Working Professionals -Lessons learned

Ok, My time to give back to the community.

This post is especially for folks who work full time, have families and prior commitments and who do not have the flexibility to study at continuous stretches.

1. Please plan Gmat only when you know for sure that the next 6 months would not be hectic or you will not have a life changing event. Gmat needs continuous practice and especially if you are out of school for a long time.
2. Keep a realistic score target for the time you spent and the score needed for the school.
3. Everyone has a different style of learning, figure out early(if not you will loose thousands of dollars in re-tests, reschedules, various course materials!)

I never take training for any of the professional certifications and usually figure things out and thought the same applied to gmat...WRONG. Don’t waste money on verbal courses that teach you a 1000 rules to memorize but instead take a instructor led course and start reading and practising early along with the course. (Veritas and Manhattan are good, though SC is good in both, Veritas has much better content in CR, which is the only weak point in Manhattan. RC again veritas does a good job compared to Manhattan) . Quant -Manhattan is way better than anything out there. Targettestprep is another quant that I highly recommend.
3. As you can see just to get an idea of things and start practising would take a full tome working professional somewhere around 3-4 months and if you take breaks like me because if other important things you will easily stretch out to an year long preparation.
4. Practise tests in a loop will not help anything...start spacing them about 2 weeks apart and finish gmatclub (quizzes ) first.
Gmat club helped me a lot in quant and also the most under appreciated material on gmatclub is 700+ SC and CR questions. There are 1000 of them and you can search/filter thise questions. I used their subscription on mobile($9.99/month) to practise all 1000 SC and CR whenever I could and this helped me to break out on verbal.
5. Finish OG , advanced verbal pack first before you touch any other material.
6.Donot extrapolate OG practise tests to real GMAT score...my first test had a 80 point variance compared to official practise tests. Veritas/Manhattan scores will be +/-20 points to your final score.

7. After the 2018 GMAT format change the difficulty level of RC has increased and no amount of practise would help without the right startegy and reading (read voraciously WSJ, and other materials on top of your gmat prep)

8. Spend time outside your gmat prep, do not try to ram through on weekends...Biggest mistake...you will burn out...unlike student working professionals have less mental energy left with everything else going on. Be physically fit and stay in shape and it will help tremendously.

9. On Test day, If you are a non native start verbal first, Even though it may be your weakest/ strongest because mental inertia is key in CR and RC when compared to quant.
GMAT will drive /nudge you to pick correct sounding wrong answers and you will pay the price.

10. Research the schools /programs....Ranks will only give you a general sense of direction, your fit into the program and the programs ability to help you in career/switch is the key. All top 20 programs teach about the same material...how that helps you to grow as a leader is the key.

11. Talk to you significant other before undertaking this marathon GMAT prep journey...the material to cover is humongous and will easily take 6-9 months so be prepared/ prepare the family that means cutting back on family time.

12. Work schedules- Stick to a fixed time to read , I did 2 hours (5:30-7:30 am- Verbal) and (6:30pm-8:30pm quant/practise tests) for about 3 months straight and you will be burned down. Practise right material (OG/GmatClub/Manhattan/veritas practise tests are a good start)

13. Talk to current students at the school and attend every event near your metro and speak to admissions officers and learn more about the schools culture. The websites won’t give you everything.

14. Last but not least- Finish what you started, don’t loose hope, Things like visa problems during/ after MBA will always be there..Don’t let these hypothetical situations deter you. If you have enough experience a good MBA will land you in a much better position anywhere.

Good Luck.

Posted from my mobile device