Hey finmin88! Welcome to GMAT Club! We're honored that you joined just to ask EssaySnark a question*!
We actually don't have nearly enough info to say if you'd have a shot at HBS. The core stats of your profile say you're qualified - but so are, like, 75% or more of the people who apply. So, sorry, can't offer insights there. We're not saying "no" but we can't say "yes" either.
And despite the fact that you're not in IT - which does help somewhat, that you didn't study engineering, that puts your profile in a different playing field, slightly - you're still coming from that super-competitive candidate pool of Indian male. You look like you've got some good stuff going on but at the same time, much of what you reported is really really common. The quizzing thing comes up a lot with the Indians, and it doesn't come up at all for any other demographic. You didn't actually give us any sense of significant contributions at work. It can sometimes be challenging for the finance profile to stand out from the crowd - so while you're not in the IT pool, you're still in the also-competitive "finance male" pool.
And you didn't breathe word of career goals, so we can't even comment on how suitable these schools are for you.
At the same time, we're happy to see NYU in the mix; that indicates that you're not completely brandwashed.
(
We define that term on the EssaySnark blahg here; sorry to link to a post behind the paywall; you can probably figure out our meaning just fine from the term itself though.)
And with that list of schools, we're guessing that finance is in your future as well - but then we don't know why Columbia is missing from the list.
So it's a bit of a mystery, the info you've provided.
In terms of the AWA question: Not great, obviously, but it's the least important part of the GMAT (not unimportant; only least important) so it's not going to be a showstopper, and we very rarely ever recommend retaking the GMAT over a low AWA issue.
The grades look fine, not seeing any big issues there either, but you also didn't share the big picture (e.g., which state school? ranking in class? grad school grades?).
Feeling like we're not getting the whole situation and so we can't be definitive one way or another - not that we ever can be, in the limited constraints of these forums. If you want one-on-one extensive personalized input on all aspects of your candidacy, you could sign up for our Comprehensive
Profile Review, which is just what it says it is and we can drill down into EVERYTHING -
read about it here and specifically check out the reviews that others have left;
GMAT Club members get a $10 discount if you click through from this page).
Not trying to punt on your questions here. If you want to hit us up again, feel free to post a follow-up and we'll take it from there.
EssaySnark
*Or maybe you simply created a new account in order to do so and hide your history from us... we're seeing some people do that too which is uber-lame. _________________
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