Institute of Banking Personnel Selection or IBPS, every year, conducts IBPS SO exam for the posts of Specialist Officers (SO) like IT Officer, Rajbhasha Adhikari, Agricultural Field Officer, Law Officer, Human Resource/ Personnel Officer, and Marketing Officer under different PSBs (Public Sector Banks).
The banks need a Specialist Officer to deal with the technological advancement and upkeep efficient working of banks. Since many applicants try their luck in this exam, you should use the right Strategies to Prepare for IBPS superior officer Exam to qualify in your first attempt.
After all, with these brilliant posts comes massive competition. Hence, you should focus and crack it.
Table of Contents
Understand the IBPS Special Officer Syllabus and Exam Pattern
By referring to the IBPS syllabus and exam pattern, you can understand the details about the test. What are the subjects you will find in the exam, how many questions you need to attempt in the test, the number of marks for every question, and the total time you get to solve the problems? All these points are essential for you to prepare for this exam.
Quick Highlights
1. This is an Objective-based online test
2. The marks for the prelims exam you can score is 125
3. The prelims exam has 150 questions
4. The total number of Questions in the mains IBPS exam for special officer exam is 60
5. The marks you can score in the Mains exam is 60
6. You can take the test in any medium: English or Hindi
7. The complete time for prelims and mains exam each takes 2 hours
Analyze and Devise Your Strategy
Once you know the bank exam syllabus, you should analyze the topics and mark the challenging and important ones to begin your bank exam preparation. You must devise a study timetable and cover the issues of diverse sections.
Make a Strategy for Every Section
Different sections of the exam will test your different calibers. For example, the English area is one of the most scoring sites in all other areas. It will test your grasp of the English language. For preparing for the English segment, don’t miss the following points:
1. Read all the grammar rules according to the exam pattern
2. Boost your vocabulary by reading the newspaper daily
3. When you read a newspaper, try to enhance your reading speed. Efficiency will aid you to score more in reading comprehension.
4. Try to attempt your most vital areas in the section initially. It will boost your confidence
Strategize for Logical Reasoning Section
One of the trickiest segments of the IBPS SO exam is the logical reasoning section. You may find the questions quite challenging, and the area will also prove to be time-consuming for you. You can follow the below points to strengthen your logical reasoning strategy:
1. Categorize all the reasoning topics as easy, medium, and challenging as per your convenience
2. Attempt the questions in the same order in the IBPS examination
3. Solve different puzzles online to hone your logical thinking
Practice topic-wise tests, discover your weak areas, and concentrate on such topics. Also, create a shortcut to attempt those topics to ignore more time consumption.
Finally, remember that last year, the questions from the reasoning section were tough, and hence, you must practice with the previous year’s question paper so that you get an idea to divide your time.
Additionally, the other sections, like quant, examine your accuracy and speed. For the quantitative Aptitude section, boost your calculation speed by remembering tables, practicing mental calculations, and more. Hence, for every area, you must have your sub-strategies to prepare well.
Take Mock Tests
Taking mock tests can be the best way that you prepare for this exam. Marks you get in the mock test give you a real-time view of the real paper. Please plan your study routine after you take up the mock test.
It will help you in examining sections that need more effort and concentration. These mock tests will also help you in time management. Once you solve the questions, you get clarity about where you are doing good. You will even know about your weaker areas where you should work double hard.
Revision is a Must
One of the essential things during bank exam preparation is memorizing your tricks and patterns that you have already learned. Once you revise from time to time, you keep in touch with the stuff you fed your mind in the past. Hence, you can be sure that you have clarity of all the topics, concepts, and question types.
A quick tip you can follow here is; make study notes of all the crucial topics that are significant from the examination point of view. This way, you can revise these important topics right before your exam.
To sum up, apart from the above strategies for the IBPS SO exam, don’t miss out on your time management. The more systematically you practice and stay constant in revision, the better you can grasp the exam concepts.