I scored a sad 590 (Q41, V28) in my first attempt in April. I was scoring 610-680 on my practice tests, but I really managed to screw up on the test day.
Mistakes I made:
- I didn't read any forums. Since I was in a panicked rush to do the exam, I asked a friend who had already passed it what I should do. He said to buy the OG book. That is all I did. There was absolutely no strategy involved in my studying. The OG is the best for practice problems, but you also NEED to strategize on the GMAT. Most of the test is not about what you know, but how you can outsmart the actual exam. It's not like any university exams for those people, including me, who haven't done a standardized test before.
- on the day of the exam, I "cared" too much. I did not manage my time appropriately at all and spent too much time and effort trying to get every question right. It resulted in me not finishing my integrative reasoning section (scoring a sad 3) and having to guess 11 remaining questions on the Quant section
- For verbal, I had 3 bold face CR questions. I didn't practice/improve those skills during my studying as I thought the bold questions weren't common, and I believe that was one of my weaknesses. If you're not good at something, make sure to improve the skill.
- Be afraid to guess and move on. You HAVE TO DO THIS in order to optimize your score. It's absolutely counter-intuitive, I know. But this is how you beat the GMAT. Get the points where you can. An extra minute you spend on one problem is an extra minute you can use to get another one right. I guessed a lot on my 740 score exam. I had NO idea I scored remotely so well, until I saw the score.
- I was obsessed with doing as many practice problems as I could. But for the GMAT, It's quality over quantity. Better to take time to understand each problem you do, and take the time to review it. If you make a mistake, note that question number in your log and make sure to review it later.
Strategies that helped me: (not in any particular order)
- I bought the 10 MGMAT strategy guide (Manhattan Prep) and went through all the books as quickly as I could (I only had 30 days total to improve my score for this round). As my time was limited, I didn't have time to practice all the problem sets, but I made sure to do the recommended midterm and final tests (moderate and hard) for each book
- Used the MGMAT navigator that came with the book. The video solutions were great! and even the written solutions are much better than the ones in the OG
- Joined the beat the gmat Verbal and Math question of the day (they email you a question every day)
- I had an error log. Yes, everyone will tell you how annoying it is but that it's useful. It's not AS bad as I imagined. I simply would write down in an excel spreadsheet all the questions I got wrong, and why I thought I got them wrong (careless mistake, missing the concept knowledge, or perhaps just a really tough question). It's equally as important to record your careless calculation mistakes to analyze whether you have any pattern for those. Keep good track of your errors to see which are your weak areas... for example- percentages or evaluate the argument CR questions, etc.
- The MGMAT general strategy guide suggested developing a one-minute timer, where you try to estimate every passing minute. That helped me with my huge time management issue, but the best way to improve time management was to set up my answer sheets in the grid style they suggest (5 problems per page for Quant, remaining minutes written at the top). REALLY really useful, I cannot express the importance of that enough. I knew exactly which question I should be at with the remaining time. It helped me keep track of time and not focus on calculating which question I should be at.
- For critical reasoning, think like the GMAT. Try to think from their point of view and what they want you to answer. Before reading the answer choices, try to predict the answer yourself - think of what could weaken/strengthen/needs to be assumed. For me, the MGMAT critical reasoning book really helped. Especially for those boldface questions that previously seemed impossible! Now I probably get 19/20 of those right!
- For reading comprehension, again, try to think like the GMAT. What do they want from you. The MGMAT book helped me identify all the types of wrong answer choices they like to trick you with. The worse one is when they state something true from the text, but it's not the right answer to the question. Watch out for those! I really improved my RC with that book. I went from getting 1/10 to getting about 8/10 questions right.
- For sentence correction, just learn the idiom rules, practice questions... its just grammar. The more you study, the better you do.
- My weak points were Quant (extremely ironic, I'm an engineer. Still can't figure that one out!) as well as Reading comprehension. For the Problem solving questions, the biggest mistake I would make is to start trying to solve immediately, using algebra (it's the engineer in me). The Quant part is not a math exam, it's not traditional, no one is going to check how you got your answer. Quite often, it's better and quicker to use the answer choices and back solve to see if they fit the question, or to pick numbers. I had to often remind myself and get rid of the algebra solving habit in order to improve my problem solving skills.
- data sufficiency is my worst enemy. I still can't say I'm any good at those questions, but at least I learned to solve them strategically. I would say the biggest help for DS is to listen to the Thursdays with Ron videos (https://vimeo.com/manhattanprep/videos). He taught me about the infamous C trap, as well as some other useful techniques to solve data sufficiency questions.
- Practice your guessing skills first, on every question. Then try to opt for the answer. You will get better at guessing which will help you on the day of the exam. It's inevitable to have to guess some questions.
- I saw somewhere on a forum that GMAT club has practice tests you can subscribe to. Those were good for studying as well
- The last step of my studying this week consisted of trying some practice tests. I scored 610, 690 and then 590 on my MGMAT practice tests. I was so disappointed. Nothing had changed after a whole month of studying so hard. I think the 590 was just because of exhaustion. I couldn't focus anymore.
Having said all of this, the MGMAT practice tests were actually much harder than the exam. I had no idea how I was performing during the exam itself, except that I managed to stay within the time limit much easier than on the MGMAT practice tests. I now realize the practice tests were very good, they were much harder than the exam itself and really trained me for it. (Although they did demoralize me a lot). I kept my focus during the exam, I stayed within the timelines and was not afraid to guess some questions. Needless to say, since I never scored above 690, I nearly jumped for joy when I saw my score of 740. The miracle GMAT stories I was reading in these forums are in fact... possible!
On a final note, I'd like to share a wise piece of advice I read somewhere, which really helped me: Don't get frustrated when you make mistakes. On the contrary, you should be happy if you make a mistake! Why? A mistake is a learning opportunity. Analyze it, write it down in your error log and review it. The more mistakes you get out of the way now, the less of them you are prone to make during your exam.
I hope I didn't forget anything in the strategies I mentioned above. I definitely recommend the MGMAT 10 strategy guides. Feel free to ask me any questions if you need clarification on anything. Best of luck to everyone!! Most important is... Don't give up!!!
