Cracking CAT with a perfect 100 percentile is not a cakewalk but definitely, something which can be achieved with a lot of hard work, perseverance and a proper strategy. The road to all the IIM’s which are the most prestigious management institutes in the country is only through CAT.
With CAT 2018 nearly round the corner, it is crucial that all aspirants must start gearing up their preparation level at higher speed. In order to crack the CAT with a good percentile, it is very essential to follow a strict routine, set goals, and targets and keep utmost dedication towards the goal. Students must also have a proper timetable, regular practice of mock tests and a focused approach towards achieving the goal.
We bring you across to success story of one such person who scored a perfect 100 percentile in CAT 2017 with his strong determination and dedication. This will surely increase the enthusiasm of all young CAT aspirants aiming for CAT 2018 and will definitely help you in gearing up your preparation levels.
Yogesh Taneja who cracked CAT 2017 with a perfect 100 percentile hails from Haryana and was always interested in academics right since schooling. As per Yogesh, there is no success mantra to crack CAT as such but to him, it was the source to enter into the B-school of his choice. He says preparation for CAT shouldn’t act as a burden to aspirants but rather aspirants should enjoy the course more rather than only thinking about the end result. He believes that the biggest factor as per him to crack CAT is a long-term commitment and confidence throughout the journey.
Preparation Strategies
Coming to preparation strategy, he believes that every aspirant should devise their own strategy for preparation. But for him, there are various strategies that he adopted which helped him in acing the CAT. For Verbal Ability and Reading Comprehension, Yogesh used to practice RC every day and always maintained time to gain accuracy. He suggests that people should make it a habit to read a lot be it even random articles as reading more will increases both reading as well as analytical skills. This would also help in enhancing your vocabulary and he suggests that readers should also try to comprehend the meaning of words.
For quant’s section, the biggest and most crucial factor is practice. Even Yogesh emphasizes the fact that this section can be cleared only through a lot of practice. He suggests that aspirants should begin preparation for this section by focusing on getting the basics right first and then keep giving as many mock tests as possible. He suggests that it is not necessary to prepare everything in quants, and rather focus on some specific topics depending on your strong areas and then study and deeply and go to their advanced levels. This will help in increasing your accuracy and also speed.
Coming to the Data Interpretation and LR section, a lot of practice is needed as this is a section where one needs to rely a lot on your intuition and analytical ability. It is also a very time taking section compared to the other sections and hence, needs to be tackled cleverly.
Yogesh suggests that aspirants should begin by focusing on accuracy and learning to select the right set of questions to answer in this section so that no time gets wasted. He suggests that aspirants should start practicing the same until August and once they gain accuracy gradually they can keep increasing the number of questions to be practiced to increase speed.
Mock Tests
Mock tests are considered to be the most integral part of CAT preparation. This is a thing which no CAT aspirant can evade from. Even Yogesh attempted a lot of mock tests as a part of his CAT preparation journey. Mock tests make the aspirants acquainted with the real-time experience of the actual exam and also help them in solving questions within the given stipulated time.
Yogesh bits of advice that aspirants should ideally be attempting 4-5 mock tests a month for now, and as time increases the main focus should be towards increasing these mock tests as time moves ahead. Yogesh used to give mock tests daily when CAT was just around the corner. Apart from attempting the mock tests, he suggests the important key which one should remember is “Analysis of the mock tests”.
Analysing mock tests is very crucial as it helps in gauging the performance levels and helps you in knowing where you stand. He believes mock tests are fruitless unless and until the analysis of these tests is done.
Time Management
Yogesh followed a very strict time-management strategy in order to crack CAT. It was his biggest priority during his preparation which he started right from the third year of his college. He used to set up weekly targets and work upon them and analyze them. For CAT 2018 aspirants, he suggests that students should devise a proper study plan, assign some tasks and try and meet those goals. This boosts up the confidence levels and as time starts approaching you would be more focused and determined to reach the goal. Five months he believes is a great enough time to hit the CAT target.
Tackling Weaker Sections
Yogesh believes that he was never really weak on a particular section but, it is important to identify and analyze your strong and weak sections and work hard towards strengthening the weaker sections. He believes CAT is an examination which required a perfect balance on all the section if one is aiming to score a good percentile. You cannot focus on one section and ignore the rest of the sections. But if someone is lagging behind in some section, then you should focus on making it strong and then aim towards achieving a perfect balance between all sections.
These are some of the strategies that helped him achieve his goal. We are sure these will definitely motivate and encourage you to take a step ahead towards reaching your goals. All the best!
