From posts I have read it seems that several people are currently enrolled in an MBA program or have taken the GMAT. I am going to take it at the end of Sept and wanted to get your feedback around your prep, how you scored, and what you did to nail the 700+ quant questions. Thanks.
I used the full MGMAT series (5 Q and 2 V books) and the OG books (OG12, V and Q guides) and scored over 700. If you want more infor, CFABLACKBELT is right that gmatclub.com/forum has everything you could want and more.
I used Kaplan GMAT 800- a book all about the hardest problems- and got a 710.
i studied for ~20 hrs using OG12 and got a 760 … and i’m not a native english speaker. not a difficult test. i should add that i don’t plan to apply to b-schools after thinking it through a bit further. this was sort of my back up plan in case I failed L2 this year. An MBA comes at an enormous cost, both in terms of time and money, and I honestly don’t think it’s worth it for me since I plan to stay in investment mgmt for the rest of my career and expect to have the charter within the next 2 years.
That’s impressive mb389! Being a non-native E. speaker how did you manage to get score so well in Verbal session? Which country are you in?
mb389, what a sound performance!!! can you share your working schedule in the GMAT with me? Planning to take GMAT this September after passing CFA level 2
Got 760 with 20 hrs of study? Great. Can you share your study schedule and tips please?
I’m absolutely not hating on mb389, but its painfully obvious if the guy only studied 20 hours for the GMAT, his 760 was much more a function of his skills that existed before he started studying than the particulars of his study (cram) strategy. If you can’t take a practice test and score 700+ before studying, I’m not sure how you’re going to get to 760 with just 20 hours under your belt. Very nice stuff, mb389 – congrats.
Before starting my preparation I tried an mba.com 1st sample exam and scored 690 with close to 99% in Quant and quite an average result on Verbal. My strategy now is to break down verbal part into types of questions and read some books/forums/opinions on how to deal with each of them. Test seems rather easy and 750 looks achievable. Doesn’t imply, however, anything.
Do a diagnostic test, learn the actual topics that give you trouble, and study them intensely. A week before the exam, go over your strengths to gain confidence. Go to gmatclub.com and beatthegmat.com and do practice problems EVERY day. Keeps you in the rhythm of things. Good luck.
my strategy was nothing special. just worked through all of the practice problems in the book and did the few free sample online tests. it felt like there were 8-10 “frameworks” that most of the questions fit into, in both verbal and math, that once you master them the test is fairly easy. at that point, you just need to get the timing and general test taking approach down. This test is not like the CFA. there is no actual material to learn here – you already know it all (hopefully). there is definitely a plateau after a certain point where each incremental hour of studying provides little to no benefit. That may not be 20 hrs for most people…but 50-60 should be plenty for the majority of people on this forum.
I prepared by taking two full mock GMATs. Got 760, 750, and then 730 on the real thing. I reviewed the questions I got wrong or guessed on to “re-teach” myself math I hadn’t touched for about 15-20 years! The only tough thing about the real test is the adaptive feature where you end up with a streak of the toughest questions. I think I actually ran out of time on the real thing and failed to answer a question or two since I tried to “conquer” one or two toughies.
I have learned a lot since studying for the GMAT (score: 770) and my years of being a GMAT tutor. Whether you are studying in a classroom, online or from books, it is essential to take notes. I can’t stress how important this is. Many of the students that I work with who are having trouble with content are struggling because they never took notes. You are much more likely to remember something if you write it down, especially if you write it down by hand.
It is also essential to review your notes periodically. This will also help you remember the content that you will need to know for the exam. One valuable way to do this would be to create a cheat sheet after you have completed a topic. This is more essential for sentence correction and the quantitative section, since there are so many rules to memorize. For critical reasoning and reading comprehension it is more important to get a basic handle on strategy and then practice, practice practice.
Another essential part of studying that I have seen many people overlook is going over answers after completing practice tests or quizzes. It really defeats the purpose of going over practice questions if you aren’t going to review the answers, especially for those that you got wrong. The only way you are going to learn and get better is to analyze your mistakes to help prevent you from repeating them. I have worked with so many students who have done lots of practice questions and weren’t able to improve, because they weren’t going over the answers. Once they did, their scores went up tremendously. And finally, 2 key steps to scoring a 700+ on the GMAT.