Posted on by Phil

How I Studied for the GMAT

Every 6-10 weeks someone asks me how I studied for the GMAT and any advice I have.  Well, here’s my story!

Unfortunately, in college I was friends with a bunch of over achievers who thought it’d be a good idea to take the GMAT during senior year after they’d secured full time jobs.  So, due to peer pressure and insecurity, I too signed up to take the test.

I took the ManhattanGMAT class which was ~7 weeks long.  Each week consisted of 2 hours in a classroom, and 2 hours or so of homework.  I’d say I did around 1/2 of the recommended homework each week.  After taking the prep course, I immediately signed up for a date to take the actual exam which was about 2 weeks out.  The date was during my finals week at NYU, but I wanted to take it before I headed out for a post-graduation trip to Asia with friends (the same ones who’d peer pressured me into taking this exam!!).

Before the prep course, I took a practice test and scored ~610 (my memory is slightly hazy, but it was in that ballpark).  My goal was to get to a 700 by the time I took the test, and I was around a 680 by the time I finished the prep course.

The number one piece of advice for anyone taking this test is to create and use flashcards to internalize the information you need to answer the most difficult questions.  This was a strategy I stole directly from my Dad who used it to become a doctor (much harder than getting into bschool – so it seemed battle tested).

With that in mind, I went through the 7-8 books that the test prep course had provided, and made a flashcard for any piece of info that I thought would help me answer questions.  I made them for the types of triangles, grammar rules, and for the toughest types of questions (two trains going towards each other, the ones that require factorials, etc).

I had 200-300 flashcards, and would look at them when I had 5 mins on the subway, or while waiting for a friend.  When I’d correctly answered a given card in three consecutive cycles (I put the card on the bottom of the deck after I’d tried to answer it), I discarded it.

The week before the test, I studied for 3-4 hours/day (mostly the flashcards plus some practice problems).  The day before, I didn’t do anything but workout, eat some good food, and watch a movie.  It’s important to rest your brain and de-stress!  Now, I’d probably also do an extra long mediation session but I wasn’t into that back then.

I don’t remember exactly the slope of the curve, but there was a huge increase in my scores in the week before the test.  I started off maybe at the 700 mark for a practice test, and then got a 720, and a 750 before my studying ended (don’t take too many practice tests.  They are good to gauge where you’re at, but take a lot of time and aren’t very instructive in helping you improve).  I’m pretty confident if I’d pushed the test back another week I could have continued to improve…but the commonly accepted rule says increasing your score above a 700 doesn’t help too much in getting you into school.  Btw, I share these numbers only so you can see my progress from the original 610 to when I took the exam and what I did to get there – not to brag!!!

The day of the test of course I was a bit nervous.  The worst part of the GMAT is that they ask you “do you want to accept this score” after you take the test.  Basically, you can say “no” – and it’s like it never happened.  But, if you “accept the score” it goes on your record.  My advice: just accept the score unless you had a monumental meltdown for some reason.  Because of the way the test works, you get harder questions if you answer questions correctly.  So, if you’re getting hard questions, even if you can’t answer them, you’re doing well!

In the end, I scored a 740.  I remember not being completely happy with the score when I got it, and the person working the front desk who’d given me the score basically said “I don’t get it – if I got that score, I’d be jumping up and down!”

My advice is to not put that much pressure on yourself.  And, if you score above the range you need to get into your dream school, go celebrate!  Luckily, I came to my senses about 10 mins after leaving the test center and couldn’t wipe the smile off my face for a few days.

Good luck, don’t stress, and look forward to two of the best years of your life 🙂

14,712 Replies to “How I Studied for the GMAT”

  2. Hello there! This is my first visit to your blog! We are
    a group of volunteers and starting a new initiative in a community
    in the same niche. Your blog provided us valuable information to work on. You have done a outstanding job!

  4. Pretty component of content. I simply stumbled
    upon your weblog and in accession capital to say that
    I get actually loved account your weblog posts.
    Anyway I’ll be subscribing on your feeds or even I fulfillment you get admission to
    persistently fast.

  5. Good day! This is my first comment here so
    I just wanted to give a quick shout out and tell you I
    genuinely enjoy reading your articles. Can you recommend
    any other blogs/websites/forums that cover the same
    subjects? Thank you so much!

  6. Howdy fantastic website! Does running a blog similar to
    this require a massive amount work? I have no expertise in coding however I was hoping to start
    my own blog in the near future. Anyways, if you have any suggestions or tips for
    new blog owners please share. I know this is off topic but I simply had to ask.
    Kudos!

  7. I have to thank you for the efforts you’ve put in writing this site.

    I’m hoping to check out the same high-grade content by you in the future as
    well. In fact, your creative writing abilities has motivated me to get my own website now 😉

  9. Are you gonna be a betting togel online player?
    View the news in the site key to get the most
    up to date information. There are correct estimates and how to
    enjoy.

  11. With havin so much content and articles do you ever run into any problems of plagorism or copyright violation? My site has a lot
    of unique content I’ve either authored myself or outsourced but it
    appears a lot of it is popping it up all over the internet without
    my agreement. Do you know any ways to help prevent content from being stolen? I’d definitely appreciate it.

  13. Hi there, I do think your site might be having internet browser compatibility issues.
    When I look at your site in Safari, it looks fine however,
    when opening in I.E., it has some overlapping issues.
    I simply wanted to give you a quick heads up! Aside from
    that, excellent site!

  14. Good day! I know this is kinda off topic however I’d figured I’d ask.
    Would you be interested in trading links or maybe guest writing a blog article or vice-versa?
    My website discusses a lot of the same topics
    as yours and I feel we could greatly benefit from each other.
    If you’re interested feel free to shoot me an e-mail.
    I look forward to hearing from you! Superb blog by the way!

  15. I think that what you published made a ton of sense. However,
    think on this, suppose you composed a catchier post title? I am not saying your
    information is not solid., but what if you added something that
    makes people desire more? I mean How I Studied for the GMAT – Phil
    Strazzulla's Blog is kinda vanilla. You should look at Yahoo’s home page
    and see how they create news titles to grab viewers interested.
    You might add a video or a related pic or two to get people excited about what you’ve
    got to say. In my opinion, it could bring your website a little
    bit more interesting.

  16. My developer is trying to convince me to move to .net from PHP.

    I have always disliked the idea because of the costs.
    But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using WordPress on various websites for about
    a year and am concerned about switching to another
    platform. I have heard excellent things about blogengine.net.
    Is there a way I can import all my wordpress posts into
    it? Any kind of help would be really appreciated!

  17. Its such as you read my thoughts! You seem to know so much approximately
    this, such as you wrote the e-book in it or something.
    I think that you could do with a few p.c. to drive the message
    house a bit, but instead of that, this is great blog.
    An excellent read. I’ll certainly be back.

  19. Simply desire to say your article is as amazing.
    The clarity on your submit is simply spectacular and i can suppose you’re knowledgeable in this subject.
    Fine together with your permission let me to grasp your feed to keep up to date with drawing close
    post. Thank you one million and please carry on the rewarding work.

  22. Hmm it looks like your blog ate my first comment (it was extremely long) so I guess
    I’ll just sum it up what I wrote and say, I’m thoroughly enjoying your blog.
    I as well am an aspiring blog blogger but I’m still new
    to everything. Do you have any tips and hints for rookie blog writers?
    I’d genuinely appreciate it.

  23. When I originally commented I clicked the “Notify me when new comments are added” checkbox and now each time a comment
    is added I get four emails with the same comment.
    Is there any way you can remove me from that service?
    Many thanks!

  24. Somebody necessarily lend a hand to make significantly posts I would state.
    That is the first time I frequented your website page and thus far?
    I surprised with the analysis you made to create this particular submit amazing.
    Great activity!

  26. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I truly appreciate your efforts and I will be
    waiting for your further write ups thank you once again.

  27. Hi! I know this is somewhat off topic but I was wondering if you knew where I could find a captcha plugin for my
    comment form? I’m using the same blog platform as yours and I’m having trouble
    finding one? Thanks a lot!

  28. I would like to thank you for the efforts you’ve put in penning this blog.

    I’m hoping to see the same high-grade content by you later on as well.
    In truth, your creative writing abilities has motivated me to get my very
    own site now 😉

  30. Hey there, I think your website might be having browser compatibility issues.
    When I look at your website in Safari, it looks fine
    but when opening in Internet Explorer, it has some overlapping.
    I just wanted to give you a quick heads up!
    Other then that, wonderful blog!

  31. I have been exploring for a little bit for any high-quality articles
    or blog posts on this sort of space . Exploring in Yahoo I finally stumbled upon this web site.
    Studying this info So i am glad to show that I have a very good uncanny feeling I found out exactly what I needed.
    I such a lot unquestionably will make certain to do not put
    out of your mind this web site and give it a glance regularly.

  35. Hello! Would you mind if I share your blog with my zynga group?
    There’s a lot of folks that I think would really enjoy your content.
    Please let me know. Thank you

  36. I’m amazed, I have to admit. Rarely do I come across a blog that’s
    both educative and interesting, and let me tell you,
    you have hit the nail on the head. The problem is an issue that not enough
    people are speaking intelligently about. Now i’m
    very happy I found this in my hunt for something relating to this.

  37. Can I just say what a relief to discover somebody that genuinely understands what they are
    talking about over the internet. You actually realize how to bring an issue to light and make it important.
    More and more people need to read this and understand
    this side of the story. I was surprised that you’re not more popular since you surely possess the
    gift.

  38. Greetings I am so glad I found your website, I really found you by mistake, while
    I was browsing on Digg for something else, Anyhow I am here now and would
    just like to say thank you for a marvelous
    post and a all round enjoyable blog (I also love the theme/design), I
    don’t have time to read through it all at the minute but I have saved it
    and also included your RSS feeds, so when I have time I will be back to
    read more, Please do keep up the awesome work.

  40. I’m really enjoying the design and layout of your site.
    It’s a very easy on the eyes which makes it much more pleasant for me to come here
    and visit more often. Did you hire out a developer to create your
    theme? Fantastic work!

  41. Howdy! This is my first visit to your blog! We are a group of volunteers and
    starting a new initiative in a community in the same niche.
    Your blog provided us beneficial information to work on. You have done a extraordinary job!

  43. It’s in reality a nice and helpful piece of info.
    I am happy that you shared this helpful info with us. Please stay us up to
    date like this. Thanks for sharing.

  45. At this time it seems like Movable Type is the top blogging platform available right now.
    (from what I’ve read) Is that what you are using on your blog?

  46. Hmm is anyone else experiencing problems with the pictures on this blog
    loading? I’m trying to determine if its a problem on my
    end or if it’s the blog. Any feed-back would be greatly appreciated.

  47. My programmer is trying to persuade me to move to .net from PHP.
    I have always disliked the idea because of the costs.
    But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using Movable-type on numerous websites for about a year and am nervous about
    switching to another platform. I have heard very good things
    about blogengine.net. Is there a way I can import all my wordpress posts into it?
    Any help would be greatly appreciated!

  48. great points altogether, you simply gained a new reader.
    What would you suggest in regards to your put up that you made some days in the past?
    Any certain?

Comments are closed.