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luishector
Joined: 04 Jan 2015
Last visit: 20 Apr 2016
Posts: 2
Given Kudos: 12
Concentration: Marketing, Strategy
Schools: HBS '18 (WL)
GMAT 1: 730 Q49 V40
07 Feb 2015, 15:23
Kudos
Bookmarks
“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee”; Muhammed Ali
Background: Spanish. MSc in Telecommunications Engineering. Ex-consultant, now work in Digital Marketing for an e-commerce company.
Schools interested in: MIT, INSEAD, HBS, Columbia
GMAT score: 730 49q/40v
First of all, I must admit that I am not the kind of guy who would post his GMAT experience in a forum. I have to be 100% honest with you and say that I have always been quite passive (a leecher and not a seeder if you want to see it that way) with regards to internet forums. I’ve always thought that there is an excess of information out there, in many occasions duplicated and hard to segregate. BUT, since this forum has helped me so much in the last couple of weeks (dam, I wish I had known about it before!), I believe that I owe it a post summarising my point of view and my experience; hopefully it will help others in there way to a decent GMAT score (where decent means >700).
This is how I see the GMAT, you can take it or leave it, but I believe it’s a practical approach to a >700 score:
1. Three myths about the exam
“The GMAT is hard and requires lot of study”
FALSE. The GMAT requires LOT of practice. You simply need a solid math base (basic math indeed). On the other hand you need to be EXTREMELY agile when solving problems. I made the mistake of focusing too much on difficult problems…this is worthless, simply because difficult problems will only appear if you aim at scoring >750, which was not my case. The time spent on SUPER difficult problems is time that you are wasting if you aim at >700. Better to spend 15’ doing 10 medium-easy exercises trying to be SUPER fast than to spend them understanding someone’s explanation on a problem that you simply won’t face on the exam day. Concerning the verbal part, I only “studied” the most relevant idioms (used Magoosh Android App when going to the toilet to do the number 2). I have a decent English level (decent for a Spaniard) and honestly did not feel like going through text books or through Sentence Correction miraculous tips; to succeed on the verbal part you just need to UNDERSTAND PERFECTLY WELL what the heck the argument is about. Who does what? When? Why? What is the impact? etc. Again, you need to be SUPER fast, no hesitation. If you hesitate, guess and move on.
“I need to purchase every single material out there”
FALSE. I was surprised of how similar the actual exam was to the questions in the OG. I spent lot of time (and some dollars too) going through MGMAT, Kaplan and 800score exams…again: WORTHLESS. My score in these exams was in the range of 590-650 and the question type that I found had nothing to do with the actual exam. You are here to pass an exam, not to learn new formulas or new math. Practice again and again and again AND AGAIN the OG problems. I recommend to purchase the extra exams that come with the GMAT prep software (49€), I scored 700 and 710 on them 3 days before the exam and reflected very accurately my level. MGMAT’s exams are decent for the verbal, but the math is too theoretical and too difficult to be solved in <2’. 800score’s are simply too difficult for the math. AGAIN, focus on being agile. You float like a a butterfly, not like a f***ing Boing 747.
“If I haven’t scored 7XX I will never get to that score on the exam day!!
FALSE. I did and never thought I would score that high. You just need concentration (in my case 3 Red Bulls and 2 chocolate bars as well). Take into account that when you are studying you are probably at home, a bit relaxed in your pyjamas and probably with some music, the phone ringing, the flatmates playing music, and the neighbours…well, you know…the neighbours. On the exam day you are a robot, a machine. No distractions. 100% concentration. Only you and the exam, nothing else in the world. You are a bee, that is the day in which you must STING!
2. The plan
The plan is no plan.
I must admit that I started with a carefully designed 4 months plan that seemed robust. I am a very organised person so I even stablished a consultant-style calendar (1 month math, 1 month verbal, 1 month both and 1 month timing and exam mode). The plan looked great on the paper, but I I failed twice when trying to follow it (gave up after 2 weeks both times due to a lack of time). I basically redesigned my strategy to a more “on-the-go” move. I started alternating: one day math, one day verbal and so on. I had to study before going to work (6AM-7h30AM) and during weekends, so it was a bit tough to be 100% active, restful and concentrated. I spent a total of 4 months studying, but it was not until the last 2 weeks that I made the biggest progress when (1) I decided to shift strategy and to stop looking at too difficult problems and (2) discovered Bunuel’s material. Do. Re-do. Do again. Time yourself. Re-do. AGAIN, be agile and don’t make mistakes on the basics.
Time yourself. Keep track of your results (graphs / trends that help you see easily if you are making any improvement). It motivates to see that you started at 530 and that you are almost at 700.
3. The material
Less is more.
If you want to be successful in your GMAT, you only NEED to buy the Official Guides (I bought the 3 of them - General/Verbal/Math) and the 2 extra GMAT prep exams. The rest, in my humble opinion, is a big piece of expensive CRAP. Nothing that you cannot learn through exercising or reading The Economist. Messi did not learn to play football by watching TV, he learned by playing every single day. Practice, practice, practice and when you are done with practising, practice a bit more.
Ah, almost forget about it! This is where gmatclub forum starts playing a crucial role… The excess of posts drove me crazy at the beginning: too many strategies, too many opinions, too much material indeed! I decided to focus on Bunuel’s material, which proofed to be solid and well explained. For the theory I used the gmatclub Math Book. Also, the people in this forum are simply AMAZING so I encourage you to check your answers in the forum and try to solve problems in different ways. For the verbal, I downloaded Magoosh Android App 3 days before the exam and learned the most important idioms by heart. When you have practiced A LOT, you just need a couple of trips to the toilet to learn the most important pieces of theory
In summary: choose a “religion” and stick to it. I chose Bunuel’s + OG and worked out perfectly well. I wish I had knew about Bunuel’s material before…it’s PRICELESS.
4. My 2 cents
Improvise. Be creative. Be agile.
I have read multiple strategies and ways of cracking the GMAT. I would recommend to stay naive, to stay foolish and to avoid loosing creativity. Avoid learning formulas by heart, avoid learning methods or rules of thumb; just THINK. A misplaced comma can change the meaning of an entire question, so don’t worry about not knowing the exact formula, I am sure it’s 1000 times better to know how to get to it rather than to apply it by heart. Trust me, as a butterfly you don’t want to carry on 100 heavy formulas and 200 Sentence Correction tips with you (you might loose them in the middle of your flight!), you need grey matter that doesn’t weight and can be used anywhere!
5. The day of the exam
Keep calm and concentrated.
I live in Luxembourg and had to take a train the day before to Dusseldorf, where my exam would take place. The day before the exam I simply enjoyed the trip, went out for lunch, took some pictures of the city architecture and went running (nothing exhausting, just 30-40’ to keep the blood flowing through my veins). I went to bed at the time old people go to bed (9 PM) and slept for 10h (I can tell you that I dreamed of the GMAT, that’s for sure). The exam itself is not a math or English test, its a psychological test in which being concentrated and calm is crucial. For that, you need to be SUPER restful. Forget about studying that day, it’s useless and you need to rest. I woke up around 7AM and, as the night before, went running for 30’ (I recommend exercise before the exam, specially if you are taking it in the morning, as I did). I took not one, not two, but THREE Red Bulls, two apples and two chocolate bars (I must admit that this might be too much and I don’t want to cause any heart attacks among the readers, so feel free to avoid following this piece of advice).
If you can, get familiar with the test centre and visit it before the exam day. Me I didn’t have the chance to do it and found some “surprises”: the chairs had wheels and were noisy, the “cube” in which I took the exam was basically made of carton (I could actually hear other people breathing and typing on their keyboards), the table was small, there was too much light and I was sitting facing the sun, the pen was not an actual pen but a marker, the paper was not actual paper but plastic paper, and so on…
BUT there were no excuses, I was there to crack the exam. I selected the TOP schools I was aiming at. No time for plan B, just TOP choices…YOU NEED TO BELIEVE THAT YOU CAN DO IT and the first step is to select the schools with confidence (are you dreaming of Harvard? go and select f**king HBS! they will be happy to receive your 7XX score!). I put on my earplugs, concentrated as much as possible and cracked it. I was OVEREXCITED (I broke two pens and I honestly think I had a caffeine hyper dose), but I cracked it. By the way, don’t get crazy with the AWA and the Integrated Reasoning parts…just do the best you can and keep your energy intact. The real test starts afterwards!
Hope it helps (or at least motivates you!)
Luis.
Background: Spanish. MSc in Telecommunications Engineering. Ex-consultant, now work in Digital Marketing for an e-commerce company.
Schools interested in: MIT, INSEAD, HBS, Columbia
GMAT score: 730 49q/40v
First of all, I must admit that I am not the kind of guy who would post his GMAT experience in a forum. I have to be 100% honest with you and say that I have always been quite passive (a leecher and not a seeder if you want to see it that way) with regards to internet forums. I’ve always thought that there is an excess of information out there, in many occasions duplicated and hard to segregate. BUT, since this forum has helped me so much in the last couple of weeks (dam, I wish I had known about it before!), I believe that I owe it a post summarising my point of view and my experience; hopefully it will help others in there way to a decent GMAT score (where decent means >700).
This is how I see the GMAT, you can take it or leave it, but I believe it’s a practical approach to a >700 score:
1. Three myths about the exam
“The GMAT is hard and requires lot of study”
FALSE. The GMAT requires LOT of practice. You simply need a solid math base (basic math indeed). On the other hand you need to be EXTREMELY agile when solving problems. I made the mistake of focusing too much on difficult problems…this is worthless, simply because difficult problems will only appear if you aim at scoring >750, which was not my case. The time spent on SUPER difficult problems is time that you are wasting if you aim at >700. Better to spend 15’ doing 10 medium-easy exercises trying to be SUPER fast than to spend them understanding someone’s explanation on a problem that you simply won’t face on the exam day. Concerning the verbal part, I only “studied” the most relevant idioms (used Magoosh Android App when going to the toilet to do the number 2). I have a decent English level (decent for a Spaniard) and honestly did not feel like going through text books or through Sentence Correction miraculous tips; to succeed on the verbal part you just need to UNDERSTAND PERFECTLY WELL what the heck the argument is about. Who does what? When? Why? What is the impact? etc. Again, you need to be SUPER fast, no hesitation. If you hesitate, guess and move on.
“I need to purchase every single material out there”
FALSE. I was surprised of how similar the actual exam was to the questions in the OG. I spent lot of time (and some dollars too) going through MGMAT, Kaplan and 800score exams…again: WORTHLESS. My score in these exams was in the range of 590-650 and the question type that I found had nothing to do with the actual exam. You are here to pass an exam, not to learn new formulas or new math. Practice again and again and again AND AGAIN the OG problems. I recommend to purchase the extra exams that come with the GMAT prep software (49€), I scored 700 and 710 on them 3 days before the exam and reflected very accurately my level. MGMAT’s exams are decent for the verbal, but the math is too theoretical and too difficult to be solved in <2’. 800score’s are simply too difficult for the math. AGAIN, focus on being agile. You float like a a butterfly, not like a f***ing Boing 747.
“If I haven’t scored 7XX I will never get to that score on the exam day!!
FALSE. I did and never thought I would score that high. You just need concentration (in my case 3 Red Bulls and 2 chocolate bars as well). Take into account that when you are studying you are probably at home, a bit relaxed in your pyjamas and probably with some music, the phone ringing, the flatmates playing music, and the neighbours…well, you know…the neighbours. On the exam day you are a robot, a machine. No distractions. 100% concentration. Only you and the exam, nothing else in the world. You are a bee, that is the day in which you must STING!
2. The plan
The plan is no plan.
I must admit that I started with a carefully designed 4 months plan that seemed robust. I am a very organised person so I even stablished a consultant-style calendar (1 month math, 1 month verbal, 1 month both and 1 month timing and exam mode). The plan looked great on the paper, but I I failed twice when trying to follow it (gave up after 2 weeks both times due to a lack of time). I basically redesigned my strategy to a more “on-the-go” move. I started alternating: one day math, one day verbal and so on. I had to study before going to work (6AM-7h30AM) and during weekends, so it was a bit tough to be 100% active, restful and concentrated. I spent a total of 4 months studying, but it was not until the last 2 weeks that I made the biggest progress when (1) I decided to shift strategy and to stop looking at too difficult problems and (2) discovered Bunuel’s material. Do. Re-do. Do again. Time yourself. Re-do. AGAIN, be agile and don’t make mistakes on the basics.
Time yourself. Keep track of your results (graphs / trends that help you see easily if you are making any improvement). It motivates to see that you started at 530 and that you are almost at 700.
3. The material
Less is more.
If you want to be successful in your GMAT, you only NEED to buy the Official Guides (I bought the 3 of them - General/Verbal/Math) and the 2 extra GMAT prep exams. The rest, in my humble opinion, is a big piece of expensive CRAP. Nothing that you cannot learn through exercising or reading The Economist. Messi did not learn to play football by watching TV, he learned by playing every single day. Practice, practice, practice and when you are done with practising, practice a bit more.
Ah, almost forget about it! This is where gmatclub forum starts playing a crucial role… The excess of posts drove me crazy at the beginning: too many strategies, too many opinions, too much material indeed! I decided to focus on Bunuel’s material, which proofed to be solid and well explained. For the theory I used the gmatclub Math Book. Also, the people in this forum are simply AMAZING so I encourage you to check your answers in the forum and try to solve problems in different ways. For the verbal, I downloaded Magoosh Android App 3 days before the exam and learned the most important idioms by heart. When you have practiced A LOT, you just need a couple of trips to the toilet to learn the most important pieces of theory
In summary: choose a “religion” and stick to it. I chose Bunuel’s + OG and worked out perfectly well. I wish I had knew about Bunuel’s material before…it’s PRICELESS.
4. My 2 cents
Improvise. Be creative. Be agile.
I have read multiple strategies and ways of cracking the GMAT. I would recommend to stay naive, to stay foolish and to avoid loosing creativity. Avoid learning formulas by heart, avoid learning methods or rules of thumb; just THINK. A misplaced comma can change the meaning of an entire question, so don’t worry about not knowing the exact formula, I am sure it’s 1000 times better to know how to get to it rather than to apply it by heart. Trust me, as a butterfly you don’t want to carry on 100 heavy formulas and 200 Sentence Correction tips with you (you might loose them in the middle of your flight!), you need grey matter that doesn’t weight and can be used anywhere!
5. The day of the exam
Keep calm and concentrated.
I live in Luxembourg and had to take a train the day before to Dusseldorf, where my exam would take place. The day before the exam I simply enjoyed the trip, went out for lunch, took some pictures of the city architecture and went running (nothing exhausting, just 30-40’ to keep the blood flowing through my veins). I went to bed at the time old people go to bed (9 PM) and slept for 10h (I can tell you that I dreamed of the GMAT, that’s for sure). The exam itself is not a math or English test, its a psychological test in which being concentrated and calm is crucial. For that, you need to be SUPER restful. Forget about studying that day, it’s useless and you need to rest. I woke up around 7AM and, as the night before, went running for 30’ (I recommend exercise before the exam, specially if you are taking it in the morning, as I did). I took not one, not two, but THREE Red Bulls, two apples and two chocolate bars (I must admit that this might be too much and I don’t want to cause any heart attacks among the readers, so feel free to avoid following this piece of advice).
If you can, get familiar with the test centre and visit it before the exam day. Me I didn’t have the chance to do it and found some “surprises”: the chairs had wheels and were noisy, the “cube” in which I took the exam was basically made of carton (I could actually hear other people breathing and typing on their keyboards), the table was small, there was too much light and I was sitting facing the sun, the pen was not an actual pen but a marker, the paper was not actual paper but plastic paper, and so on…
BUT there were no excuses, I was there to crack the exam. I selected the TOP schools I was aiming at. No time for plan B, just TOP choices…YOU NEED TO BELIEVE THAT YOU CAN DO IT and the first step is to select the schools with confidence (are you dreaming of Harvard? go and select f**king HBS! they will be happy to receive your 7XX score!). I put on my earplugs, concentrated as much as possible and cracked it. I was OVEREXCITED (I broke two pens and I honestly think I had a caffeine hyper dose), but I cracked it. By the way, don’t get crazy with the AWA and the Integrated Reasoning parts…just do the best you can and keep your energy intact. The real test starts afterwards!
Hope it helps (or at least motivates you!)
Luis.
08 Feb 2015, 19:47
Kudos
Bookmarks
Luis, this is the best GMAT experience post I've ever read.
Best of luck to you and your applications.
Best of luck to you and your applications.
09 Feb 2015, 03:26
Kudos
Bookmarks
You killed it man! Congratulations on your spectacular success and thanks a ton for sharing your invaluable insights
