Ask ARINGO MBA Admissions Consulting

Hi

I am a 26 year old male from India, currently working in Dubai. I need some guidance on my MBA application process. I am in a dilemma about where all to apply. Below are some details of my profile:

10th – 94.2%; 12th – 80.2%
B.E. (Hons.) Electrical and Electronics Engineering from BITS – Pilani, Dubai – CGPA: 7.05/10, First Division
GMAT – 1st attempt (April’13) – Q42, V26, Total: 560, AWA-5, IR-5
2nd attempt (March’14) – Q46, V27, Total: 600, AWA-5, IR-4
3rd attempt (Dec’14) – Q46, V40, Total: 700, AWA-4, IR-7
I do not intend to give another attempt at GMAT.

Experience: I have been working with a top MEP construction company in Dubai as an Assistant Quantity Surveyor for around 3 years 9 months now and will have completed over 4 years by the time I start the session anywhere in 2016.
My job is a techno-commercial role based out of projects and my responsibilities include maintaining the project cash flow and monitoring costs and value throughout the project duration by preparing billing projections / forecasts, cost to completion reports, regular payment applications as per the forecasts, variation claims, etc. All these projects have been huge projects with project values ranging from 15 Million AED to over 140 Million AED. I also liaise with the Consultants, Clients and other Contractors for commercial issues. Many of these people happen to be from nationalities other than India and other South Asian countries.

All my experience has been in Dubai with a single company since my graduation after engineering. I have not worked in India or in any other country.

The major reason that I want to an MBA is that I want to move out of the construction industry. While there is money in this industry, it comes with a lot of experience and is a slow process. Moreover, at this stage, I feel I am not learning as much as I used to a couple of years back. As I have done well with whatever has been thrown at me, I need more challenges to sustain myself and enough of that is not happening right now. Also, the construction industry is fairly volatile here with the market booming at times and failing miserably at others, which does not inspire a lot of confidence. Future success in my role involves an interest in and grasp of contractual knowledge, which I am not very much interested in. Currently my job involves dealing with lots of numbers and excel sheets which I love. As my job role is in Operations and I report directly to the Operations Manager, I am looking to use my interest and experience with numbers and working in tight deadlines and in a team, while supplementing it with formal theoretical and working knowledge of management principles and concepts, in General Management / project management roles or Operation roles outside the construction industry. I am keen on moving on to Consulting roles which could also involve travelling, an aspect that is not at all present in my current role.

I do not have extensive extracurricular activities to talk about other than an odd volunteering experience here and there.

I have thought about applying to Insead, HEC in France, Rotterdam in Netherlands, Mannheim in Germany, NUS,NTU, Insead in Singapore. I did not include any colleges from USA in the list as those are very expensive programs and the duration of most programs is 2 years. I would prefer to do a one year MBA but I am also open to doing a 2 year MBA in case I do not get any good one year MBA. I am a bit skeptical of European colleges in light of the downturn in the European market.

However, recently I have started wondering whether I am limiting myself by applying to only a few colleges. Should I consider US colleges too as they are the traditional powerhouses for MBA and they continue to dominate the overall MBA landscape? A quick look at the costs for most decent programs revealed costs to the tune of 130,000 to 160,000 USD, which is a lot in my case. How do I go about in deciding where to apply? I do not want to limit myself but I feel restricted when I look at such high costs for an MBA. Are the scholarship chances at most US schools realistic in my case?

Any help that can guide me in the right path will be appreciated. I can provide any additional info as well if required at all.

Thank you