Harvard (HBS) Calling all applicants - Class of 2016

@Keima: I was blinded by the green on your profile!!

congratulations.

How similar is this open essay compared with Stanford one?

Not at all similar. The schools are totally different places and they use the essays in different ways. What's often appropriate for a Stanford essay would not be advisable at all for HBS. It will be very obvious if you try to reuse a Stanford essay for Harvard (or any other school's essay for Harvard, actually). You need to be approaching them differently.

EssaySnark

But if we want to add depth and color to the HBS application, shouldn't we touch on the personal side of things? And if so, isn't that similar to stanford? What do you suggest we should focus in the HBS essay?

As we just stated, these schools look for different things in their applicants. Stanford Essay 1 is a personal essay. Harvard has never wanted personal content in their essays. At risk of repeating ourselves, these are different requirements and a different approach is needed for both.

We have a full Harvard essay guide if you are interested.

EssaySnark

Hi There,

Quickly wanted to introduce myself.

South Asian / Female/ 26/ 4 years with the United Nations/ Previous Masters from Harvard / 710 GMAT

Just got done with my Essay. Mine is 700 words. Wondering if this is too long?

Hey butterfingers123, welcome to GMAT Club - sounds like a very interesting profile!

700 words is DEFINITELY not too long - you're right in range of what we recommend.

Good luck with HBS!!
EssaySnark

Interesting background! Waiting for you at HBS!

Hi Keima,

Thanks for the vote of confidence! I'm really quite nervous. Congratulations on all your acceptances . Wow!

Hello,

Thank you I'm working on cleaning up my essay a little before I send it to you . Please be brutal

Looking forward to seeing it!!!

(Brutal? Who's brutal?!?? )

Hi all,

Apologies if this post is in the wrong place (it's my first one!) - I have been a long-time lurker like many. Took the GMAT earlier this month and thanks to many of the tips on here, got a 760. Made the decision to apply to HBS in R1 but now have a small (somewhat trivial) question about the application that has been on my mind for a couple of days now - I have a nagging suspicion I might be interpreting a section incorrectly and wanted to pose the question to others.

For those who are currently working through the application, under the Employment section where you can list up to 3 roles - each role asks for a "Description", "Key Accomplishments" and "Most Significant Challenge". How did you guys interpret the "Description" section - did you take it to mean a description of the role or a description of the organization? I assumed it was asking for a description of the role but that seems a bit like a repetition of your resume, does it not? How did you go about differentiating this section from the information on your resume?

Any insight you could provide to ease my mind would be greatly appreciated

Thanks!

Hi there,

Congratulations on an amazing GMAT score!

They're asking for a description of your role, not the company. Think of the description this way - it's a summary, high level statement that rolls all of the bullet points in your resume into one short, concise, powerful statement. In other words, if you were at a dinner party and someone asks what you do for company XYZ and it was someone you wanted to impress, how would you describe your job?

Bhavik

HBS 2+2 Round 1 here... I just started my essay... Where is everyone else up to?

Hey,

Just noticed HBS isn't asking for High School grades anywhere on the application. Am i missing something obvious or is it required somewhere on the application but I couldn't see it.

Thanks for the help!

I'm pretty sure HBS are not interested and with good reason too, it's pretty irrelevant when you already have the data points from GPA, GMAT and work experience.

Exactly what domotron said. Your HS grades got you into college; HBS (and other schools) rely on the college admissions process to evaluate (and reward you for) what you did as a kid. In fact, we don't recall any bschool apps that ask for HS grades. They may ask what HS you went to, but not about the grades. If you know of any that want grades we'd be interested to hear.