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655-705 Level|   Modifiers|   Pronouns|   Use of Being|   Verb Tense/Form|                                 
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 03 Oct 2022, 17:08
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RonTargetTestPrep


That construction doesn't have to obey modifier rules because that construction isn't a modifier.

In this version of the sentence, "Being..." (a 'gerund' = _ING-as-noun, like "swimming" in the sentence Swimming is fun) is the main subject. "Is" (in front of "likely", is the main verb.
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RonTargetTestPrep
I see how "swimming" is a gerund in the context you provided. However, I found "being heavily committed" a bit more difficult to see as a gerund. I would be so appreciative if you could provide a few more examples of gerunds that are noun phrases. Thank you so much for your time...
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 04 Oct 2022, 05:57
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For Choice E, "Being heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that has worked well in the past, is likely to make an executive miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear." I was struggling to understand how "an executive" can be so far away from the -ing modifier at the beginning of the sentence.

That construction doesn't have to obey modifier rules because that construction isn't a modifier.

In this version of the sentence, "Being..." (a 'gerund' = _ING-as-noun, like "swimming" in the sentence Swimming is fun) is the main subject. "Is" (in front of "likely", is the main verb.

RonTargetTestPrep
I see how "swimming" is a gerund in the context you provided. However, I found "being heavily committed" a bit more difficult to see as a gerund. I would be so appreciative if you could provide a few more examples of gerunds that are noun phrases. Thank you so much for your time.
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Hello woohoo921,

We hope this finds you well.

To provide a bit of clarity, here are some simple examples that follow the same structure as the sentence formed by Option E.

1. Jogging is a great form of exercise.

2. Being late all the time is a bad habit.

3. Being tired all the time can be a symptom of diabetes.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 17 Oct 2022, 03:52
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Hey RonTargetTestPrep,

In the Manhattan Forums, you have mentioned -

in the construction
it is/was ADJ that...
or
it is/was ADV that...
or
it is/was ADVERB PHRASE that...
the "it" DOES NOT have to stand for an actual noun.

Does the above comment still hold?

And is it only "is/was" or is any verb okay in the setup?
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 20 Nov 2022, 11:51
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D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.

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GMATNinja
Thank you for the broad explanation. The explanation helps me a lot, but I intend to have a short response for the explanation D. GMAC made this sorta things flexible, right? I saw few official questions where ''Non-possessive pronouns'' refers to ''possessive nouns''!
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 01 Dec 2022, 20:17
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D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.

GMATNinja
Thank you for the broad explanation. The explanation helps me a lot, but I intend to have a short response for the explanation D. GMAC made this sorta things flexible, right? I saw few official questions where ''Non-possessive pronouns'' refers to ''possessive nouns''!
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Yep, there's some flexibility, which we've discussed at length in another thread, starting here: https://gmatclub.com/forum/although-she ... l#p2549453.
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 31 Jan 2023, 08:18
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This is one of the OG questions that causes the most trouble, partly because a lot of GMAT test-takers have an (occasionally incorrect) impulse to automatically eliminate any answer choice with the word "being."

But we'll get to that. Let's take these buggers in order:

Quote:
A. Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

That second "it" is the big problem here: "makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble..." I suppose that "it" could refer to "heavy commitment" or "course of action", but neither of those would make any sense. (A) is gone.

Quote:
B. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that worked well in the past, makes missing signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting ones likely when they do appear.

This is fairly subtle, but the subject doesn't make a whole lot of sense with the main verb here. "An executive... makes missing signs of incipient trouble... likely when they do appear." The pronoun "they" is OK, but it doesn't make logical sense to say that "an executive makes missing signs of trouble likely..." Also, I see no good reason use "ones" here -- in theory, "ones" would refer to very specific signs of trouble, and there's no good reason to use "ones" when a simple "them" would work. (B) is gone.

Quote:
C. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action is likely to miss or misinterpret signs of incipient trouble when they do appear, especially if it has worked well in the past.

The "it" is a problem here: "it" generally refers to the nearest singular noun. In this case, "it" would seem to refer to "trouble," and that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. "Course of action" would work, but that's much farther back in the sentence.

To be fair, ambiguous pronouns aren't always wrong on the GMAT, so if you want to be conservative, you could keep (C) for now. But as we'll see in a moment, (E) is a much better option.

Quote:

D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.

Quote:
E. Being heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that has worked well in the past, is likely to make an executive miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

There are lots of pronoun issues in the other answer choices, but we're all good with (E): the ambiguous "it" we saw in (C) isn't here at all, and "them" and "they" very clearly refer to "signs of incipient trouble." The subject "being heavily committed to a course of action" works nicely with the main verb phrase ("is likely to make an executive miss signs of trouble..."), so (E) is an upgrade from (B).

That leaves "being" as the only reasonable objection to (E). But "being" is absolutely fine here: it's just a noun, also known as a gerund in this case. "Being" is no different than any other gerund. So (E) is our answer.

Please see last Monday's Topic of the Week for more on gerunds and other "-ing" words on the GMAT: https://gmatclub.com/forum/experts-topi ... 39780.html.
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egmat karishma GMATNinja

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.


What is the issue with option D?
I've seen OG questions in which pronouns refer back to possessive forms?

Here you're saying it cannot!

Has GMAC evolved with this theory of pronoun referring to possessives during years?
Pls clarify because I am seeing both examples as correct
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 01 Feb 2023, 06:17
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This is one of the OG questions that causes the most trouble, partly because a lot of GMAT test-takers have an (occasionally incorrect) impulse to automatically eliminate any answer choice with the word "being."

But we'll get to that. Let's take these buggers in order:

Quote:
A. Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

That second "it" is the big problem here: "makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble..." I suppose that "it" could refer to "heavy commitment" or "course of action", but neither of those would make any sense. (A) is gone.

Quote:
B. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that worked well in the past, makes missing signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting ones likely when they do appear.

This is fairly subtle, but the subject doesn't make a whole lot of sense with the main verb here. "An executive... makes missing signs of incipient trouble... likely when they do appear." The pronoun "they" is OK, but it doesn't make logical sense to say that "an executive makes missing signs of trouble likely..." Also, I see no good reason use "ones" here -- in theory, "ones" would refer to very specific signs of trouble, and there's no good reason to use "ones" when a simple "them" would work. (B) is gone.

Quote:
C. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action is likely to miss or misinterpret signs of incipient trouble when they do appear, especially if it has worked well in the past.

The "it" is a problem here: "it" generally refers to the nearest singular noun. In this case, "it" would seem to refer to "trouble," and that doesn't make a whole lot of sense. "Course of action" would work, but that's much farther back in the sentence.

To be fair, ambiguous pronouns aren't always wrong on the GMAT, so if you want to be conservative, you could keep (C) for now. But as we'll see in a moment, (E) is a much better option.

Quote:

D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.

Quote:
E. Being heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that has worked well in the past, is likely to make an executive miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

There are lots of pronoun issues in the other answer choices, but we're all good with (E): the ambiguous "it" we saw in (C) isn't here at all, and "them" and "they" very clearly refer to "signs of incipient trouble." The subject "being heavily committed to a course of action" works nicely with the main verb phrase ("is likely to make an executive miss signs of trouble..."), so (E) is an upgrade from (B).

That leaves "being" as the only reasonable objection to (E). But "being" is absolutely fine here: it's just a noun, also known as a gerund in this case. "Being" is no different than any other gerund. So (E) is our answer.

Please see last Monday's Topic of the Week for more on gerunds and other "-ing" words on the GMAT: https://gmatclub.com/forum/experts-topi ... 39780.html.

egmat karishma GMATNinja

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.


What is the issue with option D?
I've seen OG questions in which pronouns refer back to possessive forms?

Here you're saying it cannot!

Has GMAC evolved with this theory of pronoun referring to possessives during years?
Pls clarify because I am seeing both examples as correct
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Hello samagra21,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, yes; GMAT has, in recent years, relaxed its stance on the usage of subject pronouns to refer to the base of a possessive noun and no longer tests this concept on the exam.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 10 Feb 2023, 09:59
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D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.
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Is it the only sole reason to reject D? But as per GMAT, pronouns can refer back to possessive, right?
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 10 Feb 2023, 13:51
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egmat karishma GMATNinja

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.



What is the issue with option D?

I've seen OG questions in which pronouns refer back to possessive forms?

Here you're saying it cannot!

Has GMAC evolved with this theory of pronoun referring to possessives during years?

Pls clarify because I am seeing both examples as correct
Show more

Yep -- we've updated our understanding of how the GMAT treats a possessive pronoun referring to a non-possessive antecedent. It's allowed, as long as the construction is clear and logical.

Check out this post from earlier in the thread for more on that: https://gmatclub.com/forum/heavy-commit ... l#p2500015.
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 10 Feb 2023, 15:31
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Quote:

D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"Them" is trying to refer back to a possessive pronoun, "executives'", and that's wrong on the GMAT. Non-possessive pronouns (they, them, he, she, it) can't refer back to possessive nouns on the GMAT. So (D) is gone.

Is it the only sole reason to reject D? But as per GMAT, pronouns can refer back to possessive, right?
Show more
That reference is not a reason to eliminate choice (D).

However, there is are reasons to eliminate choice (D), one stronger than the other.

The first is that "Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely ..." goes back and forth from the plural "executives" and "them" to the singular "course of action." So, unlike the other versions, this version seems to about multiple executives' being committed to a single course of action. I guess that meaning could make sense, but I get the sense from looking at the other choices that this sentence is meant to be about one executive who is committed to one course of action. So, maybe that issue is sort of a signal that this version probably isn't the credited choice.

The more solid reason to eliminate this choice appears toward the end of the choice. In "makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear," "misinterpreting" doesn't work logically with the other elements. We have a two-part list, "to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting," and the second part of the list doesn't work with the rest of the sentence. If we cross off the first part of the list, we get ""makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear." We see that "makes them likely ... misinterpreting" doesn't work. To be correct, the wording would have to be "makes them likely ... to misinterpret."
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 21 Mar 2023, 13:55
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It was easy enough to get to C and E. I noticed the pronoun issue for C, the latter clause being far away from what it was modifying. Why I chose C over E was I felt C conveyed the meaning of the sentence better. The subject of the sentence is an executive. I felt this should be introduced earlier, whereas with E its introduced way later. The meaning of the sentence isnt that being heavily committed to a course of action is like to make… It is that an executive who is heavily committed… So I must say I am still surprised as I would say meaning trumps pronoun ambiguity in GMAT, but yh, I can see it from both ways now.
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 17 Jul 2023, 02:49
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What will be the level of this question on the GMAT test?
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 17 Jul 2023, 18:58
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What will be the level of this question on the GMAT test?
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Hi jainanant909,

The GMAT considers this a hard question (the official categories are easy/medium/hard).
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 17 Aug 2023, 12:23
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Can second it not refer to executive in the first option? Can anyone explain?
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 17 Aug 2023, 13:57
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Can second it not refer to executive in the first option? Can anyone explain?
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Check out this post: https://gmatclub.com/forum/heavy-commit ... l#p2781123.
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 03 Sep 2023, 22:39
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GMATNinja
This is one of the OG questions that causes the most trouble, partly because a lot of GMAT test-takers have an (occasionally incorrect) impulse to automatically eliminate any answer choice with the word "being."

But we'll get to that. Let's take these buggers in order:

Quote:
A. Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

That second "it" is the big problem here: "makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble..." I suppose that "it" could refer to "heavy commitment" or "course of action", but neither of those would make any sense. (A) is gone.

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Hey GMATNinja,
I am a big fan but for the life of me I can't understand why you eliminated A here. Why is the second "it" considered a pronoun needing an antecedent?
I am no good with fancy jargon, but we do use "it" in a different sense too, right? For example: "Studying diligently makes it likely that you will do well on the GMAT". Is that sentence wrong? Because "it" doesn't have an antecedent there either. Why can't the 2nd "it" be used in that sense?
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 11 Sep 2023, 06:47
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Saupayan
Hey GMATNinja,

I am a big fan but for the life of me I can't understand why you eliminated A here. Why is the second "it" considered a pronoun needing an antecedent?

I am no good with fancy jargon, but we do use "it" in a different sense too, right? For example: "Studying diligently makes it likely that you will do well on the GMAT". Is that sentence wrong? Because "it" doesn't have an antecedent there either. Why can't the 2nd "it" be used in that sense?
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Thank you for being a fan!

We've written a few posts addressing this point earlier in the thread. Check 'em out, and let us know if you still have questions:

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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 27 Jan 2024, 03:47
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EMPOWERgmatVerbal
Hello Everyone!

Let's tackle this question, one problem at at time, and narrow it down to the correct choice! To begin, let's take a closer look at the original question, and highlight any major differences we spot in orange:

Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

A. Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.
B. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that worked well in the past, makes missing signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting ones likely when they do appear.
C. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action is likely to miss or misinterpret signs of incipient trouble when they do appear, especially if it has worked well in the past.
D. Executives' being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.
E. Being heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that has worked well in the past, is likely to make an executive miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

After a quick glance over the options, we have a few areas we can focus on. However, this is a question where the entire sentence is underlined, so we need to treat this differently than we do other questions! Whenever you see a question with the entire sentence underlined, there are a few areas you should pay attention to first to narrow down your options:

1. Modifiers
2. Parallelism
3. Meaning
4. Structure

Let's start with #3 on our list: meaning. There is also another glaring difference we see throughout each of the options: PRONOUNS! There are a LOT of pronouns in these sentences, so let's do a quick check to make sure all the pronouns have clear antecedents, and rule out any that don't:

A. Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes it likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

first "it" = refers to "course of action" --> OK
second "it" = doesn't refer to anything, so we call this a "dummy pronoun" --> WRONG
"them" = refers to "signs of incipient trouble" --> OK

B. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that worked well in the past, makes missing signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting ones likely when they do appear.

"one" = unclear; could refer to either "An executive" or "a course of action" --> WRONG
"ones" = misleading; changes meaning from referring to "signs of incipient trouble" to some other signs we haven't mentioned yet --> WRONG

C. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action is likely to miss or misinterpret signs of incipient trouble when they do appear, especially if it has worked well in the past.

"they" = unclear; could refer to "An executive," "a course of action," or "signs of incipient trouble" --> WRONG
"it" = refers back to "a course of action" --> OK

D. Executives' being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

"it" = refers to "a course of action" --> OK
first "them" = refers to "Executives" --> WRONG (see below)
second "them" = refers to "signs" --> WRONG (see below)

So why are both "them" pronouns wrong? Because placing two of the same pronoun so close together is confusing to readers. It's too ambiguous which "them" is referring to which antecedent. Yes, you could do the hard work and figure it out, but reading shouldn't require the reader to do the heavy lifting.

E. Being heavily committed to a course of action, especially one that has worked well in the past, is likely to make an executive miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpret them when they do appear.

"one" = refers to "a course of action" --> OK
"them" = refers to "signs of incipient trouble" --> OK

Well there you have it - option E is the correct choice! It's the only sentence that used clear pronouns.


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"C. An executive who is heavily committed to a course of action is likely to miss or misinterpret signs of incipient trouble when do appear, especially if it has worked well in the past.
"they" = unclear; could refer to "An executive," "a course of action," or "signs of incipient trouble"
"it" = refers back to "a course of action" "

I do not agree with your pronoun analysis of C. "They" is clear as it is plural and can only refer back to "signs of incipient trouble". On the contrary "it", a singular, can refer to both "trouble" and "course of action" which makes it ambiguous.
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Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action, especially if 09 Oct 2025, 11:34
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