{"id":46969,"date":"2019-09-12T15:41:54","date_gmt":"2019-09-12T22:41:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/?p=46969"},"modified":"2019-09-12T15:51:25","modified_gmt":"2019-09-12T22:51:25","slug":"harvard-mba-experience-a-current-student-shares-her-story-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/harvard-mba-experience-a-current-student-shares-her-story-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Harvard MBA Experience- a Current Student Shares Her Story \u2013 Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"168\" height=\"168\" src=\"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Mansi.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-46974\" srcset=\"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Mansi.jpg 168w, https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Mansi-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 168px) 100vw, 168px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mansi, a Delhi IIT civil engineer and an oil and gas professional, had worked with MER on her application for 5 top programs and was accepted by all of them - HBS, Stanford, Wharton, Kellogg, and INSEAD. She went to Harvard, her dream school. <a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/student-interviews\/indian-engineers-journey-5-tops-mba-programs-including-dream-school-harvard-part-4\/\">In her first interview with MER<\/a> (myEssayReview) last year, Mansi had shared her application experience, career objectives, why MBA, preference for HBS, and much more. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mansi\nis here today to share her amazing first year experiences at Harvard. This\ninterview will be published in two parts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>In Part 1 of the interview, Mansi talks about:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Her Background- <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=101s\">01:41<\/a><\/li><li><strong>GMAT prep\/ Application prep- <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=160s\">02:40<\/a> \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=269s\">04:29<\/a><\/li><li><strong>Financing\/ Funding MBA- <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=419s\">06:59<\/a><\/li><li><strong>Her favorite things about Harvard (community, case study method, in- class and outside of class experiences)- <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=557s\">09:17<\/a> \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4dcS-yOiVgs&amp;t=684s\">11:24<\/a><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-youtube wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Harvard MBA Experience- a Current Student Shares Her Story\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4dcS-yOiVgs?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam<\/strong>: Hello Mansi. Welcome back. Thank you for taking the time to talk to us. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi:<\/strong> &nbsp;No problems. I have been looking forward to\nthis. So I am hoping to have a good conversation here. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam<\/strong>:\nYes, me too. For those who have not seen your first interview, could you please\ntell them something about your background? Where you are from? Where did you do\nyour undergrad from? What was your pre HBS job?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi: <\/strong>I graduated from\nIIT Delhi in 2012, and thereafter, I worked with Schlumberger, an oil and gas\nservice provider. I started work in India and then in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and\nIndonesia. After Schlumberger, I also worked for an Indian oil and gas company\ncalled Cairn India wherein I moved from more of operation and technical role to\na business planning and strategy kind of role, and that made me further think\nabout my career and an MBA. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam:&nbsp;\n<\/strong>Looking back, you scored a stellar 770 GMAT score. Can\nyou share with our viewers your planning and preparation of GMAT?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi: <\/strong>&nbsp;This question has been asked to me by a lot of\nGMAT applicants who want to earn a good score. This is a very genuine question\nbecause your entire application starts with this preparation and the score. The\nbest advice that I can give is to start early so that you have as much time as\nyou can in terms of not just GMAT preparation but also GMAT retake in case you\nwant to improve the score. So to start with, start early and have a lot of time\non your plate, and secondly, make a good plan, identify what you want to work\non, whether it is quant&nbsp; or verbal, or\nboth, and how do you want to work on that to improve step- by- step to get your\ndesired score All this helps in putting the preparation together that take you to\nyour target score. I took e-GMAT online course and all the official GMAT\nresources in terms of the official guide. I also took some online tests which\nwere in packages one to six. I think the official resources and the e-GMAT online\ncourse are just enough for preparing for the entire GMAT. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam: <\/strong>In your first interview with us\nlast year, we had discussed in detail your strategy, planning and preparation\nfor the MBA. Could you please briefly share your MBA preparation that led to\nyour incredible success at the top 5 MBA programs?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi: <\/strong>&nbsp;I took my GMAT around June end, so I could apply\nin Round I. I was sure that in a couple of months I could not apply to all the\nschools I wanted to which were Harvard, Wharton, INSEAD, Kellogg, and Stanford,\nso I thought of breaking that list up in two categories.\n<a href=\"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/reviews\/comments\/multipe-school-package-345355791\">And\nPoonam, you truly helped me in that by advising me to focus on Harvard in the\nlater round<\/a> when\nI was more prepared, more practiced, both in terms of preparing my application\nas well as interviews. So I applied to Wharton and Kellogg in Round I and\nHarvard, Stanford, and INSEAD in Round II. INSEAD was somewhere in between\nRound I and Round II of the US schools. That also helped in distributing my work.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Again, starting early is the\nkey thing. In July, I was kind of lost and was trying to figure out what to do,\nhow to do, which consultant to work with. The first school takes up a lot of\ntime just in terms of introspection, figuring out the story behind your\napplication, connecting the dots in your story, and understanding your goals,\netc. So be prepared that the first application takes a long, long time because you\nneed time to figure out yourself. So have a strategy of how you want to tackle\ndifferent applications. Poonam, I still remember that Wharton and Kellogg were comparatively\nshorter, so we could accomplish them in the first round and by the time we came\nto Harvard, we both were pretty confident on my application and how we wanted to\nframe it. So I would suggest just know what you want in your application, be\nyourself, and don\u2019t think what the schools want to hear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam: <\/strong>Exactly. Can you tell the viewers how\ndid you fund \/finance your MBA? Do you have any advice for them<strong>?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi:<\/strong> Yes.\nAbsolutely. It is one of the questions people have asked me time and time again\nI would suggest feel that they should feel free to ask their seniors, peers who\nare in that school to guide them to go through the financial aid process. Many\nschools in the US have good programs of financial aid in which they help students\ngo through their tuition fees. Harvard and Stanford have great programs, and I\nam sure Wharton does have that too. So be aware of all those Financial Aid programs\nbefore you apply to them because sometimes you have to incorporate an additional\nessay or information in your application that ties into Financial Aid. Harvard\njust has the means-based FA program which is helpful. But most of the schools\nhave something or the other kind of program which helps provide people a better\nfinancial position after MBA. So make sure that you are aware of that before\napplying to the school. Secondly, you may also search online for the kind of\norganizations that you have worked within the past in India or abroad, or the\nkind of organizations you want to be associated with. Thirdly, taking loans also\nhelps. I am funding my MBA partly with Financial aid, my savings, and partly\nwith the loan. But you can definitely have your mixture to that. You can just\nopt for taking a loan rather than put your savings. So just be aware that there\nare options, and you can ask people for help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam<\/strong>: Harvard was always your dream\nschool. What has been your favorite thing\nabout Harvard so far? Would you please share your best experiences in and out\nof the class that helped shape your career?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi:<\/strong>\nMy\nmost favorite thing about Harvard so far is the community. And when I say the\nword \u2018community\u2019, I am not just saying it randomly, I mean it. It starts from\nprofessors, colleagues, alumni, everyone who is part of the Harvard community. Most\nof the learning experience happens through this community. My best learnings so\nfar have been from the conversations I had with my people around me- my section\nmates, my friends, and everyone. It is not like that you genuinely want to\nlearn something from them, it is just that being with them, listening to their\nperspectives, even though they differ from your own, is a great learning\nexperience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The case study method\ncomes into this play because the professor facilitates the discussions among your\nclassmates which fosters a nice environment in terms of being safe and being\npolitically correct. You really get immersed in the discussion of the case, discuss\nit before and after the class and learn a lot from these discussions with your\npeers. It takes time, but you can start trusting your colleagues and peers. You\ndefinitely have the advantage that you are at the HBS and you have the access\nto all these kinds of cases and knowledge that you did not have earlier.&nbsp; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think my best experiences have been outside the class. Traveling and being with friends or peers is something I enjoy. I have traveled a lot in India and around as well but traveling here is different as you start seeing things through a different lens. For example, I attended a global course in Argentina a couple of months earlier. When you travel with your friends and professors, you learn as well as enjoy You start looking at things differently. You have a certain specific&nbsp; or background of a country or that place, and at the same time you have a perspective of your own, and you want to see as to how you can improve certain situations, I think that is the kind of difference that a school like Harvard can make in your personality that whether you are traveling or just interacting with other people, you gain a different lens to it and start seeing things in a more intellectual as well as more experiential manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;Inside the class, with all the cases,\nsometimes we get to meet the protagonist as well and that has been one of the\nbest experiences so far that we get to meet so many different protagonists that\nyou have looked up to all your life till now, you get to meet them, you listen\nto them face to face. I am truly grateful for that. I remember when Indra Nooyi\ncame to our class- I have seen so many videos of her and idealized her during\nmy MBA application process as well but meeting her and getting the same\nlearnings more or less, being face to face with her was just a surreal\nexperience. I am fortunate to have met many CEOs who visited the classes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam<\/strong>: Wonderful. I was wondering if there is anything you will\nlike to change about Harvard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi:\n<\/strong>Yes.\nI think it is a good question. I just sometimes feel that the class size is huge,\nand a smaller class could have been more helpful to connect with more people\nclosely. So that is the only thing I could have wished for Harvard. However,\nthis too comes with another advantage as big class size will give you a large\nnetwork in terms of Alumni database.&nbsp; I\nreached out to many different people whether it was organizing a conference or\nlooking for an internship, or just connecting with people to learn about their\nexperiences. Though the large network is helpful, the advantage of small class\nsize will allow you to know people more closely. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Poonam<\/strong>: What do you think your classmates were surprised to know\nabout you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mansi: <\/strong>That is an interesting question.\nEveryone comes out with a very nice and interesting aspect of their life,\nwhether it is professional or personal. In my case, I think they were really\namazed to hear about my oil and gas stories. And surprisingly, we had a lot of\noil and gas cases as well where I was called upon multiple times. And then, I\nused to tell them my experiences on the oil rigs, working in conditions that\nthey have never even heard of, and those kinds of experiences, those kinds of\nstories sharing was something they were really surprised by. They could not\nimagine that a world like that existed and that I was part of that world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Stay tuned to the Part 2 of\nthe interview wherein Mansi discusses the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Clubs at the HBS<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Global Immersion program <\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Recruitment at the HBS<\/strong><\/li><li><strong>Advice to incoming students about recruitment and other resources of HBS<\/strong><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since 2011, Poonam., founder and president of <a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/\">myEssayReview<\/a> (MER) has helped applicants get accepted into top 20 MBA, programs. ( Poonam is\u00a0 one of the <a href=\"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/reviews\/myessayreview-345345505?fl=menu\">top 5 most reviewed consultants on the GMAT Club<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThis\n<a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/student-interviews\/harvard-mba-experience-first-year-student-shares-story\/\">interview<\/a>\nwas first published in <a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/\">myEssayReview<\/a> &nbsp;blog\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want to discuss? Email Poonam at &nbsp;poonam@myessayreview.com<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/category\/mba-topics\">Blog\/<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/myessayreview.com\/samples\/\">Samples\/<\/a><strong> <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/reviews\/myessayreview-345345505?fl=menu\">Reviews\/<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/LinkedInProfile\">LinkedIn<\/a>\/<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/myessayreview?notif_t=page_user_activity\"> Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/myessayreview\/\">\n \n \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n \n \n \n\n \n \n<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/poonam-tandon-43221547\/\">\n \n \n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mansi, a Delhi IIT civil engineer and an oil and gas professional, had worked with MER on her application for 5 top programs and was accepted by all of them&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46969"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46969\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47013,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46969\/revisions\/47013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}