Is my GMAT score good enough

Question

My background
GMAT 700(Q45, V40)
GPA (3.0, BS Comp Sc. from India)
Work Exp. 0ver 8 yrs ( 7 yrs US exp)
Nationality: India (US Green Card)
Average extra curricular. 
target schools, chicago, wharton and michigan. 
Do I have realistic expectation. Any sincere advice is greatly appreciated.

Hjort · Answer

Hi,

1. How was the GPA calculated?
2. What makes you stand out from other candidates? ie Why should the admissions comm admit you over other candidates with similar attributes?

Hjort

Accepted.com · Answer

Your GMAT is competitive. Your GPA is a little low. But there is more to admissions than those two stats. What have you been doing professionally? Why do you want to attend the indicated schools? 
Good luck!

roo222 · Answer

Thanks a lot for your reply.

My gpa is 7.2 on scale of 10. our school provided GPA directly. I converted it to 4 point scale and it comes out to be 2.88 so actually mine is 2.88 only that way. Sorry for some reason i thought it was 3.0. 
we didn't have A- or B+ type grades so even if u miss A grade by half mark you will get B. Also they used to follow a very strict bell curve in awarding the A grades. A will be given to less than 15 percent of class. Some teachers would give A only to 10% of class only. And on top of that I never cared too much about the grades at that time. Courses were dry and boring and some of the teachers were just incompetent and brown nosing used to help a lot in getting better grades and i was never good at that and fact is that i didn't care about it either at that time. Now i have worked for 8 yrs in industry (IT consulting and software development mostly) and know how to handle situations like that better. Can't change back the clock though. Also I can't get a class rank from the college also since they didn't maintain that detailed data.
 I didn't know that 8 yrs later i will have to repent this much. 
Is there a way i can explain all that to adcom. I am planning to apply to michigan, ucla and kellogg. 

I think i am different in that i have better interpersonnal skills and very high emotional IQ so as to speak which is generally missing in applicants with Engineering/Com sc. degrees. Also I have good general knowledge. I can talk to someone about anything ranging from differnce between Windows and Linux to Roman empire and anything inbetween. I was the GK stud in my college.
 Because of my consulting backgroud I have travelled to diff client places and worked with people of diverse backgrounds. I have developed good skills to work in diverse teams in different capacities such as team member, leader, subject matter specialist, mentor to junior developers etc. 
 In short I have a engineering background and technical experiece and hence I can understand technology very well like most of engineers but I also have very good understanding of human psychology, how social issues affect people, very good knowledge of history and the ability to analyse situations with my historical perspectives. In general I have verey good business sense. I also have a good and compassionate heart and the few times when I was given leadership roles, I never misused my powers to exploit my team members. Rather I used my knowledge and skill to create value for the team.

Also I have US Permanent Resident status so I don't need visa for the MBA program and also don't need visa to get a job later on. I am not sure if this can help me or not.
Your advise is greatly appreciated.

Hjort · Answer

Thanks for the additional information.

Your GPA is probably rather higher than the value you stated based on differences in grading standards.

It sounds like you have strong raw ingredients for the US elite and transelite schools.

Hjort

livelyjimmy · Answer

Hi ..
My GMAT score is 730 (QA 50 VA 39) AWA 4.0 IR 6 ... I got 690 in my previous attempt with AWA 5.5... Is this good enuf for ISB.. I got a work exp. of 3.25 yrs in a multinational IT firm.. please reply.. do i need to retake the GMAT for the low AWA score..

Accepted.com · Answer

Congrats on the improved  GMAT ! While I cannot guarantee that you will get accepted to ISB with this GMAT score it is a competitive score at ISB and I don't recommend you retake.

Best,
Linda

Is my GMAT score good enough

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards