I've read many debriefs along the years and always dreamt of writing my own. Many of the debriefs that I have read include students sharing their long and arduous GMAT journeys, and mine is no different. I scored a
770(Q50, V45) on my fourth attempt.
My GMAT journey started in April 2018. Many of my friends were going for an MS in US and had written the GRE. They prepared for the GRE from an in-class course of a famous global test prep company. I didn't do much research into the resources available for GMAT preparation and blindly followed along in my friends' footsteps. This move was probably the biggest mistake in my GMAT journey.
I began my classroom coaching, attended the classes for about 2 months, and then started the preparation from my end. Majority of my time was spent in practicing questions and revising them. A major issue in the revision was the lack of quality solutions for both the questions from the prep company and the
OG questions. Instead of asking me to revise pertinent concepts the tutors available kept asking me to practice different types of questions. I was also asked to take mocks at random junctures and after each mock I would just revise the questions and move on. There would be no analysis of the mock data and no specific plan for improvement. I took the free MBA mocks available and scored around 700/710. I was told that these mocks almost accurately reflect my performance on the real test (The reality is quite different
). Come the test day of my first attempt I went in all anxious (as most other students) and ended up scoring a
650(Q48 V30). I went back to my tutors and they blamed the test day anxiety for the huge score drop. I was asked to continue practicing/revising questions and take a few mocks. I purchased the Official MBA Mocks 3 & 4 and scored about 710 in both mocks. 20 days after my first attempt I took the second attempt and ended up with a
660(Q49 V31). At this point I was already exhausted and took a hiatus from my GMAT preparation.
Fast forward to 2020, Covid has disrupted all our lives and entrapped us in our homes. However, as the saying goes "every cloud has a silver lining" for me the silver lining was the infamous Work from home. I was left with a lot more time on my hands I decided to study for GMAT. I began my preparation in August 2020 and this time I did a little bit of research into the resources available. I ended up choosing
Magoosh because I saw some good reviews and because
Magoosh has a video explanation for each question. I took a diagnostic mock and as usual my verbal was hovering around 30 while my quant was around 49.
Magoosh provided a generic verbal concentrated plan, in which I had to spend around 70% of my time on verbal. I went through all the verbal course modules and could immediately see a difference in the depth of concepts covered and the quality of application skills thought. The main issue with this course was that I had no way to really quantify my progress. There were no clear metrics available and all I would do is practice a set of questions, revise the questions, and then move ahead. The mocks available on
Magoosh are no good either and I once again ended up relying on the Official MBA mocks (still believing that these mocks are reliable indicators). At the end of the course, I had learnt a lot of new concepts and had improved my approach for a few questions. I was a lot more confident, and I was performing even better on the Official MBA mocks - scoring around 730. So, I booked my third attempt in October 2020 with a strong belief of getting a 720+ score, knowing that I have improved my ability. On the test day, the Quants section was way tougher than on the Official mocks and I got bogged down. I managed to get through the Quants section, guessing a few questions and skipping the last few because of lack of time. Then I started the Verbal section, brimming with anxiety, and I once again found the verbal section to be harder than on the Official mocks, specifically in SC and CR. I ended up scoring a
660(Q48 V33). Seeing a score way below my expectations I knew that I needed to prepare from scratch again and so I decided to take a break for a while.
Six months on, I decided to resume my GMAT prep. To be honest I was torn between choosing the GRE and GMAT as business schools are increasingly accepting GRE scores for admission. I knew about
e-GMAT and the high success rate it manages to achieve. I got on a call with a client acquisition specialist from
e-GMAT and he made me see that despite 3 failed attempts I can make it to my target GMAT score. So I started my preparation by taking a diagnostic Sigma-X mock (taken by all
e-GMAT students) and the insights from the test results blew me away. I scored a Q49 and V28, with clear percentile scores in each of the sub-sections - SC, CR, RC, Arithmetic, and Algebra/Geometry. Clearly, I needed to work a lot on my verbal, and I was given a personalized study plan based on the number of hours I could accommodate on the weekdays/weekends. Honestly, I couldn't keep up with my time commitments and if anyone is facing such an issue I would suggest going back to the planner and updating the actual number of hours that one can spend preparing. So, I started off with SC, which was my weakest suite and I made sure to start from scratch. I think me believing the data from the Sigma-X mock helped me perform well. At the end of the day when we trust reliable data, we will always get the desired results. I went through the course as suggested and the best part of the SC course is its depth and breadth. I can say with all certainty that
e-GMAT's SC course covers all the concepts required for GMAT, eliminating the need to ever guess the pertinent concept or to follow your hunch while solving an SC question. I then went ahead with the 3-step preparation strategy followed at
e-GMAT and while it was tedious and long it was all worth it. In fact because of the length of the course I ended up taking 2 months just to complete the verbal course (it can be done a lot quicker if enough time is allotted), during this time I did many times doubt the entire process but stuck to it anyway. At the end of the verbal preparation, I took a Sigma-X mock and had improved to a V44. Now it was time for some fine tuning in Quants and
e-GMAT has a very dynamic Quants course, which fits perfectly to meet the needs of each client. Before each module there is a diagnostic quiz, which lets you know whether you need to go through the module and which sections of the module you need to go through. After completing my preparation on Quants, I was scoring in the 98 percentiles but was having some timing issues. This is when the support from
e-GMAT's strategy team was invaluable. Archit was my mentor and he sent me detailed videos analysing my mocks, showing me the questions in which I was taking longer and how I should improve my timing. It was Archit's support that drove my score that extra few points higher. I took my fourth attempt in September 2021 and scored a
770(Q50 V45).
I never gave up on my GMAT journey only because I knew my score of 660 wouldn't get me to my dream universities, but I did doubt myself plenty. After 3 failed attempts it's natural to doubt yourself but now I have realised that with the right prep and support it is possible to improve your score. In conclusion, for all those out there who have had unsuccessful attempts and those who aren't sure about whether they should give GMAT another try, I would like to say that if you know you need a higher GMAT score to get into your dream universities then you can improve your score even on the 7th attempt. There's no such thing as failure x times will lead to failure again. But don't expect a different result without difference in preparation.
close
16 Sep 2021, 11:32
