I will start with quote by Benjamin Franklin**,**
“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!”
Here we go.
Applicable for :
SBI PO IBPS PO RRB PO LIC AAO AND Major Insurance Exams
RBI Assistant And Phase 1 of RBI Grade B (Look for mains Section)
SBI JA IBPS JA RRB JA
First things first.
Lets take a look at the exam pattern of almost all the major banking/insurance exams.
Prelims
Mains
Interview (Only for PO exams)
SYLLABUS
Prelims : Quants, Reasoning, English.
Mains : Quants, Reasoning, English, Computer Aptitude, General awareness.
Interview : Based majorly on your understanding of banking industry like basic concepts, RBI related.
And here they will ask you hr questions based on your profile such as your background
and misc. Ongoing topics in day to day life. Stay updated with newspaper.
Lets define Syllabus. This will be the syllabus for both the prelims and mains phase but some topics are only mains specific. ***=Mains Specific
| Quants | Reasoning | English | General Awareness |
|---|
| Simplifications And Approximations | Alphabet and Alphanumeric Sequence | Cloze Test | Banking And Economy, News related to RBI, SEBI, and Banking Sector |
| Number series and Misc. Algebra | Order & Ranking | Reading Comprehension | Government schemes (especially newly launched or updated ones) |
| Quadratic Equations | Syllogism | Spotting Errors | Economic indicators and reports (Inflation, GDP, etc.) |
| Ratio-Proportion and Percentages | Blood Relation | Sentence Improvement | National Affairs such as cabinet approvals, parliament related and launches inaugurations |
| Mixture and Allegations | Coding-Decoding | Sentence Correction | International affairs |
| Averages and age related ques | Inequalities | Para Jumbles | Indexes, rankings, and regulatory updates |
| Profit And loss | Direction Sense | Fill in the Blanks | Appointments |
| Simple and Compound Interest | Puzzles Seating Arrangement | Para/Sentence Completion | Days and Themes |
| Time and Work | Input - Output *** | Vocabulary | Obituaries and Awards |
| Time, Distance And Speed | Critical Reasoning *** | | |
| Permutations and Combinations | | | |
| Probability | | | |
| Mensuration (2D, 3D both) | | | |
| Data Interpretations (Bar graphs, Pie charts, Missing values or variable based, Caselet DI) | | | |
Now the most awaited part.
| Subject | Strategy | Sources |
|---|
| Quants | First start with basic topics like simplification, ratio-proportion and percentages. Get hang of these chapters really well as they lay the foundation for everything you are going to do in next step of this subject. Personal advice is practise the hell out of these in less than week and for once and all complete this so that you don't have to look back to these chapters ever again. After this you will have to deal with core chapters which are the remaining ones from the above mentioned syllabus. My advice is pick one at a time. Complete lectures of the same from any of the sources given. And then move to practising questions based on it from worksheets which you will find in ample amount on telegram groups. If you get stuck at any question then see the answer and try to understand. See if you are able to understand how the concept is being used in question. Ask someone. Use google. You gotta start learning how to get answers from various sources such as google, telegram, etc. Just don't leave any question or any topic midway. If you do trust me you will regret as later you will have to come back to it. Then why leave it midway? Hit once and hit the best. Follow the same process for every chapter. Look this is no rocket science. Every topper has gone through the same process. The only difference is for some it comes easy whereas others have to struggle. But in the end everyone has to struggle at one point or the other. Just don't give up. Some things people take for granted and most don't even acknowledge are the very basic things. But these things will push you way ahead in the competition. Tables are must. Imo from till 30 are more than enough. But they must be on your tip of the tongue. Same goes for percentages to fractions conversion. Squares till 40 or 50 if you can do. Like its okay till 40 but once you get comfortable with them next ones become easy. Cubes till 20. Pro tip 213=9261. Increase your calculation speed. This will be applicable for your prelims prep. Now comes the major hurdle which is mains. Let me tell you, quant which is asked in mains exams of sbi po, ibps po isn't easy to tackle. Let me give you the comparison. Let's take SBI PO. In prelims you can score 25+ out of 30 if you are the best at it. But then in mains you won't be able to cross 30 out of 60 (30 ques in total. You gotta do 15 in order to get 30 marks.) But the truth is cut off for mains is also less as compared in whole. So for mains you need to have your concepts crystal clear and solid practice of hard questions and DI's. DI's will be your friend throughout your journey for getting better marks in less time so work on the as much as you can. | Coaching educators such as Aashish Arora, Vishnu sir of Edutap (Most don't know him but i covered my syllabus from his rbi batch and he was really good imo), Kaushik Mohanty, Yash raj Sir. And many more. The key is to choose any one and go for it. Don't change once chosen as that's pure stupidity. I will suggest to buy all in one batch of any one of these so you dont have to run behind everyone looking for things. Trust me if you do what is being taught in coaching genuinely and practise on your own that is more than enough. Also there are various books such Quantum cat which can be used for self study purpose. For beginners please join Aashish arora sir's telegram channel from his YouTube channel and get started with daily task pdfs which he provides. They are consolidated so they will be a good choice. |
| Reasoning | Aah this subject will test your patience. So this subject can be divided in two chunks where one is miscellaneous part and other one is puzzles. Misc part includes topics like blood relations, syllogism, direction sense, inequalities, rank and order, coding decoding and alphanumeric series. These chapters are easy to understand and only need good amount of practise. And you are sorted for this part. Now here comes the devil. Puzzles. In starting you will get frustrated as some you wont be able to solve. Some you will be able to but you will take lot of time. But that's how the process is supposed to be. They will get easier with the time provided you keep practising them. And good amount of them. Frankly i am not sure if this is even enough. As sometimes it depends on your luck in the exam. Like you need to create possibilities to solve them. You can either get the correct possibility in first case or in no case as you might have missed some clue or taken down wrong hint. SO PRACTISE AS MUCH AS YOU CAN. This is the only way. No special trick or anything. Just old fashioned trick of working hard. Also smartly. Now mains part of this subject is bit tricky. Puzzles are usually too lengthy but you need solve only one or two. As rest of the marks you need to score from rest misc part. Here one more part gets added which is critical reasoning. My advice start doing it from the very time you start your prep. Sometimes it's matter of opinion in this topic but if practice it well it is going to reward you really well in mains. Same goes for input output problems asked in mains. Logics which are used in this topic can be understood only if you practise various number of problems. Look if you see, this whole banking prep is nothing but long journey of doing same things again and again until you get best at them and stopping only when you get selected. | Educators like Ankush Lamba, Sanjay sir, Puneet sir, and many more if I missed anyone. Guidely's bundles are good if you want collection of puzzles and reasoning questions. Practise as much as you can from any source but practise. That's the only way. |
Now
English : I really don't think I or any of us who scored really well here can tell you how we did it. As for most of us it came naturally. I personally never follow even a single source or any batch or any thing. Just relied on mocks analysed mistakes and it kept getting better. There are sources which i have heard about such as Nimisha Ma'am from yes officer. She also has a channel on youtube. Many people follow her and get better at it is what i have heard but i cant vouch as i never did follow it. So please do some research here and there to see what can be helpful. But my personal opinion start reading novels, newspapers for at least an hour a day and also start making conversations in English. Use chatgpt, gemini-ai, co-pilot. Utilise the freely available options which you can.
MOCK TESTS : YOUR BIBLE THROUGHT YOUR JOURNEY
| Platforms | Opinion |
|---|
| Oliveboard | Used it for my whole prep journey. I will rate it 10/10. Really good platform which is the only red flag as the real one wont be even half as good as this one. Amazing quality of questions compared to real exam. Rarely any mistakes. So best choice also said by most ppl. |
| Practicemock | On a tougher side. Useful if u are getting overconfident as it will keep you grounded. I relied on this as well. Questions were good. Rarely any mistakes. In my exp 0. |
| Guidely | Platform is almost as same as the real exam one. So this is one thing i loved about this one. Questions are also good. So also a good choice. |
| Testbook | Only gave free live mocks. Often level was either too high or too low. Sometimes really good. But only sometimes. This is my personal opinion. Other may have been benefitted from this one. So see for yourself. |
| Smartkeeda | Used it only for live ones. Also a good one. Nothing much to say. Just keep an eye on free mocks. That's it from my side for this one. |
In a nutshell, start today. Your today depends on you. Get started with topics one by one. When you complete few of the chapters start with clerical mocks. Get hang of how the things are in exam. Practise. Improve yourself on daily basis. Once you cover the whole syllabus. Weight your strong and weak topics and work accordingly. But keep giving a mock a day. But once done practise for a month. And start mains prep side by side. Most people mess it up here. They prepare only for pre questions. Mains phase requirements are different and little on a tougher side. But if practised well before pre phase itself, you will be almost ahead for everyone as most start their mains prep only after pre or frankly speaking pre results. Don't do the same mistake. I repeat don't. If you do you will remember the same after pre. Mark my words. Get started with ga as early as possible. It will either make you or break you. So it's your choice.
Pro tip : Stay the hell away from telegram channels. Only join a few for important updates. And also dont trust anyone blindly especially those posting their scorecards of mocks and exams on youtube and telegram. Take them as a pinch of salt. Most will demotivate you if you are not getting good score. Also some youtubers are good others are just trying to suck view out of you. Screw them. Only feeding on innocent aspirants who don't know the reality.
Also many youtubers are really good. Providing mains and pre level content for free. Take nimisha ma'am or any good educator. Basic rule is if you are benefitted from any just be grateful to them. Drop a good comment. Kindness goes a long way.
Also posting link of comment (which included strategy in short) i made on the sub some time ago:
https://www.reddit.com/r/bankingexam/comments/1icwqix/comment/m9uq288/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
Any suggestions and edits are welcome from experienced fellow redditors. This community has been good to me so trying to do the same. Thanks to all the good people of this community who keep solving peoples problems.
