niranjan_soni

Hi David I am 30 y/o male from India, working in U.K. for last 5 years. GMAT - 700 (Q 48, V 38) AWA 5.0 taken on 12th April 2006. This was my third attempt, the first 2 attempts were in last year in which i had scored 610 and 600 respectively. Undergrad - B.Tech. (Electrical Engg.) from India with 68% (Don't know how to convert this to GPA) Work Experience - Approx. 9 years full time but it has been in IT industry in a technical role (Systems Architect). During the course of 9 years i have held positions which involved leading teams of developers on different projects. My first 4 years of full time work was in India and last 5 years have been in U.K. working with the same organisation. Post MBA Long term Plan - Start my own company Post MBA Short term Plan - Working in a role in a company in which i get the exposure to the various aspects of a well run organisation. I had applied to LBS R4 this year and my application was rejected. I wanted to apply to Oxford (Said) as well in this years R4 but then decided against it. I want to reapply to LBS for fall 2007. Unfortunately LBS doesnt offer any feedback sessions so i don't know where did my application go wrong. Thinking back, there are few points that i can think of about my application that could have been weak, but i am not sure how much they matter 1. I hadnt been to any open day sessions at LBS before i applied for R4. I know that LBS recommends to attend these open days and to interact with Students and Alumni there. Could this had been a strong negative on my application? 2. How important is to have great references? I think the references i got were good but not great. 3. Do multiple GMAT attempts lowers my chances? 4. I know that one of the eassys i wrote (the one for starting a student clud) was very ordinary. Can it be this point that led to my application rejection? Regarding Reapplicants, LBS says that one should show significant improvement over the last application.To that end, i am planning to do couple of management courses this year from Open University. Do you think it will support my reapplication strongly? I am also thinking of changing my job, working in the IT divison of company working in Finanical or Investment sector. But i am not sure whether it is a good idea and will it give me extra points on my reapplication. Do u think i stand a good chance for LBS reapplication and Oxford application for fall 2007? What areas do u think i can improve upon in order to boost my chances? I will great appreciate your advise on this. Regards Niranjan Soni

Congrat CABS, great score!!!

Sorry guys, took so long for my debrief, but i had been quite busy lately (filing the App for LBS, last date is 28th April). So here we go. Preparation After my disappointing attempt last year which yielded a score of 600 (i dont know why i was thinking all the time that i had score 610), i thought to myself there is no point pushing myself too hard, I need to plan properly and give enough time for my preparation. I started my preparation in Mid Sept 2005, it was going very well. I was aiming to a Dec. 2005 date for my GMAT. But then things went horribly wrong. As i work full time in IT, i was assigned a very critical project in Mid Oct. and i had finish it by Dec. End. My studies went for a toss (as i was working late nights) and so did my effort of one and half months. I started my studies again around end of Jan. 2006 and set a date of Mid April for my test. I feel that it is always a good idea to set a date in mind for the test as you start your studies. From my past experience, i knew that my verbal was terribly weak. So in my studies this time i concentrated more on verbral. Completed the Verbal Section of OG in the begining. Then got Kaplan 2006 Premier programme book and also Kaplan 2006 Verbal workshop. Finished these 2 books as well. After that i started working very extensively with this forum, looking at the posts from other members especially 800Bob and tictaktoe. All this while i working only on my Verbal. I was studying around 2-3 hours on weekday and around 4-5 hours on a weekend. Less than a month to the test date, i started started focusing on my Quant as well. It was during this time that i started taking full length GMAT Tests as well. Did all four from Kaplan 2006 CD and was scoring between 610 to 660 Did both the GMATPrep tests as well and scored 690 and 700 (this test i took 2 days before the actual Test) respectively. Another thing i did differently this time was to work on some AWA before my test. It gave me an idea of the structure of AWA and what kind of mistakes i was making there. Things i did differently this time - Focus really hard on my weak area which was Verbal - For SC, i revisited the 8 Golden Rules of SC, went to the basics. Did all the SC Questions from OG and in each question looked at correct as well as incorrect answer choices to find out different kind of mistakes. - For SC and CR , i started using POE as a must. It helped my a lot because i was able to eliminate around 2 to 3 choices using POE. - For RC, i used the strategy as explained in Kaplan workshop. Making the road map of the passage. I put that in practice during my mock GMAT test and found it quite useful. Though i think that one cannot use this strategy on each RC type. But this is my personal opinion. - Finally, i visited this fourm regularly during my preparation. Everyday looking at the new posts, understanding the explanation provided by other members. Though the above points sound very simple but i think correct execution is the key. The D-Day I stopped studying one day before the test. Didnt even touch the book. Enjoyed myself completely, went for a long walk, cleared my mind of all the thoughts of what would happen. That really helped me because it took the pressure from me. My test was scheduled for 12:45 in the afternoon, so i got up at around 8:00 in the morning. Had a good 8 hours sleep. Had my breakfast, watched my morning TV to keep my mind of the test. Left home for my test center, reached the test center at around 12:00, so hang around for some time here and finally went in at around 12:15. I was immediately assigned the test as there werent many people taking the test at that time. AWA To my surprise, both the argument and issue i got were same as the ones i got in my last test. Argument was very simple, lot of examples and points to make there. I think i did good there. The issue was a bit complicated, i was feeling that i was lacking in examples there, but in the end put enough there as well. Took 10 mins optional break. Freshen up, had half a cereal bar and got ready for the Quant. Quant Quant started with a difficult problem. I think i got stuck at around 4 or 5 question and must have got it wrong. In the middle of the section i started feeling that i am not doing very well in this section as i getting a mix of easy and difficult questions and towards the end of the section, to my horror i got a simple addition question...asking me the add 3 different numbers and provide the answer. I was sure by this time that i have done terribly in Quant. I was struggling to finish the section towards the end, had 5 questions remaining with 3 mins to go....but managed to finished the section with 30 seconds to spare. I found level of questions in the beginning certainly harder than the ones in GMATPrep. DS questions were much harder than PS ones. Strange thing was that i got a prob. question in the test which is present in GMATPrep as well (Spoiled Apples) Take 10 mins optional break. Told myself that it is not over yet and prepared myself for the verbal section. Verbal Started with a SC question, took around 3 mins to answer that. Got a CR next, found it easy. Got few SCs after that. Like many have said in this forum, the difficulty level of SCs was quite high. The answer choices were very close, so it was difficult to use POE correctly. CR questions were resonably simple, i got a BF around 12 or 13th question. Got 4 RC passages, the first 3 were short, around 250 - 350 words. The last RC was lengthy, around 400+ words. Didnt get any science RC. I found the RC easier on the test and i think RC reading on the new layout of test is easier as well. By the time i finish one third of Verbal, i had around 44 mins left, so had to hurry in rest of the section. Finished the rest of the section with 10 seconds to spare. After completing the section, went through the survey quickly, got to final screen, select Report Score and covered my face with my hands (just like watching a horror movie). I was sure that i have messed up my test again. Peeked at the computer screen through my fingers and there it was 700 (Q 48 and V 38) I was very happy considering my experience a year back. The test was a complete roller-coaster ride for me. I felt quite confident at the beginning of Quant, but towards the middle i started feeling that my test is not going well at all and the test threw me off completely by giving simplest of all problems towards the end of the Quant section. I think that's one of hidden attributes the test is testing, to remain calm and composed and not let the situation overpower you. Finally, i got my AWA score as well, scored 5.0, so i am happy there as well. Once again i thank every member of this forum who has contributed their time and effort to make this place a gold mine for anyone who wishes to score good on GMAT.

The online version of score report becomes available before 20 days. I got mine in 7 or 8 days i think.

Took my test yesterday and scored 700 (Q 48 and V 38). I was hoping for around 720 (greedy me), but i am happy with 700 considering that last year around the same time when i took my first GMAT test, i scored a dispointing 610. I would like to thanks all of the members in this forum for providing their invaluble inputs. My special thanks to tictaktoe,800bob,CTG1983,chix475ntu,sdasar and finally to Erin for starting this great place. Will post my test experience later, now i have to start with my Apps. I am thinking of applying in Said Business School (Oxford University), LBS and few others here in UK. If anyone can help me with any material related with Application process and interview, that will be great.

OA is E. both stmt 1 and 2 say that they are close to a number...never equal to the specified number. Hence the explanation provided by CD AIM 2006 is correct.

Hi bungholio, your answer is correct. OA is C. There is one point i am not able to understand in your answer. You say that "from the question stem we know that both a and b have to be of the same sign". I dont understand how both a and b have the same sign. I try to put numbers for a and b. So for (-a, b) , i take (-2,3)...so (-b,a) becomes (-3,2), in both the case i see that a and b are going in 2nd quadrant. Please correct my understanding....

If ab not equal 0 and points (-a, b) and (-b, a) are in the same quadrant of the xy-plane, is point (-x, y) in this same quadrant? (1) xy > 0 (2) ax > 0 I know that above question has already been asked in another thread but i am not able to understand the explanation provided there. can someone explain this question in an easier way?

Yes, the OA is B. sdasar, can you explain how we can solve this using venn diagram?

Each of 3 charities in Novel Grove Estate has 8 persons serving on its board of directors. If exactly 4 persons serve on 3 boards each and each pair of charities has 5 persons in common on their boards of directors, then how many distinct persons serve on one or more boards of directors. A) 8 B) 13 C) 16 D) 24 E) 27 OA to follow, please explain your answers.

Should be C. In my understanding, C explains properly a section of people who are sleep-deprived.

Yeap C is the answer

E is the correct answer. Whats the OA?

Yes, the answer is C. Stmt 1, w+c > 50.....doesnt tell us anything, w can be both +ve or -ve here - insuff. Stmt 2, c Combining 1 and 2, we know that if w+c>50 and c > 48, then w > 3 so the answer is C

D is the correct answer. "which" in A,B and C seem to refer to shark population whereas it should refer to remedies.