From 600 to 690: Mastering the Fundamentals

I began thinking about going back for my MBA earlier this year while studying for the CFA Level II exam. After working in financial planning and analysis for a blue chip company the last two years I was ready for a career shift into investment management, and I saw getting an MBA as the path toward that goal. In hindsight I would have liked to start studying for the GMAT earlier, but I had to polish off the CFA LII exam in June, meaning I couldn't begin studying for the GMAT until the summer.

My background:
Native English speaker
BBA in Finance from Big Ten school
Experience in FP&A for blue chip company

First thing I did was do plenty of research on the GMAT Club forums and Amazon to get an idea what to get for study materials. Here's what I used:

1) OG 12 (Necessary)
2) OG Quant Review 2nd ed. (Necessary)
3) OG Verbal Review 2nd ed. (Useful, but probably optional)
4) Set of 8 MGMAT Books (Highly recommended)
5) Kaplan 800 (Useful practice, but honestly thought the questions were too easy)

The first two months I put in about 2 hours a night. I took the first GMATPrep practice test and scored a 650. Ok, not bad. A week later took the first MGMAT practice test and scored a 660. Feeling confident I signed up to take the actual exam in September and upped my study time to 4 hours a day. A week before the test day, I took the second GMATPrep test.

And scored a mere 600. My confidence level dropped to zero and going into the actual exam I ended up scoring only a 600 (Q37/V35). Shocked at the score, I signed up to retake in October and amped up my studying regime to 6 hours a night.

This time I knew I had to dominate quant if I had any chance of reaching my goal of a ~700. I put about 5:1 quant:verbal study time into the second attempt. Believe me, it makes a huge difference knowing immediately how to tackle a quant problem when you see it rather than having to stare at the question for a minute before figuring out how to set it up. I took two more MGMAT Practice tests and scored a 700 and a 710.

On test day I was scheduled at 8:00 am and woke up a couple hours early to run through several problems to get my brain fired up. I didn't buy into this tactic when I heard about it from the forum the first time around but I completely endorse this now. Unlike the first time I went in overly confident, but this time I went in much more humble, but cautiously optimistic.

I actually did score very well on the AWA in the first attempt, getting a 5.5, so I wasn't too worried going into this section. The essays seemed easy to tackle and I had plenty of time to revise.

Going into the Quant section I felt much more efficient on the first half of the questions than in the first attempt, and I was actually ahead on time. Despite the horror stories that some people talk about, I didn't see any combinatorics problems and only saw one surprisingly easy probability problem. I did see several overlapping sets problems interestingly enough.

Verbal was pretty straightforward and I had a ton of time left near the end. The last problem was a bold face question and I had 9 minutes left so I had plenty of time to break it down.

The moment of truth came and the score came up: 690 (Q44,V41). Awesome. Just short of the elusive 700 but I'll take it.

Key takeaways:
1) Don't go nuts trying to understand the hardest material. Make sure you master the fundamentals first so you are perfect on the mid-level questions. It will make a bigger difference in your score than focusing on just the hardest questions.
2) The MGMAT books are as good as advertised. Use them if you have time.
3) Do every problem in the OG 12 and Quant/Verbal Review books. If crunched for time focus on doing all the Quant problems though. They are more varied in nature than Verbal problems.
4) Exercise and eat right in the weeks leading up to the exam. Your brain needs to be firing on all cylinders.
5) Try and vary your study routine between Quant and Verbal. Don't focus on just Quant for a few weeks and then shift over to Verbal for the next few weeks. You won't keep the material fresh in your head if you don't mix it up.
6) If you have time and you're willing to step up the study regime, retake the exam if you don't score as well as you had hoped the first time.

Thanks for reading. Let me know if you have any questions.