Do you really need to have an MBA degree? Have enough reasons?
If yes – then please go through the following lines it might help you else STOP here.

     In Indian B-schools most of the students come directly from college and if you ask them the above question, you will hardly get a satisfactory answer. But before thinking about preparing for MBA one must be clear about this question. If you are thinking only about IIM then you need to have a strong mindset as during the course of your preparation you ought to come across many pessimistic views on your potential. There will be times when your Mock scores ‘ll be much less than your expectations, you need to have that much of internal motivations to overcome all sort of negative thoughts.

A word of caution - Even though most of coaching center  ‘ll say you can get into any top b school if you prepare hard. That’s true but not easy, rather I ll say it’s very tough.
All the questions in CAT come from what we have studied in up to class 12^th.  If during those long 12 years one couldn’t get all the basics of mathematics & English, I doubt that person ‘ll get correct all the fundamentals in just 6 months of preparation time. Joining a coaching center & preparing for CAT helps in recalling whatever knowledge one had gathered during school days. Coaching centers can’t teach you what one should have learnt in school. I am not trying to de-motivate any one but there is no need for giving a lot time in preparing for CAT and then not making it into a good b school. At the end of all you shouldn’t felling like a person who has lost both time & money.

        

There are many who appears CAT without knowing anything about it. You should not be one of them. If one get ZERO in CAT then that person ‘ll get more than 15 percentile (15% of the total applicant gets a negative marks). Before starting preparing for CAT , please gauge yourself and see if you fit for it. In order to decrease the number of applicant, IIMs have decided to set a minimum eligibility criteria of 50% in graduation but I think it ll be better if all the students decides themselves before applying for CAT. Such a large number of applications are not helping any one. You should remember - It’s not necessary to have an MBA degree to be successful in life. You can achieve anything in life with or without MBA. What about Mr. Ambani or Mr. Gate. J

Going back to our original question why MBA? Does it help?
The obvious answer is yes. It gives a greater flexibility in choosing career. First year in FMCG, second your in Insurance, third year in IT and finally you ll find media is the place where you want to be. With an MBA degree you have the option of choosing any company, any sector and so any career. No other degree ‘ll give you so much flexibility in choosing your career.
A good salary, I shouldn’t be writing anything on this. Much has been written in all sorts of Medias about this.
But the most important thing is what you learn in a good B school is the experience of the best brains of our country. In 2 years of time you can gather knowledge which you might not just by working in a company through out your life.

Do I have it in me?
The best person who can answer this question is you. Before thinking about CAT I‘ll suggest you to take any previous CAT paper and try to Solve it. If you get anything more than 25% of the total mark, then you should prepare for CAT. If it’s less than that then check where you went wrong, if you have done any calculation mistakes, couldn’t solve a problem in quant as you couldn’t remember the exact formula, or anything else which you think you can improve with preparation then you are in shape for CAT.

To be a good manager you need to have Sound communication and interpersonal skills. Communication skill doesn’t mean just fluency in English. You need to have the power to convince people. You should be capable of helping others understand your knowledge and ideas.  You must have leadership skills. All these qualities are checked during Group Discussion & Personal Interviews.

Once you have decided to go for CAT, you need to give your full effort. The first step is to join a coaching center , if that’s not possible for other commitments, and then join a correspondence course or at least collect all the materials of any good coaching center. For notes you can refer to our notes section. If you are not joining coaching center then first schedule your preparation timings. Depending upon your level of competency and the time left for your CAT exam, you should allocate a fix time table and strictly follow that.

Give regular tests published in our site (they are updated on a regular basis). Check with time your performance is improving, if not, you need to make certain changes in your method of preparation. Remain in touch with other seriously preparing students through our discussion forum. You can discuss al your problems here and also share your success method with others.
Two month before CAT, you need to join any good coaching center which conducts all India level of mock. Better if you chose one of TIME, CL, IMS, PT or CF. Finally , have faith on GOD , give your best try you‘ll definitely make it into a TOP B school.
Best of Luck.