Best Time to join a consultancy

HK,

You are most welcome. I work with a lot of applicants from India actually, but by all means do what makes sense for you. Best of luck and let us know if you have any more questions on the boards!

Cheers,
Scott

Hi Scott,
That is quite shocking , a 5 school package converted to INR is almost 600,000 I need a year to earn that money :D , if need be would schedule hourly advice if needed. Thanks

Regards,
Hk

HK,

I definitely understand. Best of luck with your applications and if you have any other questions about the process, let me know!

Best,
Scott

HK-san,
Although applications don't begin to be released until May, right now is an excellent time to have at least a strategy/brainstorming call with a consultant. We can discuss steps you can still take in the coming months to improve your profile and to be in a position to hit the ground running in May after your take. If you start working on your applications in earnest after your May retake you will have plenty of time to finish strong apps for 4-5 schools by the R1 deadlines. If your 710 score is balanced well between the Quant and Verbal scores and your profile is otherwise strong, it is a strong enough score to aim for Top 15 schools. If your score is lopsided, you have other weaknesses or you are aiming for Stanford, HBS, Wharton, then I would try to raise the score. If you are Japanese you will have a certain advantage in that business schools don't receive as many apps from Japan as they used to (or would like to). I'd be happy to review your resume: paul@admitify.com.
--Paul Bodine, Great Applications for Business School, www.admitify.com

Hello Paul Senpai ,
I am from India and I am a huge fan of Anime , hence the Japanese reference. Thank you for the quick response and valuable insights.

GMAT - 710( QA 49 VA 36 IR - 7/8 AWA 6/6 )

Ethnicity- Indian
Male , 25 years old
Btech (Mechanical) - 2013 - 69% [ Under grad]
12th - 2009 -87%
10th (ICSE) - 2007 - 75%

Work Experience - 43 months as on Date will reach 48 months by August ( At the time of applying will have around 49-50 months work experience)

I am currently working as a business development executive at a startup and have worked with a government agency to design some training programs for their employees to effectively use social media for better E-Governance and have worked on building an android application along with successful launching of a online platform designed for certain companies. ( working for about 2 years here).Working alongside here , My father owns an advertising agency in which i play a role too because it is a family business and i need to look after when he is away and have helped create logos for the Government of Telangana. I am from Hyderabad , India and Telangana is the State. So i do not know how to leverage this work because in my own personal opinion I think it is great to have worked on a few government projects and design logos for it. The logo is evident on their websites and posters and all over the city . So i think i can give me some edge but any opinion regarding this will be considered. Prior to this i worked with Google for a year via a third party. I worked there as a business analyst.

EC

Sports - Swimming, basket ball , kabbadi , table tennis and badminton , Boxing .
Won the 1st Place in basketball at College (team event) .
Participated in multiple university and state level competitions . (table tennis)
Participated in a national level debate and Adjourned best speaker in a debate at a college level event.
Winner of an Extempore at a national level technical fest
Participated in multiple public speaking events and debates
The president of a Student Body in college for 2 years until the end of graduation undertaking lot of responsibilities and conducting multiple events
Organiser of the Sports Fest for 3 years along with a team under me and successfully organised multiple events. Along with Organizing as a sports player had to participate thus managing both organizing and playing.

I was the anchor for the Annual Day for 2 years and conducted the event in a splendid fashion
Class representative and event organiser for the college Fest for 4 years
Musical instruments learned - Keyboard , Guitar
Performed in the annual day and formed an own band during the college days and participated in college events.
learnt Classical singing for over 11 years and still learning
An active member of NSS during college and couple with the other activities i had , went on to form events to distribute food , books , clothes to the needy and have taught maths and physics to the needy .
Associated with an NGO as well , hope this help in application process


Academic Projects and Achievements

Always in the reckoning of the class - top 5%
95th percentile in CAT ( Management Exam in India) a neccesity to get in the reputed IIM’s ( Indian Institute of Management) and 90th percentile in XAT ( Management Exam for XLRI - Xavier School of Management)
Multiple projects in Robotics and designed various prototypes using basic principles of robotics and have done an internship in a PSU regarding steam engines

Final project in College related to Robotics – 6 degree Stewart Gough Platform
I have been to multiple industries such as steel pant , iron ore plant and a couple of thermodynamic industries to see the functioning of machines and an automobile industry as well to see the understanding of manufacture of components.
Softwares learned - CAD/CAM , Catia , Solid Works , Pro-E , Ansys (taught during academic rigour ) along with the normal C , C++ , Blue Java , MS office etc.




Q) Do you have a specific Company to work for? - I do not have a specific company to work for. My areas of interest are marketing and consulting . Of course every aspirant desires to be in the best of the best companies. Rather than working for a company would love to have company of my own down the line

Q) what do i want from my MBA? - I want my MBA to provide the knowledge n specific skills to run a business. It comes with experience i am sure but an MBA adds value and can make one think better in terms of the business. I would like to start a company of my own. My father has his own business and i want to diversify its services . A marketing related MBA would help me to make my company more reachable to cater to the needs of clients. At this stage my answer isn't clear and might be vague but i still haven't put a thought to it . Mostly like i wish MBA helps me better to run a business

Q) Mba full time/part time - I would want to do an MBA full time (2/1 year is fine) . I turned 25 last week so at the moment thinking i could use 2 years for an MBA unless a one year MBA suits me more. I am willing to relocate and looking for schools in India , US , UK , Singapore

Areas of Interest - Marketing / Consulting
Dream School – Kellog (Marketing)

Target Score for Retake - 740 (QA 50 VA 40) , owing to my poor academics , i thought of giving the exam another shot and I represent a demography of very high scores

Regards,
HK


P.S - sorry for keeping it long , i might have missed out anything , feel free to ask something if it is missing

Hi Hateke Kakashi,

B-schools start to come out with the new essays from sometime around mid April (that includes ISB, which is always among the first b-schools to release their essays). So you are not too far away from the application cycle. And getting a head start on the application cycle is good because you will then have some time to iron out any creases in your profile. For instance, it seems that while you have sufficient extra-curriculars, you can add some more meaningful activities such as volunteering, with a chance to make impact on others.Here and here are some blog posts that will explain what you should do over the next few months.

I didn't quite get your work experience- are you working full-time in your father's ad agency or are you working elsewhere? Your involvement in the government account sounds interesting, but again what was the full range of your work there? Did you help acquire that business or did you only coordinate with your design teams to design the logo? These are some of the few questions in my mind, so feel free to share your resume with me - we can set up a more elaborate discussion after that.

And, retaking the GMAT to score 740+ is a great idea.

Hello there,
Thank you for the quick response.

Sorry for the confusion I work at a company full time but in the mean time , during weekends or days where my father has to cater to clients in a different city , I look after the business as well.
We own an advertising agency , so we have designed the logo for the Government . i haven't made a resume yet , held up with some works , will get back accordingly .

At the moment , investing my time and effort to breach the 740 barrier.

Regards,
HK

That should pay rich dividends. All the best.

And feel free to schedule a phone call, even without the resume- I'd be glad to hear your story from you.

I am of the opinion that you should work with a consultant as far in advance as possible.

I think it is totally asinine to wait for essay questions to be release before starting. Like anything else, you do the research and then write the report. And most of the report is unchanged from year to year.

It would benefit you to build the foundation from where you are, right now. The first step is introspection, and it's hard to do a good job with this when you have work demands and GMAT issues breathing down your neck. Most of my clients are extremely busy at work (read: consultants) and for this reason, can only commit one or two hours to this per week. They need to work gradually and at the same time, are aiming for M7 schools so apps must be top notch.

Before essay topics are released, you can work with a consultant on 1) introspection, 2) developing your core stories (leadership, problem solving, etc.) 3)clarification of career goals, 4) career goal research, 5) Why MBA essay, 6) Why You/your unique contribution, 7) fit with each school, school selection and school research....plus, you can work on the 8) common LOR questions/develop talking points - and 9)create an MBA-program ready resume.

And if that doesn't convince you - know that you will get a better share of mind from your consultant when they are less busy ie April-June. My 2 cents.

Hello Namita ,
Will do that over the weekend. Kindly let me know as to how to

Regards,
HK

Hello Namita ,
Will do that over the weekend. Kindly let me know as to how to

Regards,
HK

Wow thank you for the Valuable insights . Much needed thanks

Will bear in mind and choose one accordingly and get in touch from this month end

Regards,
HK

It's never too early to start! With time on your side, you can bolster your profile in a systematic way without being rushed.