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GMAT — The Most Subjective Professional Exam?

You might imagine that the GMAT exam is logical. Until you start doing practice questions.

The biggest struggle for people beginning their GMAT study is almost invariably learning to deal with the fact that a good number of the questions simply “don’t make sense.”

What causes this, you might ask? How can a test ask such illogical questions?

It is a very interesting phenomenon that comes from the fact that the test is multiple choice.

For a multiple choice exam, rather than a fill-in-the-blanks “standard” exam, the answer is sitting right in front of you.

Think about it. Like it or not, one of those five choices is the correct choice.

How you get there is another question altogether.

Do you want to learn how to find the right answer all the time? Silly question.

It requires a mindset shift: you must realize that the GMAT is extremely subjective.

It’s a terrible word, really: subjective. But remember, it doesn’t mean “arbitrary.”

That is, you have to learn to say what the GMAT writers want you to say.

Of course you need this knowledge to succeed, just the same as you needed to learn what the professor wanted to hear to succeed at university exams!

The more quickly you adapt to what you’re meant to be saying or how you’re meant to be thinking, the better off you will be.

Now here is the hard part: the GMAT is also designed to test “creative,” “lateral,” or “outside-the-box” thinking.

Basically this means that the testwriters make their questions as intentionally obtuse as possible to make you find creative ways to solve them.

Ultimately, the answer is easy to find if you can figure out what the hell the question is saying!

Do you want to be able to think like the testwriters?

Bear this in mind. No matter how “creative” the exam expects you to be, it is still standardized and multiple choice.

It is taken by thousands of people every year. A 700 one month must match the level of a 700 the next month.

It’s simple: the GMAT exam is written systematically.

This limits its ability to provide a metric on your “creative thinking,” no matter how much it claims to do so.

If there is a system, the system can be beaten.

Wanna get started beating it?

Click HERE to arrange a
FREE PHONE CONSULTATION

P.S. How precise are the questions you’re using? Are they written by real testwriters?

P.P.S. When is the last time you rewrote a question in your own words. Try it!

Rowan Hand

Head Coach Rowan Hand has been a GMAT tutor, writer, and editor of GMAT materials since 2005. Rowan has coached hundreds of clients in private and group classes and is the author of three #1 Amazon bestsellers in the GMAT category. Former clients have gone on to INSEAD, LBS, Columbia, Harvard, Wharton, Kellogg, and other excellent business schools.

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