A long Journey ...... from 520 to 710 (V17 to V40)

My GMAT journey started in 2012 when, first time, I thought that MBA would be right choice to move into management role. So I joined a very renowned coaching institute in India. I assumed that just by attending all lectures and following methods, I would be able to achieve my dream score of 700+. I gave my GMAT in march 2013 and scored just 520 ! (Q44 V17 IR6 AWA 4). I extended my subscription and took additional lectures from institute. Along with coaching, I also purchased a few Manhattan books and online mock tests. After religiously studying for 4 more months, I again gave GMAT in October 2013 and got a miserable 530 (Q44 V17 IR5 AWA 4). After few years (4 to be precise), one of my friend told me how he improved his GMAT from 630 to 700. He explained his study approach and recommended e-GMAT Verbal Online. After brief discussion with him and few other colleagues (most of whom scored 740+) I devised my strategy and again gave GMAT in July 2017 and scored 710 (Q48 V40 IR2 AWA 5). Believe me if I can improve from 520 to 710, so can you!
As I see, a lot of non-natives are struggling to get 100 + point improvement. So, I have tried to explain about my study approach and the resources used for prep. I hope this would be helpful.

ABOUT ME:

I am a non-native mechanical engineer having 7 years experience in Oil and Gas field. When I started GMAT preparation, I was almost always confused between adverbs and adjectives & had no clue about verb-ing modifiers and verb-ed modifiers.

GMAT 1 : 520

I extensively used the coaching institute materials and their methods for SC and RC. I did not focus much on quant, since I thought being an Indian Engineer, it would be a cake walk.
The institute always emphasized on solving SC mathematically without understanding the meaning.
For eg.
Inuits of the Bering Sea were in isolation from contact with Europeans longer than Aleuts or Inuits of the North Pacific and northern Alaska.

(A) in isolation from contact with Europeans longer than
(B) isolated from contact with Europeans longer than

1. Scan the options vertically and check the differences in starting and ending points of the options.
2. Compare any two options, apply basic rules and try to get rid of options without even reading the original statement.
3. After you get rid of 2-3 options, go to original statement and try to find out errors (if any) and then compare rest of the options and arrive at the final answer.
I think this method is more useful in IDIOM based questions. please keep in mind that GMAC is giving more emphasis on meaning based SC questions. Secret of cracking SC problem lies in its meaning.
I have specifically mentioned this method, since using this method blended with e-GMATs three step approach (which I have explained down) I achieved almost 90% accuracy in SC.
For RC, I used to skim through the paragraphs and make summary of them. I did not have any strategy for RC, CR and Quant. I just completed all questions from coaching institute’s materials.
I just gave two gmatprep mocks and scored 650 & 660 in them ( 30 % of questions were repeated. I had already solved the questions in practice material. I found actual GMAT very tough and scored just 17 in verbal.

GMAT 2 : 530

This time I took help of Manhttan SC, CR and RC guides. I finished all the books twice and started giving full mock tests.
I gave following mocks :
1. GMAT PREP FREE TESTS
2. 800 Score GMAT
3. Manhattan Tests
Since, I almost followed same study approach, I ended up scoring 530.

GMAT 3 : 710

VERBAL Prep:
After enrolling for egmat Verbal Live Prep, I did see enormous improvement in my verbal score (almost 8 to 10 points) in my mocks. All I did was I religiously followed methods explained in e-GMAT.

Sentence Correction:
The three step approach by e-GMAT is impeccable.
1. Read the statement and understand the meaning.
2. Try to find out all the errors in initial statement
3. Check each option statement and get rid of options by POE method.
With this method I was able to improve my SC accuracy from 40% to 80% in very short duration of time. In order to reach 90 %, I just replaced POE method with Point no 2 of earlier method (Comparison).
(Compare any two options, apply basic rules and try to get rid of options without even reading the original statement)

Critical Reasoning:
Prethinking approach of e-GMAT is mind blowing. I just followed this approach and I was able to solve most of the 700+ level (Assumption, Evaluate, Strengthen and Weaken) in two minutes. You can find more about prethinking from e-GMAT lectures.

Reading Comprehension:
I was very weak at RC since beginning. I followed following approach:

1. Read first paragraph and try to remember the crux of the para and author's stand on the issue. e.g :

The fact that superior service can generate a competitive advantage for a company does not mean that every attempt at improving service will create such an advantage. Investments in service, like those in production and distribution, must be balanced against other types of investments on the basis of direct, tangible benefits such as cost reduction and increased revenues. If a company is already effectively on a par with its competitors because it provides service that avoids a damaging reputation and keeps customers from leaving at an unacceptable rate, then investment in higher service levels may be wasted, since service is a deciding factor for customers only in extreme situations.

Crux : Unnecessary investment in services can be wasteful. (author = aligned/not aligned)

Repeat this for each paragraph.

This helped me in increasing accuracy of RC upto 75-80 %.

QUANT Prep:
For quant, I completely devised my strategy. This time I just followed GMATCLUB free book and online tests.
1. Complete a topic from Gmat Club book
2. Solve 50% questions from online tests ( You can customize the tests)
3. Repeat this for rest of the topics
4. Then solve Quant tests
Even though the difficulty level of questions in gmatclub tests is little high, but if you want to score 50+ in quant, try to solve all the examples of gmatclub tests. Believe me, it’s totally worth. You will see drastic improvement in your scores.

With all this, I was able to achieve 700+. I have attached my ESR for reference. If you want to know more about my prep, please PM me.
I learned a lot from GMATCLUB. Special thanks to this community!!

PS : This was written too hurriedly. So please ignore all grammatical mistakes.