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Dear EducationAisle GMATNinja egmat

The correct answer option is using a singular verb "is" for plural subject "understanding cultural norms". Why the verb is not "are"???

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Dear EducationAisle GMATNinja egmat

The correct answer option is using a singular verb "is" for plural subject "understanding cultural norms". Why the verb is not "are"???
Hi Abhijit, the reason is that understanding is used as a noun (gerund) here and so, the subject is understanding (singular) and not cultural norms.

I do agree that GMAT is being slightly cheeky here; I would have preferred the following version (which no option offers!)

For global managers working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues.
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Hi experts!
EducationAisle, CrackVerbalGMAT, GMATNinja, egmat


Is the relative pronoun ("when") make any sense within A and B? Isn't the relative pronoun itself also a problem? "when" can only be used to modify a noun event or time
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Hi experts!
EducationAisle, CrackVerbalGMAT, GMATNinja, egmat


Is the relative pronoun ("when") make any sense within A and B? Isn't the relative pronoun itself also a problem? "when" can only be used to modify a noun event or time
Hello samgyupsal
You are correct on "when" can be used to modify event or time.
Thus "When working with overseas clients".
Don't you think when is modifying the time here ? When global manager were working with overseas client ...

Problem is what comes after this phrase
"an understanding" is wrong here.
Who is working with overseas client ?
its global manager and this can't be conveyed through either option A or B.

Hope this helps :)
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Hi AjiteshArun could you please explain how "is" is used for the plural "norms" in correct choice?

Even if understanding is a gerund, the combine phrase "understanding cultural norms" is a plural entity isn't it? Where am I going wrong?

Thanks

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Hi AjiteshArun could you please explain how "is" is used for the plural "norms" in correct choice?

Even if understanding is a gerund, the combine phrase "understanding cultural norms" is a plural entity isn't it? Where am I going wrong?

Thanks

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Hi nkshmalik1
The key to understand the subject verb agreement is identifying the "subject".
So what's the subject here ?
cultural norms ?
Well, look again.
Sentence is talking about "understanding" cultural norms and not just cultural norms.
Thus subject is "understanding cultural norms" and use of "is" perfectly fine here.

Hope this helps :)
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Cannot understand why option E is wrong, Understanding and Grasping seem to be parallel..Plz expain..
The easiest way to eliminate E is to recognize the redundancy in "equally important as." X can be as important as Y. X and Y can be equally important. But X cannot be equally important as Y.

(The parallelism thing is pretty subtle. "An understanding" is more noun-like because of the article "an." Take a silly example: "Amy has an understanding of why feeding her dog chocolate is a terrible idea." "An understanding" is the object in the sentence, something Amy can possess. "Grasping," though not a verb, is more verb-like - an action rather than something one could possess. So "an understanding" and "grasping" are not parallel. That's not an issue that I'd devote any brain space to.)

I hope that helps!

Skywalker18

E. Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms to be equally important as grasping the pivotal business issues.

Hi GMATNinja!
So you mean that if we said:

"Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms and a grasping of the pivotal business issues to be equally important"

Then the sentence would have been correct?
In this case, the idiom is okay ("X and Y can be equally important"). But we still have the subtle, not-very-important parallelism issue discussed in an earlier post.

But I wouldn't worry about "fixing" incorrect answer choices -- that's something you'll never have to do on test day! As long as you understand why (C) is better than (E), you can move on. :)
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Hello experts,

I have a very basic doubt in Option C. What is the role of preposition phrase " for Global managers working with overseas clients" here?
What is it trying to modify here?
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Hello experts,

I have a very basic doubt in Option C. What is the role of preposition phrase " for Global managers working with overseas clients" here?
What is it trying to modify here?
Let's start by removing the prepositional phrase:

    "Understanding cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues." - This is a very general statement that, apparently, can be applied universally -- to anyone and everyone.

The addition of the prepositional phrase tells us who this statement applies to. The statement does not apply to just anyone. Instead, the statement only applies to global managers working with overseas clients.

Now consider a simplified version of (C):

    "For global managers, understanding cultural norms is important." - Understanding {x} IS important, but not for everyone -- only for global managers. The prepositional phrase modifies the understanding's act of being important. In other words, the prepositional phrase seems to modify the entire clause here.

The good news is that the GMAT will never ask you to do this sort of analysis! The most important thing is that you understand how that prepositional phrase affects the meaning of the sentence (telling us WHO the statement applies to). Does it matter what exactly this prepositional phrase is modifying from a technical grammar perspective? Not one bit. :)
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When working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues for the global manager.


(A) When working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues for the global manager.

(B) When they work with overseas clients, understanding cultural norms is at least of equal importance to the global manager as grasping the pivotal business issues.

(C) For global managers working with overseas clients, understanding cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues.
Correct

(D) For global managers working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important to them as that they grasp the pivotal business issues.

There's a comparison here between the relative importance of UNDERSTANDING of cultural norms and GRASPING the pivotal business issues. Here we have a comparison between 'understanding' and a relative clause 'that they...'

(E) Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms to be equally important as grasping the pivotal business issues.
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Cannot understand why option E is wrong, Understanding and Grasping seem to be parallel..Plz expain..
The easiest way to eliminate E is to recognize the redundancy in "equally important as." X can be as important as Y. X and Y can be equally important. But X cannot be equally important as Y.

(The parallelism thing is pretty subtle. "An understanding" is more noun-like because of the article "an." Take a silly example: "Amy has an understanding of why feeding her dog chocolate is a terrible idea." "An understanding" is the object in the sentence, something Amy can possess. "Grasping," though not a verb, is more verb-like - an action rather than something one could possess. So "an understanding" and "grasping" are not parallel. That's not an issue that I'd devote any brain space to.)

I hope that helps!

Hi, GMATNinja VeritasKarishma I might be late to the party, but I noticed none of the posts mentioned the reason for which I eliminated E, so wanted to check if I eliminated it for the correct reasons. In C and E there is one difference in what the sentence intends, C states that 'understanding cultural norms' is as important as 'grasping pivotal business issues. Now it merely states the importance of two things but it does not state that managers find those two things to be important. While E explicitly states that managers find those two things to be equally important. Now, given the shift in meaning, I eliminated E. Please let me know if my understanding of the issue was correct, or was it a fluke?
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leo125
Cannot understand why option E is wrong, Understanding and Grasping seem to be parallel..Plz expain..
The easiest way to eliminate E is to recognize the redundancy in "equally important as." X can be as important as Y. X and Y can be equally important. But X cannot be equally important as Y.

(The parallelism thing is pretty subtle. "An understanding" is more noun-like because of the article "an." Take a silly example: "Amy has an understanding of why feeding her dog chocolate is a terrible idea." "An understanding" is the object in the sentence, something Amy can possess. "Grasping," though not a verb, is more verb-like - an action rather than something one could possess. So "an understanding" and "grasping" are not parallel. That's not an issue that I'd devote any brain space to.)

I hope that helps!

Hi, GMATNinja VeritasKarishma I might be late to the party, but I noticed none of the posts mentioned the reason for which I eliminated E, so wanted to check if I eliminated it for the correct reasons. In C and E there is one difference in what the sentence intends, C states that 'understanding cultural norms' is as important as 'grasping pivotal business issues. Now it merely states the importance of two things but it does not state that managers find those two things to be important. While E explicitly states that managers find those two things to be equally important. Now, given the shift in meaning, I eliminated E. Please let me know if my understanding of the issue was correct, or was it a fluke?

There is no "original meaning". We need to find the sentence which is grammatically correct and has a sensible meaning.

(E) Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms to be equally important as grasping the pivotal business issues.

The problem with (E) is the use of "equally important as".
A is equally important as B - Incorrect
A is as important as B - Correct
A and B are equally important - Correct

Had (E) said that they are equally important while all other options had said that A is at least as important as B, I would have picked (E) if (E) were the grammatically correct option.
There is no "original meaning". Whichever sentence makes sense and is grammatically correct is fine.
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Quick update on this question...

We've fixed the following typo in (E):

  • original post: "equally important as grasping"
  • corrected post: "equally important to grasping"

The phrase "equally important to" only really works if you have something like this:

    "X and Y are equally important to Tim."

That should make (E) a bit easier to eliminate, in addition to the reasons discussed here. Sorry for the confusion!
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When working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues for the global manager.

(A) When working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues for the global manager.

Following are the errors with Option A -

i) Modifier Error : "an understanding" is incorrectly modified by "When working with oversees clients". It is illogical to say that "an understanding works with over sees clients"
ii) Comparison Error : "an understanding" is more of a noun while "grasping" is more of a verb. So comparing "an understanding" to "grasping" is incorrect.


(B) When they work with overseas clients, understanding cultural norms is at least of equal importance to the global manager as grasping the pivotal business issues.

Following are the errors with Option B -

i) Modifier Error : Same as option A. "When they work with oversees clients" modifies "understanding cultural norms"
ii) Pronoun Error : Here "they" logically refers to "global manager". BUT "they" is plural and "global manager" is singular. Thus, there is pronoun-antecedent disagreement.


(C) For global managers working with overseas clients, understanding cultural norms is at least as important as grasping the pivotal business issues.

The errors in C have been resolved in the following ways -

i) Modifier Error : "For global managers working with overseas clients" correctly modifies "understanding cultural norms".
ii) Comparison Error : "Understanding" is correctly compared to "grasping". Both "understanding" and "grasping" signify an action.


(D) For global managers working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important to them as that they grasp the pivotal business issues.

Following are the errors with Option D -

i) Pronoun Error : "them" & "they" both refer to "global managers". The sentence reads -

For global managers working with overseas clients, an understanding of cultural norms is at least as important to global managers as that global managers grasp the pivotal business issues.

Does not make a lot of sense.

ii) Comparison Error : "an understanding" is illogically compared to "that they grasp"...does not make sense. Usual construction is As X as y

(E) Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms to be equally important as grasping the pivotal business issues.

Following are the errors with Option E -

i) Comparison Error : Same as A. "an understanding" is more of a noun while "grasping" is more of a verb. So comparing "an understanding" to "grasping" is incorrect.
ii) Redundancy Error : "equally important as" is kind of redundant. Both "equally" and "as" are not needed.


Option C is our answer.
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Hi , hope you're doing well! :)
I have the following Question -

Isn't 'when' an adverb ? so isn't it modifying the the verb 'is as important as' in the clause ?
I understand that if 'when' was not used ,then it was a clear case of modifier issue .
But how does 'when' not make/make a difference ?
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Hi , hope you're doing well! :)
I have the following Question -

Isn't 'when' an adverb ? so isn't it modifying the the verb 'is as important as' in the clause ?
I understand that if 'when' was not used ,then it was a clear case of modifier issue .
But how does 'when' not make/make a difference ?
Yes, the "when" part modifies the clause that comes after it in (A). And what's the subject of that clause? An understanding of cultural norms.

Here's an example to help illustrate why that's an issue:

  • "When working from home, Tim is distracted by his children's boisterous flatulence."

The reader expects the "working from home" part to connect with the subject of the main clause (Tim) -- and that makes perfect sense here.

But that's not the case here:

  • "When working overseas, an understanding of cultural norms is..."

If you stop right here, it would be very reasonable to assume that "working overseas" is an action performed by the subject of the following clause ("an understanding of cultural norms"), just like in the previous example. But if you keep reading (A), you realize that that wouldn't make any sense and that the "working overseas" part is an action performed by somebody who doesn't appear until the very end of the sentence ("the global manager").

Does that make (A) automatically WRONG? Maybe not. After all, you can eventually figure out the intended meaning. But the structure in (C) makes the meaning much clearer, giving us a solid vote in favor of (C) over (A).

The parallelism is also a bit better in (C), giving us another vote against (A). Lastly, in (A), it's tough to figure out what "for the global manager" is doing -- does that phrase modify "business issues"? Or the entire clause? Again, the meaning is simply clearer in (C).

Remember, the GMAT isn't about looking at a single sentence in a bubble and labeling it wrong or right -- it's about comparing your options and picking the best one of the bunch.

I hope that helps!
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GMATNinja KarishmaB

Why A can't be equally important as B?
Please explain why meaning-wise it's wrong.

I believe that meaning of "equally important as" is both A & B have same importance. Then why this usage is incorrect?
-
-
The problem with (E) is the use of "equally important as".

The easiest way to eliminate E is to recognize the redundancy in "equally important as." X can be as important as Y. X and Y can be equally important. But X cannot be equally important as Y.

(E) Global managers working with overseas clients find an understanding of cultural norms to be equally important as grasping the pivotal business issues.

The problem with (E) is the use of "equally important as".
A is equally important as B - Incorrect
A is as important as B - Correct
A and B are equally important - Correct
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