The primary reason why I believe students have a doubt on passing CA exams is 'lack of self-confidence'. Self-confidence, or the lack of it is generally not because of your own thoughts, it typically accumulates or diminishes because of what you hear from people.
I graduated in 1999 and had almost decided to pursue Chartered Accountancy. My distant relatives and friends were somewhat apprehensive about CA as a subject course because of a few failures in known circles. These people had enrolled in CA but they weren't able to qualify for a very long time. One of them had finally dropped the idea to pursue CA after spending six to seven years and one was still to qualify for the CA finals.
So, the general atmosphere was not particularly encouraging. One option could have been to listen to them, lower my self-confidence and drop the idea because of the known failures. And this is what majority does. You listen to what other people have to say about your career and decide based on their vision about you. However, champions don't do that way.
Students who are determined to stay on their vision and goals are the ones who find passing CA exams not difficult. And the only reason why they feel that way is because they have a very clear goal in front of them without any haziness or lack of visibility. The goal to become a CA is so clear in their mind that no statement from others makes it look feeble to them. Their determination to achieve their goal rather becomes stronger when people doubt their capability.
This reminds me of an incidence of Mahabharata. When Pandavas and Kauravas were young and learning archery, one day their guru Dronacharya took a test. On the top of a tree he hung a fish and all the young archers were asked to come with their bow and arrows and aim for the fish's eye.
Now imagine, at the height of atleast 15 foot, there is a small fish hanging in the air and one has to hit its eye. Indeed a challenging test. One by one all the archers came and guruji asked them to take a shot. When they were taking the shot, guruji asked them - "what can you see". Some said, "guruji I can see the fish and leaves of the tree". Some said they could see the entire fish, some saw the fish and birds sitting on the tree and so on and so forth. And as expected none of them could hit the eye of the fish.
It was then Arjun's turn. He took his bow, put the arrow onto it and aimed at the fish. After few seconds guruji asked him, "Arjun can you see the fish?" He said, "yes, guruji I can see it". Then guruji asked, "Arjun can you see the tail of the fish?" He said, NO. Then guruji asked, "Arjun can you see the leaves or birds on the tree?" He said, NO. Then guruji asked, "Arjun what are you currently seeing?" He said "guruji I can only see the eye of the fish". And that moment he fired his arrow and BANG, it hit the fish's eye.
This is the power of having a very clear goal in front of you. With such clarity, you are unable to see the things around to distract you. And that makes your goals easily achievable.
Similar is the case with passing CA exams. It is not tough to become a chartered accountant provided:
- You are sure that you want to become a CA;
- You are determined to not go down if you encounter failures;
- You are ready to compromise the comforts of your life;
- You are ready to sacrifice on your social life and pleasures;
- You are ready to work extremely hard;
- You are ready to dedicate 3 to 5 years of your life only towards this degree and nothing else.
The only reason why I could finish the CA in three and half years was because I had visualised myself as a Chartered Accountant in a time span of approximately three years and was determined to achieve my objective. I still remember a statement that said:
"If you don't plan for your future, someone else will do it for you. And guess what others have planned for you - Nothing much"
CA Chakravyuha: Enter It Face It Conquer It
With an intent to assist students to make goals with supreme clarity on how they should lead their CA life, I have authored the book: "CA Chakravyuha: Enter It Face It Conquer It".
This book is not about steps to pass the CA exams or about ways to make your life easier as a CA student. This book goes beyond, it's all about YOU, the aspiring future Chartered Accountant; it's an attempt to make YOU one of the finest Chartered Accountants in this country. It's all about making your hopes and dreams come true by implementing tools to build a solid foundation for success, a success that will help you go miles.
Upon starting the Chartered Accountancy journey, you need to understand some fundamentals and once those fundamentals are in place, there is no way you will ever encounter any failure.
These fundamentals start right from making the correct choice for articleship, picking the right field in articleship, ways to manage studies along with work, establishing strong networks in your firm, understanding how to behave and perform like a champion and finally creating a schedule strong enough to help you crack exams in the first attempt.
This book captures every bit of planning that the author did during his articleship days, words of wisdom passed onto by his seniors, tips and tricks to crack the exams and how one should lead his/her life as a CA student. Every principle in this book has been inspired from either his personal experience or from the life of a highly successful CA or an entrepreneur.
Again, this book is not just about clearing exams nor is it theoretical because each and every chapter has elements inspired from the practicalities of life.
You can order the book by clicking on the link below:
/books/CAchakravyuha.asp
By Nimish Goel, author of the book titled "CA Chakravyuha: Enter It Face It Conquer It". By profession, he is a qualified chartered accountant but by passion, he is an active blogger. Nimish has worked with EY and PwC in India and has also worked with KPMG in Europe. He now runs his own consulting company (International Business Advisors) and manages his blog www.nimishgoel.com.
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