What Are Your Tips to Pass a Competitive Exam?

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - Yeah, we have one more question.

00:00:06.360 | It's from a student and he has a question

00:00:09.080 | about starting for a highly competitive exam.

00:00:12.680 | - All right, let's do it.

00:00:13.640 | - Hello Carl, Shubham here from India.

00:00:16.060 | Firstly, thank you so much for your podcast and books.

00:00:18.960 | Your books have profoundly influenced my academic career

00:00:23.080 | and life in general.

00:00:24.560 | As a student preparing for civil services examination,

00:00:28.620 | one of the highly competitive examination held in India,

00:00:32.040 | the only way I think to stand out

00:00:34.280 | is to putting extra number of deep work hours

00:00:38.080 | in the preparation.

00:00:39.320 | Any tips for that and in general about cracking

00:00:43.100 | and highly competitive examinations?

00:00:45.880 | Thank you.

00:00:47.080 | - Yeah, I used to deal with these questions a lot

00:00:49.380 | when I was doing primarily student focused advice

00:00:51.560 | back in my early days.

00:00:53.860 | The big high level point that applies

00:00:58.280 | to any high stakes examination

00:01:00.700 | and really sort of any high stakes grading situation

00:01:03.480 | is to make sure that your approach to preparing

00:01:07.900 | is what actually matters and not what you want to matter.

00:01:11.780 | It's the most common trap that happens here

00:01:15.100 | is that people write a story in their head

00:01:17.260 | of what they want preparation for this exam to be.

00:01:22.140 | And it matches something that's typically

00:01:24.100 | it's some sort of activity that it's hard enough

00:01:26.140 | to feel fulfilling, but not so hard

00:01:28.240 | that it's really gonna cramp their life or be too hard.

00:01:31.420 | Or they just like the idea of it

00:01:32.860 | and they just throw hours at it

00:01:34.420 | and they just want that to be what matters.

00:01:36.180 | And often what really matters for doing well for the exam

00:01:38.680 | might be completely different

00:01:39.980 | and actually require a lot less time

00:01:41.460 | once you know what it is.

00:01:43.100 | So you gotta figure out what really matters

00:01:45.160 | for passing the India civil service entrance exam.

00:01:48.420 | And the way you figure that out

00:01:49.420 | is you talk to people who have done it.

00:01:52.380 | Know about it from direct experience.

00:01:54.940 | You say, what mattered?

00:01:58.260 | What was the prep you did that really was useful

00:02:00.180 | and what was the waste of time?

00:02:01.180 | And you talk to five people like this.

00:02:03.840 | And if it's a big enough exam,

00:02:04.860 | there might be books on it, you read the books too.

00:02:06.420 | You figure out what really matters.

00:02:08.780 | And then you get a realistic picture of this is what I

00:02:11.180 | the activities I actually need to do,

00:02:13.480 | the activities I actually need to do

00:02:15.700 | to prepare for this exam.

00:02:16.740 | And then you find the time for it.

00:02:17.780 | Okay, well, how much is that gonna take?

00:02:19.260 | And so how early do I have to start?

00:02:20.780 | Then where do I wanna put that on my calendar?

00:02:22.700 | You should autopilot schedule it.

00:02:23.940 | Let me get that all on my calendar in advance,

00:02:25.500 | the same times on the same days.

00:02:27.100 | And then you just execute

00:02:28.100 | and you're executing the stuff that matters.

00:02:30.400 | If you're really working backwards

00:02:31.860 | from focusing on what people know from experience

00:02:33.900 | makes a difference,

00:02:34.740 | it's probably less time than you think.

00:02:37.300 | For God's sakes, it's much less time

00:02:38.740 | if you come at this with the mindset of just,

00:02:40.620 | this is a morality setup.

00:02:42.340 | Like the more sacrifice I do, the more I'll be rewarded.

00:02:46.100 | So let me just make sure I'm miserable

00:02:47.420 | and doing lots of hours.

00:02:48.540 | Your hours are only interesting to me

00:02:51.300 | as a secondary side effect of you figuring out

00:02:54.140 | what prep matters and you scheduling it.

00:02:56.620 | And that'll take whatever it takes.

00:02:59.180 | Hours are not a planning tool.

00:03:00.420 | Trying to hit another hours is not a planning tool.

00:03:02.740 | Trying to hit a certain level of misery

00:03:04.420 | or so you feel like you're at least trying hard

00:03:06.820 | means nothing.

00:03:07.660 | All I care about is are you doing

00:03:08.620 | the actual concrete activities you have evidence work?

00:03:11.460 | Did you give yourself enough time to get those all done?

00:03:13.420 | Do those things when you've done them, you're done.

00:03:15.020 | If you don't, you're not, that's it.

00:03:18.220 | A real differentiating factor

00:03:19.420 | when it comes to high stake test,

00:03:20.540 | the people who figure that out

00:03:21.500 | and the people who want it to be some sort of

00:03:23.420 | more morality play about sacrifice and sweat.

00:03:27.420 | That's not the way it works.

00:03:30.460 | Here's an example from my own days in college.

00:03:33.580 | So I went to an Ivy League school here in the US

00:03:36.260 | and had a lot of friends go to Harvard Law School

00:03:40.900 | after college, right?

00:03:42.900 | Which by the way, side note, naive public school kid I was

00:03:47.660 | going to this Ivy League school was completely surprised

00:03:51.740 | that most of the people I know

00:03:53.820 | went to Harvard Law School, right?

00:03:55.500 | Because in my mind, I didn't have this mindset of like,

00:03:59.540 | these are the professional tracks that are allowed.

00:04:02.100 | Of course, this is why you went to this school

00:04:03.700 | so that you can then go to Harvard

00:04:04.700 | and then get a law firm job.

00:04:05.900 | Like I just thought everyone was gonna be professors

00:04:07.700 | and journalists and start nonprofits and cool companies.

00:04:10.940 | And no, they all went to Harvard Law School, right?

00:04:12.300 | Because I was from a naive public school background, right?

00:04:16.380 | So I didn't realize like, oh, these are all pathways.

00:04:18.820 | You become a doctor or a lawyer

00:04:20.180 | or a management consultant or finance

00:04:22.260 | and you go through these schools and whatever.

00:04:24.820 | So you look at that from the outside, you're like, man,

00:04:27.860 | how did all these kids get into Harvard Law School?

00:04:29.580 | And depending on your orientation

00:04:33.380 | on the optimist pessimist scale about human nature,

00:04:35.780 | you think it's one of two things.

00:04:37.780 | Either they must all just be brilliant.

00:04:41.340 | Man, I'll never be like that.

00:04:42.180 | Look at these smart kids.

00:04:43.020 | They all can just go into Harvard Law School.

00:04:44.380 | Or you say, yeah, it's all just like,

00:04:48.540 | what school you went to and look at that pipeline.

00:04:50.980 | You just for free, you get to go to Harvard Law

00:04:52.420 | if you go to an Ivy League school.

00:04:53.340 | And so it's just perpetuating,

00:04:54.980 | sort of entrenched privilege.

00:04:57.140 | But there's a third element here that I noticed up front,

00:05:01.580 | which was they systematically figured out

00:05:04.660 | what is needed to accomplish this goal.

00:05:09.420 | And they looked up, there's these matrices

00:05:12.660 | you could look up first of all, that shows you

00:05:15.180 | with your current GPA, what LSAT score would you need

00:05:19.980 | to have a high percentage of being accepted

00:05:22.100 | into Harvard Law School?

00:05:22.940 | And they all looked at this

00:05:23.780 | and they all looked at their current GPAs and said, great,

00:05:25.580 | I have to get this LSAT score.

00:05:26.940 | So they're specific.

00:05:28.500 | And they figured out by talking to people

00:05:30.940 | who had gone before and gotten good scores on the LSAT,

00:05:35.380 | what really matters.

00:05:36.380 | And it was practice.

00:05:37.460 | A lot of it was practice, real tests under real conditions.

00:05:41.020 | You would learn some techniques and do real tests

00:05:42.580 | under real conditions.

00:05:43.420 | And so they organized a club internally

00:05:46.380 | where they would just do these tests, real LSATs

00:05:49.780 | under real conditions again and again and again

00:05:53.660 | until their scores hit exactly this number

00:05:55.740 | that the statistics told them would give them

00:05:57.180 | a good chance of being accepted.

00:05:58.700 | And then they were done.

00:05:59.780 | And then they went and took the LSAT

00:06:01.020 | and they got that score and they got into Harvard.

00:06:04.060 | The reason why I tell the story is to show

00:06:05.580 | what they were doing there is what often happens

00:06:08.260 | when you see people who do very well

00:06:10.060 | in high stakes testing is they figured out

00:06:12.380 | what do I really need to do and how do you actually do it?

00:06:14.540 | And they put aside the time.

00:06:15.700 | And these students, my memory is they spent

00:06:18.500 | like a whole quarter working on this.

00:06:19.980 | They're like, okay, we're probably gonna end up

00:06:21.300 | having to dedicate, I'm trying to add this up in my head,

00:06:26.300 | 100 hours of work on this to get our LSAT scores

00:06:29.380 | where they are.

00:06:30.220 | So we got started early and we do this every Friday

00:06:33.140 | or whatever, every Thursday morning and let's just go.

00:06:35.700 | So I just use it as an example of this is the key

00:06:39.460 | to anything high stakes is get the ground truth evidence

00:06:44.460 | what really matters here and confront that

00:06:47.940 | for better or for worse.

00:06:49.060 | This is what I would actually have to do

00:06:51.460 | to prepare for this.

00:06:52.980 | And then try to find time to do it, build your schedule,

00:06:55.060 | start early to fit it in.

00:06:56.180 | So, and then either do the work or you don't,

00:06:59.100 | but do not invent your own story

00:07:02.260 | for what you think should matter.

00:07:04.540 | Do not just retreat to storylines about

00:07:07.660 | there's nothing I can do because I'm not brilliant.

00:07:09.780 | So I'll just never get a good score.

00:07:11.860 | Nah, it's work.

00:07:13.660 | Like how do I get to where I need to get?

00:07:16.020 | So figure out the real solution, do the real work.

00:07:18.580 | It's not very exciting, but that's, honestly,

00:07:21.340 | that's how the world turns with most of these,

00:07:23.620 | most of these types of high stakes exams anyways.

00:07:25.980 | (upbeat music)

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What Are Your Tips to Pass a Competitive Exam?

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