Get Admitted to Top B-School by Acing the New GMAT

GMAT Changes: Are You Prepared?

The GMAT is one of the most important exams you will take in your life. It will tell MBA admissions if you have the skills to make it as a b-school student.

With the recent changes on June 5, 2012, it’s important to know what they are and how to prepare for them.

Why the GMAT Changed

In the ever-changing world of business, the GMAT must keep up. After consulting with 740 management faculty around the world, they came to the conclusion that a new section must be included in the GMAT, the Integrated Reasoning section.

This new section will help b-schools identify students who have superior decision making skills, can use verbal and quantitative reasoning to solve problems, and distinguish patterns.

All of these skills are important in management careers, so having them before b-school means students have the fundamental skills necessary to succeed in the business world.

The New GMAT Exam: Questions, Time, and Scoring

Don’t worry; the exam is still 3 hours and 30 minutes. The only change in the time it takes you to complete the exam is the Analytical Writing Assessment section.

The Analytical Writing Assessment portion was 60 minutes, but is now 30 minutes. You will have 30 minutes to complete the new Integrated Reasoning section.

You will have 12 questions to complete. They are all multiple-choice questions. However, each question has more than one part.

You will not be able to move to the next question until you finish all parts of the question. Once you move to the next question, you cannot go back to change your answers.

You will receive a score from 1 to 8. It’s important to note that your Integrated Reasoning score has no influence on your Quantitative, Verbal, Total, and Analytic Writing Assessment scores.

You will not receive your score immediately following the exam; instead, you will receive it in your Official Score Report in 20 days.

Besides the interval score you will receive, you’ll also receive a percentile score. This is the percentage of exam-takers scoring lower than you.

Since this section just began, your percentile score will change as more people take the exam. You can request an updated Integrated Reasoning score from mba.com.

Prepare for the New GMAT Exam

While you may already have the skills necessary for the new section of the exam, many hopeful b-school students feel they need to prepare for the new questions by taking practice ones.

The GMAT prep firms have practice IR questions for you to take, and more information on how to sharpen the skills that the Integrated Reasoning section measures.

What are Your Thoughts?

With any new change comes resistance. Many applicants have expressed their frustration with the test test and view it as another hurdle that applicants have to overcome in the quest for admission to top business schools. What do you think?

How important do you believe integrated reasoning skills are to the business world?