I needed help with GMAT Verbal & I got exactly what I was looking for

Hi everyone,

When I decided to start my GMAT prep, I went through a lot of stories that were posted here on GMAT Club. And, they helped me avoid a lot of mistakes.

I had decided that I will share my GMAT story here after I take the exam. That is why I am telling you about my GMAT prep journey.

I am a working professional who decided to do an MBA to progress in my career. I am sure a lot of you must be considering doing an MBA for the same reason.

But before your MBA applications, come the GMAT prep and the exam.

I was very confident about my Quant skills. But, my Verbal skills were really poor.

I realized that I needed help and that is how I joined CrackVerbal. It was after I started taking their classes that my entire perception about GMAT Verbal changed.

My Background

I am Saurabh. I have been working with BHEL for the past 11 years and I have a total experience of 13 years. I have worked in the engineering space in the defense sector. Earlier, I was working in the commercial function of nuclear and thermal projects.

The growth at BHEL is time-bounded. I felt that it might be better to move out and learn new things. That is when the whole idea of doing an MBA came to my mind. With an MBA, I know that I can pick up new skills and also network.

Getting Started with My GMAT Prep

My friend suggested that I should do an MBA if I am looking for career progression.

I was very confident about my Quant skills but I was very poor at Verbal. In my first GMAT mock test, I scored a V28. I really did not know how to proceed. At that time, my friend said that I should definitely go to CrackVerbal and that they will be able to help me. That is how I got to know about them. He said that they have been in the industry for so long and that they will know exactly how to help me.

I started with V28 and I scored a V35 on my GMAT!

My GMAT Prep Journey

Verbal was really difficult for me. I would say that all the parts in Verbal - Sentence Correction, Reading Comprehension, and Critical Reasoning - were difficult for me.

I was slow when it came to Reading Comprehension and I could not comprehend the passages properly. I could somehow manage Sentence Correction I guess. But even that wasn’t easy for me. In Critical Reasoning, I could not understand the questions at all.

This is where a mentor plays a huge role. Arun Jagannathan actually helped me understand how I should approach each of these question types. He told me that I need to understand what the sentence in the Critical Reasoning question means. He guided me to that extent.

When it comes to Reading Comprehension passages, I need to understand what the passage is about and what it is trying to tell me. That is very important. They helped me understand the structure of the passage better. And, this helped me get answers to the questions much more easily.

My ‘Aha’ Moment During My GMAT Prep Journey

Like a lot of GMAT aspirants, I thought the Verbal section is just about English. Coming from an English medium school, I thought that I would be able to manage the Verbal section well.

But, that was not the case.

When I gave my first mock and got a V28, I realized that I would need to work a lot on Verbal if I were to score well on the GMAT.

And then I started attending Arun’s classes. It is in his class that I learned that GMAT Verbal is not about knowing a lot of English. But that it is about the logic behind all of it.

I realized that I was making mistakes in the Verbal section because I approached it like a grammar section. But once I understood the right approach, it became easier for me.

I was consistently scoring 700 on my mock tests.

I gave the GMAT and scored a 700 with V35! That was a 7 point increase from my initial Verbal score. I was really happy and that has been my GMAT journey.

One thing that I would like to add here is that CrackVerbal not only helped me achieve a good GMAT score but also an admission at IIM-A. I would like to thank them for all the support they have offered.

Now that you know my GMAT journey, I hope you have more clarity. And, I really hope that this helps you achieve your target GMAT score in some way.

All the best to all of you out there.

Thanks for reading my Success Story!

Regards,
Saurabh