Hello
Rajukiran1408Though your profile is quite diverse from other applicants, try to address the following challenges-
1.
Slightly higher age bracket. Not a deal breaker, but at the likes of IIMB it may be a disadvantage, as they prefer candidates with 5-12 years of work ex.
2.
Establishing a need of an MBA. You have grown well in 12 years and are directly managing a business and large team (as opposed to being in a technical role). With such an experience most people get on the job training or part time executive certifications sponsored by the company to get promoted further.
3.
Tying a full time MBA to your career goals. Retail is an industry that prefers years of experience more than the MBA degree (as you must have seen in your past experience). It is not a big feeder or recruiter of MBA candidates. While this may help you become diverse, but this may not have the desired impact you assume on your career. Moving into ecommerce might be possible without an MBA too, as the Ecom space is mostly hiring from top offline retailer for many senior positions.
To conclude, no doubt focus on getting a good GMAT score (in your case a 700+) should be good, but also address the challenges above in your written application.
For a more detailed discussion, you may reach out.
Best
Varun Sharma+919137133507
MBAkarma.comGMAT Score Predictorinfo@mbakarma.comRajukiran1408 wrote:
Hi, kindly review my profile and share your feedback.
Background: 12 ½ years’ of extensive experience in Retail Store Operations. Worked with retail giants in India like ITC- Wills Lifestyle, Reliance- Trends, Future group- Central & Landmark group- Lifestyle.
Work Experience: Started my retail career in 2005 as a campus recruit from Institute of Hotel Management, Hyderabad to ITC Lifestyle Retail Fashion Division. Grown from a management trainee profile to a store/business/operations manager with Brand like Wills Lifestyle, Nike, United Colors of Benetton to larger Departmental stores like Reliance Trends, Central & Lifestyle.
Have gained immense knowledge and expertise across various Retail aspects in Apparel industry during my journey so far pertaining to mall operations- tenant, facility management, new store opening, complete store operations- SOPs, merchandise management- buying, planning & allocation, marketing- ATL and BTL, visual merchandising, customer behavior and buying patterns, people management, training and development, inventory management- audits and stock checks, vendor management. Varied retail math involved in business performance and understanding like- key performance indicators, sell thru analysis of products, P & L along with store operating cost, margins, & EBITDA, Area vs Sale ratio of Departments/ Brands, etc.
Current Work: Business Manager with Lifestyle (Departmental store of Landmark group for Apparel & Fashion) since 3 years in Bangalore heading a store comprising an area of 50,000 sqft with a yearly turnover of 80 crores and leading a team of 350 team members.
Undergrad Information: Xth : 81%, XIIth : 77%, Graduation (BSc in Hotel Management from IHM Hyderabad): 60%, EPRM (Executive Program in Retail Management) from IIM- Calcutta- Online MBA with a “Good” rating.
GMAT: Preparing since 3 months & targeting beginning of Nov’18.
Targeted B-Schools: IIM-A PGPX, IIM-B EPGP.
Why MBA? post MBA goals: With a 12+ years’ of experience under my belt in Brick & Motor retail, I want to explore E-commerce and get into online business models like Amazon, Flipkart etc / join a Retail major of India in a substantial strategic role after graduating from my B- school.
Few years of exposure to pure online retail post MBA with a backup of physical retail experience in the past will definitely boost my profile to grow in the industry in the near future. Also the market share of organized retail in general and online retail in particular is growing year after year with many giants of World Retail already in India. Many major brick & motor retailers are getting into online business models as well resulting in new form of hybrid retail coming into existence. Hence I see an immense scope in this field for the next 5 to 8 years.
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17 Sep 2018, 00:14
