Yesterday, after a year long battle and 2 retakes I finally beat the GMAT. I scored a 710 (48Q, 39V). Since I have greatly benefited from all of the stories and advice from GMATClub I wanted share my experience so it could possibly inspire someone who is currently going through this grueling process.
Background:I graduated cum laude from an Ivy League University (think Harvard/Yale/Penn), liberal arts major, currently working as a strategy consultant at a top consulting firm. The reason I mention my background is because from society's perspective i'm relatively smart. The reality is my intelligence had very little to do with my GMAT score.
I thought that because I had done pretty well in school, the GMAT would naturally come very easy to me and that is the farthest thing from the truth. This entire GMAT process has easily been the most humbling experience of my life. It has taught me what it really means to grind, and put in work for something you really want. There were several times when I wanted to give up and began to question whether b-school was really for me, but I knew it was something that I really wanted and I was willing to sacrifice anything to get the score I wanted. The GMAT took a large toll on my social life. While everyone was at brunches, concerts, parties, I was in my room studying because I knew my score wasn't going to raise by itself. When I started this process, I had no idea that it would take me nearly a year before I would crack the 700 mark on the GMAT but hey thats how it worked out. Now to my story:
In the end of 2013, I decided that I was going to sign up for a
MGMAT class because my work schedule was relatively easy and I knew I wanted to go business school in the near future. I heard from people that
MGMAT was a great class to take, so I decided to gather my funds and pay for the GMAT class. Before the class, I decided to take a practice test blind. I took a
MGMAT CAT and scored a 550, quant was pretty low (I think low 30s) and my verbal was decent mid 30s. During the 10 week class, I did all the
OG homework and all the assignments but even after the class was over, felt that like I still wasn't ready to take the test. I decided to wait about 6 weeks before taking the exam. Before taking the exam, I was very nervous because the best I had ever scored on any practice exam was a 660, and even then I felt that was a fluke. I went into the exam very nervous and basically dreading it, HUGE mistake. Confidence is sooooo important on this test. I started the IR and essay that went fine, and then came the dreaded quant section. Quant was by far my weakest section, and I went into the test knowing that I was probably going to bomb it....and I did. I started the quant section, didn't know how to solve the first question, and it just went downhill after that. I started panicking a little bit and the quant section was here and gone before I blinked. After the quant was over, I knew I messed up big time, but I thought, alright time for the Verbal which was my bread and butter. The problem is...I couldn't stop thinking about how I bombed the Q. Mid way into the verbal, a girl sat next to me and starts coughing the whole time, and it just went from bad to worse. I fill out the questionnaire, open my eyes, and boom. 580 (Q32, V 34). I was very disappointed because I had studied for 4 months and gotten only 30 points higher than when I took the test blind. But I knew it was ok because many people take the GMAT twice, so I tried not to fret to much about it.
After the first test, I had a debrief with Stacey K from
MGMAT and she explained to me that my fundamentals were probably shaky and I didn't have enough mental stamina, which explains why the girl coughing bothered me. When you are in the "zone," you don't even hear people around you, all you are thinking about is the test. So after failing the first time, I decided to give myself a couple weeks to just decompress and then get back at it. This time, I knew Quant was my weak area, I really needed to spend a lot of time learning the basics of math. At this point, I decided to reread all of my
MGMAT books from front to back and do all of the corresponding
OG problems. I also decided to implement some new resources. I bought
Magoosh and the Powerscore Critical Reasoning bible. These were easily two of the best GMAT purchases I made. I can't rave enough about
Magoosh. If you are a visual learner like myself,
Magoosh provides over 100 videos on various GMAT concepts in a very digestible method. For example, of you are having issues with probability just watch the probability chapter. The way the videos are organized they work in tandem with the
MGMAT books. Also the price can't be beat, I can't say it enough BUY
MAGOOSH if you are struggling with math. I also decided to buy the Powerscore CR bible because I had read that it was really helpful in raising your CR accuracy. I'm not sure what it is about this book but the methodology is sooo much simpler than
MGMAT. Within 2 weeks after finishing the book my CR accuracy went from about 50-60% to 80-85%. This time I wanted to take my time before taking the test again. I started getting into a rhythm of taking a practice test every Saturday to build up my mental stamina. I can't tell you how important practice tests are because they require you to focus under real time constraints. I continued to take
MGMAT practice tests even though they were extremely hard, and noticed my scores started to improve, and after about 4 I finally broke the 700 mark. I took a couple GMAT prep tests scored in the high 600s to low 700s and felt that I was ready.
Test Day #2This time I felt a little more confident but was still worried about whether I was ready. Started the test, breezed through the AWA and thought the IR was pretty tough but really didn't care that much. I was awaiting the beastly Quant section. Started the quant, felt it wasnt that bad, got a couple hard questions but felt pretty good at the end of the section. I didnt think I did great but knew I didn't bomb it. So again, I went into the verbal pretty confident and then the unthinkable happens, I was so focused on getting the first 10 correct, I completely botched the timing and realized I was really behind at the midway point. Not to mention, I felt that the verbal was significantly harder than what I had seen in the
OG or
MGMAT practice exams. My heart started racing and began to panic, and ended up guessing on probably the last 6-7, and knew that I bombed it again. I filed out my questionnaire, opened my eyes, and boom...580 AGAIN (Q42, V28). I was extremely disappointed and sad. I was in shock, this time I studied for another 3 months before retaking and I got the same exact score. I couldn't believe it. The only saving grace was that my quant score climbed almost 10 points which was great (thanks
magoosh) but overall I was really upset. After failing twice, I got in a really dark place and really questioned if this whole business school thing was for me. I had spent so much time and money and really had nothing to show for it. I took another break, and spoke with my friends and family to see what they thought. A good friend of mine told me, "its ok to not do well, but the true failure is letting this beat you and stop you from your dreams." I decided all right I'll give it one more go, this time it was destined to be.
Finally turning the cornerI really dug deep and decided that I fully intended to go to business school and would not let some stupid standardized test stop me from my dream. Things really started to change, when I decided to look into my old ACT score. The whole time, I had created this notion that I wasn't good at standardized tests only to realize in high school i got a 28/36 on my ACT and scored in the 94th percentile. This gave me a huge boost of confidence, took a practice test got a 690, when previously I was scoring in the mid 600s. There are many takeaways I learned upon studying for the GMAT the third time.
1. Reviewing correct and incorrect answers is far more important than just answering questions. I can't stress this enough. In order to do well, you really need to understand why you got questions wrong and also if you did get it right, is there a quicker way to get it right. After I would take a CAT, I would probably spend 2-3 hours reviewing my test. I would redo every single problem and make sure I understood them. I lived on the GMATClub, BeatTheGMAT, and
MGMAT forum. Any time I did not understand a question, I would google the question and read the various explanations from people. This was incredibly helpful to my Quant score increase. As well, when reviewing, focus on WHY you selected the wrong answer. Was it a careless error, did you simply guess, do you really understand the concept being tested? These are questions you need to answer in order to be successful.
2. Take timed sets. Its very important that you develop an internal clock with questions. You need to practice enough questions to know when you've reached the 2 minute mark without looking at a clock.
3. Learn when to guess. It is impossible to get every question right, so you need to be confident enough to blindly guess on a question and know you will get the next one correct. If you've spent 1 min on a question and you don't where to start, you have to guess
4. FUNDAMENTALS! This test is a test of logic and fundamentals. None of the problems are that difficult once you have a very solid foundation especially in math. The first two times I took the exam, my fundamentals were incredibly shaky. I spent countless hours watching
Magoosh videos and reviewing math concepts. You need to get to a point where you understand the concepts in and out so if you see something like 12^3 you start thinking ok to solve this perhaps i need to use 4^3 * 3^3 or maybe its 6^3*2^3.
Test Prep Materials 1.
e-gmat Verbal - After bombing the verbal, I decided to look into additional help because whatever I was doing wasn't working. Subscribing to the
e-gmat course was one of the best things I did. I really realized where I was weak in terms of my understanding of verbal. THE ENTIRE VERBAL SECTION IS A TEST OF LOGIC NOT GRAMMAR. I know this sounds crazy, but even SC is a test of logic over grammar.
e-gmat helped me realize this and with that my score increased.
2.
Magoosh - i've already talked about this.
3.
GMATCLUB tests - This helped me get my quant from 42 to 48. The tests are extremely hard, but it'll really test your fundamentals and even as you continue to get your a$$ kicked by these tests you'll realize when you take a GMATprep test your score will definitely increase. I think they best I ever did on a GC test was 42.
4.
Veritas Test - I felt these tests were far more representative of the real GMAT than
MGMAT exams.
5.
GMATPREP Question Pack- these questions were golden as they are a level above the
OG. The
OG book is NOT representative of the questions you'll see on the actual test. The questions are significantly harder so its better to work on more difficult questions.
6.
GMAT Cheatsheet- I compiled a 20 page document of important GMAT concepts and tips & tricks. Its topics ranged from probability to different verb tenses. I read through this almost everyday for a month to make sure I had everything down pact.
7.
GMATQuantum Youtube Channel - While I don't think the
OG is representative of the actual exam, GMATQuantum was extremely helpful in figuring out answers to the
OG problems. They have videos explaining how to do every single
OG question. I watched every video for every question I got wrong, and even for some I got correct.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHb2l0 ... ZYJXBFKX-AMock Scores Leading up to Exam 3.Leading up to my exam every weekend I took a practice exam. This is very important. You need to take enough practice tests so that it becomes second nature. Take them under real conditions. Focus on practice tests when you get to the end of your prep, in the beginning its more important to focus on learning the concepts. The practice tests are just that practice, so you use them to see how you are developing.
GMAT Prep #1- 710 (49Q, V40)
GMAT Prep #2 - 740 (47Q, V44)
Veritas #1- 680 (Q46, V38)
Veritas #2- 730 (Q43, V47)
Veritas #3- 710 (Q44, V44)
Veritas #4- 770 (Q47, Q49)
Veritas #5 730 (Q45, V46)
For almost 2 months I was consistently testing pretty well, so I felt I was finally ready to take the exam. My confidence was up and I knew it was my time.
Test Day #3 It was game time. I was ready, I knew it was my time to shine. Again the GMAT is a test of confidence, so before the test I went and got a fresh haircut because I always feel confident after leaving the barbershop. This time I looked forward to the test because I knew I was going to crush it.
AWA was fine, IR was fine. Now it was the dreaded Quant section. I start quant the first questions was a mixture question ( I HATE mixture questions), but I spent a little extra time and figured it out. I felt like I missed a couple early ones and I was behind on time but I kept fighting through. Got some number property questions and then came my first probability question. At this point I started feeling good because I knew probability only come when you are doing well. I still was behind on time, but I made some educated guesses and kept working my way through, saw some geometry questions and then another probability question. Again a boost of confidence. Guessed on the last couple and came across a beast of a question that tested combinatorics. I felt I did good but not great.
Next Verbal, I thought the verbal was a little easier than Veritas, felt pretty comfortable going through it. Passages were focused on history, business, and animals, no science (praise the lord). I got a surprising large number of SCs vs. CR but I didnt think they were that hard. Anyways did the survey, said a little prayer, opened my eyes and boom...710 (48Q, 39V) I couldnt believe it, I was always worried about Q and I did very well. I went from a 34Q on my first exam to a 48Q on my last one. I was ecscastic. I felt I could have done better on verbal but whatever I broke 700, which was my end goal.
Test Day Suggestions1. Get a good nights sleep and do not study the day before. Relax and ease your mind. You do not want to burn out before the test.
2. Keep cool and breathe during the test. The test is very hard, so its very important to keep your cool and be calm. There was several times during the test where I took a couple seconds to just breathe when I felt my heart rate going up.
3. CONFIDENCE IS KEY. You need to walk into the test, knowing you are going to own it.
Sorry for the long post, but this forum has given me so much so hopefully this can help anyone studying for this test. If I can do it, you can too. I am no genius, just a guy who works hard.
The GMAT is beatable, the question is how bad do you want it?
Peace and Love,
Q
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Updated on: 16 Mar 2015, 07:41
