Essay writing is gaining more and more importance as a component of the personal assessment round of the top B schools. The general notion about writing an essay is to organize it according to the word limit, structure it into paragraphs and make it worth reading. But while writing an essay for the IIM admission, you better check your watch than planning the structure and counting the words.
While IIM Bangalore will give 30 minutes to write the essay, the time will be even lesser for IIM Ahmedabad and Lucknow. While the Written Ability Test of the IIM Lucknow is of 15 minutes, the time for writing the essay is as less as 10 minutes in IIM Ahmedabad.
Here, the key is to write as fast as possible in order to finish the essay. Don’t waste time in thinking and planning the structure of the essay, you will not be able to complete it. For this, you would need sufficient practice before you actually take the plunge.
According to a student of IIM Ahmedabad, who is also a student mentor, best way to practice is by picking up a current affairs topic everyday and write as much as you can for 10 minutes.
Your focus should be to start the essay and put as many important points as possible. It is not a compulsion to present it in an impressive and flowery language. But accuracy and correctness of spelling and grammar definitely matters a lot.
The evaluation is based on the number of new ideas or points you can produce in a given time, the different angles in which you analyze the topic and the logic behind your arguments.
It is important to develop the ability to think and articulate fast. For the B-School panelists, it is a tool to see how you structure your thoughts and produce them in least time.
Topics of the essays
Like GDs, essays also have a vast array of topics. They can be on anything under the sun from political, social, economic issues to something abstract.
Some of the last year’s essay topics are:
-- The NGO sector in India is not getting due recognition from the society
-- Should India change from a multi-party system to a bi-party system
-- Pen is ‘not’ always mightier than sword
-- Space tourism
-- News channel’s coverage: A reflection of people’s tastes
-- Corporate Governance
-- Fitness classes should be made compulsory for all politicians
-- Should Nehru’s centers of learning remain elitist?
-- Indian education system does not encourage creativity
Some of the topics for this year which have high probability are:
-- Union and/Rail Budget 2009
-- Women’s Reservation Bill
-- Indo Pak Talks
-- Sachin’s Double Ton
-- India in Olympics
The significance of Essay as a precursor to the PI round
The essay you wrote in the first half of the personal assessment round can generate some questions in the interview round. The interview panel can ask you questions about the essay you have written and you have to defend it. Questions on the topic can also be asked, which demands you to know a lot about the topic. But don’t get tense if you don’t know something. You need to simply admit it.
thanks for the useful info.
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