Group Discussions - Part I
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"For good or ill, your
conversation is your advertisement. Every time you open your mouth, you let men
look into your mind. Do they see it well-clothed, neat and business-like?"
- Bruce Barton
To say that communication, then,
in the light of what, is immaterial, would be to play with one's own future. Who
does not want to be able to speak cogently, convincingly and fluently?
Everywhere you go, there will be a need to express to people your knowledge that
could remain untapped due to lack of proper verbiage. From the classroom to the
boardroom, through every stage of one's career and social life, we need
communication.
Group
Discussions
I hope all the MBA aspirants in
the nation know that candidates who qualify in the written part of entrance
tests for selection in MBA courses are then asked to appear in the Group
Discussions (GD) and Personal Interviews (PI). In most cases (B-schools like IIM
Bangalore have openly declared the admission criteria), the Written Test (WT)
carries a weightage of 75%, while the combined weightage of the GD & PI phase of
selection is 25%, most of which is carried by the Group Discussion.
The Process
The Group Discussion is a process
in which all candidates successful in the Written Test (usually 8 times the
number of seats) are divided into groups of 8-12 candidates each; and every
group is assigned a specific topic or a Case Study to discuss. The group of 8-12
candidates carries the entire discussion forward on its own, and the supervising
panel neither intervenes nor participates in the discussion.
The GD is left to evolve itself
while the panel observes and assesses the performance and/or attributes of all
the candidates from a distance. The candidates display their knowledge,
view-points and exchange ideas on the given subject matter among themselves.
This happens in a dynamic situation in which every candidate wants a time period
of 25 minutes or so. The medium of the GD almost always is English, though
sometimes, a choice is given to the group to speak in Hindi or English (but a
majority opts for English). For identification, either the candidates wear chest
numbers or their name-plates are displayed in front in a semi-circular
formation.
