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Joined: 30 Nov 2009
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Location: Chicago, IL
Schools:Brown University, Harvard Business School
Notes from our Shanghai Seminar
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25 Jun 2011, 19:07
Greetings from sunny Beijing my friends.
Jon Frank here, your friendly neighborhood consultant. And the neighborhood to which Im referring, of course, is Chaoyang.
There was a great question in our Shanghai seminar yesterday--and I wanted to share it. So my co-founder Raj was presenting a point about how important it is to present your stories cleverly. With "craft." After all, that is Rajs background (screenwriting in Hollywood.)
So one girl asks a great question: which is more important, the facts of your story, or how you tell it? Here is how we responded...
The facts, of course, are more important. That is, without the facts--the cool stuff that youve actually DONE in your career, you are dead in the water. It doesnt matter how great you are at writing--this isnt a writing contest of course. You NEED the facts to make your essays, stories, and work experience sing.
But here's the problem; everyone's got those kinds of stories. Or at least, everyone gunning for the BEST schools in the world has em. THAT is where the writing comes into play. The craft comes into play. Everyone has the great stories, so at THAT point (and not before) THAT is the part where you can make your stories, and your application stand out.
The facts--the experiences themselves are the first part of the equation. The part that you cant LIVE without. Then and only then, do we shift into the craft section of the application prep.
Hope this helps folks, and more from China shortly.