Hi, and thanks for writing! Since you've provided a lot of valuable information, it may work best if we discuss over the phone. If you haven't yet had a free consultation with
mbaMission, you can sign up for one with me here:
https://www.mbamission.com/consult/mba-admissions/ During the half-hour conversation, we'll go through your profile and career goals and talk about which target schools may work best for you. Thank you, and I look forward to hearing from you!
lauren7158 wrote:
Demographics:
28-year-old, Asian American, Female.
Education:
- Big state school, Statistics major, GPA: 3.6 (Dean's list all semesters but I have 3 withdrawals; one quant elective course and two business electives).
- Undergraduate researcher at the business school (received a scholarship for the research program);
- Teaching assistant.
GMAT or GRE:
GMAT overall 740: (Q48, V44)
Work Experience:
Approximately 2 years now, will be 3.5 years at matriculation if I apply this year. Or 4.5 years at matriculation if I apply next year(2022).
I'm a data analytics consultant at a global consulting firm. At first, I started as an analyst in the financial services segment in LA and worked there for about 1.2 years. Then, I switched to my current team, which is data analytics, and also in a different office outside the U.S.(Singapore). It's been about 10 months since I joined my current team and I just got a promotion in this new team. I worked really hard for this promotion because I changed the practice team from Finance to Data Analytics and also 2020 was a very tough year due to COVID-19. I still have a very good relationship with my old team. I decided to switch the team only because I was really interested in Data Science and found it very promising.
Extracurriculars:
Undergraduate:
- A member of the Dean's Student Advisory Council.
- Co-chair of a student-led international conference between the U.S. and South Korea. It's a prestigious international conference program between the two countries, endorsed by Hillary Clinton(Secretary of State at that time) and MB Lee (President of South Korea at that time). One of the host universities of this program was Wharton.
- Received a Best Roundtable Presentation Award from Korea Economic Institute of America(KEI) in D.C. for a start-up business idea called Facile(Online commerce application).
- An eboard member of co-ed business fraternity
Post-graduation:
- Volunteering for women from low-income households, providing financial literacy education and career advice.
- An active member of diversity & inclusion group within the company.
Post-MBA goals:
I wish to continue to work in consulting(hopefully MBB) after graduation. I'm planning to come back to Singapore upon graduation and it seems like MBA brand name really matters in the APAC consulting industry, especially if you want to move forward after a certain level.
Target Schools:
Wharton (Reach), MIT, Columbia, Kellogg, Booth, Yale SOM, Hass, Stern, (Maybe INSEAD)
I'm interested in all M7 schools but I think HBS and Stanford are completely out of my league (Not an IVY undergrad and most importantly my age).
Any specific questions you would like answered by our team:
1) I'm concerned about my age and the total years of work experience I have. I have two years of gap between high school and the first year in college due to a personal matter(medical issue).
Also, I ended up staying an extra year in college because I switched my major right before my junior year. That's why I only have 2+ years of work experience at 28. This really concerns me because if I apply for MBA programs in 2022, I'd be 30 at matriculation but only have 4.5 years of WE. I know the odds of getting into top programs go down dramatically if you are 30+ and what's even worse for me is other older applicants will at least have way more years of experience than I do. I just started college late compared to my peers but I believe I did well both academically and socially in college and don't have any gap between my college graduation and employment. Plus, I believe I'm doing well at work too based on the promotion I got and I'm pretty confident that I can get very strong recommendations from my bosses. Do you think this factor (age/WE) will be a huge minus when I apply for programs, especially for the top schools? Do you think it's still worth trying or am I aiming too high?
2) When do you think is a better time to apply? Would it be better to apply this year (age 29, 3.5 years of WE at matriculation) or next year (age 30, 4.5 years of WE at matriculation). If I apply next year (2022), I will try to get another promotion in March 2022 so I will have two promotions in total. But I can't be sure because the whole company is having a tough year because of COVID. It's not going to be easy to get another promotion next year but it's not completely impossible.
3) I would really appreciate an overall assessment of my profile including my GPA, GMAT score, etc. What can I do to improve my profile?
Thank you so much for you time.