Profile Evaluation Request

Question

Hello,

Please find the following information to help you evaluate my profile.
Age: 24
Nationality: Indian
Gender: Male

Keen interest in Operation Management as my specialization for an MBA.

Schools I would like to apply are Columbia Business School, Haas, UCLA, Michigan Ross, NYU Stern, CMU Tepper.
I am a little concerned about my chances to get in because of my background in architecture (although I have decent exposure to Project Management and Leadership). I will be hoping that you would help and direct me so that I have a better understanding of my chances to get into the above-mentioned colleges and what you would consider as stretch schools for my profile.

1) A brief description of my full-time work experience:

I am an architect currently working in India. I will have accumulated 3 years of full-time experience in the same firm where I have managed multiple projects. My experience in the firm has helped me understand process involving the management of a project and I am inclined to understand the business part of processes involved.
I also have 1 year of Internship experience under my belt, but this year was purely the architecture part and very scarcely related to management.

2)GMAT 1: 640 - 70 Percentile (Q46 V31)
GMAT 2: 730 -96 Percentile (Q 50 V39)

3)College Info:

Bachelor of Architecture 2011-2016 (CGPA 7.1/10)
Manipal University.

4) Significant college and post-college extra-curricular activities or community service, especially leadership experience:

i. An active member of a non-profit run for educating children for the past 2.5 years. I help in organizing events for fundraising as well as recreational activities for children associated. I also take up pro-bono work for the non-profit in designing the schools.
ii. Undergraduate College Team Captain in Table tennis and represented the College.
iii. Represented the College Team in Cricket.

5) Important certifications like CFA, CPA, FSA, or CA: 
No Certification of such sorts.
(However, I am a Certified Architect under the Council of Architecture, India.)

6) My post-MBA goal:
My desired post-MBA role would be to work for a construction company as an Operation Manager where I will help in building lean and cost-efficient construction models for the firm.

Thanks for your help,
Abhimanyu

AvantiPrep · Answer

Hi  abhimanyujp ,

Thank you for your post. Here are a few observations and recommendations:

- Read this post from Souvik, one of GMAT Club's MBA Section Directors:  The Indian Male MBA Application Guide

With your current GMAT score and profile, top 10 programs like Berkeley and Columbia are going to be extremely difficult, and schools in the 10-20 are still going to be difficult. When you're applying from such a crowded and competitive demographic, you typically want to target 30 or 40 points above the average for whatever programs you're considering. The only school that fits in that category for you right now is Tepper. (And that's just to "neutralize" the GMAT... it doesn't mean you're going to get in by any stretch... you then have execute very well across all elements of your applications.)

- Read  this analysis  of the MBA admissions chances for Indian applicants to the top 50 programs in the U.S.

Within the top 20, you'll see that applicants with a 720/730 have a 5% acceptance rate (quite low). That rate more than doubles to 11% if you have 740/750 and then increases to 16% when you have a 760/770. On top of that, you will be applying from a non-traditional background (architecture), so you won't have the "built-in" business credibility that many other applicants in your situation will have. That will more of an onus on your stats. I'd encourage you to boost your score if you want to entertain the type of schools you've listed. Or if you are going to apply with a 730, you should recalibrate your school list. (I would be happy to formally assist with that if you'd like.)

- Read  this post  about some of the cornerstones of the MBA application process, and the degree to which you should be developing the specificity of your career goals and approach to programs you're interested in. You should begin to build definition around the questions I've listed below. Creating a narrative that shows how and why architecture plus an MBA leads to your goals will be critical. And it will be somewhat challenging for you given that architecture is a pretty different starting point. Operations at a construction company is at least related, so that's not a bad starting point. But you need to really develop your career goal specificity and articulate a clear, coherent, connected, and specific career vision.

What company(ies) do you want to work for? What role(s)? Where? Why? What type of projects do you hope to work on and impact do you hope to have? Within your industry, what specializations will you aim to develop or areas will you focus on? What are your long-term goals? What is your dream job? Why is that your dream job? What exactly do you hope to accomplish if you achieve it? How does who you are and what you've done to this point – plus the MBA – lead to your short-term goals? How does all of that together enable your medium- and long-term goals? What knowledge, skills, and experience do you already have that are relevant to these goals? What knowledge, skills, and experience do you lack and therefore need to acquire via the MBA? Why is now the right time?

Hope this helps. Please feel free to sign up for a Free Consultation via the link below!

Thanks,
Greg

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