Hi guys,
I joined this forum in August this year. I never posted really much, but I used it a lot in my preparation.
The main usage of this forum was to see how other people find solutions for problems. Sometimes I had the feeling that the "official" explanations from the
OG and
MGMAT are not really useful. Anyway, I would like to say thank you to the people here, which posted solutions and very detailed explanations. In the Math area that's especially bunuel. His posts are exceptional!
I took the GMAT for the first time in September (exactly 3 months ago) and scored a 580. Quite disappointing, but not very surprising cause I invested only like 2,5 weeks for preparation. In the upcoming weeks I didn't have much time for preparation. I'm working as a consultant and spend much time on business trips. It's not really possible/easy to learn in some hotel room after a long working day. In September and October I did exactly 0 hours of preparation. Beginning of November I got sick, so I also couldn't do anything for 1,5 weeks. From mid of November I had vacation and I started my preparation again with the
Manhattan books (I bought the complete set of 8 books). It was not possible to read through all the 8 books, so I focussed on the quant part, which was really bad in my first exam. I spend my 2.5 weeks vacation studying almost every day around 8 hours. I became more and more confident after taking the
MGMAT mocks and the GMATprep practice exams. I scored 590, 650, 700, 650 and 690. So that resembles my score quite well.
However, during the test today I had some trouble. The quant questions were a little different and quite hard (at least from my point of view). I think I had a good start, but then I needed more time from question to question. I felt like I can solve the problems, but not in under 2 minutes. In the mid of the quant I realised that I'm 11 minutes short. So I had to rush. I answered some questions pretty quickly until I was in time again. From that point I could manage the time well, probably also because the questions were easier
At the end it was a 44 and 61 percentile. Nothing to be proud of, but enough for me
Unfortunately I was a little bit down after the quant, cause I thought that it was worse. I tried to focus again in the verbal session and things were going well for me I think. I answered a bunch of questions quite quickly and didn't have the feeling that it's difficult. At the end it was a 40 (90%). I think that's pretty ok for a non-native
I know that 690 is not dream score for many of you, but I hope that it's sufficient for me to get accepted in one of the programs I'm interested in.
Honestly, I'm not sure how business schools use the GMAT score, but I see that "racing for good scores" quite critical. I don't think that the GMAT score is a good indicator, whether someone will do well in the program or not.
At the end it's a test about math and logical thinking. For non-natives it's additionally a good test for English language. For me there is no point in forcing people to prepare +1 year for a GMAT exam to get a good score, but all they learn is more or less useless for the later study...
I'm happy that I could get a reasonable score with "only" investing around 4-5 weeks of my life. Everything above 600 should be enough for someone to be able to complete a postgraduate study...
The GMAT is not an exam anymore, it's an industry. Unbelievable how many people earn money with that test. Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming those people. It's a job like any other job. Teaching people is actually a nice job. Nevertheless I think that it's just crazy and too much what's going on around the GMAT
Kindest Regards and thanks again to GMATclub and the others!