GMAT Update

These days GMAT is taking most of my time. I have completed Quant and Verbal portion and now I need to revise what I did for the last 10 weeks. Time to start practicing the problems, reviewing the notes and hard coding various quant formulas and equations in the brain. SC is the one portion about which I am still not confident, so need to work on that. All in all I should say that GMAT is the very first step for getting an MBA and believe me it’s the one which will not only test your quant & verbal skills it will test your time management skills too (which is very important for a good manager). What matters on the GMAT is how effective you are in laying your study plan to the point you execute it, how you divide your time based on your comfort level for each of the quant and verbal sections and how you make use of the time wisely between work and the GMAT prep.

Before putting the plan for the GMAT, I faced a tough time deciding the books I should consider. There are myriad of forums and blogs suggesting the books and other prep material for the GMAT. At times this plethora of information is too much for an individual and at time this data mining is excruciating & time consuming. I guess we all know where we stand in terms of our present quant & verbal skills and this should be the foundation for consulting/buying the books for the GMAT. I knew I had pretty rusty quant skills and for the verbal I knew it would be a challenge to take up SC, RC & CR without the basics. Based on this information I short listed the books which I am using for my GMAT prep. Here goes the list:

Quant (PS – Problem Solving & DS – Data Sufficiency)
Manhattan Series - Quant:
1. Number Properties
2. Fraction, Decimal & Percentage (FDP)
3. Equations, Inequality & VICs (VICs – Variable in answer choice)
4. Word Translation
5. Geometry

Verbal (SC – Sentence Correction, CR – Critical Reasoning, RC – Reading Comprehension)
Manhattan Series - Verbal:
1. Sentence Correction - SC
2. Reading Comprehension - RC
3. The Powerscore GMAT Bible Critical Reasoning – CR

Apart from these I also bought OG11, OG Quant, OG Verbal (OG – official guide from the makers of the GMAT).
Primarily these are the books on which I am going to concentrate. I bought some more books for the additional practice exams, more on those books in a later blog.
I have read in some blogs & forums that some people started to develop this hatred somewhere during their prep period and this hatred act as their power booster for the GMAT. This feeling brings out the best in some individuals. For me I have this simple logic which I have followed most of my life, hate it or love it if you want to succeed in any point in life, if you want to conquer those unfathomable dreams then hard work is inevitable. I agree that luck will play an important part in our life and will drive some of the life’s main decisions too. To support the Luck factor in the equation, there is one of the quotes from the movies I like: “Chance favors the prepared mind”. Which movie? – Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (Watch it. One of the best from Steven Seagal)