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2-MONTH GMAT STUDY PLAN FOR
WORKING PROFESSIONALS
By  Sameer Kamat on  May 6, 2019
Categories 
Tags 
We asked GMAT test prep expert and personal tutor,
Chiranjeev Singh, to share a 2-month GMAT study that working
professionals can follow without leaving their full-time job.
 

2-Month GMAT study plan for working professionals

How to study for the GMAT in 60 days with a full-time job
by Chiranjeev Singh
 
A question that you must ask before creating a plan is
whether the plan will work. If you need 6 months to prepare but
create and follow a 2-month study plan, what do you think are
your chances of succeeding?
With such a plan, you may end up consuming all your resources
in ineffective ways (rushing through to complete within 2
months) and find yourself, at the end of 2 months, unprepared
and without resources to prepare.
So, how much time do you need to prepare? This article (GMAT
prep: How long does it?) lists out various factors that impact
the time you need to prepare.
Generally, however, it’s very hard to know upfront how much
time it will take. Thus, it is always a good idea to start as early as
possible.
 
The Principle

The main principle underlying the plan is that you should

master one skill at a time.
When you try to master multiple skills at a time, you may not
spend enough time on any skill,and thus your mind may not
make the required inter-connections and grow in that
particular skill.
Thus, you need to focus on one section at a time if you have 2-3
hours a day. If you have 4 or more hours a day to prepare, you
may takeup 2 sections at a time.
To avoid getting out-of-touch with a section after it is over, you
should continue practicing 3-5 questions of the section
everyday or on alternate days.
 
60-day GMAT study plan
Here’s a 60-day GMAT study plan you can follow with a full-
time job.
 
Day 1 – A Preliminary Analysis
Solve about 10 questions each from Quant and Verbal sections
from the GMAT Official Starter Kit (link to the kit given at the
end of the article).
If the questions seem alien to you, or in other words, you are
not comfortable with the questions at all, start with the items
mentioned for Day #2. If the questions seem manageable, take
one mock out of the two mocks in the Starter Kit.
After taking the mock, don’t review the questions since you’ll
want to use the same mock after you are done with your
preparation. Just look at your performance – in terms of
sectional scores and accuracy within subsections.
Then, start your preparation by working on your strengths first.
By working on your strengths first, you’ll boost your confidence
that you can ace the test.
Devote about 14 days to your stronger section – out of Verbal
and Quant – and 25 days to your weaker section. For this
discussion sake, let’s say your stronger section is Quant.
 
Day 2-15 – Work on the Stronger Section
Practice Quant from the Official Guides. If you need help with
the concepts, which the official questions will not teach you,
you may look at books (MGMAT), online/classroom courses, or
private tutoring.
 
Day 16–40 – Work on the Weaker Section
Practice Verbal from the Official Guides and the resources
mentioned at the end of this article. Ideally, start with CR, then
do SC, and lastly RC. If RC is your weakest area, you can do RC
before SC.
However, I suggest that CR should be the first section you do in
Verbal. The reasons are that CR takes the longest time to
improve and that the skills built in CR are helpful in RC too.
 
Day 41-45 – Timed Mixed Practice
These five days should be devoted to analysing the past
mistakes and doing timed mixed practice. Practice questions
from different topics and sections together within timed limits.
Do about 10-15 questions at a time.
After doing any set of questions, go through each question in
detail and learn from your mistakes. The Official Question Pack
(Link #3 in the resources below) will come in handy at this
stage.
 
Day 46 – The First Checkpoint
Take the 2nd mock from the GMAT Official Starter kit
mentioned above. Make sure that you take the test in test-like
conditions and when you are fresh. Only then can you expect
the score to be a correct assessment of your ability.
 
Day 47- 50 – Identify and Rectify
Thoroughly analyse the 2nd mock. Go through each of the
questions and pay attention to not only whether you got the
question right but also whether you got it right for the right
reasoning. A question that you got right for the wrong reasons
should be considered wrong.
Based on this question-by-question analysis, try to figure out
topics/concepts in which you faltered the most.
Then, spend these four days working on these concepts – by
revisiting the concepts and its questions you got incorrect
before and by solving more new questions on the concept.
 
Day 51-58 – Repeat the Process
Repeat the above process by taking the 3rd, 4th, and 5th mocks on
Day #51, Day #55, and Day #57 respectively and analysing
them in the days in-between.
As you can notice, the time difference between two consecutive
mocks keeps going down. It’s logical because the number of
areas you need to work on should go down with every mock.
Look at AWA and IR sections too during this time.
 
Day 59 – Rest
Yes. Take the whole day off. You’ve put in a lot of effort over the
last 58 days. Now, the best you can do for your GMAT score is
give your mind some rest.
Take the pressure off your head. Focus on preparing a calm and
composed mindset for the GMAT tomorrow. Be relaxed.
 
Day 60 – Take the GMAT
If you want the 3.5 hours of the test to reflect your ability, you
need to avoid going into the test overly worried about not
getting the desired result and the cataclysmic effect it’ll have on
your career and life.
Remember that you’re not going to lose all your wealth, health,
and relationships if you don’t get your desired score.

Your life is not going to crash!

So, be at peace. Just accept that the outcomes of life are not in
our control; only efforts are. And then, let go of the result.
If you let go of your hold on the result, you’ll feel the stress
leaving your body. And then, you’ll be able to work at the best of
your ability. Congratulations on your score! 😊
 
Tips to get the most from your GMAT study plan
 
1. Customize the Plan to Suit Your Needs
Obviously, the above plan need not be followed to the letter.
You can customize the plan per your needs. If you want to
create a 1-month or a 3-month study plan, you can
proportionately increase or decrease the number of days
devoted to different topics. You can also choose to devote much
more time to one section than to the other, depending upon
how you fare relatively in the two sections.
 
2. Execution >> Plan
It is said that the perfect plan, poorly executed, will fail while a
lousy plan, well executed, is often successful. Therefore, focus a
lot on executing the plan well. The following three articles will
help you a long way in that.
 Three Pillars of a Successful GMAT Strategy
 Practice won’t lead you anywhere!
 GMAT Aspirant: Are you also measuring yourself the
wrong way?
 
3. More Time per Day = Fewer total days
The minimum average number of hours one needs to have an
effective preparation is 1 hour a day. However, on an average,
working professionals spend 2-3 hours a day. Should you aim to
spend even more hours per day?
Why not? If you have a job and life that allow you to take out
more than 2-3 hours a day, you can spend more time per day.
The more time spent per day will bring down the total number
of days you need to hit the target score.
The only thing one should keep in mind is that more hours
should not come at the cost of quality. If more studying hours
will mean less than 7 hours of sleep, you better sleep.
 
4. Practice Daily
Studying only over the weekend is highly ineffective. If you have
so many commitments during the weekday that you cannot take
out even an hour per day for GMAT preparation, try for 30
minutes or even 15 minutes a day.
However, do it daily. Daily practice is needed to allow the mind
to make interconnections among concepts and to retain past
learnings.
 
5. Attitude Matters the Most
If you are focused too much on continually assessing yourself
rather than focusing on the improvement, you’ll soon build so
much negativity within because of the repeated failures that
you’d either give up GMAT preparation or prepare in a highly
disengaged way.
Either way, your career will suffer. Therefore, focus on whether
you’re improving every week, not on whether you’ll hit the score
next week.
 
Resources
Here are a few resources that I recommend for the 2-month
GMAT study plan:
1. GMAT Official Starter Kit – Free 90 questions and 2
official mocks.
2. GMAC Official Guides – From the makers of the GMAT
test, these official guides contain questions that were once
used to score candidates but have been retired now. These
guides are indispensable for anyone preparing for GMAT.
3. Other Official Material – GMAC offers resources for
GMAT preparation other than official guides. Anyone
looking for the most authentic sources of preparation
should consider these resources.
4. For a list of all official questions published so far, please
click here and here.
5. If you are looking for private tutoring, get in touch
with GMAT with CJ
 
About the author: A passionate teacher and learner, Chiranjeev
Singh is a private GMAT tutor based out of Delhi. CJ (as he is
commonly called) is an IIMA Alumnus and has scored 780 on the
GMAT (we’ve verified his score from the Pearson VUE site). He
follows a skills-based questioning-driven methodology and takes
online sessions for students across the world.
 Mega-Collection of 3700 Unique Official GMAT Quant
Questions

What if one could collate the list of all unique official questions

that are available in the market? Wouldn’t such a list add
tremendous value to students’ lives?

With such thoughts in mind, I set out to create a list of all

unique official GMAT Quant questions out there on GMAT Club.
I parsed through more than ten (or probably twenty) thousand
questions to create lists of unique questions. Initially, I created
this list for my private tutoring students. However, I realized the
tremendous value addition I could do by sharing the lists
publicly. So, here I am, sharing the lists of these unique
questions.

I hope you like the effort! If you do, please feel free to drop a
comment. Also, freely share this resource with others who are
also preparing for GMAT.
1. Official Guides Questions – List of 1829 Questions that
have appeared in various Official Guides so far.

2. GMAT Prep Questions – List of 1574 Questions that have

appeared in GMAT Prep Question Bank and Exams 1 & 2
and in GMAT Paper Tests. Use this list only if you have
already taken GMAT Prep Exams 1 & 2 and do not plan to
retake them.

3. Exam Pack Questions – List of 297 Questions that have

appeared in Exam Packs 1 and 2 (Official Mocks 3, 4, 5,
and 6). Use this list only if you have already taken all the
mocks in Exam Packs 1 & 2 and do not plan to retake
them.
 Mega-compilation of 4000 Unique Official GMAT
Verbal Questions

The value of the official questions of the GMAT Verbal section

cannot be overestimated. While a plethora of non-official
questions is available from various test prep companies, there
is a near-unanimity among experts and students that no non-
official resource comes close to the official questions in terms
of quality and reliability. Thus, no student would want to miss
on any official question that is available in the market. However,
the task of finding all the official questions is not easy.

While one can find lists of official questions in various official

guides on GMAT Club, there is significant overlap among the
lists. Thus, the student has to go through multitudes of
repetitive questions to find any new questions a list might
contain.
What if one could collate the list of all unique questions that
have appeared in various editions of Official Guides so far?
Wouldn’t such a list add tremendous value to students’ lives?

With such thoughts in mind, I set out to create a list of all

unique official GMAT Verbal questions out there on GMAT Club.
I parsed through more than ten (or probably twenty) thousand
questions to create lists of unique CR, SC, and RC questions.
Initially, I created this list for my private tutoring students.
However, I realized the tremendous value addition I could do by
sharing the lists publicly. So, here I am, sharing the lists of
unique CR, SC, and RC questions.

I hope you like the effort! If you do, please feel free to drop a
comment. Also, freely share this resource with others who are
also preparing for GMAT.

Critical Reasoning:

1. Official Guides Questions – List of 560 Questions that

have appeared in various Official Guides so far.
2. GMAT Prep Questions – List of 481 Questions that have
appeared in GMAT Prep Question Bank and Exams 1 & 2
and in GMAT Paper Tests. Use this list only if you have
already taken GMAT Prep Exams 1 & 2 and do not plan to
retake them.
3. Exam Pack Questions – List of 78 Questions that have
appeared in Exam Packs 1 and 2 (Official Mocks 3, 4, 5,
and 6). Use this list only if you have already taken all the
mocks in Exam Packs 1 & 2 and do not plan to retake
them.

Sentence Correction:
 1. Official Guides Questions – List of 584 Questions that
have appeared in various Official Guides so far.
2. GMAT Prep Questions – List of 787 Questions that have
appeared in GMAT Prep Question Bank and Exams 1 & 2
and in GMAT Paper Tests. Use this list only if you have
already taken GMAT Prep Exams 1 & 2 and do not plan to
retake them.
3. Exam Pack Questions – List of 121 Questions that have
appeared in Exam Packs 1 and 2 (Official Mocks 3, 4, 5,
and 6). Use this list only if you have already taken all the
mocks in Exam Packs 1 & 2 and do not plan to retake
them.

Reading Comprehension:

1. Official Guides Questions – List of 773 Questions that

have appeared in various Official Guides so far.
2. GMAT Prep Questions – List of 634 Questions that have
appeared in GMAT Prep Question Bank and Exams 1 & 2
and in GMAT Paper Tests. Use this list only if you have
already taken GMAT Prep Exams 1 & 2 and do not plan to
retake them.
3. Exam Pack Questions – List of 88 Questions that have
appeared in Exam Packs 1 and 2 (Official Mocks 3, 4, 5,
and 6). Use this list only if you have already taken all the
mocks in Exam Packs 1 & 2 and do not plan to retake
them.