When Taking the GMAT, Know When to Move On
Rich Zwelling is a top teacher in Knewton's GMAT prep course.
No one likes to admit defeat. Whether you're taking a test, playing a competitive sport, making a bet, or engaging in any other activity that requires a demonstration of skill, you want to do your best.
We live in a culture that fosters competitiveness, and there are few environments that encourage competition to the degree that the business world does. So if you're taking the GMAT, you most likely have a bit of that Type-A spark. And as such, you don't want to accept any kind of failure.
In short: It sucks to lose. I consider myself a laid-back person overall, but I would be lying if I said I don't have a bit of this competitive drive in me. In fact, I'm sure that everyone who enjoys standardized tests has it, to a certain degree.
Even if it's something as silly as a tennis match, a triathlon, or a Math Bee (yes, they do exist!), I become a bit of a different person when in competition. I really want to win, and I think there's no harm in admitting that. There's nothing wrong with wanting to show off the best you can do.
But it doesn't take an 800 GMAT score to realize that the desire to win has its pratfalls. And thus we come to the point of this post...
When you take the GMAT, you're going to get questions that make your brain come to a screeching halt. The test is designed that way; remember, it adjusts to your level, so it will throw you questions that are at your abilities and slightly above.
You may get stuck, and of course, you want to get as many questions correct as you can, so you may feel the irrepressible urge to spend extra time on a problem that's giving you fits.
But with a limited amount of time at your disposal, you should know when it's time to give up the battle for the sake of winning the war.
As I said before, I can be extremely competitive, and I would never say that I'm immune to taking too much time on a question. There have been times when I've been unwilling to give up, convinced that I can crack a problem if I just hack away a little longer. And like I said, part of this is personal pride. I just don't want to admit that I can't!
But there's a distortion here: you may think that setting a question aside is tantamount to a confession that you can't do it. But all it really means is that you couldn't solve the question given the very strict time constraints of the test.
Remember, your goal is a good GMAT score. It is not getting every question correct. You can miss questions and still get the score you want. In fact, it's inevitable that you WILL miss some questions. The test works like that. It's not designed for perfection.
All you're doing by taking four or five minutes on a question is ensuring that you'll have very little time to tackle the final questions, which can often be the most difficult. And all for the sake of getting one question correct... maybe.
So to sum up: No one question is so important that you should spend an inordinate amount of time on it, because no one question will make or break your GMAT score. If you've already taken more than two minutes on a question, you should seriously consider whether it's time to move on. If you haven't gotten the question by that point, and you feel completely lost, chances are, another minute or two (or five!) won't make things any better.
And to clarify, my advice here is not the equivalent of saying "Give up." It merely acknowledges that you have 78 questions to answer in a limited amount of time, and at some point, you need to know when to set aside one question for the sake of your performance on the others.
We all like to do our best... but don't let a bit of momentary hubris sabotage your better judgment!