How an Indian IT guy scored a 720 (Q49 V40)

MBA
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I would like to share my experience on how I went about preparing for Gmat. I hope my experience will help at least a few fellow GMAT takers and they do not commit the same mistakes that I did. Let me give you all a little background about my…

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I would like to share my experience on how I went about preparing for Gmat. I hope my experience will help at least a few fellow GMAT takers and they do not commit the same mistakes that I did.

Let me give you all a little background about myself. I am your typical Indian IT Male
Education: B.E(Computer Science), 2007 - Aggregate 72%
Job: Arcot Systems (Till now) 4+ Years of experience.

This year In March -April I figured that I should try for an MBA. My two options were either I start studying for CAT again (I had given it some time back in 2006 and had got a decent score 97 percentile which involved a lot of hardwork) or study for Gmat. As studying for CAT is much more time consuming(specially after being out of touch from Quant for so long) than Gmat and the scores for Gmat are valid for 5 years I came to the conclusion of studying for Gmat. As any noobie planning to study for Gmat I went and searched all the Forums (Pagal guy, Beat the Gmat and others) to get ideas on what needs to be done.

I came across the user name Psychodementia. He used to be my colleague. I took this opportunity to give him a call and ask for his advice. Even though we had not spoken for quite a few years he asked me to take an official Gmat prep test without preparation to find out where I stand. This helped me to understand which all areas I need to work on.

I took the Gmat prep test and got 650 (Q49, V30). I wanted a score more than 700. As I had already read about crackverbal and the high percentage of crackverbal student who scored more than 700. Also considering that I was already good at Quant I wanted to focus only on the Verbal part. I decided to join crackverbal at the end of April. I wanted to take the gmat test before August end. Due to my hectic work schedule I wanted to pace my preparation accordingly. From the test review I figured that I made the most mistakes in sentence correction though there was a lot to improve on the other two sections of the verbal as well.

Firstly, I got a copy for OG 12 ,OG Verbal Review and joined Crack Verbal. I learnt a lot on how to tackle the Gmat verbal question in these classes and I also figured how to handle the pressure that Gmat puts you in with his adaptive question pattern. The advanced document/questions provided with all Gmat prep questions was very helpful to solve the questions at a higher level of difficulty (esp SC with meaning, tough RC/CR etc)

I also made some friends in the fellow-students I met at the classes and this helped in keeping me competitive and more focused on my preparations. At the end, I got a good idea of what was needed and I was a lot more confident about reaching my Gmat target score.

After the classes, I took my second Gmat prep test along with AWA and my score was 680 (Q 50, V36).The section where I was losing marks was SC. So I focused primarily on SC and went through all the types of questions on SC in OG 12 and OG verbal.

But due to the increased work pressure was not able to spend as much time as required on the preparation. So I decided to schedule the gmat test. I scheduled it for the last week of august.

On the D-day I reached the center to take the test and gave my best shot. After the test when the option screen appears where you need to either submit the score or cancel the score I was very tempted to click on the cancel button as I felt I did not perform well. Anyhow after I submitted the score I was happy that I did not give into my initial feelings. I had scored 720 (V40 Q49). I had expected to score 50 in Quant so I was a little disappointed with my quant score. As the score was in my scoring range so I was still happy about it.

-Rahul

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Congrats!!! dude. I'm also from IT (7+ yrs exp), need to put effort on Verbal, any suggestion/tips.. Appreciate if you suggest some materials.

Good luck

Regards,
Vijay

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Hi Vijay,

I would suggest you to take a mock test using the test prep software available at mba.com. This will help you to understand on which section of Verbal you need to focus on.
Regarding materials get a copy of OG 12 and start with that. After you have completed that you can go through OG verbal.

Thanks,
Rahul

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Hey Dude, Many Congrats on your Score.

I am also an IT guy with 3 + exp. and planning to give GMAT in DEC end.

I need to work on my Verbal a lot..I am almost done with OG - 12 but its not helping my cause sometimes I doing all the questions right and some times I am doing all the questions wrong.I am so Confused and feeling helpless for VErbal part. I am quite ok with Quant part but VErbal I still Suck in that..

Any suggestions please...???

Thanks in Advance
Abhinav

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Congratss!!!
which college did you get admission???
can u throw some light into the admission criteria and how much weightage was given to your B.Tech score??

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Hi Abhinav,

In verbal are you able to pin point on which Topic you are facing problems. Until and unless you are able to pinpoint your problems you will not be able to work on them. I would suggest take the GMAT prep test to understand your weakness. Personally I found OG 12 and OG verbal enough material for my verbal preparations.

Hope this helps.

-Rahul

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Hi Soumiktalukdar ,

I am still in the process of creating my application so its too premature to answer this question :).

Thanks,
Rahul

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Hi Rahul,

Thanks for the reply please do tell us when you get admission and till then Best of luck.

Thanks Soumik

:cheerio:

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Lovely post there, n many congratulations!

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Hey Rahul,

Thanks for writing...I always mess up with long sentences in SC :|
Am working on it with SC grail.And I am starting with OG 10 for verbal practice hope it is enough for GMAT.

Regards,
Abhinav

Hi Abhinav,

In verbal are you able to pin point on which Topic you are facing problems. Until and unless you are able to pinpoint your problems you will not be able to work on them. I would suggest take the GMAT prep test to understand your weakness. Personally I found OG 12 and OG verbal enough material for my verbal preparations.

Hope this helps.

-Rahul
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Hey Abhinav,

SC was the problem even I faced while preparing to take my GMAT test. But the way I went about it was to ensure that in the other sections I am decent enough so that in SC even if I make mistakes in the tough questions I would still get a respectable score. You will need to decide on such a strategy for yourself. People can just guide you but you will need to figure out a few things like:

1) What is your current score in Verbal?
2) What is your target score in Verbal?
3) In the three section in verbal how many mistakes you make in each section?
4) Are these mistakes during the initial set of verbal questions or towards the end?

These will help you in deciding on a strategy for yourself. You will need to understand one glove doesn't fit all.

Regarding the material go through OG 10/12 or OG Verbal. At least these were the ones I went through.

-Rahul

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@[540905:shahrahul1985] : Hi there .. Congrats for your score !!!


Well m planning to take gmat this year .. Need some info on following points please :
1. Is OG books sufficient for preparation ? (I have verbal and quant review OGs)
2. Did u refer any other books (apart from OG) ? if yes , then what were they?

Thanks
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@[540905:shahrahul1985] Congrats !!

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I have gone to crackverbal and BY FAR THE BEST thing i have ever done..Salut !!! will be taking GMAT in Sep ... but i am already feeling confident ...next practice and more practice..as Arun a.k.a Psychodementia advised me ... OG and advanced verbal is enough for verbal.. Stick to a plan guys.. and i will let u know what happened to me .. in couple of months. 😃 Fingers crossed.