1) The publication of Joyce‘s Ulysses was blocked on grounds of obscenity by the courts in the United States, but he published it in Paris in which there were less restricted novel contents.

1. he published it in Paris in which there were less restricted novel contents
2. he published the novel in Paris which had less restricted novel contents
3. Joyce published it in Paris where the content of novels was less restricted
4. Joyce published it in Paris where there were less restrictions for the contents of novels
5. Joyce published this novel in Paris in which there were less restrictions for the contents of such novels

2) The vice-president of engineering argued that the biggest advantage of the proposed alloy for the designs of the new fuselage would lay in not its unusually light weight but in its superior resistance to the corrosive influence of the elements.

1. would lay in not its
2. would lie not in its
3. will lie in not their
4. will lay not in its
5. would lay in not their

3) Deaths by drowning at the state beach have increased by 35% this year, due not to having less lifeguards but to dramatic changes in ocean currents.

1. due not to having less lifeguards but to
2. due not to having fewer lifeguards but
3. because of not having less lifeguards but
4. because it had not less lifeguards but
5. not because it had fewer lifeguards but because it saw

Full explanations to these will follow this article.

Diction

One of the topics the GMAT tests on Sentence Correction is Diction.  What is Diction? Diction concerns the proper use of individual words.  Whereas idioms primarily concern combinations of words (e.g. what verb goes with what preposition), diction concerns the specific usage of individual words.  You see, some words in the English language are badly abused in ordinary colloquial conversation.  The great arch-purist T.S. Eliot complained that words “decay with imprecision.”

For example, the word “nice” represents a diction battle that the purists lost and that the ignorant masses won.  Originally, the word “nice” meant “exacting in standards or requirements” or “characterized by, or demanding, a high degree of precision.”  Almost a century ago, if a scientific paper was described as having “nice measurements”, that was high technical praise for the rigorous quality and precision of the measurements.  Somehow, the very untechnical, unrigorous masses retain the connotation of praise, but reduce the word to its current meaning — a weak, bland, casual expression of vague agreeability and approval.  From a purist’s point of view, this is a dead word, a word that has died a terribly distasteful death.  In a quixotic gesture, some dictionaries will still list the former definition of “nice”, but in practice, no one uses the word that way anymore.  You will not see “nice” on the GMAT.

This is a battle that the purists have lost.  Other battles are much more current, and pit the wide usage in formal language against the wide usage in casual language and in the popular media.  These are the Diction issues you will see on the GMAT.  Some of these include

= less vs. fewer

= lie vs. lay

= due to vs. because vs. because of

= listing examples: “like” vs. “such as”

One can see a Diction mistake involving the first split at almost supermarket in the United States — inevitably, some express lane will have a benighted sign such as “10 items or less.”  The battle continues.

Check out those links if the precise usage of those words in not crystal clear to you.

Summary

If this article, or the linked articles, gave you any “aha” into the questions at the top, then take another look at those questions before reading this article.   If you have any questions about this topic, please let us know in the comment section.

Practice questions explanations

1) Split #1a: pronoun agreement.  Who is the “he” in the underlined section?  Presumably, James Joyce.  The problem is: Joyce’s name appears only in the possessive, which cannot be a proper antecedent for a pronoun.  If we want to discuss James Joyce in the underlined section, we need to mention him again by name.  (A) & (B) make this agreement error and must be incorrect.

Split #1b: pronoun agreement.  Unlike the pronoun “he”, the pronoun “it” has a very clear antecedent: the book Ulysses.  We could say “the novel”, or we could just use the pronoun.  Either is correct.

Split #2: “in which” vs. “where”.  Paris is a physical location, so we can use either “in which” or “where” to modify it.  This is a false split.  Either is correct.

Split #3: the combination of words “less restricted novel contents” is very awkward — a clump of words like this would not be correct on the GMAT.   This provides another reason why (A) & (B) are unacceptable.

Split #4: “less” vs. “fewer”.  Choices (D) & (E) talk about “restrictions”, which are countable.  For a countable plural, we would need to say “fewer restrictions”, not “less restrictions.”  Choices (D) & (E) use the latter, so both are incorrect.   Also, (E) seems to be competing in a contest for most awkwardly long & wordy — it is a turgid trainwreck, completely unacceptable.

For all these reasons, the only possible answer is (C).

2) Split #1: “would” vs. “will”.  The word “will” denotes the unambiguous factual future: “X will happen.”  The word “would” indicates the subjunctive, which signals a tentative prediction or hypothetical assertion: “X would happen.”  Which is correct here?  Well, the new alloy is “proposed”, so it may be tentative, or perhaps the proposal was fully approved already and the use of the alloy is not in doubt.  We don’t have enough information to decide between these two.  We cannot eliminate answer choices based on this split.

Split #2: lie vs. lay.  We are talking about the where the biggest advantage “is located” — the verb that means “to be located” is “to lie.”  The word “to lay” is absolutely incorrect in this context, so choices (A) & (D) & (E) are all incorrect.

Split #3: the common word in parallelism.  We are using the parallel structure not P but Q.  Both P & Q are prepositional phrases in parallel, phrases following the preposition “in”.  Here, we need to follow the “once outside or twice inside” rule.   We could either have the preposition “in” appear once, outside the parallel structure, applying equally to both terms — in not P but Q — or it could appear inside the parallel structure twice, once in front of each term — not in P but in Q.  Notice that the second part, after the underlined section, has the preposition: “in its superior resistance …”  Therefore, “once outside” is not an option here: we must go with the “twice inside” plan.  This means, in the underlined section, the word “in” must follow the word “not” — only (B) & (D) get this correct, and the others must be incorrect because they have the wrong order.

Split #4: pronoun.  What has the “unusually light weight”?  Either the alloy, the physical material, or the fuselage, the physical product — both are singular.  The only plural noun is “designs” — designs are ideas, so they don’t have physical weight.  The pronoun at the end of the underlined section must be the singular “its”, not the plural “their.” Choices (C) & (E) make this mistake and are incorrect.

For all these reasons, the only possible answer is (B).

3) Split #1: less vs. fewer.  Lifeguards are eminently countable.  You can only have a positive integer number of functioning lifeguards on any beach.   For countable nouns, we need to use “fewer”, not “less”.  The phrase “fewer lifeguards” is correct, “less lifeguards” is completely wrong: choices (A) & (C) & (D) make this mistake.

Split #2: problems with due to. The word “due” is an adjective, and as such, it can only modify a noun, most typically the noun it touches.  First of all, it clearly doesn’t modify “year”, the noun it touches.  More to the point, what the sentence is trying to do is identify the cause for an entire action, so we need adverbial phrase or clause to modify the entire independent clause.   The word “due” can’t do that, and (A) & (B) make this Diction mistake.

Split #3: logical problem.  The original sentence implies — yes, there were fewer lifeguards, but that’s not what caused the increase in drownings: rather, it was the dramatic change in ocean currents.   Choices (C) & (D) change the meaning, suggesting that there were not fewer lifeguards. This implies a scenario factually different from the one given in the prompt, so these are incorrect.

For all these reasons, the only possible answer is (E).

1) The spokeswoman for the national laboratory announced that, while the lab had been operating at a loss in the 1990s, it had become profitable in 2006, and would continue to yield high profits at least until 2025.

(A) had been operating at a loss in the 1990s, it had become profitable in 2006, and would continue

(B) had been operating at a loss in the 1990s, it became profitable in 2006, and would continue

(C) had been operating at a loss in the 1990s, it became profitable in 2006, continuing

(D) operated at a loss in the 1990s, it became profitable in 2006, and would continue

(E) operated at a loss in the 1990s, becoming profitable in 2006, and continuing

2) When the reporter asked about the status of the budget, the governor said that, at that very moment, his team is fashioning a compromise and will deliver it to the senate offices by later that afternoon.

(A) is fashioning a compromise and will deliver

(B) fashions a compromise and will deliver

(C) was fashioning a compromise and would deliver

(D) had been fashioning a compromise and would deliver

(E) has fashioned a compromise and will deliver

3) The people of the ancient Near East believed that the Earth’s dry land first appeared when the Creator separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there is another ocean in the sky, above the firmament.

(A) appeared when the Creator separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there is

(B) appeared when the Creator had separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there is

(C) appeared when the Creator separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there is

(D) had appeared when the Creator had separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there was

(E) appeared when the Creator had separated the “water above” from the “water below”, and that there was

Solutions will follow this article.

A review of tenses

Verbs have simple tenses (ordinary past, present, and future) as well as perfect tenses, progressive tenses, and even progressive perfect tenses.  Here’s a brief list of examples for the verb “to go” (an irregular verb), with both singular and plural forms.

Simple past: he went, they went

Simple present: she goes, they go

Simple future: he will go, they will go

Past perfect: she had gone, they had gone

Present perfect: he has gone, they have gone

Future perfect: she will have gone, they will have gone

Past progressive: he was going, they were going

Present progressive: she is going, they are going

Future progressive: he will be going, they will be going

Past perfect progressive: she had been going, they had been going

Present perfect progressive: he has been going, they have been going

Future perfect progressive: she will have been going, they will have been going

Obviously, those last three tenses are somewhat rare, but in the right context, they could show up on the GMAT.

Sequence of tenses

Suppose we have a sentence, a statement of fact, which has past & present & future in it.  For example,

P did X, does Y, and will do Z. 

Now, suppose that, whatever these facts are, they are important enough for someone else to announce them, or tell them, or think them, or believe them.  In fact, we might use any of the idioms of thinking and knowing or any of the [verb] + “that”-clause idioms here.

Someone else announced that P ____ X, _____Y, and _____ Z. 

This is called indirect speech.  The big question is: what tenses do we use when we change from a description of the events themselves to a spoken or thought “that”-clause in the past about the events?  In other words, what’s the right tense within indirect speech?  This subject is the sequence of tenses, and the rules are relatively simple.   What we sorta do is back everything up to a previous-time tense

a. the present tense real event becomes past: (does Y) becomes (did Y)

b. the past tense real event becomes past perfect: (did X) becomes (had done X)

c. the future tense real event — this is a tricky one.  You may thing future goes back to present or to future perfect, but neither of those are correct.  We actually use the subjunctive for a hypothetical future: (will do Z) becomes (would do Z).

d. anything progressive would stay progressive, following the above rules; for example, (was doing omega) becomes (had been doing omega)

Thus, our indirect speech sentence above would be

Someone else announced that P had done X, did Y, and would do Z. 

Summary

If you had any insights or realizations reading this, you may want to give the practice questions above a second look before reading the solutions.  If you have any further questions, please let us know in the comments section at the bottom.

1) The first verb, to operate, refers to a past event (in the 1990s), so that should be past perfect in indirect speech.  This is correct in (A) – (C).  The second verb, to become profitable, is also in the past (2006), so this also should be past perfect in indirect speech: only (A) has this correct. The final event, to continue to yield, refers to the future, so this should be the hypothetical future, “would continue to yield“, which (A) & (B) & (D) have correct.  All three verbs should remain in parallel: it is not correct to change some to participles, as (C) & (E) do.

The only possible answer is (A).

2) The first verb, to fashion, was a present-time action for the governor, and because the governor emphasized “at [this] moment”, we know it must be in the progressive.  The governor would have said “is fashioning” when we spoke, so in indirect speech, this becomes “was fashioning”. Only (C) has this correct.

The second verb, to deliver, was a future-time action for the governor, and he would have said, “will deliver”.  In indirect speech, this becomes “would deliver”.  Both (C) & (D) have this correct.

The only possible answer is (C).

3) Here, we have an interesting variant on indirect speech, a “that”-clause about belief.  Both of the first two verbs, to appear and to separate, refer to actions that occurred at the Creation of the World, presumably a past event for anyone speaking about it.   In indirect speech, these both should be in the past perfect, “had appeared” and “had separated“.  Only (D) has both of these.

The last verb, a form of the verb to be, describes a current condition of the world (at least in this ancient worldview), so this would have been a present tense verb to anyone speaking about it, and in indirect speech, present becomes past, so this should be “there was”, which is correct in both (D) & (E).

The only possible answer is (D).

What Business Schools Want to See in Your Application

There is no standardized process to evaluate business school applications. Each of the top 10 business schools has its own methodology to understand an individual applicant. Nevertheless, there are certain personality traits and academic achievements that all business schools look for in prospective students.

A Habit of Leadership

The purpose of an MBA program is to groom graduates to become business leaders and innovators. Schools want to see a habit of leadership in applicants’ personal and professional lives. This can mean leading a team on an important project in the office, initiating a community program to provide education to underprivileged children, or even a personal accomplishment, such as learning a new language or musical instrument. Essentially, it all boils down to being hands-on, initiating action, and demonstrating leadership credentials throughout your career.

Ambition

Top business schools want their graduates to be agents of change. They want them to dream (and plan) big, shoot for the stars, and make their proverbial dent in the Universe. Aiming for a steady career as a mid-level executive at a Wall Street bank isn’t good enough; you have to try to change the world and create something spectacular in the process. Of course, ambition needs to be tempered with reality, so be prepared to be grilled heavily on any world-changing plans that you might have! Not to worry though, as the feedback and criticism you receive will help you grow and succeed.

Consistent Academic Performances

Whatever everyone else might say, your academics still play a crucial role in your application. Top B-schools want to see consistently good performances, not flashes of intermittent brilliance. As a business school graduate, you will be expected to fit into an existing corporate system where steadfastness is more valued than meteoric genius. Consistent academic performances tell the admission committee not only that you have the intellectual capability to handle difficult coursework, but can also work hard to do justice to your intellectual talents.

A Compelling Story

Make no mistake about it: your MBA application is a story. And just like any good story, it too must have its share of drama and intrigue. Granted, plenty of plain vanilla applicants get through each year, but admission committees also favor candidates from off the beaten track who have more compelling stories to tell. Consider each aspect of your application – the academic credentials, GMAT score, work history, references, etc. – as narrative elements that can help you craft a story. It’s your responsibility to arrange these individual arrangements in a manner that highlights your unique personal and professional story.

A Good Fit

“Fit” is a rather ambiguous word that is bandied about aplenty in MBA applications. But what does “fit” really mean?
Essentially, fit is the aggregation of a school’s culture and identity built up over years of expertise and focus on certain characteristics and management pursuits. Some schools are focus on operations, while others emphasize entrepreneurship. Some attract investment bankers, some become the camping ground for ex-journalists and writers. Some are quant focused, others are more conceptual in their approach. Seeing whether is an applicant fits into the school’s culture, therefore, is a crucial part of the application vetting process. A wrong fit, after all, can affect the school as much as it affects the student.

An MBA application is more than the sum of its many parts. It is essentially a brief biography of your life, one that you get to write yourself. Admissions committees don’t merely look for a catalog of personality traits and academic requirements; they consider your application as a whole to see whether you represent as good an investment for the school, as the school does for you.

Let’s have a look at a simple example:

. What is the value of ?

(A) 2
(B) 3
(C) 5
(D) 6
(E) 9

Explanation

To approach strange symbols think of the Q’ as a recipe. To the right of the equals sign are the steps (or the recipe) you have to follow.

Another way of looking at it, whatever we see in place of Q’ we want to plug it into the ‘Q’ in . Therefore . Because the question has two apostrophe signs, we want to repeat this procedure to get, . Answer (D).

This is a basic problem, one that if you saw it on the GMAT, would not bode well. So let’s try a problem that will make you sweat a little more.

. What the value of p in ?
(A) -5
(B) 9
(C) 13
(D) 25
(E) 625

Explanation

Be careful not to fall the trap that switches the order of b and a. Our equation should read: . Solving for p:

.

Answer (E).

For those who are looking to score a Q51, here are two brutally difficult questions. If you think you know the answer, go ahead and post it below with an explanation.

Brutal Question #1

. How many unique sums of x and y result, if x@y is an integer less than 15?

(A) 9
(B) 10
(C) 21
(D) 27
(E) 30

Brutal Question #2

[[x]] is equal to the lesser of the two integer values closest to non-integer x. What is the absolute value of ?

(A)

(B)

(C)

(D)

(E)

1) Next October, the commission’s delegation will visit the Prince of Westphalia, contributing the largest amounts to the commission over each of the last seven years.

1. contributing
2. having contributed
3. who contributed
4. who has contributed
5. who had contributed

2) The Federal investigators at Stapleton Industries have failed to find any evidence that has suggested that the unusually large contributions to its accounts are derived from government kickbacks, nor its officers guilty of improper relations with industry regulators.

1. that has suggested that the unusually large contributions to its accounts are derived from government kickbacks, nor its officers guilty
2. that suggests that the unusually large contributions to its accounts are derived from government kickbacks, or its officers guilty
3. suggesting that the unusually large contributions to its accounts had been derived from government kickbacks, with its officers guilty
4. to suggest that the unusually large contributions to its accounts are derived from government kickbacks or that its officers are guilty
5. to suggest that the unusually large contributions to its accounts had been derived from government kickbacks, nor were its officers guilty

3) Since the beginning of the year, the community medical clinic verified rigorously the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients are vulnerable to the flu.

1. verified rigorously the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients are
2. rigorously verified the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients would be
3. is rigorously verifying the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients not be
4. rigorously has verified the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients are
5. has verified rigorously the potency of each flu vaccine sample, lest any of its patients be

4) Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony, which is known as the “Leningrad” Symphony, was composed at the outset of World War Two, made the composer a hero to the Soviet people who embraced the work as a symbol of heroic resistance to Nazism.

1. which is known as the “Leningrad” Symphony, was composed at the outset of World War Two, made
2. known as the “Leningrad” Symphony, composed at the outset of World War Two, and made
3. which is known as the “Leningrad” Symphony, was composed at the outset of World War Two and made
4. known as the “Leningrad” Symphony and was composed at the outset of World War Two, and made
5. known as the “Leningrad” Symphony, which was composed at the outset of World War Two, and made

5) Modern planetary science has a detailed understanding of the conditions necessary for a planet to develop life, but scientists are still unable to determine whether a given specific planet meeting all these conditions does develop life.

1. does develop
2. is developing
3. might have developed
4. has developed
5. could be developing

Verbs

Verbs are the mainspring of a sentence.  Every sentence needs a full bonafide verb at its core.   Full verbs have several qualities, and verbs also take forms that retain some of the verb-like qualities.  The four major qualities of any verb are mood, voice, tense, and number.

Verb moods

There are three verb moods in English.  The first, the indicative, accounts for more than 95% of all verbs used on the GMAT.   The indicative is used for stating ordinary facts.  Every sentence in this paragraph and in the previous paragraph are in the indicative.

The second, the imperative, is used for commands and exhortations.  “Stop!” “Enjoy yourself.” “Buy our product.”  The imperative appears frequent in road signs and in advertising, but it almost never appears on the GMAT Sentence Correction.

The final, the subjunctive, is used for hypothetical situation and doubtful possibilities.  The subjunctive is wildly misused or ignored in colloquial speech, so the GMAT likes to test it from time to time.

Everything else that follows is about verbs in the indicative.

Verb tenses

Verb tenses indicate the time of the action.   Most folks understand the simple tenses (past, present, future), but folks sometimes find more challenging the rules concerning the perfect tenses and the progressive tenses.

Verb voice

The two verb voices are active and passive.   As the former blog explains, active language is a priority on the GMAT, so often the active voice is preferable to the passive voice, but the latter blog indicates some instances in which the passive voice would be acceptable on the GMAT.

Verb number

Verb number is the distinction of whether a verb is “singular” or “plural”, and understanding this is crucial for subject-verb agreement.   This distinction only exists in the “third person” — in the “first person” (“I” vs. “we”) and in the “second person” (“you” (sing.) vs. “you” (pl.)), all verbs other than forms of “to be” are identical, but in the third person (“he/she/it” vs. “they”), the form may be different.  The distinction only exists in the simple present tense or in tenses in which the auxiliary verb has different singular/plural forms.

Verb forms

All of the foregoing talks about quality of full verbs.  Every sentence needs at least one full verb.  Verbs also have other forms that can’t take the place of the main verb of a sentence, but which can have many of the other properties of verbs — they can have direct objects as well as adverbs & adverbial phrases.   The three most important verb forms are:

a. infinitives

b. participles

c. gerunds

When any of these is followed by direct object or an adverbial phrase, the whole thing becomes a phrase: an infinitive phrase, a participial phrase, or a gerund phrase.  None of these, no matter how long and complex, can take the place of a bonafide full verb.

Summary

Many of those links might answer some questions you have on this topic.  If you have had any realizations while reading this, give another look at the practice questions above before you read the solutions.   If you would like to add anything or ask a question, please let us know in the comments section.

Practice question solutions

1) The action in question, making contributions, has happened in the past (over the past seven years) and continues to the present moment.  This is best described by the present perfect tense.  Only (D) uses the present perfect tense correctly.

The present participle in (A) is wrong.  The simple past tense in (C) and the past perfect tense in (E), as well as the participle in (B), all imply a past action that is over and completed, which is not the case here.

2) Split #1: “are derived” vs. “had been derived”.  The present tense “are derived” is correct.  The past perfect “had been derived” would only be used to contrast with another past tense verb, which isn’t the case here.   (C) & (E) are wrong.

Split #2: parallelism.  The first “that” clause properly has a full verb, so the second part must also be a “that” clause with a full verb.  (A) & (B) & (C) all have an absolute phrase, [noun] + [adjective], in the second half.

Split #3: double negative.  The verb “fail” in the main clause has a negative meaning.  The “nor” in (E) is therefore a double negative that changes the meaning of the sentence.

For all these reasons, (D) is the only possible answer.

3) Split #1a: [adverb] + [verb].  Throughout the answer choices, the adverb “rigorously” appears both before and after the verb.  Which is correct?  Either is.  This is a false split.  They look different, but both orders are perfectly fine.

Split #1b: In (C), the adverb splits the auxiliary verb from the main verb: some writers consider this inappropriate, and it certainly is not common on the GMAT, but (C) is not automatically wrong for this reason.

Split #2: tense.  This action, the verifying, has been taking place since the beginning of the year.  We need to emphasize that it has been done and that it continues through the present time.  For this, we need the present perfect, “has verified”. Only (D) and (E) have this correct.

Split #3: the “lest” clause.  A “lest” clause demands the subjunctive.   Choices (A) & (C) use the ordinary indicative after “lest”, so they are wrong.   The word “lest” implies a negative, so (C) has a double negative that changes the meaning of the sentence.   Choice (B) has a curious hypothetical phrasing, “would be vulnerable to the flu”: this is not appropriate to this context.   Only choice (E) has the correct “lest” clause.

For all these reasons, (E) is the only possible answer.

4) Choice (A) divides two parallel verbs simply with a comma, and no conjunction “was composed …, made”.  This is incorrect.

Choice (B) puts two participles (“known … composed”) in parallel with a full verb (“made”).  This is incorrect.

Choice (C) follows the modifier with two main verbs in parallel.  No mistakes here.

Choice (D) has a participle (“known”) in parallel with main verbs.  This is incorrect.

Choice (E) has a participial phrase joined by “and” to a main verb.  This is incorrect.

(C) is the only possible answer.

5) Split #1: both progressive verbs are entirely inappropriate.  We don’t need to know whether life on some other planet is in the process of developing at this exact instant.  That’s not the concern of the sentence.  Both (B) & (E) are wrong.

Split #2: according to the scientists, the conditions themselves already guarantee that live “could develop”.  If a planet meets these conditions, there’s nothing hypothetical in question — we know life “could develop.”  We want to know whether life actually has developed.   Both hypothetical answers, (C) & (E), are wrong.

Split #3: The development of life is not necessarily in the present moment, so the present tense in (A) is incorrect.  This development could have happened in the past, up to and including the present: for this, we need the present perfect tense. Only (D) has this.

(D) is the only possible answer.

The good news is what really matters to admissions committees is where you stand in the field, that is your percentile ranks. That just means how you stack up against other test takers, which is pretty useful for admissions committees. GMAC produces this information on GMAT score percentiles, and for your convenience, I’ve reproduced it below.

Total Score Percentiles

Raw Score Percentiles

AWA and Integrated Reasoning Percentiles

There you have it! Of course, you’ll have to do research on your program to make your own determinations about what is a good GMAT score.

Applicants who have worked in a family business sometimes worry that their professional profile won’t measure up when compared with other MBA hopefuls with more traditional employment paths. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Every year, top schools accept students who will go back to work for the family business. In fact, 9 percent of the applicants accepted into the Harvard Business School class of 2014 had worked for, or planned to work for, their family-owned company.

Business schools strive to compose a cohort of diverse personalities and backgrounds to guarantee lively discussions, so depending on your role in the company and the type of business itself, your experiences would likely add a unique perspective to the class.

Family business management has emerged as an important discipline at business schools as second- and third-generation family members realize the need for specialized skills in order to take over the reins and create a more corporate work environment. Over the past decade, schools have introduced courses and clubs on family business, founded centers dedicated to the subject or launched concentrations in this area.

Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management has a Center for Family Enterprises. Columbia Business School, stating that 80 percent of businesses worldwide are classified as family businesses, offered a course this spring on Family Business Management. And students and alumni of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School can participate in the Wharton Family Business Club.

Part of your school selection research should focus on what types of resources and support for family businesses are offered by your target programs. For many applicants, a one-year MBA program is ideal since you won’t need the internship and recruiting opportunities that job-switching students in two-year programs rely on.

I advise applying to the best schools that you think you can get into because they will offer a great education as well as the best networking opportunities. Also, think about whether the school’s geographic location will help you build a network which would directly help your family business.
If the school offers a student club focused on this group, reaching out to current members for their insight on the program’s benefits might prove invaluable in your decision-making process.

As with any winning application, the strategy in this case is to show in detail how an MBA degree will help you further your professional goals. Explain with specifics what you need to learn in order to grow the family business.
Paint a clear picture of your vision for the company’s future, and leave no doubt as to how an MBA will help you make an impact on the business after graduation. That way, the admissions committee understands why business school is the logical next step.

For your essays, start brainstorming some of the challenges your business has faced, and come up with examples that show how you as a family worked to overcome those obstacles. Business schools place a high value on teamwork, and what better way to show commitment and follow-through than by demonstrating you know how to work well with others to achieve a common goal?

As many applicants know, the ideal recommender for an MBA application is the manager to whom you report directly. However, if your immediate supervisors are relatives, you’ll need to get creative since you cannot have a family member write your recommendation letter.

Can you approach a supervisor or manager from a company you’ve previously worked for? Or have you worked closely with any clients or vendors that can speak to your managerial or leadership abilities?

Our client Bill had been working for the family business, a manufacturing company in Baltimore, for three years after college.

After brainstorming for recommenders he could approach outside the business, Bill hit upon a retail vendor that had been supplied by his company for more than a decade with whom he’d built a strong relationship. Since this vendor was evaluating Bill on many similar criteria as a direct supervisor and was an objective, outside source, he turned out to be the perfect choice.

In the end, Bill’s family business-based application fared well next to candidates coming from a corporate background. He was ultimately admitted to Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business and University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, and chose Darden to be a little closer to home.

Alberto Gimeno, director of Esade Business School‘s International Family Business Lab, recently noted in the Financial Times that “Concepts such as honesty, pride, loyalty and long-term commitment … are everyday practices of successful family businesses around the world.”

If you’re planning on pursuing an MBA to learn how to take your family business to the next level, take pride in your professional circumstances and know that business schools will value your accomplishments and responsibilities, whether acquired at a Fortune 500 company or under Mom and Dad’s tutelage.

1) Colfax Beta-80 is a rare genetic defect found primarily in people of Scandinavian descent.  Over 97% of known carriers of this defect have are citizens of, or are direct descendants of immigrants from, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.  People who carry the Colfax Beta-80 defect are at substantially higher risk for contracting Lupus and related autoimmune diseases.

Assuming the statements above are true, which of the following can be inferred from them?

1. People from Denmark are at a higher risk for Lupus than people of other, non-Scandinavian countries.
2. Genetic engineering that eradicated this genetic defect would constitute a de facto cure for Lupus.
3. Find a cure for Lupus would eliminate most of the health threats associated with the Colfax Beta-80 defect.
4. A person not of Scandinavian descent born with the Colfax Beta-80 defect is more likely to contract Lupus than is a Scandinavian who is born without this defect.
5. The majority of people who contract Lupus are either Scandinavian or of Scandinavian descent.

2) In social science research, “highest education level attained” would refer to the most advanced grade or degree achieved by an individual — for some individuals, it may be a grade in grade school, and for other individuals, it may be a Bachelor’s Degree, a Master’s Degree, or Ph.D. (which is considered the highest education level). A recent study has shown a strong correlation between highest education level attained and proficiency in chess.  Another result, studied at many points throughout the 20th century, shows a marked positive correlation between highest education level attained and income level.

Assuming the statements above are true, what conclusion can be drawn from them?

1. If one practices chess enough to raise one’s proficiency, one has a good chance of raising one’s income level.
2. It is possible that a person who has attained only a sixth grade level of education could earn more than a person who has a Ph. D.
3. If Jane has a Ph. D., and Chris has not finished his undergraduate degree, then Jane will usually beat Chris in chess.
4. The average salary for people who have completed three-year Master’s Programs is higher than the average salary of people who have completed two-year Master’s Programs.
5. An individual’s proficiency at chess rises consistently during that individual’s years of school, and levels off once that individual has finished her years of formal education.

Reasoning with populations

Folks who have not studied statistic tend to fall into some likely mistakes when thinking about issues involving correlation.  After all, correlation is a very sophisticated idea.  Most educated people have heard this word and have a vague idea (e.g. if A goes up, B goes up), but this vague popular understanding lends itself to some obvious misunderstandings that the GMAT loves to exploit.

Mistake #1: Correlation & Causality

Any veteran of Statistics as probably heard the mantra: Correlation does not imply causality.  This is tricky, because of course, the inverse is true: causality does, in fact, imply correlation.  If A reliably causes B, then whenever you find A, you will be likely to find B.  For example, smoking causes a large collection of undesirable conditions, including lung cancer, emphysema, and heart disease, and sure enough, it is highly correlated with each of these.

The catch, though, is that two things can be correlated and A does not cause B.  For example, A & B would be highly correlated if they were the common response to the same underlying cause: for example, beer sales and ice cream sales are highly correlated, not because folks like having beer a la mode, but because another cause, hot weather, drives both.   There are other more complicated relationships we will not explore here in which A & B would tend to show up together — that is, they would be correlated — but each would not be a relationship in which one is causing the other.

Another way to say this is: correlation is relatively easy to demonstrate.  All you need is broad sociological or epidemiological data, and you can show correlation. Anyone with a data set and statistical software can demonstrate correlation.  By contrast, demonstrating causality is often a major scientific achievement, sometimes worthy of a Nobel Prize.   To demonstrate that A causes B, one would need to show dozens and dozens of conditions are met, only the most elementary of which is that A is correlated with B.

In any question about correlation, the GMAT loves incorrect answers that blur the distinction between correlation and causality.

Mistake #2: The Problem of Scope

A correlation is something that exists across a whole population.  In the natural sciences, and especially in the physical sciences, one can get extremely tight correlations, such that all the data points line exclusively on a straight line.   In that case, the correlation is true not only at the population level, but also at the level of individual points — one point is higher in A, that point must be higher in B.

When the GMAT talks about correlation, mostly this will not be in the context of the natural sciences.  Instead, it will be in context of the social sciences.  Human populations are messy.   There’s always a ton of random fluctuation involved in anything you measure about people, and this makes the social science considerably less precise than the natural sciences.  A correlation in the social sciences is something that’s true in a population-wide view, but when the scope shifts to individual-to-individual comparisons, the statistical noise is too great to discern any reiable pattern.

For example, one well measured social science study demonstrated the correlation of income and height.   If one steps back and looks at the whole population, one can discern a mild relationship — on average, taller people are slightly more likely to have higher salaries than are shorter people.  At the level of whole populations, at the level of probabilities, this relationship holds.  Now, switch to the individual level.  It’s sheer nonsense to say that, if Alex is taller than Bert, than Alex must be richer than Bert.  It’s trivially easy to find single examples of poor tall people and rich short people.   The correlation is something that is true in the population-view, but at the level of individuals, it’s virtually meaningless, except as a very weak probability statement.   Folks not familiar with statistics forget this, and get almost “fundamentalist” in their interpretation of correlation, as if the fact that A is correlated with B means that in every single instance that A goes up, it absolutely must be true that B goes up.  The GMAT loves to prey on this kind of misconception.

Summary

If reading this post gave you any insights into the nature of correlation, you might give those questions at the top another look before reading the explanations below.  If you would like to share any insights or ask a question, let us know in the comment section at the bottom!

Solutions to the Practice Questions

1) The prompt tells us that Colfax Beta-80 is a genetic defect.  Most of the folks who have this defect are Scandinavian, but we don’t know what percent of Scandinavians have this defect.  It may be a substantial portion, but that’s unlikely because the defect is “rare.” Much more likely: there only be a couple hundred people in the whole world who have this defect, and 97% of this couple hundred are from Scandinavia —- a large percentage among those with the defect, but not a large percentage among the Scandinavian population as a whole.  A couple answer choices conflate these two percentages.

Anyone with this defect is at higher risk for Lupus and other autoimmune diseases.

(D) is the credited answer.   This more or less restates the information of the last sentence.  Anyone with this defect (Scandinavian or not) has a substantially higher risk of Lupus compared to anyone without the defect (Scandinavian or not).

(A) & (E) play on the misunderstanding about what the 97% implies.  Most folks with this genetic defect are Scandinavian, but that doesn’t imply that most Scandinavian people have this defect.   People with the defect are at higher risk for Lupus, but that doesn’t mean large sections of the Scandinavian population are at risk for Lupus.

(B) is wrong because, while we are told this genetic defect causes susceptibility to Lupus, we don’t know what other factors might cause or contribute to Lupus.  Just because we eliminate this one factor does not mean we would eliminate everything in the world that could possibly contribute to the onset of Lupus.

(C) is wrong because, while we are told this genetic defect causes Lupus, we are also told it causes other autoimmune diseases.  Even if we had a cure for Lupus, these other autoimmune diseases would still poses health threats to carriers of the defect.

2) This question presents two correlations, education level with chess, and education level with income.  We would do well to remember both errors mentioned above.

(B) is the credited answer.   In the population view, higher education level is correlated, on average, with higher income, but this doesn’t apply at the individual level.   Indeed, despite the overall population pattern, it would certainly be possible to find someone with a sixth-grade education who struck a fortune and therefore was richer than many people with Ph.D.’s.  It wouldn’t be likely, if we picked a random person with a sixth-grade education and a random Ph.D., but it would be possible.

(A) plays on the correlation-causality fallacy.  Chess is correlated with education level, but doesn’t “cause” education level.  Education level is correlated with income, but doesn’t singlehandedly “cause” income.  There is no reason to conclude what (A) says.

(C) plays on the fallacy of scope.  Yes, there’s a correlation in the overall population, but just because Jane has a Ph.D. and Chris doesn’t even have an B.A., we can’t automatically assume that Jane is better at chess.

(D) is tricky.  The “education level” variable implied the idea of “length of time being educated”, but that’s not explicitly part of the variable.  The question very clearly says one of the last three categories is “Master’s Degree”, so all master’s degree would fall into this category, irrespective of the duration of the program.

(E) also plays on the correlation-causality fallacy.  In general, folks who are more proficient at chess are more likely to pursue higher degrees, but it’s not that step-by-step in their year-by-year learning process, they are steadily learning more about chess.  In other words, the education does not strictly “cause” the proficiency in chess.

1) In the diagram above, what is the measure of angle y?

Statement #1: x = 30°

Statement #2: line AB is parallel to line CD

2) In the diagram above, line m and line n are parallel.  Given that angle a = 40° and angle c = 55°, what is the measure of angle b?

1. 85°
2. 90°
3. 95°
4. 100°
5. angle b cannot be determined from the information given

3) In the diagram above, angle measures in degrees are marked as shown, and segment BC is parallel to line AD.  What is the measure of angle E?

1. 30°
2. 35°
3. 40°
4. 45°
5. 50°

Solutions will come at the end of this article.

Basic Geometry on the GMAT

Some of the most fundamental geometry facts have to do with the special properties of parallel lines.   These facts include what angles are equal, and which angles have other mathematical relationships, if the lines are parallel.  The special properties of parallel lines are also directly connected to one of the most famous theorems in Geometry, the 180°-Triangle Theorem:

The sum of all three angles in any triangle equals 180°.

This is a fact true, not just for certain triangles, but for every possible triangle.   A more dramatic way to say this would be: God Himself would not be able to create a triangle in the plane the sum of whose angles is not 180°.

(Cool fact that is 110% irrelevant to the GMAT: in some alternate, non-Euclidean geometries, there are no parallel lines possible, and in these geometries, the 180°-Triangle Theorem does not hold.  Consider the surface of the Earth, which is approximately spherical.  Consider a triangle formed by three points: (1) the North Pole, (2) the intersection of the Prime Meridian and the Equator, and (3) the intersection of the 90° West meridian and the Equator.  That’s a triangle with three right angles!!)

Close but no cigar!

Important idea #1 in this context is: while there are a number of special geometry facts that are true for parallel lines, absolutely none of them are true for lines that are almost parallel.  Almost parallel is absolutely worthless in geometry.   This has an important implication for diagrams.  Unless otherwise specified, all diagrams on the GMAT Problem Solving are drawn as accurately as possible.  BUT, if two lines look parallel, you can’t assume they are parallel.  Two lines that look parallel could be half a degree off from being truly parallel — that difference would not be visually apparent, but none of the special parallel-line facts would be true if the two lines are not exactly parallel.  Your eyes can deceive you on this.  You have to see, printed in black & white: the lines are parallel.  Otherwise, you can’t assume anything.

If two lines are parallel

OK, if we are guaranteed that the lines are parallel, and another line intersects these parallel lines, what do we know?   This diagram summarizes everything you will need to know.

Notice that we could divide these eight angles into “big” angles (angles 1 & 4 & 5 & 8) and “small” angles (angles 2 & 3 & 6 & 7).  Here’s what’s true:

1. All the big angles are equal

2. All the small angles are equal

3. Any big angle plus any small angle equals 180°

There are all kinds of fancy geometry names these angles had back in high school geometry — for example, angles 3 and 6 are “alternate interior angles” (does that bring back pre-prom memories?)  —- but for the purpose of the GMAT, you don’t need to know any terms more technical than “big angles” and “small angles.”  Keep it simple.  J

Summary

It may that this refresher cleared up a few things for you.  If you found the three questions at the beginning of this article challenging, then take another look at them before reading the solutions below.  Here’s a slightly more challenging question along the same lines, for practice.

4) http://gmat.magoosh.com/questions/80

Practice question solutions

1) First of all, notice from the diagram: if the lines are parallel, then the two angles would be equal, x = y; but, if the lines are not parallel, we can conclude absolutely nothing about x & y.  Furthermore, a visual assessment is not enough — yes, the lines look parallel, but that’s not a guarantee that they are parallel, and without this guarantee, we can do nothing.

Statement #1: Here, we know angle x, but we don’t know whether the lines are parallel, so we can conclude nothing.  Alone & by itself, this statement is insufficient.

Statement #2: Now, we know the lines are parallel, but we don’t know the values of any variables.  Alone & by itself, this statement is insufficient.

Combined Statements: Now, we know the lines are parallel, and we know x = 30°, so this means y = 30°.  We now have definitive information that allows us to answer the prompt question.  Together, the statements are sufficient.

Answer = C

2) Imagine we constructed a new line, parallel to lines m & n, through the vertex of the “crook” between the lines.  This splits angle b into two smaller angles, b1 & b2.

Notice, by the parallel lines properties, b1 = a and b2 = c, so b = b1 + b2 = a + c.  This means b = 40° + 55° = 95°.  Answer = C

3) This is a very tricky one.  First of all, in triangle ABC, the sum of the three angles must be 180°.  We are given two angles, so we know the third angle, the angle at vertex C, must be 40°.  Now, because segment BC is parallel to line AD, we know this angle at C, 40°, must be equal to angle EAD.  Therefore, angle EAD = 40°.  Now, we know two of the three angles in triangle EAD, and we know their sum must be 180° also, so the angle at E must be 45°.  Answer = D

Economics: Supply and Demand

Economics: Labor and Wages

Economics: Inflation, unemployment, and interest rates

Law: “beyond any reasonable doubt”

Statistics: Statistical significance

Economics: Profit and Non-profits

Revenue, Costs, and Profit

This basic nexus of ideas could be relevant on Critical Reasoning, on Reading Comprehension, on any math problem, or even in Integrated Reasoning.  Moreover, if you are planning on going to business school, getting an MBA, and pursuing the life of a manager in corporate America, you absolutely have to know these basic Economic 101 terms.

1. Revenue — this is all the money that comes into any particular company.  For many companies, this would be composed primarily of money from sales. Other revenue sources might include investments of some kind.

2. Costs — this is tricky. The word “cost” in the singular means the price an individual or business must pay to obtain a good or service.   In the plural, the word has a very different connotation.   A business’ costs are all the expenses, all the outgoing money.  The words “expenses” and “expenditures” mean substantially the same thing.   Typically, a business’ costs would include payroll (i.e. wages of employees), insurance, taxes, possibly some investment in materials or resources, possibly rent on a space, and possibly R&D (research & development).

3. Profit — for any successful business, incoming money is more than outgoing money, and profit is the difference between these.  In other words:

Profit = Revenue – Costs

If this number, the profit, equals a negative number — that is, if the outgoing expenses are larger than the money the business is taking in, then that business is operating at a loss.   That’s not good.  Sometimes, it may be that a particular division of a company operates at a loss for a while, and the larger company, which is making a profit, chooses to support this unprofitable division for a time, perhaps allowing it to develop to the point of turning a profit on its own.  Sometimes, also, companies take strategic losses — for example, expensive investments that are likely to pay off big in the future.   Yes, that’s a gamble of a sort, but then again, everything in the business world is a kind of gamble!

Any company is an ongoing thing that changes and develops through time.  Typically, revenues and costs and profits are specified either for a year or for some other fixed time period (per quarter, per month, etc.)

Gross vs. per-item

This is a distinction that can be particularly tricky in a variety of problem.  A problem (RC, CR, math, or IR) might give some information in terms of gross revenue, gross costs, or gross profits — that is, the total dollar amount for that quantity across the whole company —- and revenue or cost or profit per item or per sale.     Many very predictable errors when students confuse gross quantities with per-item quantities.

For clarity, consider this real life example.  Suppose Company X has $30,000 in total costs each year, and makes $40,000 in total revenue each year, and thus clears $10,000 in profit each year.  Now, suppose, in a typical year, this company sells 200 items.  This means — the cost per item is 30000/200 = $150, the revenue per item (presumably the price of the item) is 40000/200 = $200, and the profit per item is $50.  So far, so good.

That was an extremely simple example.  For a typical company, some costs (perhaps rent and wages) are fixed at some gross level, and others (perhaps materials used) depend on the number of units produced.   Problem #2 in this post draws this distinction.

Notice, also, the “per item” quantities are fractions, and the value of a fraction changes either if the numerator changes or if the denominator changes.  Consider that same Company X — suppose in the next year, it makes $8,000 in profits, selling a total of 100 items.  Now, its profit per item is 8000/100 = $80.  Its profit per item went up, but its gross profit went down.   That’s bad.  A company always wants its gross profit to go up, even if profit per item declines.

Nonprofits

The purpose of a business, the fundamental reason any business exists, is to make money, to make a profit.   Other institutions, serving basic human needs, exist primarily to serve those needs, and making a profit is not nearly as important. An institution is called a nonprofit organization if it formally falls into this latter category.

Nonprofit organizations typically include most schools & educational institutions, most hospitals and health institutions, scientific research facilities, museums & symphony halls & many artistic venues, public broadcasting, churches & synagogues & religious institutions, and charitable organizations of all sorts.  Pretty much, any group that could ask you for a donation is a nonprofit.  Businesses don’t ask for donations: instead, they try to sell you something!  Some nonprofits, such as those serving the underprivileged, may run almost entirely on volunteers and thus have a budget of only a few hundred dollars a month, while others, such as large foundations or large laboratories or major universities, may control tens of billions of dollars.

Non-profits have very different tax code —- 501(c) status, a much more lenient tax-code — than for-profit businesses have: for example, nonprofits pay no income tax.  Sometimes an organization will try to claim nonprofit status for the tax benefits.  The IRS is particularly strict about which organizations qualify for the special benefits of nonprofit status: claiming nonprofit status involves a rigorous application process to the IRS, and several criteria must be met before the IRS will grant the benefits of nonprofit status to a particular organization.

For any non-profit, on average the profit will be zero, so on average, the gross revenue will equal the gross costs.

Summary

All this information is crucial important to understand, not only for a variety of GMAT questions, but also for your post-MBA life in general.  If you have any thoughts or any questions, please let us know in the comments section.