Veteran Profile evaluation/Consultant Recommendation

A few reflections on your profile Adam:

1. In general, schools love folks with non-traditional background. We've worked with several folks from the armed forces background and the reason is clear - the sort of experiences you have are pretty unique; and the best part, many of them would apply to a business scenario too. That is the key when you are articulating your essays - make sure you are not too self-absorbed and are able to link those to the business world (assuming that's where you want to head out).
2. The years of experience can work both ways. It is not uncommon however for folks from the armed forces to start late - service before self is something that most would understand. So provided you can reason out why you'd want to stop an apparently blooming career, this could indeed be an asset. The optional essay does have to clearly articulate the reason for the relatively lower GMAT of course.
3. Finally, contrary to popular belief, in most cases, hiring a (good) consultant can actually slow down the application process. Read this. So if you are hard pressed for time, try to rework that timetable or go solo.

Cheers,

Adam - as mentioned in earlier posts, trying to get a higher GMAT score will go a long way. I won't give a detailed profile evaluation as that is not my level of expertise, but I will say you should definitely reach out to Scott at Personal MBA Coach. He is absolutely incredible. The support he gives and his model is quite unique and vastly different from the other players out here. He has been helping applicants for over 8 years and with Wharton and MIT degrees, to get his direct help throughout the process (rather than a junior editor) is quite amazing.

He works with a ton of military applicants every year. Look him up, you won't be disappointed. www.personalmbacoach.com

Hi Adam! Hope you're doing well. I like working with vets (that's why we offer a vet discount actually), and we have an advisor on our team who is Navy pre-MBA. Anyway, That's the context for where I'm coming from. I think you have a great profile! For the top 10, it would be nice (and safer) to have a higher GMAT score, especially since I'm assuming you don't have a ton of quant from undergrad? If you cannot take the GMAT again and don't have quant on your transcript, then I strongly recommend you take an online course from a credible institution (asap). Is that something you'd be able to do or would the timing be challenging with deployment? Regardless, you need to prove your academic abilities so perhaps it's a longer discussion in terms of how to do that given your timing constraints. Military deployment is something that is treated as an exception, so I wouldn't lose hope. Either way, you're going to want to take advantage of the "optional information" section of any application so that you can talk through the timing elements (eg. age, deployment, etc) to address some of the concerns already brought-up here. But typically vets have amazing stories, so I think you really have something in your back pocket there! One word of caution - please be sure to get many opinions on your essays, resume etc. I worked with a vet last year who had incredible stories / details that weren't even on his resume when we first started working together (although they seemed boring to him, they were stories that could really resonate with an adcom who probably knows very little about the military). He also tended to use military lingo that was very hard for the average civilian to follow. He thought it was hilarious when I didn't understand what he meant, but by talking through it, we were able to restructure his explanations to be understandable to a broader audience (eg. ensuring he got full credit for his experience). And now he's going to a top 5 school! Just something to consider as you start down this process.

My firm offers a free 30-minute consult if you'd like to chat further (meredith@vantagepointadmissions.com). Thank you for your service and best of luck!

Wow. I didn't see all these replies. Thank you everyone for the evaluation.
If anyone has the time for a follow up question I would appreciate it.

Do I apply to schools in range in first round and wait for second round for stretch schools? In hopes of attempting the GMAT again and improving my score. Are the increases in the competitive field of round 2 worth the increase of 20-30 points?

As I mentioned, I don't have the time to take the test before round 1. But I do have the time to retake before round 2. 690 was the highest I got on practice tests doing self study while studying 2-4 hours every day for 3 months. 690 was my final score (44/40/IR8)

Regardless, I start a calc course and accounting course this summer while deployed.

Thank you all again for your time!