‘Leadership’ – a Cardinal Ingredient During SSB Selection Process. During SSB, all the three assessors, through their respective tools of testing i.e. psychological tests, GTO tasks and interaction by IO during Personal Interview, endeavour to ascertain the leadership potential of the candidate. The intellectual ability, social warmth & people’s skills, resilient resolve and dynamism of the candidate automatically get divulged as he/she performs over various tasks of testing, and these are of course the true tenets of a ‘Leader’. Some of the personality attributes essential to be a leader and a group effective person are in-born and are part of our DNA, while some traits are inculcated by a person through the interplay with the environment in which he/she was nurtured and grew up. Hence, the first requirement while preparing for SSB is to get to know as to what these ingredients are, second requirement is to know what level of those ingredients you already possess and the last requirement is to know how to fill up the gap through a focused ‘Action Plan’ to acquire the deficient leadership ingredients.
How Coached Thought Process or “Put on” Leaders are Identified by Assessors?
- Coached thought process is reflected through, shallow preconceived information and low level of general awareness, besides, being insensitive towards others and poor social graces.
- Some coached candidates who are very well informed, many times develop a superior attitude and are abrasive while interacting with others and may lack tact and people’s skills.
- Such candidates write practiced stories, with utter disregard to the stimulus (pictures) shown and having stereo typed themes, that are not portraying your actual personality as reflected through other psych tests and PIQ.
- Conflicting responses of behaviour between various psych tests and amongst psych tests, GTO series & Interview, because of borrowed thoughts that the coaching academy imposed on your mind.
- Losing originality of thinking and expression and giving only ‘coached responses’ that do not conform to your actual personality, which get highlighted and are exhibited through some of the non-coached responses given by the candidate.
- Behaving unnaturally during various tasks, as the true self keep emerging from behind the shadow of the coached persona that the candidate is trying to hide.
- Demonstrating coached ideas during GTO series, i.e. applying a high level or difficult idea when a very simple idea was possible.
- Giving preconceived views and speaking like a parrot with no spontaneity in the answers given to the interviewing officer.
Who Needs Training?
- Candidates with low general awareness, poor communication skills, stage fright, poor interpersonal relationship building skills and low self-esteem.
- Candidates who did not get the opportunity to learn the correct social graces and people’s skills. (Includes, dress sense, posture, tact to deal with others, basic civic sense and positive mannerism).
- Low practical work sense for candidates who got fewer opportunities in participation in outdoor activities and hands on practical tasks in routine life.
- Candidates who have not participated in interactive activities frequently and lack the skill to be visible in a positive manner in group activity.
- Some very bright candidates , with minor undesirable kinks in their social attributes are unable to clear SSB even after repeated attempts, need help to calibrate that portion of their exhibited behaviour.
- Candidates with poor physical and mental stamina would need guidance to improve their physical standards.
How Olive Greens Caters to Above Requirements of Training ?
- The complete team of Olive Greens (8 Officers) has been ex-assessors, at various SSBs for 3-4 years duration.
- The feedback from previously trained students, in terms of their quality and passion for training, speaks volumes of their dedication and commitment to train the aspirants. (Many coaching academies have hired their team who are only doing a job and may not have the true passion to train aspirants).
- The state of art infrastructure existing with the Institute; both, indoors and outdoors.
- A look-alike mandatory GTO ground facilities, exist only with Olive Greens Institute and no other institute in the country:- 2 PGTs, 2 HGTs, 8-10 Command Tasks, all 06 obstacles for Snake Race and all 10 Individual Obstacles made to the same specification as in the SSB laid out in a serene environment. (Institutes which do not have these facilities are unable to impart a realistic feel of the GTO ground).
- Psychologist discusses the responses given by candidates in the practice Psych Test Dossier. This multiple interaction with candidates make them self-aware and progressively they are able to project desired responses.
- Group Discussions are conducted every day and individual feedback is given to each candidate on their performance. This immensely builds up their confidence by removing ‘stage fright’ and broadens their knowledge base.
- Frequent classes on current affairs are conducted to update the candidates on current national and international issues, so that their horizon expands and mind is chiseled to become analytical for giving mature responses in all SSB activities.
- GPEs and Lecturettes are conducted at least 3-4 times during the two weeks course and candidates are given profound tips by specialists to perform better during SSB.
- Separate classes and activities to enhance overall personality and social graces of the candidates are interposed with the SSB schedule for overall personality development.
- A total of 7-8 hours of quality time training is conducted daily and an in-depth counseling of candidates is done on culmination of their training. During counseling a detailed ‘Action Plan’ for future self-preparation is discussed with the candidates.
- Olive Greens Institute has embarked upon the new concept of E-Learning by an informative blog in the Institute website, which is constantly updated by our team of assessors.
To have a fair idea about SSB selection please view our documentary movie uploaded in our site:
Finally, “leaders are not born…..they are made” through rigourous and relentless training. Those with passion, MUST start the process early and let themselves loose into the “Leadership Cast” prepared by Olive Greens, and emerge as leaders for life.
