A graduation degree offers minimal scope when it comes to salary or even job prospects. Having a professional course or certification is a must and the need of the hour, especially when it comes to getting into management.

Before starting with the management courses such as PGDM or MBA, you have to attempt competitive exams for these courses.

Today’s article covers that aspect for you as we share with you a list of competitive exams students must attempt to get admission for PGDM OR MBA.

List Of Competitive Exams For PGDM/ MBA

The mandatory requirement of B- schools in India along with graduation is appearing for competitive exams. There are 6 nationalized competitive exams that are approved by AICTE for PGDM or MBA.

GMAT, CAT, MAT, ATMA, NMAT, XAT, and CMAT are the 6 nationalized competitive exams.

CAT, MAT, GMAT, XAT, MBA are the widely accepted competitive exams across a larger range of B-schools across India and all the details of these competitive exams are mentioned below.

CAT

Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) administers the Common Admission Test (CAT). Registration for this exam is done online, and it has about 400 locations.

CAT started in 1950, and its online admission exam was in 2009.   For CAT exams, students must attempt 100 multiple-choice questions within 180 minutes. Because of the pandemic, the CAT exam was held in 3 sessions, each of 120 minutes.

XAT

XAT (Xavier Aptitude Test) management aptitude, computer-based test. The administrative authority of XAT is Xavier Labour Relations Institute Jamshedpur. XAT takes place on the first Sunday of each year.

The test judges the students on these levels –

• Decision Making
• Ability to think quantitatively
• Logical Reasoning
• General Knowledge & English Language

CMAT

CMAT- a National Level online exam supervised by the National Testing Agency and administered with the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) of the Indian government’s directives.

MAT

The Management Aptitude Test is held four times a year in February, May, September, and December and is authorized by the All India Management Association (AIMA).

Following are the formats for the entrance exams

• Computer-based testing (CBT)
• Paper-based testing (PBT)
• Internet-based testing (IBT).

Students need to attempt 200 questions in 150 minutes and are assessed on the following parameters –

• Data Analysis
• Critical Reasoning and Intelligence
• Mathematical Knowledge
• The environment in India and Around the World
• Language comprehension

GMAT.

Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is administered by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC). It is a national-level exam conducted throughout the year.

Syllabus For Management Competitive Exams

The syllabus for each competitive exam syllabus varies; however, the basic framework for the exam remains the same, and below sections mentioned are part of all the PGDM Competitive exams.

Verbal Ability:-

This section tests the English language usage and comprehension skills of a candidate.

Candidates must develop good grammar habits and reading skills to ace this section.

Syllabus For Verbal Ability

• Reading Comprehension
• English Grammar and Usage |
• Cloze Test
• Verbal Ability
• Fill in the Blanks
• Sentence Correction
• Vocabulary / Synonyms and Antonyms
• Jumbled Paragraph etc.

Preparation Tips for Verbal Ability

In the verbal ability test section, students are supposed to find errors in paragraphs, and sentences, improve grammatical errors, answer questions based on paragraphs and do other tasks.

• Look back at fundamental grammar right from high school books. Get the basics cleared like sentence formation, sentence structure etc.
• Increase the implementation of English in your daily routines to help you have a good command of the language.
• Solve the previous year’s question paper, as that will give you a better understanding of the questions asked.

Reasoning Ability

In this section, candidates must use their logical and analytical reasoning skills to solve the questions. The questions test the ability of a candidate to think out of the box and solve complex problems quickly and accurately.

Syllabus Reasoning Ability

• Blood Relations
• Seating Arrangement
• Series
• Verbal Reasoning
• Syllogism etc

Preparation Tips for Reasoning Ability

This section is considered quite difficult by the majority of PGDM candidates.

The main preparation tip for reasoning ability is practice. The more questions you solve related to this section, the better you will get at answering questions related to reasoning ability.

• Find Your Own Tricks:- Many students use their own tricks to solve questions related to maps and codes.
• Solve puzzles:- Solving puzzles enhances your ability to think out of the box and sharpens your analytical skills. Developing a daily habit of solving puzzles will increase your speed and accuracy in this section.
• Find your own hacks. Many candidates create their ways of creating useful maps or codes to solve these questions.

Quantitative Ability

This section tests the mathematical ability of a candidate. However, it is not about testing whether a candidate knows complex theorems in Mathematics but instead about checking

their ease and familiarity with numbers and numerical operations.

Syllabus Quantitative Ability

• Number Systems
• LCM and HCF
• Profit and Loss
• Interest (Simple and Compound)
• Speed, Time and Distance
• Time and Work
• Average
• Ratio and Proportion
• Linear Equations
• Quadratic Equations
• Complex Numbers
• Logarithm
• Progressions
• Binomial Theorem
• Surds and Indices
• Inequalities
• Permutation and Combination
• Probability
• Functions
• Set Theory
• Mixtures and Alligations
• Geometry
• Coordinate Geometry
• Trigonometry
• Mensuration

Preparation Tips for Quantitative Ability

Questions in the Quantitative Ability cover portion up to class 10; hence, try to cover the basics.

Here are some of the common topics for you to begin with:

• Divisibility tests
• Profit and Loss
• Simple Interest and Compound Interest
• Data Interpretation
• Number System
• Sum, arithmetic progressions, geometric progressions
• HCF, LCM (Highest Common factor and Least Common Multiple)
• Probability
• In terms of Quantitative Ability, time plays a significant role. Keep a tab on time while you solve the mock tests. Amongst all the sections, quantitative analysis takes longer to complete.
• Summarise all formulas and shortcuts you’ve learnt so that those can be revised frequently. Don’t just mug up solutions and procedures; stick to the old and basic, understand the concept and the formulas and start solving the problems for real.

Data Interpretation

This section determines how candidates can interpret the given data in tables, charts or graphs.

Here are some of the common topics

• Tables
• Column graphs
• Bar Graphs
• Line charts
• Pie Chart
• Venn Diagrams

Preparation Tips for Data Interpretation

Attempt previous year’s question papers and try to attempt mock tests frequently, as this will help you understand the nature of questions, analyze mistakes, and improve on weaker areas.

Avoid over-approximating or assuming, and ensure the concepts are clear, as a lot of precision and accuracy is required to answer data interpretation questions.

Adapt a unique strategy to solve caselets. Analyze each CAT Data Interpretation question. Apply the shortcut techniques wherever necessary to solve the problem within the given time.

For the PGDM course at VJIM, the eligibility criteria is Bachelor’s Degree from a UGC recognized university with minimum 50% Marks (45% in case of SC/ST) and test scores of CAT / XAT / CMAT / MAT/GMAT are accepted.  

Vignana Jyothi Institute of Management, Hyderabad was founded in 1993 and is the 15th Private B-School in South Zone By the Outlook ICARE 2021 B-School Ranking. For PGDM Admissions 2023 at VJIM,  contact 9849800819 or check the website https://vjim.edu.in/