the cima student

CIMA released the pre-seen materials for the upcoming November OCS exam, so OCS students can start with their exam preparations.

You can find the pre-seen materials foe the Struans of Newland case study here.

I hope the OCS students already have a study plan created, as you will need to co-ordinate your time carefully between now and the exam date.

Here is my advice on what steps to take between now and the 7th November.

Create a Study Plan

It’s the starting point for all of CIMA studies, creating a plan is crucial in ensuring you cover the topics and areas you need – especially when it comes to the case studies.

Refresh your memory with E1/F1/P1 syllabus material

Hopefully the topics from your objective tests are still relatively fresh in your mind, and you’ve already been looking back through your notes before the pre-seen materials were released.

*I would suggest to focus on the pre-seen materials as soon as they released, then you can come back to syllabus refresh once you have an idea of what to expect on exam day.

Analyse the pre-seen materials

An obvious but very crucial point to note, the pre-seen materials should be analysed and not memorised!! There will be no marks for remembering the pre-seen material word by word, in fact you even get the pre-seen material on exam day.

So you need to understand the implications of what the pre-seen materials are telling you.

• Do they have a poor advertising and marketing mix?
• Is their machinery beginning to age and need new invest?
• Is there a conflict of interests in the board room?

Join a study group or speak to other OCS students

Hearing other peoples point of view on the OCS pre-seen materials can be a great eye opener, check out the CIMA connect site to speak with other students in the same boat. Join a whatsapp group, or create one for yourself.

It’s a great way to learn, bounce ideas off others and gives your another view point as well as morale support for the exam.

Mock Exams

Taking a mock exam on the case study in exam conditions really goes a long way to passing the OCS. I done this with Astranti as they base their mock exams on the actual pre-seen materials, it’s the best learning curve you can have and will give you confidence.

One note though, sit more than if you can and give yourself time to understand your weaknesses do you can work on them!

OCS: Watch Analysis on Struans of Newland

The below video from Astranti gives through the Top 10 Issues based on the pre-seen materials for the November 2017 OCS.

However, before watching I would recommend you make your own notes on the pre-seen materials so already have the background and some ideas of your own where the issues are with Struans. 

 

You can find the full set of videos on the November OCS here.

For those interested in the complete Astranti OCS course for Struans of Newland you can find it here.