SET 2014 PI and WAT

Interview Fundamentals
The interview is a vital component of the second stage processes for entrance to many prominent institutes. An interview is a great way for a panel to assess candidates face-to-face. At the same time, candidates have far greater control over the process – and thus, the outcome – in an interview than in a written test.

Tips for the Interview
Let us also look at some general tips for interviews.

1. Entering the room

• Prior to entering the interview room, adjust your attire so that it falls well.
• Take permission before entering the room by saying, ‘May I come in Sir/Madam?’
• If the door was closed before you entered, make sure you shut the door behind you softly.
• Face the panel and greet them confidently.
• If the members of the interview board want to shake hands, then offer a firm grip, maintaining eye contact, and smile gently.
• Seek permission to sit down. If the interviewers are standing, wait for them to sit down before you sit.

2. Lead the interview
A good interviewee would be quick to settle and begin to lead the interviewers. Tell me about
yourself, this is a typical question that is very often asked at the beginning of an interview. Do
ensure that in your answer you mention salient points that attract the interviewer’s attention. This will ensure that you will possibly get questions related to those points. Thus, your preparation will bear fruit and you will have a far better chance to show yourself in a good light. Similarly, if you do not know the answer to a question, take the opportunity to also tell the panel about some other area that you are interested in. This will again give the panel the opportunity to move to an area that you are more comfortable with. For example, if you mention that cricket is your favourite sport, you may be asked about Don Bradman’s batting figures. If you do not know the answer to this, you can always mention that Tendulkar is your favourite cricketer (or any other depending on your choice). This will give the panel the chance to ask you about Tendulkar’s figures instead and will give you an additional opportunity to show your knowledge of the game.

3. Enthusiasm
The interviewer normally pays more attention if you display enthusiasm in whatever you say.
This enthusiasm comes across in the energetic way you put forward your ideas. You should maintain a cheerful disposition throughout the interview as a pleasant countenance holds
the interviewers’ interest.

4. Be brief
Brevity is the hallmark of a good communicator. It is recommended that you volunteer information, but this must be done in a lucid and to-the-point manner. An over-talkative or
verbose person is instantly disliked and misjudged.

5. Don’t bluff
If you do not know the answer to a question, it is better to acknowledge it, rather than trying
to bluff your way through it. The interviewer will respect your honesty. In our experience, the
interviewers immediately take a stance of grilling a candidate if they suspect him or her of
lying.

6. Humour
A little humour or wit thrown in the discussion occasionally enables the interviewer to look at
the pleasant side of your personality. If it does not come naturally do not contrive it. Injecting
humour in a situation doesn’t mean that you should keep telling jokes. It means to make a
passing comment that, perhaps, makes the interviewer smile.

7. Interviewer fatigue
Most of the interviews are conducted throughout the day which generally exhausts the
interviewers. A little humor as a starter can ease their fatigued minds and arouse their
waning interest. However, if you do not have the knack of humor, it is better not to get into it.

8. Be well-mannered
The way you conduct yourself reflects your upbringing and your culture. It is good to project
an air of humility. Over confidence is often misinterpreted by interviewers as arrogance and
/ or thoughtlessness. Polite statements are recommended.

9. Avoid slangs
During an interview, slangs will probably not be understood, and certainly not appreciated.
Your communication needs to be as formal and explicit as possible.

10. Be poised
Your posture during the interview is very important as it says a lot about your personality.
Mannerisms such as playing with your tie, theatrical gesticulations, shaking legs or sitting
with arms slung over back of adjoining chair must be avoided. It is vital to be conscious of
your posture and gesticulations as you are being noticed and judged all through the interview.

11. Ask questions if necessary
Many interviewees believe that an interview is a one-way street, the hapless ‘victim’ struggling
to be selected and the ‘all powerful’ being in whose hands lies the destiny of the interviewee.
It is a myth. You may ask a question/clarify information if necessary. It is quite in order and
much appreciated by interviewers.

12. Eye contact
You must maintain eye contact with the panel, all through the interview. This shows your self-confidence and honesty. Many interviewees, while answering, tend to look away. This conveys that you are concealing your own anxiety, fear and lack of confidence. Maintaining an eye contact is a difficult process. As the circumstances in an interview are different, the value of
eye contact is tremendous in making a positive impact.

13. Listen carefully
It is imperative for you to listen carefully to the questions being asked. If a question is not
clear you should seek clarification before making any statement. Seeking clarification is far
better than giving an irrelevant answer. It is very annoying for interviewers when an interviewee
misinterprets the questions, and answers by saying something which is irrelevant.

14. Be yourself
Many interviewees adopt a stance which is not their natural self. It is annoying for interviewers
when a candidate launches into an accent which he or she cannot sustain consistently
through the interview or adopt mannerisms that are inconsistent with his/her personality.
Interviewers appreciate a genuine person rather than somebody who tries to pretend.

15. Guard against:
A candidate must guard against the following:

• Poor physical projection
• Lack of courtesy and manners
• Being over aggressive
• Dishonesty
• Lack of enthusiasm
• Lack of eye contact
• Lack of knowledge
• Being non-punctual
• Extreme opinions
• Superficial answers
• Bluffing
• Casual approach

WAT
Ok, enough about speaking. Now let’s look at writing for a change. SET has introduced the writing test borrowing an idea from various B Schools to judge the way one can express their ideas in writing. So let us understand writing tasks and their purpose and look at some ways to excel at these.

Writing Tasks Demystified
As part of your writing task, you will be given a topic or a paragraph and asked to write about it in
about 200-300 words. In some cases, you may even be given a particular situation and asked to
write down what you would do in that situation (Situation Analysis). Such writing tasks may be
stand-alone (i.e. you only need to write on the given topic/ paragraph) or they may be just one
step in a larger process (for e.g. in some institutes, you may be asked to write your views on a
topic and then asked to participate in Group Discussion on the same topic). The topic of the
writing task  may be something related to current affairs, for e.g. a topic like “Rising Food
Prices: Rich man’s meat, Poor man’s poison” or “21st century: Time for India to take her rightful
place”. Or, the topic may be related to a social issue such as “Caste-ism: boon or bane”. The
topic may also be philosophical in nature, such as “Leisure is the peak of civilization”. Or the topic
may require a historical perspective, for e.g. “Colonialism was a boon for enslaved countries”.

Irrespective of the nature of the topic, your basic task remains the same. Read the given material and write on it in about 200 to 300 words. Typically, you will get about 20 minutes for the task. An ideal response should contain a logical analysis of the topic and the conclusion or solution/ remedy suggested should be meaningful/justifiable and should follow from the analysis.

How to approach a question at WAT
1. Organize your thoughts. Don’t just rush in and start writing the moment you finish reading a
topic. Instead take a few minutes to organize your thoughts. Decide what the topic
requires you to focus on and therefore, what should be the main points that you cover. Decide how you wish to introduce the topic. For judgmental write ups, decide which way you want to lean or if you wish to be neutral.
2. Brain-storm. Start adding more points, examples, facts, etc. in order to flesh out your material
and drive home your points. Add to the basic points that you thought of the moment you saw
the topic. Your points should logically add up and build towards your conclusion.
3. Create a framework. Mentally, mark out the road map, beginning
with the introduction, the main idea, the supporting ideas and finally ending with the
conclusion. This will form the skeleton for your write up, so to speak.
4. Now, complete the write up itself. Only after you have finished planning out and
are satisfied with what it looks like, should you actually start writing it down.
5. Revisit, check, edit, submit. Ensure that your write up is free of errors, whether grammatical,typographical or logical