Tips

and

Strategy

for

Group

Discussion
Group Discussions (GDs) provide organisations and
B-Schools with a simulated managerial setting in
which the candidates can be assessed. The selectors
find it the quickest method to assess 12 to 14
candidates in the span of mere 20 minutes or so. This
makes GDs a convenient personality assessment tool
in the selection process, though some of the top Bschools have recently substituted group discussion
with an extempore essay writing.
The
first
thing
about
a GD that
candidates
must remember is that they are under constant
observation. Every word, gesture, conscious or
unconscious move and expression of the candidate
provides certain clues about the personality of the
candidate. These clues are then reduced to data that
help the panel assign an appropriate ranking or marks
to the candidate. It hence becomes necessary to
maintain decorum, a formal yet friendly attitude, and
an air of involvement throughout the group
discussion.
Content
The two broad parameters that are applied to the
observation of a candidate are the ideas expressed by
a candidate the content and they way in which
those ideas were communicated to the group
the process. These are then assessed in real time to
make certain reasoned judgments about the
candidate.

Candidates are generally wary about the quality of

content that they can bring to a GD, as the topic can
be something that they are hardly familiar with. This
is all the more so in topics that are termed as
abstract giving no clue about what is actually
meant by the topic, or what is expected from the
candidate. However, generating content in a GD is not
an impossible task for an acute thinker. Any topic,
even the one based on current affairs can be looked
at from various angles of human interest in order to
generate sufficient content to speak for a minute or
so at one time and five or six times in a GD. All GD
topics definitely carry sufficient relevance to broad
issues of human interest economic, historical, social,
psychological, and moral. Hence what one speaks not
only reflects ones background reading and thinking,
but also ones resourcefulness, ability to think on
ones feet, ones analytical skills and, to a keen
observer, ones value system. A candidate has to
project an image of confidence, maturity, and
intelligence. Hence the content that one generates in
a GD speaks volumes about several aspects of a
candidates personality.
Presentation
Though the second broad parameter about the
process is not so worrisome to candidates, the way
one speaks in a GD is of paramount importance or
at least as important as the content itself. The way
one is willing to listen to another, the dignified
manner in which one corrects a wrong or incomplete
perception or point of view, the humility one shows in
accepting reasons more valid than ones own, the
eagerness to learn from another, the keen interest
one has in the deeper issues of human interest that

the analysis has thrown up, and a mind that is ever

open to new ideas are all mirrored by the way one
participates in a GD. The process is the true gauge of
interpersonal skills.
Leadership skills
A much discussed and rather glorified aspect of a
group discussion is about leadership skills. Many
youngster go astray in GDs because of their rigid and
erroneous notions about leadership skills. What do
leadership skills really mean in the context of a GD?
Leaders are confident, are steadfast to their
ideologies and vision in that respect may even be
termed as obstinate, are unwilling to compromise,
and are able to convert willing listeners to his or her
point of view etc. etc. In the context of a group
discussion all these traits seem to be almost counterproductive in group activities. And they are so.
Leadership skills in the context of a GD are
completely different form the qualities described
above. In the corporate world, and management
education, it is situational leadership that is far more
important. Situational leadership includes the ability
to take the team to a win-win situation by perceiving
and analysing the strengths and the weaknesses of
the team, and by being one with the team.