Importance of GMAT Score in Management Consulting
The Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is often used by business schools as part of their criteria in admitting students into their MBA program. However, what does it have to do with your management consulting career? Read more and know the purpose of this standardized test.
Recruiters look at your GMAT score not because they want to know if you can proceed with your MBA degree at a particular school. They consider it because the results tell something about your management consulting competencies. The GMAT score will be one of several criteria that recruiters look at before inviting you for an interview. Once you land the consulting interview, your score doesn’t matter. Let’s look at four main parts of GMAT tests.
Quantitative Section
The quantitative section gauges your quantitative reasoning and interpretation skills. Questions are related to arithmetic, basic algebra and common geometry concepts. Some items require you to resolve numerical problems while others ask you to examine quantitative figures logically.
A good score in this section means you are capable of dealing with numbers every day – common factor recruiters look for in management consulting candidates. If you, fortunately, land your dream job, you’ll be dealing with financial reports, working on the quantitative aspect of your research, assigning product prices and computing costs and revenues. If you are terrible with numbers, you will be in trouble as a consultant!
Verbal Section
The three types of questions in this section are reading comprehension, critical reasoning and sentence correction. In the first type, you will be asked to understand written text, interpret ideas and answer inferential questions. The second type measures your reasoning skills by evaluating contentions and formulating a plan of action. The last type expects you to select which among the choices is the best way of expressing an idea.
If you score high in this section, it can be interpreted by recruiters as possession of outstanding verbal reasoning skills. This is important in management consulting since you’ll deal with researches and written reports that must be evaluated with critical thinking. Your incapacity to do so will lead to recommendations without factual basis. With this, you will lose your credibility. On the part of the client, this will result to poor decisions and irrelevant costs.
Integrated Reasoning Section
The integrated reasoning section includes items on graphical and table analysis. You will be presented with data that come in different formats and from numerous sources. You need to integrate the available information to be able to resolve a complex problem.
A good score in this section is impressive because it implies you can put together facts meaningfully. When you resolve a business case, several factors are to be considered. For instance, if you assess a market situation, you must look into the characteristics of customers, capability of suppliers, ongoing competition and the performance of current market. You can only come up with a recommendation after analyzing the costs and benefits of each factor.
Analytical Writing Assessment (AWA)
In this section, you are asked to understand and critique the argument presented to you. MBA.com states that it is not a requirement for you to have specific knowledge of the essay topic. What matters more is you’re able to write analytically within a limited period of time. You need not express your personal opinions about the subject. You will be evaluated based on your ability to organize ideas, provide supporting facts to your main points and use English correctly.
As a management consultant, you are expected to make comprehensive presentations for clients. However, they won’t just drink the kool-aid. For them to be convinced, your solutions or recommendations must have a solid basis. You can bring up the results of a survey, findings of your market study or summarized report from your interviews with employees. Hence, a good score in AWA section will also put you at an advantage.
Do not just take GMAT for granted. Perform well in this test for it tells something about your capability to do management consulting roles and responsibilities.