Bell Curves Blog

We thought that many people out there battling through the business school application process might benefit from the thoughts and insights of others who went through the experience. To that end, we started On the Record: Q&A with BC Alums. We’ve heard from Radina Russell and Rhomaro Powell. Let’s get the low-down from Gabriel Perez.

Why did you go to business school?

A career change was the real impetus for me to apply to business school.  I saw business school as an attractive proposition for several reasons.  First, I knew I wanted a career change, but I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted to change it to.  I felt business school could act as a sort of looking glass, giving me unique insights into a number of different industries and career tracks.  Secondly, I felt that by going to business school I could manage to make a career change that wouldn’t necessarily force me to take a step down, but allow me to make a lateral move in terms of responsibility and compensation.  Perhaps most important though, I saw business school as the best way to develop many of the “hard skills” I would need for long term success in the business world, especially coming from a non-traditional background (i.e. not I-Banking or Consulting)

Greetings and welcome to another installment of Akil on the GMAT. I thought I’d share some of my thoughts and advice on how to study for the test. It seems more and more I encounter people who are studying wrong (oops I mean ‘incorrectly,’ since an adverb is needed to modify ‘studying’).

First, to understand how to study properly you have to understand the nature of the GMAT. The GMAT is an adaptive test that assesses quantitative and verbal REASONING. As such, the GMAT is not a test that you get a great score by simply memorizing facts, since a reasoning test requires logic supported by facts, rather than simple fact regurgitation.

Regurgitating facts will most likely only allow you to get a score in the low to mid 500s (in the best case scenario). If you are satisfied with a score in the 500s, you should just get a list of formulas and rules tested and memorize them. [My marketing department requires that I insert a shameless plug here for Bell Curves flashcards, which give you a succinct, comprehensive list of the rules and formulas tested on the GMAT - all in a nice, pretty package.]

If you want to have a realistic shot at the higher scores, you will need to memorize the facts necessary for success on the test and then, more importantly, develop your ability to use those facts in context.

Are you Flashcard Guy/Girl?

As we’ve discussed several times in this space over the past few months, the GMAT will be changing on June 5th. There’s been quite a bit of uncertainty about Next Generation GMAT (NGG), not to mention a fair bit of conjecture and a little too much fear-mongering (see our last post,  “Locking in Your 700+ Before the Test Changes?“, for more on the fear-mongering angle).

We’re returning to the subject once more to present in the clearest terms what’s true for NGG and what’s not, so prospective test-takers have the best possible understanding of how it affects them and how it should affect their preparation. Here is what the new test will look like versus the old.

Let’s start with an unadulterated review of the facts…

Today I received an email from a test preparation company (no, I didn’t email myself…this time). The subject line of the email actually read “Locking in your 700+ before the test changes.” I won’t say which test prep company sent this email, but I will say that the subject line intrigued me…just not for the reasons you may think.

Let’s take a look, and along the way divulge what little information is available on the Next Generation GMAT (NGG) to help everyone reduce their stress a little bit regarding changes to the Big, Bad GMAT.

One way the GMAT ramps up the difficulty of questions is to combine multiple concepts in a single problem. Geometry questions that do this can be challenging, particularly for test-takers who struggle to visualize alternative structures or orientations of a given figure.

Some of the most challenging of all Geometry Hybrids are those that fuse multiple figures into one larger figure and then ask about some facet of it. We call these Mixed Shapes, and categorize them into three groups: Overlapping Figures, Strange Shapes, and Shaded Areas. Let’s take a look at a sample problem to identify strategies to conquer these Geometry Hybrids.

Two identical circles of area 36π overlap as shown above. If the distance from point A to point B is 6, what is the area of the shaded region?

Recently, we thought that many people out there battling through the business school application process might benefit from some thoughts and insights from others who went through the experience. To that end, we started On the Record: Q&A with BC Alums. Last time around we spoke with Radina Russell. This time around, we got insights from the funny and talented Rhomaro Powell.

BC Alumnus Rhomaro Powell

Rhomaro graduated from the S.C. Johnson School of Management at Cornell University, and currently works in the financial services sector.

Why did you go to business school?

Business School was the next logical step for my career progression.  My ultimate goal is to operate my own private equity firm; however I felt I was lacking some core skills, i.e. finance and accounting. Additionally, I felt I needed the proper brand and network that would provide me access to enter the private equity universe.  Johnson at Cornell University gave me the brand, network, and knowledge I needed.

How has business school impacted your career?

Business school as accelerated my career tremendously, mainly because it has helped me grow as an individual, expanded my network, and provided opportunities that I would not have had otherwise.  For example, I went into business school with the main goal of improving my technical skills, but learned that the softer skills were at least as important – and perhaps even more important – to my career.  I learned that knowledge only gets you so far, but being able to lead, influence, and build relationships with individuals will get you farther.  In regards to expanding my network and opportunities, I was able to do so through organizations such as Management Leadership for Tomorrow and The Robert Toigo Foundation.  These organizations have expanded my network from outside the business school I attended.  Additionally, I studied in Madrid, Spain for 5 months.  My network now spans all the top business schools and companies around the world.

image courtesy of h.koppdelaney @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/h-k-d/

Anyone who has prepped – or is prepping now – for the GMAT knows that every little edge counts. We’d recently been boning up on our Mozart (knowledge, not performance) and came across a little gilt-edged nugget called The Mozart Effect. Popularized in the nineties, the Mozart Effect spoke to the increases in spatial-temporal reasoning ability witnessed in research subjects immediately after listening to a Mozart sonata* (guess which one? answer at bottom). More importantly, the Mozart Effect is the reason so many “sophisticated” and/or New Age parents find themselves playing classical music for children still trapped in the womb and therefore unable to voice their own musical preferences.

Overlooking the fact the 8-9 point increase on the spatial reasoning portion of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale was completely temporary (the boost lasted about 10-15 minutes), and also overlooking the fact that all subsequent attempts at replication of the experiment (except one done by the original researchers) failed to reproduce the reported increases of the original, we thought, “Well, everyone loves music. It’s inspiring, it’s motivational, it’s calming, so let’s publish playlists of GMAT tunes that could help students get excited, get ahead, and get their prep groove on.” Besides, the GMAT does require some spatial-temporal reasoning  beyond simply navigating your way through the pat-down and to your seat.

To get the most of this list, or ones you create for yourself, here are a few tips to use them most effectively:

We’re back to share some GMAT-related questions we’ve received (as well as our answers) in hopes that the information may be of benefit to others. Today’s question deals with how multiple GMAT scores may be interpreted by admissions officers.

Q: Does taking the GMAT multiple times look bad when applying to B-schools?

The internet is filled with interesting, informative, and helpful information. Lots of the time, that information is also factually accurate. Lots of times, it’s not. What makes the internet so fantastic a tool — its freedom of access and populist design — is also the thing that can often leave it riddled with factual potholes. The test preparation industry, like any other, struggles with this problem. Given all the companies, tutors, teachers, and individuals sharing information, anyone seeking info on the web should double check what they find.

Recently, we thought that many people out there battling through the business school application process might benefit from some thoughts and insights from others who went through the experience. To that end, we present On the Record: Q&A with BC Alums. Over the next few months we’ll be sharing stories in Q&A format from some of our favorite Bell Curves alumni.

Today’s featured Bell Curves alumnus is Radina Russell.

BC favorite and all-around superstar Radina Russell

Radina graduated from Columbia Business School and now works as an Investor Relations and Financial Communications consultant. Here is what she has to say about her business school experience, the GMAT, and more: