London Business School 2012 Waitlist

If you look at the past threads (waitlist 2010, 2011, etc), you'll see that it seems like a VERY small percentage of WL make it to admit (but also keep in mind that, the threads are only representative of those who actually post to gmatclub).

I think your best bet (and mine too) is to continue to update the adcom committee of any significant career developments while actively pursuing alternative options.

very true!!.

I am looking to apply in Wharton and Booth for R2, though not much time left before deadline.

When are you planning to update adcom..now or near the next review date?

Going to update them today or tomorrow.

I have an admit from Oxford and am waiting to hear from INSEAD (pls god dont let it be another WL). So I probably will not apply to more schools. Also, my focus is entrepreneurship, so I feel that i dont really need to invest 2 years at schools whose strength is getting students into top firms.

Wish you all the best for INSEAD..

Haha also WL for INSEAD.

I took a deep breath this morning and decided that life is good no matter what schools i did and did not get into (or in LIMBO for). I'll just need to have a long strategy discussion with a few friends to figure out my next move.

Vintron, I took your suggestion and also reached out to my interviewer to see if there were any glaring weakness areas that I did not see. Will report back if he responds.

I was talking to a INSEAD student this morning and he said that INSEAD manages waitlist better than LBS. Also generally stats are better for acceptance in INSEAD (70-80%). I hope you get confirmation soon.

I just noticed that 4 out of 6 people who mentioned waitlisted on LBS forum have entrepreneurship focus, including me!!. It was shocking for me..

It could be sheer bad luck that this yr lbs had way too many entrepreneurs applying. And the thing is, what makes a school have terrific ranking isnt the entrepreneur, its the consultant, the finance person at top firms with big salaries. (You see what im saying right?) Most of the rankings really showcase salaries before and after b school....

Posted from my mobile device

What im saying is, there prob is much fewer spots for entrepreneurs.

Posted from my mobile device

I am also waitlisted..I believe I have a strong profile but I was not at my best in the interview...I am sure i am waitlisted because of this..I had mentioned 'consulting' and 'entrepreneurship in long term' as my goal.....14th march is way too far:(

Interesting observation. Even I have entrepreneurship as my long term goal! Cant be a coincidence with so many ppl.
Hope the Round 2 pool doesn't have any entrepreneurs which might boost our chances.

Dude, you would think that successful entrepreneurs would have the most $$$$$! :D

I'm going to start an "entrepreneurs as marginalized minority class" thread soon.

Hahahaha! That's awesome! I'll join that thread too!

I got a reply from my interviewer. He said that he recommended me and was surprised with my result.

I completely agree with enkie that entrepreneurs are less preferred!!

Hello all,

I am a wait-listed applicant from last year... I was wait-listed in R1 and was kept until August this year (9 months almost!).

First thing.. don't lose hopes.. but be aware that it will be very tough. Among the member of gmatclub, I heard that only 2-3 people were admitted out of more than 30. I personally wrote to them and one told me that sent regularly updates on his profile and for him it worked. Another was just admitted after being wait-listed a week earlier, probably because somebody withdrew his application.

I personally sent an update quite late, in July after being promoted Manager in a Big4 firm and another one after receiving my final feedback but it did not change it. I believed that sending monthly update with no real improvements was a bad thing rather than a good thing (on the contrary I believe it was also not trustful because I hardly believe that all the good things such as promotions and so on happen always after the submission of the application). However I did not manage to be accepted, I was asked to send an update by beginning of September to have an early admission to next year MBA but decided not to do so because I wanted to do the MBA this year. And again, among the 15-20 people who sent an update, only 2-3 were admitted to next year class.

I also spoke with some LBS alumni while studying here in London and they told me that usually the interview has a smaller weight compared to the other pieces of the application. It happened to them to strongly recommend somebody who was ultimately not admitted and it also happened the contrary.

During the process I was also given the opportunity to apply for the MiF but they finally told me that my goals were more supported by an MBA than a MiF. This was quite clear so I did not understand why they propose me to apply for the MiF (I felt that anyway a MiF from LBS was very strong compared to a MBA somewhere else, given teh fact that I wanted to work in finance after the MBA). The point was that they had access to my MBA file so I needed to be consistent with what I had written in my first application when submitting the additional essay for the MiF. But this is not easy to do as the two programmes are very different.

I believe that LBS wait-list is very painful and very wrongly managed because some people stay in the WL so long and the first movement usually happen after R3, not before.

All what I have written is based on my personal experience (very frustrating - I completed a survey for LBS with my comments about the process) so don't consider this as the TRUTH, however as said at the beginning, not lose hopes!

Good luck
Matteo

Hi guys don't lose hope. I'm one of those lucky few that were admitted after being on the waitlist for nearly a year (for the following year's class). After going through that pain and then through the joy of studying and completing the MBA, I can categorically say that the pain is worth it. Feel free to look up old threads where I have posted my story and advise on what helped me get through.

Good luck.

happy new year guys!
just wanted to check if anyone had mailed adcom and received feedback or planned any school visits?

Having known bsdlover personally (very cool guy) and as a former waitlisted and rejected candidate at LBS let me throw in my 2 cents.

1. a good/bad interview is not the precursor to a waitlist. I was recommended by my interviewer, who was equally surprised to find out that I got waitlisted. My interview went well and I thought I was a strong candidate. I reached out to my interviewer for help but there is little he/she can do other than putting in a recommendation to adcom.

2. If the school has waitlisted you, it means there are better candidates or candidates with the right pedigree who will not have much trouble getting jobs. It does not reflect any shortcomings in your profile generally.

3. The LBS waitlist movement is very slow - glacial slow in fact. I would strongly recommend not to focus on trying to get yourself off the waitlist but to look at other schools. I made the mistake of applying last year only to LBS. I got waitlisted and then spent the next few months sending out regular updates to the school and trying to stregthen my profile. IMHO - it made more sense if i focused on R2 applications for other schools.

4. LBS's waitlist process is poorly managed. I met some rejected students who were kept on the waitlist even after classes started in 2011 after which they were rejected. LBS's approach to the waitlist procedure was not very professional.

Bsdlover's case is quite unique but wont apply to every candidate waitlisted. LBS is a top notch school and if I had the chance, I would give up an arm and a leg to go to this school. however being waitlisted in the LBS application sucks big time and it is very very difficult to get off the waitlist.