Thank You everyone.
I am more relieved than happy.
Here goes my “brief” debrief
GMAT Background:
GMAT has been a painful one-year ordeal. I shunned myself from several activities, social life and from stuff that I like to do....in the past one year. Based on my ability and based on my success with several past professional certifications, I assessed that GMAT should not trouble me much....but I was wrong. It took me four attempts, extreme perseverance, and several other factors, including my unwillingness to give-up my dream, to attain this score. GMAT had become a "madness" in the end....and I needed to overcome this characteristic.
I tried all the tricks, methods, advices, tests, materials etc etc. Although I learned from each of these sources, but none was a home run. What worked for me was my belief in my abilities, confidence, hard work and the thought of not worrying about the end result.
I must have taken more than 60 practice tests in the span of 4 attempts. The first two Gprep tests that I took fetched me 720 and 740 respectively (this was in Nov 07). But this performance was never replicated in the real exam for the first three instances. My practice scores always indicated a 700+ score, but the real deal gave me abysmal results. I have never quite understood as to why I scored so low in my past attempts.
After my 3rd attempt, I even thought of going with my 640….but I learnt that my chances will be extremely slim with that score. A lot of people say that even if your GMAT is less, you can still get into a good school if all other aspects of application are “stellar”. What these people forget is that there are 1 in 25 people (I made this number up) who are fortunate….that’s a 4% probability of being successful with lower GMAT score. All these thoughts made me run this marathon for one last time, thereby increasing my odds to success.
Problems Faced during 4th attempt:
• Materials: During this time I had practiced all the tests available –twice- and used all the materials. Thus, I faced shortage of practice materials, most importantly shortage of Tests. I tried tests that many of us may not have even heard of…..to gauge myself…..but all these materials were a disappointment. I had already completed OG (both), Kaplan, MGMAT stuff….in my previous attempts.
• Timing: I felt timing was my enemy # 1, followed by long passages.
What helped me:
• From day one of my prep toward 4th attempt, I made a point to practice using a timer. This really helped me…a lot! (I found this tool, made in VB, on another prep website......and if anyone needs this please let me know)
• Noticing the PATTERN of questions and TRAPS (this requires practice…..smart practice, which I realized later!). Try to know what the question is testing(the type of concept)…..once you are able to do this….you can be more confident during your real exam. This helped me speed up while I was lagging behind. For some DS and CR questions….I was able to predict the answers…...the moment I was done reading the question.
• First-Pass-Yield (FPY): This is a concept in manufacturing (I am an Industrial Engineer) that is used to measure the quantity of acceptable items produced in one run......a higher FPY will have less re-work and re-makes. This aspect was VERY crucial for me. How did I apply this to GMAT? What I did was …….I tried my best to read the questions carefully – just once…..then moved on to reading the options carefully – just once….and selected the best option. By adopting this strategy, I did not RE-READ the questions and the options....for most of the questions. This saved me a LOT of time, especially in the end. A good deal of practice and confidence is required to do so….and the nice thing is that it’s doable. I had 15 min left while I was on 28th qstn in verbal and had 10 min left on the 29th question in quant. FPY theory helped me from random guessing on several questions in a row. AVOID random guessing on several questions in a row, unless you have no option left.
• Simple Analysis: In my previous attempts I made several formula-driven excel files to track my mistakes, log errors etc. I was OVERDOING stuff! I wasted time by doing all this non-sense (at least for me). This time I used simple tools – a paper and a pencil – to track my mistakes. I made a simple checklist of errors and re-visited them twice (maybe thrice) before my GMAT exam.
• Identification of weak areas: I had identified my weak areas in RC (Inference & According to the passage type questions), CR (Inference & Assumption questions), SC (Structure, parallelism & pronoun errors), and quant (Rates, tricky word problems and number properties). By the end of my prep, some of these weak areas became my strengths. I was super confident during the real exam in my CR’s and RC’s than in SC’s (SC happen to be my strong area)
Practice Material:
I feel most of the material available in the market, with few exceptions, is enough for practice. The point is how you use them. Quality is important…but make sure you practice enough to be comfortable solving most of the GMAT-type questions. Most of you know what is right for you….so I won’t input much here. In case you need some additional practice, apart from the conventional stuff, then let me know.
Practice Tests (my personal opinion):
1. GPREP (although it is a shade easier than the real exam)
2. MGMAT (good for practice, quant is a little harder and Verbal has longer than normal RC’s and easier SC’s; the CR’s are of Gprep level)
3. Princeton (Verbal only, math is ridiculously simple)
4. Kaplan (just practice……to build stamina)
Week before exam:
Try to take most of the practice tests….before one week to the exam. Use your time during the last week by revisiting the errors that you may have made, practicing your weak areas and taking, perhaps, 1 to 2 tests…but not more. Take it easy during this week.
STRATEGIZE: think how you will react to particular questions…… think what kind of questions you may skip during the exam, if you have to……think what you will do if you are behind time during the real exam.....etc. Don’t do any tests at least two days before the exam. I read this somewhere…..”taking GMAT is like running a marathon. You don’t want to tire yourself by running 25 miles…a day before your race”
During the Exam:
Make sure your are comfortable before you hit the NEXT button to start the test. Adjust your chair, make ABCDE grid on the erasable pad, take off your shoes (just shoes!!)…..do whatever makes you comfortable during the 3.5 hr ordeal. Before the start of each section, remind yourself of the strategy that you used for that section during your practice tests. Be confident and start the test. I followed a wrong advice and started writing “time left/question # “ on each page of the erasable pad…during the exam. This may have consumed my precious 2 minutes. I was choked for time in quant and used my FPY strategy to breeze….still I fell short due to being slow in the first 15 questions. Lack of time made all the difference between a 50 and 49 in Quants. Don’t do anything new during your exam…..I made this mistake and suffered in terms of timing during both sections. Practice the same pattern/steps ....as you did during your mock exams.
Confidence:
I told myself that I have done all the practice and all what it takes to get a good score. I did not set a target score and just thought of giving my best …..while the rest will be a consequence of my actions. There is a PHSYOCLOGICAL factor associated with GMAT. It is a well designed test, albeit few flaws, to test the qualities required by a good manager. One need not be a math whiz or a Ph.d in English to do well in GMAT. One needs to mix the hard work with smart assessment and analysis to succeed, a fact that I realized later. With enough practice and analysis……..one can develop the confidence required to overcome this exam. There are always exceptional people who may require a fraction of what most of us do….and that is why they are exceptional…..or maybe they are just VERY good test takers!
My Exam Day:
I was sick…..could not sleep well and had all the problems that would encourage one to skip/postpone the test. But I could not delay this exam due to work commitments and because I was super confident, irrespective of my state. I may have done a shade better......if I were in the best state of my health.
A lot of people say that one needs to eat the same thing, do the same activities a week before the exam…etc…etc. They may, perhaps, be right; but there is no substitute for hard work and confidence. Do whatever provides you with peace of mind and with confidence required to overcome the exam. Everyone is different and everyone may have his or her own strategies…….do what is the best for YOU…..but also learn from others mistakes.
Let me know if I could be of any help. I have not mentioned any tricks /specific books etc. Most of you may already have those. In case you want to know more, please let me know.
All the best to everyone!
-3G
My odds to success increase incredibly with each attempt.
