It's going to be super long and detailed, because I always found the long debriefs to be the best. So, I'm going to do my best to provide as much useful information as possible. Also, I'd be happy to answer any additional questions that anyone has.
"I’m sorry I wrote you such a long letter; I didn’t have time to write a short one."
-Blaise Pascal
Just go to the last paragraph if you don't want all the gory details.
-Me.
-Blaise Pascal
Just go to the last paragraph if you don't want all the gory details.
-Me.
Note for aspirants:
This debrief is about my own experience. It may not be ideal for all of you. For others, I will request you to work on your weak points and devise what would be best for you. ALL THE BEST!!!
GMAT Score: 750 (Q: 51, V: 40)
Preparation Time: ~5 months
First diagnostic test score: 610
In the very starting, I attended a class in one more institute. I realized that its material and style of teaching can only fulfill students who aim for 650-700 score. I donot want to be a dead fish who flows with the water.I knew that if I was aiming for 700+, I had to get guidance from a person whom I could see as my guide towards success. Before I met Sandeep for the first time, I was aware that I need a score of 730+ to apply to my targeted schools, but I was not at all confident that I will even score 700. After attending his couple of classes and looking at success of his past students, I could easily believe that I can do it as well.
As in DDLJ, it is said that " Raj did not believe in love? But, after Raj met Simran, LOVE was never the same! ". Similarly, for me, it is like "I did not believe in cracking GMAT. But, when I met Sandeep, cracking GMAT was never the same". Meeting with Sandeep doesnot mean a handshake, it means to understand the whole concept right and understand the how to crack GMAT!!
Yesterday, I appeared for GMAT for the first time and scored 750 (Q: 51, V: 40). I'm relieved that my marathon preparation has finally come to an end. My first diagnostic test score was 600. Seriously, scoring 750 from 600 is nothing short of a miracle. All my sincere thanks to SANDEEP!! Be assured that if you take one step for you, Sandeep will take 10 steps for you.
QUANT:
Quant was never a problem for me. I am good at solving problems of any area.
But, the main problem with me was my tendency for assumptions and my carelessness in reading the questions. I tend to assume a lot in PS (Yes, PS!!) as well as DS questions, assumptions which are generally true when I solve any normal question/puzzle. It makes me complete my test in very short time, but I was never able to do all the questions correctly. Even slowing my pace didn’t help. But, after giving couple of Mock test just before GMAT, I get to know where I tend to assume the most and took care of them in the final exam.
According to me, I was always running short of time for the preparation and never bothered to prepare for Quant section. But, I did the quant class homework and handouts to the best of my ability and just revised all of them before the exam. One more thing that I noticed was that in all the mock tests + real test, there are always a bunch of questions which takes less than 20 sec to answer and hence, one should not start guessing the answers just because one is running out of time. One should wait for such questions to come.
In the final exam, I made sure that I am reading the questions very carefully without assuming even a single thing. Also, I was confident that I can finish the quant section very fast, So I took my sweet time on every question to make sure it is correct.
Two things that helped me the most:
1. Sandeep assurance that I need not to worry anything about Quant and it is way below my level. Whenever I hear that others are not scoring 51, I tend to think that I should start preparing for Quant as well. He again and again assured me that Quant will not be a problem for me at all and I need not to study for the same.
2. Sandeep’s tip that the two choices will never contradict each other in a DS question. Just by using this fact, I marked 2 questions in my real GMAT exam in less than 30 sec without even picking up pen and paper. Otherwise, they are intensive calculation based questions.
Exam experience:
In the actual exam, there were no surprises. All questions looked similar to me. I think that the quant is little tougher than GMATPrep. I rechecked all my answers and read the questions again to make sure that I am not missing any detail and it finally worked. I scored 51 J.
Moreover, I was just going through the Sandeep Class material and I realized that more than 15 questions got repeated from that material itself. So, if anyone finishes full LATEST content, I think he is not going to see even a single unknown question.
Suggestions:
1. Do the class homework of Quant very thoroughly. Tryout all the questions with every possible approach you can and then, understand answers properly. Then only, you can properly appreciate his classes and can make most of it.
2. In addition, pay very close attention to understand all the Sandeep’s explanations in the class. Well, there are those who think that they have a better solution and there are those who think that his solution is very confusing and their solution is lengthier but easier. However, just keep in mind that Sandeep has been teaching students since so many years and he knows many more ways of solving the same problem. Even after that, if he is suggesting that particular solution means that this solution may have much more significance while solving other problems as well. I think one should never ever consider a particular solution for a single problem. Even if a solution looks tedious for a particular easy problem, it could be so that this solution would be the only solution for an seemingly impossible problem that can increase your quant score from 50 to 51.
3. Always make a note of the tips/tricks mentioned by Sandeep and revise them before exam
VERBAL:
SC:
Classes, 50 error detection questions, 38 SC Questions, Manhattan SC Book, SC PPT, SC Topicwise PDF, OG 12, OG Verbal Review 2nd Edition, Latest SC Questions
Exam experience:
No major surprises. Most of the questions were similar to the latest content. You must solve all the latest content before going to the exam.
Suggestions:
1. Make a SC log, in which keep on noting down concepts which you missed during solving/practicing questions
2. Do 50+38 questions + PPT atleast 4-5 times or more, until you are sure that you know each and every concept and question by heart
3. More and more practice
CR:
Classes, Manhattan CR Book Latest, Logical Reasoning Bible, CR PPT, OG 12, OG Verbal Review 2nd Edition, CR 700-800 questions, Latest CR Questions
Exam experience:
Most of the questions were based on the reasoning, similar to the latest and 700-800 ques. Just by reading 1-2 lines of the question, I could correctly guess what has to come next. So, I did not need to spend any time understanding the question. I just read the question and I was ready to solve it.
Suggestions:
1. Read LR Bible first and then read the Manhattan CR book.
a. Benefit: Manhattan CR starts with the concept of note making while reading the question. If you get use to it, then you will unnecessarily waste your valuable time during exam. LR bible properly guides you how to go about it.
2. CR becomes more and more easier as you practice more questions. In addition, you start applying the negation/strengthening/weakening approach subconsciously and you need not to think that you should first do Step 1, Step 2 and so on and so forth. Everything starts happening together automatically.
RC:
Classes, class handouts, MLIC module and Latest collection
Exam experience:
As Sandeep says, after reading 50 passages, you can guess what the passage is all about by just reading first paragraph. Exam had 4 paragraphs. Surprisingly, I did not face any difficulty understanding any of them. In fact, after reading the first paragraph only, I could guess correctly what author is going to say in next few paragraphs. Though I did get 3 tough inference questions, on which I have to struggle to find the correct answers, others were relatively easy.
I would like to mention couple of things here. In the starting, I had a very weak comprehension of RCs. I never enjoyed reading RC. I use to just read it just for the sake of it. Then, in the beginning, I began by taking notes on these passages. I took notes as explained in Manhattan RC Book. After you do a ton of these, you start to get a feel for what is likely to be tested. After a while, I found that I was able to understand what I was reading without taking the notes, but I think the notes were good practice in the beginning.
Then, Sandeep explained OCTAVE. But, it did not make much sense to me because of my boredom while reading RC. I spoke to Sandeep about it and he helped me attend one more thorough session of 40 Primary purpose passages with the OCTAVE technique. That worked like MAGIC for me!! Next day, I started doing RC and to my surprise, I could complete 40 RCs in Latest RC Content in around 5 hours. It boosted my confidence like anything and after that day, I could believe that I can crack RC easily. Sandeep really helped me in boosting my confidence and gave me a magic mantra in the form of OCTAVE. In all the 4 passages, I could eliminate atleast 2 and sometimes 3 choices in the primary purpose question just by looking at the question. So, you people can imagine the time I saved by doing that.
Suggestions:
1. Master OCTAVE Technique
a. In the starting, apply OCTAVE technique consciously and even after solving any RC passage, force yourself to read it again, but this time look only for 2 things: author’s opinion and contrast words
b. By doing max 15 passages, you would be able to apply OCTAVE sub-consciously
2. Pay very close attention to the Sandeep’s RC Class. I was mesmerized by his approach in RC. He told many things to look out for. For example: If passage has “XYZ ignores”, “XYZ is surprising”, “XYZ is important”, this means it has something to do with the author’s opinion/tone and must be captured in the primary purpose. I cracked 2 PP questions based on the same concept.
Some things about Sandeep::
- If you compare him with any other GMAT tutors, he will be atleast 10 times better than any one of them
- Sandeep explains things in such a simple manner that even a kid would understand the solution, provided he has done his homework given by Sandeep
- He is always ready to help you. If you take one step for you, he is ready to take ten steps for you
- Even if he is extremely busy, if you need him, he will always be there for you
I have never seen such a helpful person in my life
Story of my Preparation
The first and foremost step to start the MBA process (by giving GMAT) is to get motivated. When life is going very easily and without any tensions, your life style and mood do not allow you to even pick the books. For me, it was “MBA Tour's Bangalore Round Table Workshop” which motivated me like anything. Then, I spoke to my manager and he told me it is the best time for me to go for an MBA and next year means never!!!
The next step was to decide on the preparation for GMAT. I researched on internet and came across many GMAT prep institutes in Bangalore. I could sense that most of them were just trying to make money. I went to one institute for a trial class, but, after the class, I was sure that this is not the class for me. I knew some things about myself –
(a) I would not be able to dedicate even an hour a day if there is no driving force behind it
(b) I would tend to keep on searching on NET on various forums and various sites and never would be able to decide which one is the best
(c) I would not be able to attend a class which does not make me feel challenged
(d) I have problems focusing for long periods of time
Fortunately, I got to know about Sandeep and attended his first class. I was blasted by the session. The maths, which I thought was my strength, was asked in such a different way and I could literally see how GMAC tried to make GMAT Non-Asiatic in Quant. If nobody would have told me the same, I would have learnt this thing in a harder way i.e. by solving lot of questions and hence, spending lot of extra time.
Well, don't get too much bogged down with the first two steps. What counts the most at the end of the day is solid grunt work: doing lots of exercises, learning from your mistakes and doing more exercises with a view to improving your 'strike rate'. Sandeep provides plenty of material, in terms of books, concepts, and practice questions. The key is not to complete it somehow, but to master it. You have to go through the material in an organized manner, same way as Sandeep tells in the class. I followed his pattern and I think whatever my score is just because of this systematic study only.
I suggest to all of you “Blindly follow whatever Sandeep says”. Whenever I was in doubt about any thing about my prep (be it strategy, be it duration of study, be it any technique), I always asked Sandeep about his suggestion and always implemented the same without doubt. Ultimately, Sandeep’s approach helped me to crack the exam. If anyone is in doubt, just think that Sandeep has trained 1000’s of students and he has known/tried so many different approaches. So, the approach that he tells you is the best because he knows that other approaches either fail or do not give results as good as this approach would. BUT, it is entirely your decision to blindly follow him or discover for yourself later that the other approach didn’t work that well.
I always finished the homework given by Sandeep, whatever the case may be. It always helped me to get the most out of his classes. If any one goes in his class without doing the required homework, I seriously doubt that he get much benefitted by the classes.
During the last but one month, I concentrated on concepts and OG, VR and 700-800 questions. I studied all the three topics: RC, CR and SC. During the last one month, I just did all the LATEST content and revised all the things that I studied before.
My Final Suggestions:
1. Pacing is very very important
- Stick to the timings 58min, 41 min, 24 min
- Must have 24 min for last 10 ques as it is the time when you think that you have to do the best and tend to take more time per question. For me, I has 24:20 mins for last 10 questions, but, I am left with only 3 mins for last 2 ques (though I managed to complete them comfortably)
2. You may feel stress/anxiety in actual exam at times. Just close your eyes for 5 sec. You will do fine.
3. Always decide yourself a date in mind, otherwise you will keep on procrastinating the GMAT test. I have decided that I have to take in the month of August, whatever the case arises.
4. Listen to people who have 'Been there, Seen that, Done that' - Sandeep is the best person!!
5. It is not important ki “aap kahan se aaye ho” ..... the thing that is important is “aapko kahan jaana hai?”
6. Start with your dream, make it a goal and then commit to a plan. “When the will to achieve is massive, whatever comes in the way shall be torn into pieces.”
7. Practice Practice Practice - This is the only way to boost your confidence
8. Always time your practice sessions. I bought a timer and always use to force myself to complete 40 questions in 60 min irrespective of the section. The main benefit of timer is you can compare at any question how far you are from the exact time and can adjust the pacing
9. I focused on mastering the content, not finishing it. I didn't accept an answer until I was totally satisfied. This helped me rectify all my wrong approaches of thinking.
10. Frankly speaking if you do all the latest content thoroughly, then you cannot see any surprises in GMAT
11. GMAT Prep Tests are a close indicator of not only the scores you can expect at the actual GMAT, but also the look and feel of the Actual GMAT
- You must take GMATPrep in a simulated test environment one or two days before actual GMAT. It boosts your confidence and helps you to prepare yourself for the exact pattern of the sections, breaks and timings.
- Few differences worth mentioning:
i. Time in actual GMAT shows in “mm::ss”, while in GMATPrep if shows only minutes. So, you can time yourself better during actual test
ii. There is a COPY command also enabled in the actual GMAT and you can use Ctrl+C for that as well, while in GMATPrep, only cut, paste and undo are there.
12. Avoid all the clutter and noise of material available on the web & in book stores (1000 SC, CR’s etc ... and all other books on GMAT. I think they are good only if you have excess time on your hands
13. Don't get overwhelmed by the difficulty of the class material. Persist and Persevere.
14. Prefer Pearson testing centre (on Dickenson Road) over NTTF centre. In NTTF centre, the restrooms are approximately 30 meters away from the testing centre. Going to restrooms only will consume half of your break time.
15. My general take is that GMAT is definitely beatable.
- You just need to stay motivated, organized and focused and you will surely get a respectable score.
- Don't lose hope even if your first scores are low. Have a target score in mind and slog it out.
- The target score should be a function of (time available, other strengths/weaknesses). Of course there is an upper bound on the score you can get (I just can't get a 45 in verbal without considerable investment of time), but this upper bound is sufficiently high for all people....your capacity is more than you think.
- Good luck! Hope to see you in Bschool.
This has been a long, drawn out process, but in the end it all comes down to confidence in your own abilities and how well prepared you are for the exam. I literally went in knowing that the circumstances would have to be very bad for me to score below a 720. I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to hit my goal. If I got a 700, I was going to retake it and hit my goal, regardless. This took the pressure off of this particular exam. I knew that I was either going to hit 730 today or in the future. Also, I have no doubt that on another day, I would be able to score at least a 750 or better. Anyway, I'm ecstatic that I hit my goal on the first time!
Final Note:
I scored this marks only because of you Sandeep. Thanks a lot for all your help and support.
I can surely say that “FOR GOOD STUDENTS, IVY-GMAT IS THE BEST WAY TO CRACK GMAT. FOR AVERAGE/SO-SO STUDENTS, IVY-GMAT IS THE ONLY WAY”
Hope my briefing helps…and All the very best to all aspirants…
That's it for now. I will answer if you have any questions.
Cheers and good luck to you all. Scoring high in the GMAT is an achievable goal for everyone!
Good luck! And All the best!
