{"id":24939,"date":"2014-07-22T18:00:05","date_gmt":"2014-07-23T01:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/2014\/07\/cornell-johnson-mba-essay-analysis-your-2014-2015-application\/"},"modified":"2014-07-22T18:00:05","modified_gmt":"2014-07-23T01:00:05","slug":"cornell-johnson-mba-essay-analysis-your-2014-2015-application","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/cornell-johnson-mba-essay-analysis-your-2014-2015-application\/","title":{"rendered":"Cornell Johnson MBA Essay Analysis, Your 2014-2015 Application"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are you ready to dig into your essays? Application essays are specifically and cleverly designed to get into your head. We like to turn the tables on the admissions committees and get inside their<\/i> heads. Why are they asking these questions? What are they looking for? Read on as our experts break down application essay questions to help YOU plan the attack.<\/h3>\n
Essay One<\/a>
\nEssay Two<\/a>
\nEssay Three<\/a><\/div>\n
Essay Four<\/a>
\nEssay Five<\/a><\/div>\n
\nAight, I’m pumped! Where to next?<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n
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Cornell Johnson MBA Essay Question 1<\/h5>\n

Creative Submission: You are the author for the book of Your Life Story. In 800 characters or less, please write the table of contents for the book in the space provided or upload it as an attachment. Note: approach this essay with your unique style. We value creativity and authenticity.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Cornell Johnson\u2019s table of contents essay question: this is the one they are famous for, and have been asking for years. This year (finally), they have tightened the word count to 800 characters. Ladies and Gentlemen, it\u2019s not just that they have just about halved the space here, they are sending a message\u2026<\/p>\n

Attempting to cram your life story into the chapter TITLES of your book is to miss the point entirely. That\u2019s what \u201cthe book itself\u201d is for, is it not? What are chapter titles? What is their purpose? Before we attack this, let\u2019s take a step back and consider what question the Johnson MBA adcom is truly asking. Do they really want to know your life story? Do they really even just want a snapshot OF your life story because they\u2019re curious to know about you? Nope. How many times in ANY business school (or any degree program for that matter) has the admissions committee followed up with their choices to track their progress? Never. So if they\u2019re not after your life story (or even a glimpse of it through a table of contents conceit), then what do they want to know by asking you about a glimpse of your life story through a table of contents?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s all about the gears, folks.<\/p>\n

Think about those crazy questions you hear about for McKinsey interviews or Google interviews. The ones where they ask you how you\u2019d find your way out of a blender if you were a miniaturized human, with one minute to go before the blades started whirring. Clearly, they\u2019re not interested in figuring this out because it relates to a practical version of this problem. They wanna know how you think. They wanna see the GEARS move and how you interpret the question. How you process the words. How your brain\u2019s algorithm leads you down certain pathways. How you weigh those pathways against one another. Where it takes you. How much you sweat during that process. Where you end up. But\u2026 they don\u2019t care about the answer. They care about the moments leading UP to the answer. The part of the process where the gears are in motion.<\/p>\n

Why? Because the gears give us a sense for what kind of person you are. Maybe in your approach we see a sense of whimsy. Or a sense of militaristic precision. Or a glimpse of a compassionate leader. It\u2019s all in the approach. WHAT you say here is far less important than HOW you say it. We know this because they have forced your hands with 800 characters. There is room here ONLY for an APPROACH that tells the story, and not enough for the story itself to do the talking. A straight approach is almost guaranteed to fall flat; unless your snapshots are SO remarkable, they don\u2019t require creativity. If for example your life story goes something like \u201cStarted Apple in garage. Took company public. Reinvented the music industry. Reinvented cellular phones. Reinvented retail shopping for electronics\u2026\u201d In this case, you don\u2019t need a ton of creativity. But this applies to outliers, not the typical candidate.<\/p>\n

So then what\u2019s the best way to approach a creative essay like this, where what you say matters more than how you say it?<\/p>\n

Step 1 -<\/strong> Well, ironically, the first thing you need to iron out is what you\u2019re actually trying to communicate ABOUT your life story. What impression do you want the reader to walk away with? Imagine you\u2019re a Hollywood starlet, preparing for your moment of fame on the red carpet, and you know that the impression you make will be fleeting. If you want the world to see you as \u201csexy\u201d it will influence how you wear your hair, what color the dress is, how much it reveals. If you want the world to see you as \u201celegant\u201d it will similarly influence all those elements and generally lead to a slightly different outcome. <\/p>\n

What impression are YOU hoping to make with these chapter titles? Natural born Leader? Success in spite of circumstances? Visionary in the making? Tennis enthusiast? Wonderdad? There isn\u2019t necessarily a correct answer here that applies to anyone and everyone. But, whatever yours is\u2026 should be a KEY aspect of what defines you. If you\u2019re a tennis enthusiast, but also a world famous amateur chef and cooking is your ultimate extracurricular passion, it would be strange for these chapter titles to focus on tennis and not cooking. Imagine someone catches a GLIMPSE at these titles. Long enough to read the words, but not long enough necessarily to remember each one. What do you want that guy to remember about them. \u201cThat guy seems like someone who\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Step 2 \u2013<\/strong> Once you\u2019ve formed a clear sense of what you\u2019re all about, the impression you\u2019re looking to make, now you can build an approach that effectively brings that across. Before we get to STYLE, we need our ingredients first. Remembering back to the earliest days of your life story (potentially even before you could start forming memories), and tracking forward in time BEYOND PRESENT DAY, what are all the important constituent milestones and moments of this goal impression? <\/p>\n

Step 3 \u2013<\/strong> Your list may not be 100% complete at this point. Or, it may contain many more pieces than you will end up using. Either is perfectly okay. The goal of Step 2 is to get the juices flowing. The next step is to start organizing them, in such a way that it takes the reader on a high-level journey, node-by-node. Not every single node has to relate directly to your \u201ctheme,\u201d by the way, so don\u2019t force that theme everywhere you possibly can. Simply having a \u201cgoal impression\u201d in mind will help you to FOCUS the ideation process. It will help to FOCUS those ingredients of your life around a theme. <\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say for example that amateur baking IS your side passion, and DOES tell a great deal about you, and your obsession with precision, and with creating things, and with managing ecosystems, then perhaps one of the first \u201cimportant constituent milestones\u201d might be something like \u201cTarget Practice \u2013 Ammunition: Mashed Potatoes.\u201d And perhaps later, to recall it, you may say \u201cWooing the ladies \u2013 Ammunition: Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes.\u201d <\/p>\n

Step 3 here is all about the \u201chow.\u201d How should you convey the pieces of this puzzle? There can be millions of creative, outside-the-box ways to do it. To suggest even a few may do more harm than good here because the possibilities SHOULD be endless. One way to challenge yourself is to take your milestones, and then take a very specific approach, get it to a \u201cgood enough place.\u201d And then stop. Go back, and do it again, but this time, using a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT approach. The goal here is to tell your life story with a different tactic, using a different conceit, possibly even a different tone, push yourself as hard as you can to make it different. If you have time, and can pull off a third? Great. But now, take a hard look at the three stabs. Show it to a trusted set of eyes, friend, mentor, whatever. Which one is the coolest? Which one makes them smile? Which one feels the most \u201cyou\u201d? If you\u2019re not a naturally creative person, this can be another way forward which may allow you to end up at the same place.<\/p>\n

Step 4 \u2013 <\/strong>Rework, Rewrite, Refine, Rinse & Repeat. (Maybe a few times\u2014not too many times, you will end up gutting it and oversanitizing it. The magic number tends to be around three or four revisions, we have found.)<\/p>\n

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Cornell Johnson MBA Essay Question 2<\/h5>\n
Targeted Job Type: What is the job that you would like to have immediately upon graduating with your MBA? (800 characters)<\/strong><\/p>\n
800 characters \u2014 even to George R. R. Martin \u2014 is not a lot of characters. Clearly it is deliberate. Cornell doesn\u2019t want wine and sparkling conversation, they want the deed. So, give it to em. Don\u2019t stumble over \u201cthroat-clearing\u201d clunky beginnings of sentences that just take up space, introducing your ideas \u2014 get to the ideas. Word efficiency here will stem for a very SHARP understanding of what job you want to have upon graduating with your MBA. So, get sharp on that before you put pen to paper.<\/p>\n