Dear All
Though I joined GMAT club much before my preparation but as a blog shy guy, I never dared to publish. So here I present to you my first post.
My brief profile:
Civil Engineering Graduate
Attended National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra, India
Work Experience: 4 Years as on June 2013
Present Job Nature: Business Manager with a Start-up road bridge design consultancy.
GMAT: 700 ( Q 50, V 34) was expecting a higher score. The poor score has kept me for days in a dilemma to write or not. Finally I thought score can be improved but if lost with time experience may never be recreated. Despite low score there are certain things with which I struggled and thought worth to share.
Acknowledgement: for most of the achievements there are people who inspire, guide and have belief in you, keeping my emotions in control I extend my sincere thanks to my family, my sister, my brother in-law, my college juniors ( Kamal, Vipul, Mridul) & my girlfriend for inspiring and motivating me to take up this challenge. My special mention goes to my friend Shrey who has been a daily motivation & continuous guide. At last I thank entire team of Jamboree education specially Mr. Shivam Solanki & Ms Pratibha Paliwal both exceptional faculties who have effortlessly worked to hone on my skills.
Now let me deal with specific areas one by one.
Preparation length: I took 6 months; GMAT is an exam of skills and trust me know one can tell you how much time skills takes to develop. Those who boost lightning fast preparation time are actually hiding their past skill development. The one who has good memory, grasping, comprehension of English text and uses basic quantitative skills in routine is ready to take test. As a non native English speaker - lazy to read, poor to churn brain for numbers there are as many areas of under development.
Needed Skills:
Quick English language comprehension & retention
Basic Grammar understanding (not needed for performance, but to understand explanations around)
Basic arithmetic, geometry and few easy miscellaneous topics with fancy names
Quick decision making
Test Stamina
Mental Composure
Patience
In short all essential skills for a decent business manager.
Study Material:
I had an access to varied material (Kaplan, Manhattan, power score CR Bible, Aristotle SC etc.), but did not use most of them.
Frankly Speaking I followed every step as guided by curriculum of jamboree education.
All are great books but they all tutor same thing in different package so what will suit whom is matter of best fit. Above all skill has got no shortcuts these books can only guide but one has to devise her own methodology.
I mostly relied on Official Guide 13 and other official resource apart from these I used Aristotle and Manhattan for SC.
Word of advice on official matter: OG is best guide it can appropriately prepare an aspirant to a level of 85-90 percentiles. Please dont target 800 (one may admit or not, most of the preparation goes in getting all the questions right.) you can comfortably reach a decent score without being a perfectionist. Only move on additional matter once you find every problem of OG too simple to perform.
Tackling SC
Unlike most of the engineers, I found SC the toughest.
My learning, Start with Aristotle SC, it helps with basic grammar terms. Practice with OG, once you are done with some 200 questions ( even if you get 70% wrong) you will be familiar with the patterns generally dealt segregated with different taunting names such as parallelism, comparison etc. Once Familiar with patterns read Manhattan SC, be slow in your reading start with parallelism & comparison attempt area wise specific question. Here the focus should be to get conversant with each pattern. Off all said I believe meaning is the key, with meaning you can be sure to attain 100% accuracy.
Attention: I am an engineer who struggled with maths & SC, I think I have successfully devised ways to decipher each, I may elaborate my struggle & SC Take offs if there is any interested reader.
Thanks & Best Regards
P
Though I joined GMAT club much before my preparation but as a blog shy guy, I never dared to publish. So here I present to you my first post.
My brief profile:
Civil Engineering Graduate
Attended National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra, India
Work Experience: 4 Years as on June 2013
Present Job Nature: Business Manager with a Start-up road bridge design consultancy.
GMAT: 700 ( Q 50, V 34) was expecting a higher score. The poor score has kept me for days in a dilemma to write or not. Finally I thought score can be improved but if lost with time experience may never be recreated. Despite low score there are certain things with which I struggled and thought worth to share.
Acknowledgement: for most of the achievements there are people who inspire, guide and have belief in you, keeping my emotions in control I extend my sincere thanks to my family, my sister, my brother in-law, my college juniors ( Kamal, Vipul, Mridul) & my girlfriend for inspiring and motivating me to take up this challenge. My special mention goes to my friend Shrey who has been a daily motivation & continuous guide. At last I thank entire team of Jamboree education specially Mr. Shivam Solanki & Ms Pratibha Paliwal both exceptional faculties who have effortlessly worked to hone on my skills.
Now let me deal with specific areas one by one.
Preparation length: I took 6 months; GMAT is an exam of skills and trust me know one can tell you how much time skills takes to develop. Those who boost lightning fast preparation time are actually hiding their past skill development. The one who has good memory, grasping, comprehension of English text and uses basic quantitative skills in routine is ready to take test. As a non native English speaker - lazy to read, poor to churn brain for numbers there are as many areas of under development.
Needed Skills:
Quick English language comprehension & retention
Basic Grammar understanding (not needed for performance, but to understand explanations around)
Basic arithmetic, geometry and few easy miscellaneous topics with fancy names
Quick decision making
Test Stamina
Mental Composure
Patience
In short all essential skills for a decent business manager.
Study Material:
I had an access to varied material (Kaplan, Manhattan, power score CR Bible, Aristotle SC etc.), but did not use most of them.
Frankly Speaking I followed every step as guided by curriculum of jamboree education.
All are great books but they all tutor same thing in different package so what will suit whom is matter of best fit. Above all skill has got no shortcuts these books can only guide but one has to devise her own methodology.
I mostly relied on Official Guide 13 and other official resource apart from these I used Aristotle and Manhattan for SC.
Word of advice on official matter: OG is best guide it can appropriately prepare an aspirant to a level of 85-90 percentiles. Please dont target 800 (one may admit or not, most of the preparation goes in getting all the questions right.) you can comfortably reach a decent score without being a perfectionist. Only move on additional matter once you find every problem of OG too simple to perform.
Tackling SC
Unlike most of the engineers, I found SC the toughest.
My learning, Start with Aristotle SC, it helps with basic grammar terms. Practice with OG, once you are done with some 200 questions ( even if you get 70% wrong) you will be familiar with the patterns generally dealt segregated with different taunting names such as parallelism, comparison etc. Once Familiar with patterns read Manhattan SC, be slow in your reading start with parallelism & comparison attempt area wise specific question. Here the focus should be to get conversant with each pattern. Off all said I believe meaning is the key, with meaning you can be sure to attain 100% accuracy.
Attention: I am an engineer who struggled with maths & SC, I think I have successfully devised ways to decipher each, I may elaborate my struggle & SC Take offs if there is any interested reader.
Thanks & Best Regards
P