Ask Fortuna Admissions

Indian, Female, 28
Target GMAT - 700+
Education - Bachelor in Engineering-8.7 , Diploma in Engineering-8, 10th-75%

Work experience - 6.5 Years
1. worked as Software Engineer at US based InsurTech fortune 500 company and at Healthcare and FMCG automation and technology company.
2. Co-Founder of handicraft social e-commerce startup, founded and registered in 2019.
I am from village where most women knows needle and thread art but not able to earn money because of lack of platform, technology and investment. We are helping these women earn money.
3. Partner at Import export and trading company
I am helping farmers sell their produces at price higher than MSP(minimum support price) by removing middleman layers.
4. CURRENT ROLE-Freelancer as Lead Software Engineer at LogiTech Startup

Why MBA?
I have gone had many corporate experiences and managed my startup over the years, but I learned everything in a try and error manner. Now I want to take a step back and use the MBA program to gain skills(management, strategy, marketing) in an academic setting.

Short Term Goal: To become a product manager in an AgriTech startup.
Long Term Goal: Social Entrepreneurship in AgriTech industry
Born in farmer’s family and being a tech person myself, I knew that in India and many other , farmers don’t have technology, data and advanced tools to make better decisions and ease the agriculture processes. My goal is to transform the agriculture industry through technology and improve farmer’s lives

Target Schools: M7, Haas, Yale, Duke Fuqua, Tuck, Ross, Said, Judge, NYU Stern, Insead, HEC Paris, ISB, Babson

Questions-
1. which college and program should i go for which will help me achieve my long-term goal(Entrepreneurship in AgriTech) ?
Any other colleges you want to suggest?
2. how can i highlight my strengths – Leadership, Community involvement and what do you find weakness in my profile? Suggestions you want to give to improve my profile/CV?
3. do you find my personal story strong and compelling enough?
4. I want to join AgriTech startup soon after my MBA and pursue my entrepreneurship career later down the line in AgriTech itself.
I am not sure if school will find ’join AgriTech soon after MBA suitable (because generally tech company comes into campus but not specifically tech company that works in agriculture sector) or Shall I still present this as my short term goal in my SOP? If so, how do I make sure it doesn’t look odd in the face of the AdComs.

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Hi there, Thanks for sharing.
I think it's a good idea to gain more experience first before doing an MBA. The average years of experience for these programs is more like 5/6 years. Since you are taking a course now in b analytics, might make sense to do an MBA to get a more holistic approach and learn about not just b-analytics but marketing, operations, finance, entrepreneurship, leadership skills and so on.
For the european schools, they often like candidates that have int'l experience so I'm not sure if you have that or not?
It's hard to narrow down schools so my suggestion is to attend their webinars/info session and try to talk to students alumni as much as possible to see which one is a good cultural fit for you, and you can also share your short/long term goals with them to see what each school can offer you. The students/alum will have the best insights on this since they lived it! It's a really interesting goal and wish you the best with it.

Best,

Try to be brief and short while posting your profile evaluation request. Ask specific questions!

Welcome, MJ

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Hi and thanks for your profile. Firstly these schools will love your high gpa! well done. This is very important for these top schools. Would be fantastic if you could also score a very high gre so that's good to hear your are re-writing.
You have demonstrated some nice leadership as a teacher and then progressing in your career to team lead.
These schools will want to know what kind of impact you have and will make on your communities, people and even the world. Can you speak to anything or have ambitions goals around impact? Extra curriculars will also be huge for them so what kind of volunteering have you done and have you taken any leadership roles? If so, they will look for a habit of a leadership.
Any int'l experience and working in diverse teams? Many questions for these schools are around examples of when you demonstrated an inclusive environment and worked with diverse teams.
From what I see so far though you have a very good profile but I only know so much! So what I mention above will be key to showcase to them if you have such experiences.
All the best,

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MJ and Michel are going to join us today from Fortuna Admissions. We will get started as soon as they are here

Hi and welcome! My name is Michel Belden and I previously was an Associate Director of Admissions for Wharton’s full-time MBA program. I have been with Fortuna since 2012 as a senior expert coach.

Welcome MJ and Michel

I will be releasing a few questions at a time from the queue, you can pick one and respond

28 yo, Motswana Male
Target GMAT 720-750
Reach Schools: LBS, Wharton Columbia, Booth
Targets: Stern, Ross, Tuck, Tepper
POST MBA GOALS: join investment banking and to learn and gain skills I would need to come back home in 20 or so years to set up a boutique investment
WORK EXPERIENCE: About five years’ experience at a local stock brokerage firm, where I started off as an intern, accepted as a trainee dealer and left in October at which point was co-lead of the department. While there I was co-lead we maintained the top spot by market share in the country (stats not public though). While also there I drove innovation of our in-house system to include bond trade reporting an also fostered new relationships with central bank primary dealers and executed the first government debt instrument in the company’s history.

EDUCATION: The University of Botswana: Bachelor of Arts Economics:
Second Class Upper Division, (2.1.) 70% avg (3.1 conversion to US 4 point scale via Wolrd Education services)

EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
Diacore (formerly Steinmetz) Gaborone Marathon:
-Productions Team Member January 2014 - March 2014 called back to the marathon this time comin to join the production team, doing same role as previous year with addition of coordinatin another team of volunteers with race barrier setup
-Volunteer Coordinator March 13: lead a group of volunteers in set up of water and medals and coordinated the distribution of water and medals during the race
AIESEC at the University of Botswana:
-Team Leader Business Development September 2012 - July 2013,

Question, what are my chances of getting into these schools and what can leverage to improve chance of success

Hello, I am looking to apply R1 this fall. I have an undergrad GPA of 2.986. But, my final three semesters of undergrad I was on honor roll and deans list. I suffer from a chronic health condition that had me staying several days in the hospital a few times during undergrad. I found myself in the hospital the week before finals on more than one occasion. Is this a reasonable explanation for my low GPA? How should I address this in my application?

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Hi Everyone, thanks for joining. I’m Melissa from Fortuna Admissions and previous Asst Director at INSEAD. I, like Michel, have been with Fortuna since its inception! Happy to take any MBA questions

Michel you jumping on zoom?

Michel was here a while ago

Profile Evaluation for MBA 2022 Intake-
Indian Male
GMAT: 740(current mocks)
Undergrad: 8.8 GPA Bachelor in Engineering in Computer Science(WES-> US Equivalent Undergrad).
University: Pune University
Post Graduate - 3.8 GPA Masters in Data Science, Liverpool John Moores University
12th Grade: 93% (top 1 percentile from a pool of 15 lakh) Merit Scholarship holder
10th Grade - 92%
Work Experience: 3 yrs(at the time of matriculation) as Senior Analyst - Technology (promoted once) in leading European Investment Bank and won many International and national awards
in the orgaisation for my work. Day to day work involves developing softwares and interacting with teams across globe and with immediate supervisor from UK.
Certifications - HBX CORe
Volunteer work - Started a non profit initiative to fight against covid. Work as a consultant for a multi speciality hospital to handle logistics and operations.
EC’s - Led student chapters in undergrad to organize national level events leading 300 students for the same.
Post-MBA goals - Product Manager roles in tech/ tech strategy
Target Schools - Stanford, Columbia, Darden, LBS, MIT, Haas, NYU, Cornell, Kellog

Please evaluate my profile for my targett schools. Any more target schools which might be good fit? Also any gaps in my profile which I can address?

Hi and thanks for the question. Yes, this is a reasonable explanation that you can use in the optional essay. Keep to the facts and that you had an upward trajectory in your GPA over the final three semesters.

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