This article by Charanpreet Singh was published in 2 parts on pagalguy.com

You are done with the Common Admission Test (CAT) and are probably lining up yourself for some of the other admission tests. This is a good time to brush up your skills for the last mile of selection – group discussion and interview (GD-PI).

Interestingly, there are lot of speculations and confusions among aspirants regarding GD-PI. Having been a part of selection panels representing both the corporate and institutional recruiters for several years, I have witnessed, moderated and assessed performance in innumerable GD-PIs. It is fascinating to see students trying really hard, but ending up doing things that they should rather avoid.

Here is a list of things candidates need to stay clear off if they wish to make the right impression on the interview panel. Avoiding the don’ts will help recognise the real differentiators, and the direct preparation towards improving ability to score higher on them.

Let’s begin with GD. A group of students is assigned a topic for discussion for 15–20 minutes. The panel is looking for an effective combination of knowledge and skills in the candidates. Some serious ‘don’ts’.

1. Arriving just-in-time, or worse still, arriving late for the selection process: Being punctual shows you value time and respect the institute’s time as well. Arriving early gives you a chance to familiarise yourself with the environment, meet your ‘competitors’ and become a little easy about the whole thing. Less stress equals better performance.

2. Not having a crisp, simple and effective speech prepared for the introduction: Often moderators ask the participants to introduce themselves. It sounds simple so candidates don’t give this part much thought. Consequently, we see poorly-structured, fumbling introductions, making a negative impression on the panel and participants.

3. Clarifying the topic with the moderator: If you do not know much about or do not understand the topic, the worst thing you can do is ask the moderator. It shows you in poor light, either in terms of knowledge or analytical ability, or both. You need to keep quiet and listen to your peers; as the discussion unfolds, you will know what to say.

4. Scrapping to start the discussion without having anything useful to say: Starting the discussion does not by itself necessarily give you extra points; it does, however, give you some visibility. So, if you do manage to start, make sure you make a positive impact. It’s better not to start the discussion than to make an average or poor start.

5. Failing to recognise that a GD is not a debate: Majority of candidates start the discussion by voicing their own opinion – that’s typically the debate situation. In GDs, moderators look for candidates who can create a framework for discussion or help widen its scope by guiding the group to explore its different aspects. If all you have to say is whether you agree with the topic or not, and that too before you get a chance to discuss it with the group, you have made a poor start.

6. Showing aggression: Many candidates believe that the corporate world is seeking aggressive managers. The industry, on the contrary, is looking for managers who can work in and with teams and who are assertive without being aggressive. To be aggressive is to impinge on others’ space and time and that’s not how a professional is expected to conduct him/her self. So, don’t come across as a smoke-spouting matador; you need to come across as an effective team-player who works with the group, accommodates diverse viewpoints and asserts him/ her-self without aggression.

7. Trying to be the leader of the group: Leadership cannot be demanded, it is bestowed by the group and you have to earn it on the basis of the quality of your performance. Candidates often try very hard to assume a leadership position in the group – obviously in the belief that the moderator is assessing them on leadership potential. The effort shows – and, almost always, with disastrous results. If you add value to the discussion by demonstrating knowledge and analytical ability and conduct yourself with dignity, you may emerge as a leader.

8. Trying to play moderator: You are an equal among other equals in the group – thus no divine power has given you the right to decide how others in the group should conduct themselves. This is usually misconstrued as team skills by the participants but is actually unnecessary policing. There is no one more irritating for the moderator than a member making inane statements like ‘we must allow everyone to speak’ and ‘we are digressing from the subject.’ You are assessed on your ability to make compelling points on the subject assigned – just do a good job of that and the assessment will take care of itself.

9. Grabbing airtime: Most people love to hear themselves speak. Most also believe that they have the most earth-shattering perspectives to share and that everyone else should just shut up and listen to them. Armed with these beliefs, some candidates talk themselves to the proverbial death in GDs. People who insist on talking a lot end up talking nonsense and repeating themselves ad-nauseum. These students are prime candidates for rejection – no B-school wants to fill up its campus with people who don’t let others talk.

10. Playing judge: I have mentioned that a wannabe moderator is the most irritating species in a GD. A very close second is the self-appointed judge, who spends his/ her time in the GD making incisive statements like ‘you made a good point,’ ‘he did not make sense to me,’ ‘I agree with her’, etc. Good to know who all are blessed with your approval, but what about making a contribution to the discussion with some valid, well-thought-out points?

11. Failing to listen to others: The hallmark of good communication is effective listening. Assessors actively seek superior listening skills in candidates. Your body language and the content of your speech have to, therefore, demonstrate attentive listening. Listening would automatically improve the quality of your content, and moderators are acutely aware of this. Interrupting others, trying to dominate the discussion, ignoring group dynamics are all examples of poor listening skills.

12. Showing lack of respect for other people’s views: A subject is bound to evoke diverse responses from the group members, in fact it is this diversity that makes for a rich discussion. I have seen candidates shut out other points of view, ridicule the comments or ideas of others and expend their energies in trying to prove others wrong. That is exactly what you should not do – you need to learn to accept others’ opinions and carry them in the group while putting your own perspective forward in a pleasant yet assertive manner. It’s about different ways of looking at things, not about right and wrong. Also, you need to be sensitive enough not to make comments that are likely to hurt the sentiments of any section or group of people.

13. Being closed-minded about issues: This is related to the earlier point. Managers need to be open minded about issues and have the capability of managing conflicting opinions. If you come across as a person with strong, extreme, non-negotiable views, you would be doing yourself disfavour in the selection process. The assumption would be that you are either unaware of the complexities of the issue or too closed minded to accommodate positions different from your own. This becomes even more obvious in sensitive issues like reservation, terrorism, etc.

14. Engaging in one-on-one arguments: A group discussion needs to involve the entire group, but students often indulge in parallel conversations with other members. This is more evident when two members get caught up in trying to ‘win’ an argument. Neither is likely to relent – so you end up not winning the argument and losing the opportunity to get selected. Avoid getting into long arguments – agree to disagree and move the discussion forward.

15. Repeating or rephrasing points: You get credit for making new, valid points – not for repeating or rephrasing points already made earlier in the discussion. If you have nothing new to say, keep mum and think – analyse the knowledge you have and try to apply it to the given situation. Bring a new perspective or build and develop on points made by others.

16. Making sweeping statements: Sweeping statements are strong, one-sided views of the world that lack factual support. Students love making these kinds of statements as they sound good; an assertion is no good unless you can back it up with facts and/or logical reasoning. Think through a point before you offer it for discussion – you are then ready to support it if required.

17. Becoming emotional: A GD is an artificially constructed situation that can be quite stressful at times. There could be comments made by others in the group that you find outrageous or plain unacceptable. If your peers manage to get you excited and emotional, they would have scored a couple of decisive points against you. The mature way to handle the situation is to control your emotions and respond on the basis of facts and sound logical constructs. Do not lose your composure and be polite and graceful.

18. Compromising content for form: In GDs, what you say is the most important component of your performance. The other component, ie, how you say what you say, is important, but comes into play only once your speech is strong in its content. Students often focus on their way of speaking and the accent, etc – more of that later – you need to focus on finding significant things to say.

19. Over-quoting statistics: Facts and figures are useful in supporting your assertion; they cannot be your assertion. Getting into too many details and quoting data extensively reduce the impact of your contribution. It also shows you as someone who is likely to miss the wood for the trees. By all means quote facts and figures – but only when you feel that the quoted data will add value to the discussion and act as a support to your argument.

20. Using complex English words and structure: The best way to ensure that the group loses interest in you is to present your opinion in a convoluted, complicated manner, using obscure English and long, never-ending sentences. The simpler your communication, the better will be the reception by the group. If others understand easily what you are saying and if it makes sense to them, they will listen to you and respond.

21. Speaking fast: English as a language does not lend itself to being spoken at breakneck speed. In a GD, candidates feel the compulsion to speak very fast, hoping that would enable them to say more in the limited airtime that they are likely to get. Wrong assumption. People who speak very fast lose track of what they are saying, and definitely lose their audience. Speak slowly and deliberately – make every word count.

22. Using a false accent: Perfectly normal students sometimes adopt the most fake of accents when they speak English in a formal situation. Avoid doing this – be yourself and speak the way you would normally speak (or slower than you normally speak – see #21) – and please don’t start sounding like an uneducated Westerner.

23. Being over-polite and over-doing the smiling part: As I have said earlier, be yourself – that is the best way to be in GDs and PIs. Over-polite behaviour is usually looked at with suspicion; plus, an artificial fixed smile with lots of nodding and shaking of the head does not endear you to the group – it usually ends up irritating the others.

24. Trying hard to be funny: The verdict here is very simple – either you have a sense of humour or you don’t. Focused efforts to create humour often end up in people laughing at you rather than with you. Also, the best form of humour is self-deprecating – any comments that compromise a community or section of people are a big no. If you are naturally a witty person, go ahead and demonstrate that skill. If you are not, stick to the middle path.

25. Looking at the moderator while speaking: Remember, you are a part of the group and you need to look at your group members while addressing them. Gazing at the floor, ceiling or the moderator are all invalid options. The moderator is a ‘fly-on-the-wall’ and is observing the group – you have to ignore his presence. Frequent glances in the direction of the moderator betray a sense of insecurity – it is as if you seek support from him.

26. Digressing from the topic: While it’s good to broaden the scope of the discussion, you need to ensure that you don’t move too far away from the topic. In addition to taking up precious airtime, you may end up guiding the entire discussion on a parallel course. In fact, your role as a good team player is to bring the conversation back on course in case you sense that it is floundering.

27. Underestimating the importance of body-language: As Peter Drucker says, the most important thing in communication is to hear what isn’t being said. The way you sit, use your personal space, establish eye-contact and ‘appear’ to people says a lot more about you than you would believe. It is therefore perilous to not be aware of how you present yourself to others.

28. Giving your opinion when asked to summarize: This is a very common phenomenon. Students tend to voice their points of view about the subject when all that the moderator is asking them to do is give a summary of the discussion. Desist from doing that – instead, take the group through the discussion journey, covering all the significant points made till then. Make optimum use of this opportunity – for a welcome change, no one can interrupt you so you have the floor to demonstrate your listening, analytical and articulation skills.

29. Not speaking at all: I kept this for the last. This is the gravest crime you can commit in a GD – irrespective of how alien the topic is, or how boisterous the group, you need to speak and you need to be heard. Learn more about the topic as it gets discussed; seize the smallest opening in the discussion to make your entry; use the opportunity to make your point(s). If you haven’t spoken at all, you get no points.

This article was written by Dr. Prithwis Mukerjee. You can read more of his blogs at http://yantrajaal.blogspot.com

Why do universities exist? At the most abstract level, academic institutions are supported because it is believed that new thoughts and ideas that emerge from them will lead to better standards of life and living in th civil society that funds the creation and sustenance of these institutions. These thoughts and ideas are in the form of new knowledge that is both created and disseminated in an efficient manner and this dual role, namely creation and dissemination, is structured as research and teaching. Hence the faculty of an academic institution is expected to generate new thoughts and ideas through original research and ensure that not only these ideas, but other equally useful ideas generated elsewhere, at other institutions, is communicated to the students in a lucid and interesting manner. Hence a good academician is expected to contribute to research as well as to teaching — plus of course the inevitable overhead of administrating a complex institution so that it can do its primary roles in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

If we leave aside administrative duties, then what distinguishes a good academician from the not-so-good? Obviously we are left with the two other functions: research and teaching, but more often than not, faculty is evaluated — both during new recruitment and during ‘promotion’ — on the quality of research, rarely on the ability to teach. This is a dubious yardstick but even it is not — and I am not admitting that it is not dubious — then the next shadow of doubt is cast by the metrics used to gauge the quality of research: the number of publications in peer reviewed journals. This leaves us with two questions namely (a) Is the number of publications a fair metric for the quality of research? And (b) Should research be the only yardstick for faculty evaluation?

A little thought will reveal that the two questions are independent but let us address the second one first. The obvious answer is that research should not be the only yardstick — Isaac Newton was a terrible communicator while George Gamow and Martin Gardener were wonderful teachers but were not known for any great discovery. [OK, Gamow introduced the idea of a Big Bang ...] The not so obvious answer is that we agree that teaching is important but we do not have a universally acceptable yardstick to measure teaching skills but since we do have one for research quality; let us use that one anyway. But what is this universally acceptable yardstick for research quality? Oh, the number of publications of course! …and that is where the second question folds into the first.

So is the number of publications a reliable measure of the quality of research? Before articulating my answer let me state up front that in a post-graduation career spanning more than a quarter of a century, I have  published three papers in peer-reviewed journals (of which one happens to be “national” one, much to the chagrin of our “international”ists ) Compared to the dozens, if not 70, 80, 150+ papers published by some of my colleagues, this is peanuts but instead of hanging my head in shame I have this intrepid desire to carry out a thought experiment.

Let me create a magic broom with which I can sweep away (or expunge) any peer-reviewed academic paper from all repositories on this planet and then see what happens when I use this broom. It is my conjecture (if not my firm belief) that if I were to sweep away 75% of all papers published till date, the world will not know the difference! Raise that figure to 90% and the world will be slightly worse off. Raise that to 99% and the world will be significantly poorer and of course if we go to 100% then civilisation as we know it will obviously collapse into depths of misery and despair. So it is not that publications are pointless — but the vast majority is! But then, why this proliferation of trash?

The answer is of course obvious to anyone in academia — people publish because it is the only currency that we have to purchase recognition. It is the only currency that is freely convertible to permanent faculty positions and since all of us need a stable income (and by extension, a stable lifestyle) that is the currency that we need to earn and hoard.

Or do we? For a beggar on the road, a rupee is very valuable but for a millionaire an extra rupee or two is hardly of any significance. It has no impact on the quality of his life. So could be the case for someone who has reached the peak in academics — which incidentally is not too high, since you cannot go beyond being a professor in any case. Once you have climbed onto the high tabletop of the academic plateau and you have no inclination to seek another job elsewhere, then earning anything more in the currency of peer-reviewed publications is of minimal or marginal economic value.

One could of course argue that economic value is not the only value that one should be concerned with. In Maslow’s hierarchy, the need to be recognised by one’s peers is the one that comes after one has been able to satisfy one’s basic economic needs and publishing papers fulfils that need — to be able to pin medals on one’s chest. But are these medals like the Param Vir Chakra? Or trinkets like the Padma Bhushan?

Going back to my theory of 75% trash, the vast majority of papers fall into the trinket category…. created, not through the art of real “oil-on-canvas” research but, through the craft of “patched-collage” work. Publishing papers is now more of a craft where one has to meticulously read through legions of past papers, find one small niche that everyone has somehow overlooked and plug it with great hype, hoopla and fanfare — and if you can form a cartel of mutual “admirers” who will refer to each other’s papers with circular citations, then your citation index can be driven up as well. Another analogy would be to compare publications to locating and repairing potholes on an existing road while leaving the great task of building that new road through the mountains to that 1% of the publishing population.

But if publications are really all that worthless then (a) why do universitities continue to use them for evaluation and (b) why do people who do not need publications continue to seek them? The answer to both questions is that they know of no other way!  Great research — the result of that blinding flash of intuition or insight — is rare after the age of 30 and this means that most of the papers that fall in the essential 1% category would have been among the authors first few papers. After that art gives way to craft and professors who really do not need to publish any more trash find themselves increasingly incapable of doing anything else — they are trapped in a zone of comfort. And a lot of that comfort comes from the legions of apprentices — research scholars and junior faculty — who are now available to carry on with the craft of assembling papers and the luxury of being to able to append your name to the product of someone else’s craftsmanship. This then is the nursery from where a doyen of academia generates his brood of 50,60,100 papers.

Moreover it is this same doyen who, freed from the need to think about anything original, is now responsible for the administration in the university — perhaps as the head of the department or involved with the recruitment or promotion of other faculty members. Can he think of any criterion other than the number of publications? Unlikely …  and that answers the first question and explains a university’s addiction to the publications as a yardstick to measure the quality of research.

So is there an alternative?

As a late entrant to academia, my external, industrial perspective tells me that there is a world of innovation that exists outside the closed of peer-reviewed journals. As a computer programmer, I have come across many new and exciting things, not in journals but on the web and and only a  handful of these things can track back to journal. In fact the Communications of the ACM, the premier society of Computer Scientists, tracks only a handful of papers in its vast digital archives and this is what most of us read anyway. On the flip side some of the most interesting and useful things that I have done would never ever be published in any journal but nevertheless they have been appreciated and praised by clients, friends, acquaintances and peers.  Traditional academics may be reluctant to classify what happens in this world as  research but  if we were to go back to the definition of the term in the first paragraph of this essay —   as the fountainhead of  thoughts and ideas that lead to better standards of life and living  – then the reluctance is neither defensible nor acceptable ! Honestly speaking, the excitement of working with new and innovative ideas — without the claustrophobic constraint of having to have your work formally approved by anonymous peers of dubious competence and capability — is exhilaration by itself.

But you can feel this rush of adrenaline if and only if you have transgressed the need to be appreciated by your peers and reached that next level of Maslow — where you yourself is your own motivation to push into areas that you think are worthy of your interest. If your peers — and the little journals that they fret and preen over — do not care about your thoughts and ideas, then sorry,  it is their problem, not yours !!

This then is the level at which a senior academician — and hopefully juniors too, in the future — should be in when he engages in research but to honestly be in this state he must guard against two major temptations : the temptation to be arrogant and dismissive of others and the temptation of sinking into intellectual lethargy and stupor. Then and only then can he ignores the species of panthera tigris papyrii — paper tigers — and tell them on their face that their grapes are indeed sour.