I just Beat The GMAT!

As I've been a silent observer of the forums over the past few months I felt it time to share my GMAT journey and any advice I may have for others looking to take the test. My exam ended about 90 minutes ago and I've cracked open a beer so please excuse any spelling or grammar issues, particularly toward the end...

My background:
- Australian (allegedly we speak English), 6 years in IT services sales in London.
- Undergraduate degree in marketing and undergraduate degree in bus. management.
- Last time I used any maths that didn't involve a calculator... maybe 10 years? It has to be end of high school.

Resources used in preparation for the exam:
Knewton online
MGMAT Quant (entire series)
MGMAT SC and RC
Powerscore CR
Sackman math
Kaplan 800
OG 12 edition
OG verbal and quant supplements
GMAC prep software
Personal tutor

The journey...

I decided in June I was going to take the GMAT and that I wanted to apply for a bus school start in 2013/2014. Although 29, there are a few things I want to do before I commit myself to a full time MBA. After taking an online diagnostic with a calculator and scoring 460 I thought I had a rather large mountain to climb... this mountain appeared ever greater when I found out that using a calculator was not allowed.

I chose December 20th as my exam date and reasoned that I would do what it took to be prepared for a 680+ score by this date. I'm the type of person who needs to set a concrete deadline and then work to it, rather than improve my skills and then decide that i'm ready. This probably doesn't work for everyone though it is worth knowing I ultimately changed my date!

Quant Prep
My first port of call was Knewton which I used for probably the first 2-3 months. Knewton was ok and I feel that the practice CATS are quite accurate however for me, the course didn't quite lend itself to my schedule or perhaps my learning style. The live classes available on a GMT timetable were understandably limited and I imagine this will change in the future. When I did participate, I felt they were too fast paced though this speaks directly to how poor my skills were at the time. In saying that, my score moved from 460-660 though I also used other sources including my tutor which I feel contributed to the gains. If I could have my time again I probably would have used only MGMAT books rather than Knewton.

My tutor was a huge help without whom I am certain I would not have scored above 700. If you have the opportunity to use a tutor, do it! Quant was far and away my weakness and with his help it became manageable. We put together a 3 month study plan that would have me ready for the exam come late December.

Both Sackman and the MGMAT series are excellent resources if your foundations in quant are awful (as mine were). I couldn't recommend them highly enough. Naturally the OG is the resource you should use for the majority of question practice however for concepts, go with the aforementioned publications.

Verbal

Verbal was my strength throughout the duration of my preparation. To those of you out there who score in the 40's and are non-native English speakers, I tip my hat. I can't imagine how difficult that must be.

I found the best sources for Verbal were MGMAT books SC and RC, and powerscore's CR. Use the OG and supplements for question practice.

I took online practice CATs periodically to guage where I was at and hit a ceiling of around 650 at one point which really got me down, don't let that happen to you! Rather than be bothered by the scores, seek to understand how, why and where you made mistakes. Go over these questions multiple times to pick them apart.

Here is a list of the sources and scores from my practice CATS
460- diagnostic (early June 2010)
590- Knewton (3/9/2010)
570- Knewton (24/9/2010)
660- Knewton (17/10/2010)
660- GMAC (14/11/2010)
650- GMAC again (20/11/2010)
640- Kaplan (27/11/2010)
630- Kaplan (5/12/10)
590- GMAC 2 (12/12/10)
*at this point I was absolutely gutted, I didn't understand how I could have gone so backwards. Given this score and on the back of a workload ramping up to close out Q4 I pushed back the exam to January 10th. This gave me more time over the Christmas period to revise and hit the weak areas. Unfortunately this also meant lengthy periods of sobriety.

700 GMAC2 retake (27/12/2010)- confidence is growing, like my stomach after xmas lunch
4 alternating subsequent retakes of the exam before 10th Jan resulted in 700, 720, 750 & 730.

Test Day

I arrived early and was allowed to start quickly. I completed the essays without caring too much about the result. Quite a few people I've spoken to have suggested the essays are irrelevant, especially if you are a native speaker of English... i'll let you know how I got on and if this attitude ultimately bites me in the backside.

I used this time to scribble some notes though I found the note pads a bit frustrating as they're actually laminated sheets suitable for markers, not the pen/paper experience I expected. So, after writing two reasonable essays (the formulas in the forum are bang on what you need) I took my 8 minute break... though can you believe I was stupid enough to take 9 minutes and lose a minute for the Quant section?!!!

I'd drilled myself to slow down in quant and concentrate on getting the first 20 correct even if it meant slightly eating into my time as in testing, I had flown through this section sometimes with 15 minutes to spare and unsurprisingly made a lot of errors. However, I allowed myself to get rattled by my extended break and whilst I feel I got the first 3 questions right, I thought it spiralled downhill rapidly from there. At the end of it I was gutted and thought I'd be back in 31 days time.

I took my second break and was conscious of being back in time. I think my perceived poor performance really let me down in verbal and I urge you that no matter what, if you think you've done poorly in a section, don't let it get to you and view the second section as a clean slate.

I second guessed myself quite a few times in verbal and should have been more confident with my answers. This definitely cost me points and time, it took me almost the entire 75 minutes to do verbal.

When the score came up with 710 I was both happy and irritated. The breakdown was as follows:
Quant 47
Verbal 41

Previously my verbal scores had ranged from 42 up to 48 and I can't help but think I left a few points on the table there and should have scored around 730. However, perhaps the ridiculous amount of luck with the quant balanced the performance of the verbal? That said, I see the GMAT as a tick box and that once you get over a certain score (i'm hoping it's 700) that work experience and your applications essays etc count more when you are applying to Bus school (fingers crossed).

The main reason for my post is to thank the community here for your contributions as part of my motivation was thinking about the moment I would be posting my 'I beat the GMAT' story. If any of you out there think you can't get the score you want, it's simply not true.

I'm not the brightest light on the Christmas tree, I studied for a total of more than 500 hours for this exam and even gave up ridiculously large nights of over-indulgence in alcohol just to do this. If I can score above 700 then you definitely can. If you have any questions at all, I'm happy to help and my sincerest apologies for any spelling, grammar errors etc. The beers are kicking in...

Congrats and thanks for an awesome debrief!!!
Could you please let me know what you did between GMAC2-590 and GMAC 2 retake(700)? That looks quite a good jump in 15 days-good enough to make olympic long jumpers shy.Like did you revised the existing concepts and problems or worked on new harder problems?

Also,for Quant, apart from concept books,what materials you used to practice problems(excluding OG)?

Congrats dude. Thanks for the inspiring post. I can't wait to post my victory debrief. Although I'll be drinking gin instead of beer when I write it.

Congrats! Strong work.

In using a tutor what do you recommend? Was it a tutor specifically for the GMAT or just someone familiar with quant problems?

*590-700 does seem like a big jump. However, as my score was gradually decreasing in the weeks previous to the 590, I'd been putting in some reasonable hours at work given that it was end of year and I was still trying to cram in as much content study for the GMAT as I could. By content study I mean going over individual areas in quant to improve my weaknesses, I was probably putting in 30+ hours a week at that point. The week of the 700 was the week over the xmas holidays and I only put in 10 hours. I wonder if perhaps it all came together at that point?

For quant questions outside the OG and quant review supplement, I used Sackman which has both content and question practice that I thought was representative of the GMAT. You can also get your hands on paper GMAT tests/questions if you buy them from MBA.com. The only downside is they don't come with any answer explanations.

Once you get your head round the basics, there is a post in this forum somewhere of 198 tough quant questions. I only got through the first 50 as the exam was around the corner however I think if you can wrap your head around 50-70% of the questions in that, you will be in good shape.

*The tutor I had was specifically for the GMAT. Whilst we concentrated on quant as it was my weakness, his verbal skills were also outstanding. I believe he scored a 48/46 750 a few years back and is the type of guy who (unlike me) studied for about a month and I can only guess he put in 20-40 hours total. If you're looking for a tutor I would look for one who is specifically focused on the GMAT as the exam is somewhat unique. Be sure to choose one that has a validated score of 750+.

*I look forward to your debriefs. I too indulged in some gin.... and red wine to join the beer. Given the state of my mind right now, I would not necessarily recommend this.

Best of luck to everyone!