My first post is today, I just found the club this past week, wish I found it sooner. Well, the Big Day was today, much anticipated, eager, excited, all the sum of words you have all gone through. After 4 months of submerging in GMAT books (
official guide, Kaplan,
Official Guide - Quants) and practices I felt ready to grab the bull by the horns. I signed up, however my last month of preparation was very faulty. The month I had programmed to take as many tests as I could turned out to be a critical month at work. Three of the four weeks were all taken, leaving the office at 9-10pm, leaving very little quality time to perfect my test taking techniques.
Aside from that I was able to do testing on the weekends, as follows:
Kaplan book: 530
Kaplan virtual test: 580
GMAT Prep Test 1: 600
GMAT Prep Test 2: 660
Manhattan Free Test: 590
I was discouraged with the first 2 Kaplan scores, however my hunch was that they were looking for me to sign up to their courses. So went ahead and took the first GMAT prep. Did Ok, but i realized some very stupid mistakes I was making. So the next day with full concentration I took the second test, and there it was, a score within the goal I was seeking. A 660 will be competitive in my belief. That would be my second to last practice, as I took the free Manhattan CAT test, scoring a 590.
So much for my long story, I did not have the required confidence in the first few questions today, and I feel it all went downhill from there. Got a 600, yes above average and all, but still does not help my two final applications. I have to strengthen this part of my application, my goal is to improve at least 50 points. I will read this forum from top to bottom, I will do an evaluation of what I did wrong (ej no
error log). However I would like to hear your inputs, I don't trust Kaplan any more, there is not enough theoretical content in the book and it is something I need to strengthen.
A bit of my profile:
Nationality: Costa Rican
Background: Investment banking (3 years, current), Corporate Finance, Intel (2 years)
Worked with Deutsche Bank as an off shore analyst, now enrolled with a local bank, specializing in M&A
Age: 27, 28 by enrollment in fall 2010
Schools:
IE Business School (admitted, very excited about this too! its tied with LBS as my top choices)
LBS (application, now R2 for 2010)
Vlerick Leuven Management School (application pending, 634 average, should I apply now?)
International exposure: I think this is one of my strong parts, lived in the US 4 years during my teen years. Traveled plenty with Intel to China and the US, worked with multidisciplinary and multicultural teams at that company.
Switched to investment banking in 06 as an off shore for DB, spent a month in NYC, now working for a local bank, get to travel all over Central America to meet clients.
Can't wait for your comments.