Road to SIIB

Well my road to Symbiosis Institute of International Business started long back when i started preparing for cat’05.But after the CAT disaster..i knew before hand that i was not going to make it anywhere..so i decided to give all the entrances available.This was especially hard since i was in my final year of BSc..but i had no other choice..one of them happened to be snap (which admittedly could have been conducted in a more proffessional way).The exam went quite well and i kept logging on to various sites and forums to figure out whch colleges to apply for and their cutoffs before finally shortlisting sibm,scmhrd and siib.i was desperate for sibm because of the dual mba factor but between scmhrd and siib i was torn between an international business degree and a college with more reputation.as i saw the cutofs of last year the predictions were 80/200 for sibm,76/200 for scmhrd and 70/200 for siib.
The day of the result was the same day as xat’06.there waas some glitch in the result site but finally the results were out and i had secured 93.50..going by the predictions i presumed i wudve made it everywhere.Then came the shockers…sibm dual mba closed at 97 while its marcom programme which i hadn’t applied for closed at 64.I was devastated.but presumed i would make scmhrd..here again a shocker..engineers and workex people with marks lower than me were shortlisted while i was conviniently rejected for having a “weak profile”.

All my hopes were on SIIB.As the list came out..out of the 1000 people shortlisted i was ranked a dismal 853 in the open category with only 90 open seats available.My immediate goal was to go as much on top of the waitlist table as possible.The procedure the year before was gd,pi,psychometric test and essay.this year however the psychometric test was scrapped and we had a group task instead.Luckily..after scrolling through numerous forums i realised everyone had the same topic for group task..”planes”.although confused it gave me some time to prepare..dday came..i went all dressed in blazer with neat cv and all my certificates neatly filed to SIIB..was impressed by the place..had a group discussion..the 9 of us were deciding outside to avoid a confrontation..a fact supported by much gusto by a person..lets name him A.we went inside and we were given a sheet of paper with a case study and a few questions printed on it.we were told to take 5 minutes and then discuss.i started off.put in my point of view and was immidieately confronted by A…which frankly stunned me…luckily for me the lone girl in my group and another guy decided to support me..and A was supported by another guy..whileone guy resorted to speaking irrelevant things and the other three remaining mute spectators

Then came the group task..topic…..planes and we were given lots of paper and were told only to fold and not tear..A wanted to make different types of planes so we told him go ahead..and then i and the girl decided to make a runway..then a hangar..then a guy said he could make a radar..then another guy said he wanted a fueltank..so i helped him build that..in the end we had an entire miniature airport..then came the essay..”are electronic media replacing newspapers???”….but before i could write it i was called for the interview…the guy was LG’s HR head…i asked him if he wanted to see my CV..he refused saying that he only had 10 minutes..and proceeded to ask all HR based questions..could answer them satisfactorily and then wrote the essay..my marks were confirmed and i left..in the various forums everyone said that they had done very well..while i thought my performance was good too..so didnt really know what to expect..then just a month before my final year exams could begin theresults were out..i wanted to be as high up in the waitlist as possible but i ended up being selelcted in the first list itself..my rank had jumped from 853 to 44..i was pleasantly shocked to say the least..who says miracles dont happen..that was the day i became an official “SIIBLING”.

PENNED BY VAIBHAV SHETTY- SIIB ( Batch of 08)

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