How can a graduated aspirant with a year drop improvise her resume for IIM Ahmedabad?
Posted On - Jul 22, 2021Trust me when I say, a year drop has no or very little influence during admission if you justify it rightly. In fact, with the right strategy, it might even work in your favor. The best way is to utilize the gap year in a productive way such as
- Get a recognized certification like CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) or an FRM (Financial Risk Manager).
- During your free time, volunteer at an NGO or do some social work. It might not add to your work experience but imply that you do contribute to society.
- Get yourself a good internship during your summer/winter break.
- Another effective way is to participate in a student exchange program.
- Make your profile unique by identifying your passions and pursuing them. The interviewers might get more impressed by your extraordinary talents than by your academic performance.
- Complete extra courses out of College from Coursera, edX, Udemy, etc to showcase your learning instincts.
- In this age of online platforms, it’s vital to be active with a great online profile. You can start your own blog, or a Youtube channel, or have a strong Quora profile.
- Learning a new language. It’s better to learn more than 3 languages as it adds to the credibility of your profile.
- Participating in various competitions will portray your enthusiasm and keenness for challenges.
Thus, don’t let a gap year dishearten you as you can make the most out of it and impress the interviewers.
Every student with a gap year in their resume should be prepared for the question - ‘Why did you take a gap year?’, during your interview. The interview panelists are genuinely interested to know how you made the most of your break. You should be honest while replying to this question. You can simply answer that you needed more time for preparation.
During your break year, you can do volunteer work during weekends or learn something new. If you opted out of campus placements, you can do research projects or internships with your professor. You can do some certification or take examinations, in your field of interest, such as CFA/FRM. These will help showcase that you have spent your time productively.
Dropping a year after graduation for CAT preparation is not a good idea. This gives an idea to the interviewers that you cannot handle multiple things at once, a trait future managers from IIM Ahmedabad should possess. It is not that you will not be considered but it will become more difficult for you to justify your position in such a case even if you have a very high CAT score. So it is always better to do a job during your preparation phase. However, if you still do not want to do a job, there are some things you can do, which will help your case.
- Certification Courses – If you can do certifications such as CFA, FRM, or FMVA during your preparation phase it may justify your year drop.
- Internships – You may also do some internships with some firms according to your interests. This can be actually a great point for discussion, during the interviews.
- Learn New Skills – This is the least impactful method of justifying yourself. The skills you will get on various platforms will eventually be taught at the institute itself. So learning about business and management before is not very impactful.
These are the three things you can do so that you can justify yourself. But a job is any day better than all these things.
