Subjects You Need to Study to Crack the MBA Entrance Examination

Masters in business administration (MBA) happens to be one of the most acclaimed and sought-after programs not only in India but abroad as well. If you are aspiring to be part of this program you have to crack some not-so-easy (read challenging) entrance exams. While preparing you would need to deal with not only the enormity of the syllabus and varied level of questions but also the competition that comes along. In this particular article, we will walk across all the general subjects required to prepare for MBA entrance exams.

MBA Entrance Exam Layout

Specific exam patterns vary with different MBA entrance exams like CAT (Common Admission Test), MAT (Management Aptitude Test), XAT (Xavier’s Aptitude Test), SNAP (Symbiosis National Aptitude Online Test), MAH-CET (Maharashtra Common Entrance Test), and many more. Now is the time I emphasize the need of choosing the right MBA entrance exam because you can’t catch (and crack) them all. And how do you decide? You decide by weighing factors like suitability of exam pattern, preference of college, your comfort with the subjects, and difficulty level of the particular entrance exam.

However, if we have to come up with a general layout considering all the entrance exams it would include the following subjects-

1. Verbal Ability
2. Reasoning Ability
3. Quantitative Aptitude
4. General Knowledge and General Awareness

I feel a good understanding of the subjects goes a long way not just for your exams but for your MBA program as well. Wondering Why? Here are the details.

Verbal Ability

This section deals with English Language handling and comprehension skills. If you go through the number of questions that come from verbal ability, which you definitely should, you will find an average 1/3rd weightage of this section.

Verbal Ability has three divisions- Vocabulary, English Grammar, and Reading Comprehension. Questions in VA range from finding out the error in the sentences, filling in the blanks in paragraphs, answering comprehension-based questions, etc.

Honestly, the way you deal with VA is quite relative to how comfortable you are with english usage, vocabulary, and comprehension.

• Start with an age-old foolproof method - reading the newspaper (The Hindu, Indian Express, Times of India) daily and noting down new words. Make this list your daily task, to add every new word, and synonym you come across.
• Work on your reading speed and increase text retention and understanding along.
• Study the grammar rules and increase daily interaction in English in the form of reading books & blogs, watching movies.
• Practice questions and reading comprehension, this will enhance accuracy and understanding of the topics covered.

Reasoning Ability

This section is essentially about testing your logical and analytical aptitude. It is all about thinking on your feet quickly and accurately. It is one of the most testing subjects as the pre-prepared tricks do not always work. The topics that should be covered are as follows-

Now, how should we tackle this subject?

• A prodigious resource is previous year questions and mock question papers. But before that, you need to do your basics. So, cover your basic knowledge of topics and commence with a basic level of questions.
• The practice is actually what is going to make you perfect here. Identification of key Information and Patterns is facilitated as we go on to solve more questions.
• Learn and understand the terminology associated with topics to make it easier for you to comprehend the questions.
• Train your mind to think beyond the box by solving puzzles, Sudoku, etc,

Quantitative Aptitude

This section assesses the mathematical ability of the aspirant. It focuses on checking their ease and familiarity with numbers and numerical operations. Acing Quantitative Aptitude involves double the rigor as it is calculation-centric and formula-driven. Furthermore, you would find it more exigent to do it accurately in a limited time.

The syllabus generally revolves around the following topics-

For the above-stated reasons, QA is feared famously. Divide your prep into three stages- Perfect the basics, revise and repeat the formulas, and master speed with accuracy.

Other things to keep in mind are-

• Focus on mental maths to be less dependent on calculators.
• To avoid negative marking, don’t do questions that you are not sure of.
• Solving questions once is not enough. Practice the same set of questions numerous times.

General Knowledge And General Awareness

Exams like XAT, IIFT, CMAT, MAT, etc. have a General Knowledge Section, which is not only significant to get shortlisted but comes in handy for your interviews as well.

Various MBA exams focus and accordingly assemble their GK questions in their respective GK section. As everything under the sun is covered in the GK section preparation it is important to refer to topics to be covered from the syllabus of exams you plan to sit for. The best way to round up the subject is to be consistent with newspapers and revise with monthly current affairs magazines and videos.

As of now, you must be feeling there is a lot to do. Of course, there is, but I feel and I know also this is not only for the short run of your entrance exams. All this prep brings you at par with desired skills and knowledge that will further facilitate you in your MBA program, thus you must do all this to reap the long-term benefits too.