Hi,

I'm a new registered member of the GMAT club and I actually found this place yesterday morning, the morning of my exam. =)

I wish I started searching more online before I started studying but I thought the official GMAT book would be enough for me. In a way, it was but I could have used the help of this community.

I'm kind of new to this GMAT/BSchool thing. I decided quite late that I wanted to attend business school and I'm rushing to get things prepared and ready.

Well, I took the exam yesterday and from my previous practice exams, I thought my score would range anywhere from 710 to 750. I was hoping for 730. However, real test conditions actually left me short on time. Maybe it was the nerves or exhaustion from studying so much in the past few days.

Anyways, I'm curious to know if 710 is a good score? Good enough for the likes of Stanford, Wharton, Berkeley? Those are the schools I'm interested in. From some of the statistics I've seen from some of these schools showed a fairly average GMAT score. They mostly ranged in the 690 - 730, concentrated in the middle of that range. Am I right or was that was that just my observation?

I believe I can score higher on the verbal if I can relax and concentrate better. The math score has been consistent for me so I don't worry too much about it.
I'm not sure if I should make one more attempt to get a higher score. I'm in the process of thinking about it.

Can you all give me some advice? I think I'll start looking through this site and read through all the material to get help in areas that I'm weak.

Thanks for all your help in advance.

noob

Is 710 a good enough score to be competitive?

Well, I hope this isn't the wrong place to be asking this but my profile in short is the following.

Schools being considered: Stanford/Berkeley/Wharton/Sloan

Undergraduate: UC Berkeley
Major: Mechanical Engineering
GPA: 3.7

Graduate School: Stanford
Major: Mechanical Engineering
GPA: not sure, probably close to the undergraduate one

Took some computer science courses at Stanford courses before completing my MS degree in Mech Eng. I got out and got a job with a software company that build enterprise content management software.

I've been working for about 6 years at the same company. The first 2 years, I worked as a technical consultant and the last 4 years, I move over to development and worked as a software engineer.

As a technical consultant my job duties were to go to the customer site and participate in meetings with the customer's technical and business people to analyze their business process as it relates to their web content. I would ultimately gather requirements and implement the software. Follow ups would include writing a report details the solution.

As a software engineer, I'm responsible for building the software and designing the next generation set of features that will enhance the product. I'm in constant contact with product management to understand customer feedback/requirements and with management to make sure our goals are aligned.

As a developer, I am seen as a valuable resource not only for my technical abilities but also for my in-depth and well rounded knowledge about all aspects of the software and things relating to the business process and organizational structure of the company. I like to think that I have sort of a "mentor" role to the more junior people on our team.

In addition to my development tasks I've also been asked to provide other "services". I was asked twice before to program manage the release of two products, managing schedules, resources, etc. I was even recognized for my effort and hardwork with a departmental award.

Currently, desiring more involvement with product management, I've been privileged enough to help out product management with the release of a product (another product our company builds) with a smaller scope. I'm working with a senior product manager to manage the product scope/requirements for a development team that resides in India. Daily duties include coordinating both the teams in the US (docs, development, QA) and the team in India and I'm responsible for defining the product definition and making sure all the requirements are met by the development team. I occasionally need to have contact with a counterpart in marketing to let them know about the product so they are able to prepare their messaging.

In terms of promotions, I was essentially promoted from consultant to engineer after working on a high profile internal project for a proof of concept product. I was promoted to senior engineer after two years and i'm now reaching a point where I'm being considered for another jump up.

Not sure what else would be helpful in evaluating my position. Let me know if you need more information.

Thanks.

Here you go!