Hi Guys,
Never thought that I would ever be doing this (you will soon know why), I hope that form my de-brief many re-takers will get some inspiration and will continue with their efforts towards their goals.
Attempt 1(Year
2014):-
Q50 V34 OA Score: 690Attempt 2(Year
2020):-
Q49 V44 OA Score: 750After getting into job post my engineering, I soon realized that I need an MBA to thrust my career in the right direction. Thus began my quest for CAT. Everything in my life took backstage in front of my goal of a good score. I followed a strict 16-18 hours of work + study schedule, let my love life get impacted, ignored my health and job just to accomplish this. However due to one reason or the other I could never make it through and after a series of failed attempts, I moved on to GMAT thinking that this is where I will win and maybe it was all for good. I managed a 690 which was not anywhere near to the aim I had set for myself and I could not get into a college of my choice
Life couldn’t be worse as because of continued strain and neglect I had developed Computer vision syndrome and chronic back ache. My relationship was on the verge of a collapse, things weren’t too great at my job either. It was like with each passing year the MBA goal kept on becoming distant and life kept on becoming messier
I finally decided to get my life back on track and let go-off my MBA dream, got married with the girl after a lot of struggle (another chapter in my life) and shifted my priorities from MBA to family, job and health.
6 years just passed in an instant, I am now managing my health issues much better though still not free from them, and I got so immersed in job and life that never could look back until the world was brought to a halt by COVID-19. Although still busy with work I could get some time that I could save from the office commute and the hectic travel schedule that I normally had. I thought that this might be the only chance to complete unfinished business. With my family supporting me I once again started on this amazing journey making sure to learn from my previous mistakes which I share with you now:-
1. Good guidance goes a long way:In my first attempt I was majorly on my own, took feedback from a few test takers, gathered notes and question banks from many different sources. Gave myself a time line of ~4 months and started preparing. Although there is nothing wrong in this approach however my preparation was a little erratic and I ended up solving too many questions without really learning much from them. Also sometimes questions from random sources can do more harm than good(more on that later)
During my 2nd attempt, on the recommendation of a friend I opted for the
E-gmat course, my objective was to focus more on preparation than worry about study material. However, to my surprise it turned out to be much more. After about 10 days into the course I got contacted by Archit from
E-gmat, he got me enrolled in their mentorship program and that is when my actual preparation began. I genuinely feel that
E-GMAT’s course and mentorship program have played a pivotal role in me getting to my target score. In the mentorship program we were given daily and weekly milestones, weekly discussions were held in which our progress was compared, and a lot of important tips and suggestions were shared.
Special thanks to Archit for being an excellent guide and a friend throughout this journey!In a nut shell if you follow what they teach, I think there is a very high chance you will get there.
2. Focus on Weak Areas: Verbal for many non-natives is a tough nut to crack, that is an easily identifiable weak area for most of us. But you really need go deeper and understand the specific areas that are holding you from scoring high. There may be different issues at the same time and a fix for one issue might create another one for e.g. Getting a better conceptual understanding of a particular topic which is new to you will make you spend more time on that during tests and may lead to lesser time for other questions/topics that you find easier. So, you need to keep identifying and fixing gaps and reach to your most optimum level. In my case Verbal was a clear challenge for me, after I was through with the concepts it was difficult for me to finish the test. I gave deep thought to each sub-section to figure out ways to overcome the issues. Lets understand those now:-
SC:-
First things first.
E-GMAT SC course is nothing short of brilliant!
In SC I had concept issues to begin with, then timing issues at the time of initial reading and error analysis of the sentence followed by timing issues during answer choice analysis. All this led to reduction in the time available for other sections, impacted my accuracy and caused great fluctuations in my score. Towards the end of my prep, I realized that SC was the make or break for me. Although I gradually grew comfortable with other sections but could only resolve my issues with SC just 2 days before the exam. Detailed error analysis and error logging are very important tools, and this was the missing X-factor during my previous prep. You can’t expect to score high unless you see the improvement in front of your eyes and that is GMAT’s demand from you.
P.S. During the initial reading of the sentence, focus on meaning, do the error analysis and give enough time to understand the sentence. However, during the choice elimination, focus more on the errors that you have already identified and eliminate on the basis of those errors rather than read through complete sentences again and again. This was how I fixed my SC timing issues. Thought that its worth sharing.
RC & CR:-
RC and CR came naturally to me, although I had timing issues I fixed them by making sure to read thoroughly in one go itself rather that repeating again and again without interpreting anything. Its also important to understand how the test-makers use various tricks to make you commit an error in a timed environment. Such awareness goes a long-way in preventing you from falling in their trap. Finally, there are no short-cuts. If these are your weak areas, make sure to practice medium/hard level 3-4 RC passages and 10-15 CR questions daily till you start seeing an improvement.
Quant:-
Finally for quant, get your plan ready, solve a lot of questions of each topic and make sure that you have learnt from your mistakes. I feel that in quant major challenge is not the concepts or the difficulty level of the questions, but the ability of the test makers to induce mistakes from the takers. So make sure to practice enough and know where you tend to make mistakes. GMAT club is simply awesome when it comes to quant questions and quizzes.
3. Discipline and Consistency:
There is no substitute for this. GMAT is somewhat taxing but if you have a plan in place and are consistent with the approach, you can get through this grind in 3-4 months by allocating around 3-4 hours a day. Easier said than done but nothing impossible. Again, Thanks to Archit for being diligent with his follow-up with the weekly milestones, that always kept me on my toes.
4. Timing is the Key: I did a lot of experimentation during the mocks and concluded that if I do not pace myself it will be a disaster because spending time on a question beyond a certain amount does not improve accuracy rather drops it because sufficient time is not available for questions towards the end. On the exam day,
DO not waste your precious time on overthinking over extremely difficult/unsolvable questions,
Do not waste time thinking about how the previous question/section went.
Do not regret mistakes. Maintain your pace and maintain your focus throughout.
Do not let anything distract you from your goal of solving the question at hand and moving on to the next question. Prepare a time left vs. questions finished matrix and follow it during the exam
5. Stick to OG for verbal practice:During my initial prep I had practiced a lot of questions from random sources and forums, often I was confused because of weird answer choices and even weirder explanations. Because of this I ended up just solving a lot of questions and skipping the solutions, leading to limited development of concepts. Do not make this mistake, lots of official questions are available on GMAT club or maybe take a GMAT prep course that will help you with sufficient question bank of medium and hard questions for your practice.
6. GMAT Club RocksWell! This is more of a fact than a tip. For GMAT takers this is the place to live, eat, drink, sleep and do all the other stuff. It can be easy to get lost here too, you need to figure out how to make optimum use of this forum. You can get tons of advice and official questions with great explanations here. Its just brilliant!
Finally, enjoy this journey, I always did, and believe in yourself, you will get there. All the Best to the test takers. Happy to help in any way I can..
Still a long way to go but one milestone crossed from the list..Cheers!
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Updated on: 15 Aug 2020, 22:53
