Xth: 10 CGPA (CBSE)
XIIth: 95.40% (CBSE)
Undergrad: 76.25% (Engineer)
CAT Percentile: 99.59%ile
Work Experience: 3 months
WAT-PI Location: Delhi
WAT Topic: Will the advent of shorter entertainment-focused formats of cricket such as T20 degrade the value of the sport?
IIM Lucknow Interview Experience:
When I entered the room for the interview, one of the two professors in the panel excused himself to take a phone call. Meanwhile, the other gentleman asked me to sit. He went through my application form and commented that I had a great percentile.
Q: You would have gotten a call from IIM Calcutta as well, right? Why not go there?
A: I explained that I had not cleared the cutoff and did not get a call.
Q: That’s strange… So, you’ve done graduation from DTU. The person we just interviewed was also from DTU. Do you know each other? Did he give any pointers?
A: I said that I did know him and he had just told me to stay calm.
He chuckled and picked up the application form again.
Q. So, why do you want to do MBA after B.Tech? Why not continue in the same field?
A. I gave my prepared ‘Why MBA’ answer, essentially highlighting why the shift was important for my career aspirations and what I expected MBA to provide me with which M.Tech or M.S. could not.
[The key is to be confident, state reasons logically and present specific, personal reasons instead of a cooked-up generalized story]
Q. You worked at Tata Power Delhi. What did you do there?
A. I explained my job responsibilities and linked it to the project I had done there for a previous internship.
Q. Okay, so you have handled consumer complaint data. Tell me what kind of distribution is it?
A. I wasn’t totally sure but I described the Bell curve and told him I wasn’t sure about the exact form of distribution.
Q. How do you plot the data? Tell me about that. Walk me through the process.
A. I explained in detail how the consumer data was plotted but I reiterated I wasn’t sure about the name of the distribution.
The panelist prompted by naming Normal, Poisson and Chi-Square Distribution. I guessed it was Normal distribution but I told him it was a guess.
Meanwhile, the other panelist had returned to the room. The first panelist declared he was done and asked him to carry forward.
The other panelist kept reading my application form while asking me a series of questions.
Q. Do you know what is regression?
A. I told him I assumed he meant a technical term, not the English word and that I did not know.
Q. Okay. What about correlation? You must know probability at least?
A. I told him I did.
Q. Okay so tell me this. You are walking on the road outside. What is the probability that a car hits you while crossing?
A. I worked through and he cross-questioned me about the variables and how I solved it. I said I had used Bayes theorem and explained my reasoning. He seemed reasonably convinced after about fifteen minutes of discussion about the problem.
Q. Good, now tell me what is the probability that the ceiling above us falls on your head and you die?
A. I said I wasn’t sure about the exact number but it would be less than 50 percent.
Q. He asked if I was sure and if it shouldn’t be 50 percent and if less, then why.
A. I maintained it would be much less than 50 although, I could not give an exact number or work for it.
Then, he passed my form back to the other panelist. They did not have any further questions and bid me farewell. I was about to exit the room when they called me back. They said they had noticed only then that I was giving an interview for PGP-ABM.
Q. Why ABM at IIM Lucknow and why not PGP from some other IIM? You have a good percentile. You must have other calls. Do you want to join at any cost or what is it?
A. I explained why I felt ABM at IIM Lucknow would be beneficial and gave my prepared answer about why ABM and why IIM Lucknow over some other college.
After I finished, they both nodded and ended the interview.
About the Author:-
Aditya Raizada is currently pursuing MBA from IIM Lucknow. He graduated with a degree in Bachelors of Technology from Delhi Technological University (erstwhile DCE) in 2018. Prior to joining, he briefly worked in Tata Power Delhi Distribution Limited as an Executive Trainee. He will be interning with Bennett, Coleman and Company Limited in a Brand and Sales role. Currently, he is a part of the Media and Communication Cell at IIM Lucknow and keeping up with creative pursuits, is also working on writing his first novel.
Comments