)x10= (200-M)x5
  ð  15M=2000
  ð  M=133.33

Now, how do we use this to solve slightly difficult problems? Let’s take a slightly difficult problem.

Q3)  A batsman scores with an average of 49 runs in 99 innings. How many should he score in his 100th match to take his career average to 50 runs?




To solve this question let us introduce two more variables in place of 100gms and 200gms used in Q2 and Q3. Let’s call them n1 and n2

So
L1=M-n1
L2=n2-M
The eq1 becomes
L1xA=L2xB
=>            (M-n1)x A = (n2-M)xB



And by extension

………………eq2

……………………………………. using the identity – [a/b]=[c/d] =[(a+c)/(b+d)]

Let us look at the question now armed with eq




So we have by virtue of Eq 2



Solving, you can get n2=149;
Another way to look at this is the extra runs, n2-49, has to be distributed among all the innings (99+1) in such a way that that the average is 50. So he needs 1 more run for each of his 99 innings to compensate for the average. And 50 more in the last inning to maintain the average. Or he needs to score
                              99 +50 =149.
There are many variants of Eq 2 that you may find in literature. However, I like to write them down in a full equation and solve.

Mixtures

How can we use the concept developed for averages in mixtures problems? Well they are not much different to be honest.

Let’s look at a 600 level (according to GMATClub) problem to understand this

Q1) Krisp cereal is 10% sugar by weight. Brano cereal is 2% sugar by weight. If you wanted to make the mixture 4% sugar by weight what should the ratio of Krisp to Brano.

so we have 



Or 6/A=2/B
A/B = 3:1

Note- An interesting thing to note here is that, if A=B, then the average will be 6%. But in the question the average is 4%. 4% is closer to n1 or 2%. So A must be greater than B to balance out. Recall the see-saw, where to counter my heavier friend I needed a longer handle (or Torque for the engineers out there!). Consequently A/B will be greater than 1. If the question asked us to find the ratio if the average % was 8% (closer to n2). Then A/B would have been less than 1. Actually A/B = 1:3. (You can imagine the central point or the strength of the solution as the center or the fulcrum of the see-saw and imagine the equilibrium conditions). This is a very important observation. If a question like this appears on the test. Chances are that you will get half of the ratios less than one and half greater than one. You can eliminate half of the options using this simple analysis. Saves time! J


Let’s take a 700 level question
Q2) A tank holds x gallons of a saltwater solution that is 20% salt by volume. One Fourth of the water is evaporated, leaving all of the salt. When 10 Gallons of water and 20 gallons of salt are added, the resulting mixture is 33 1/3 % salt by volume. What is the value of x?

A. 37.5
B. 75
C. 100
D. 150
E. 175

                                 20% salt implies that = 20 units salt and 80 units water. If ¼ of water evaporates, that is (80/4=) 20 units of water is lost. (Don’t try to evaporate salt please J) You are level with 60 units water. So new strength of the solution after evaporation= 20/ (20 + 60) 0r Y gallons of 1/4 (25%) strength. (It is no longer X gallons. Since part of the water evaporated, right). 
                                 10 gallons of water + 20 gallons of salt = 30 gallons of 2/3 (66.67 %) strength.
So our figure becomes



Or
Y= 120 gallons

So we have 1/4 (25%) strength 120 gallons solution.
Or 30 gallon of salt and 90 gallon water. But 90 gallon is 3/4 of water before evaporation. Or the total water before evaporation
90*4/3=120

So, X= 150 



Note that the question can be solved differently in many ways. One of them is by pure algebra.
x= salt + water
  = 0.2x + 0.8x
When 1/4 of 0.8x evaporates. You are left with 0.6x
Adding 10 gallons of water and 20 gallons of salt. New solution becomes



Solving, X=150

The Idea is to introduce the concept using a fun filled yet powerful analogy, so that the questions can be solved intuitively. Besides, it is a very good way to visualize the problem.
CheersJ

I can be reached on ranjan.rahul885@gmail.com