INSEAD Profile Evaluation - Tools for B-School Profile Evaluation

Age- 30 years

GMAT- 700 (Q49, V36, IR-6, AWA-6)

UG- B.E. in Instrumentation and Control from NSIT, Delhi

UG %age -79.7 (2nd ranker but no document for that)

12th-85.4%

10th-89.4%

Work Experience-8.5 years

Company- Indian Oil Corporation Limited

Department- Operations

Present designation- Incharge of a plant having annual turnover of Rs. 2400 crores and supplying petroleum products to 6 districts, heading a team of 18 employees, 50 contract labours, 300 Tanker crew.

Previous roles- worked in similar plants in different roles as supplies manager, safety officer, maintenance manager, second in command in 3 different plants including present one.

Professional achievements-

1. youngest plant incharge of IOCL at present.

2. developed a new supply model for a 500 crore customer to prevent him from switching on account of enroute pilferage from tankers leading to huge losses to customer

3. brought about market realignment to save 2.2 crore annually on logistics costs in the plant

4. designed the automation system for Rail wagons for which pilot project is being undertaken at my plant and post successful commissioning will be replicated on PAN India basis.

5. undertook capitalization projects worth Rs. 33 crores as maintenance manager in previous plant and Rs. 16 crore in the capacity of plant incharge presently.

6. All India winner of a series of online quizzes conducted by our operations department on various topics covering downstream oil operations.

7. My plant awarded British International Safety award for commitment to occupational health, safety and welbeing.

8. presented techincal paper to management proposing modification in core facilities in the plant to meet future challenges.

9. Developed e-learning modules for Operations department for effective training of employees, labour etc.

International experience- Nil

Extra curricular

1. Silver medalist at one National Level Painting competitions and have significant achievements in fine arts at various levels throughout school and college life.

2. President of college's annual cultural festival

3. Organised oil conservation rallies/signature campaigns

4. Provided borewell for local villagers near my plant.

Future goals
Plan A- Management Consulting
Plan B- Operations/downstream oil & gas

Background- Rose from a very low economic status by working for 8.5 years and considering an MBA now since I have stabilised my fiancial conditions.

Already applied-ISB

Seeking suggestions for alternate colleges to apply

Please suggest suitability of my profile to Insead.

Hello ImadTurey,

Thanks for writing in.

The career progress sounds good and while the global exposure is not stellar. it will give you a talking point for sure.

Having said the above, the GMAT is on the lower side of the spectrum and for you to stand a realistic chance, a re-take is strongly recommended. Of course, while you may choose to bring out the diversity in your background suitably in your essays, essentially you will continue to fall into the conventional Indian pool and therefore the GMAT expectations will be a lot higher.

Do explain the gap in work experience through your essays; remember to focus on those few months from the viewpoint of learning. INSEAD appreciates entrepreneurial experience so you must build up on this as much as you can.

Hope this helps!

All the best!
_________________

Hello NITUNKUMAR2018,

Thank you for writing to us.

There is definitely a strong career progression, fine leadership experience, and a number of achievements to talk about. All of these add much value to your profile.

On the flip side of it, however, your GMAT is nothing stellar (considering the average GMAT of Indians with tech backgrounds applying to INSEAD) and a retake is strongly recommended. Further, INSEAD does appreciate some international or entrepreneurial experience and in the absence of the same, a spike needs to be showcased elsewhere. We suggest you take the GMAT once again and aim for a score upwards of 740. That should you give you some sort of a realistic short at INSEAD.

Hope this helps!

Good Luck!
_________________

Hi, would like an evaluation of profile strength for INSEAD

GMAT : 710, 46Q 40V

Age: 2 yrs

Undergrad: BE Mechanical 3.59/4 cgpa, Final year project with country's space agency related to rocket design, Conference paper on the design. Extracurricular activities in leading roles.

Work Experience: 2 years, majorly in oil and gas sector, Currently Team Lead Mechanical, with additional roles as HoD Procurement and Warehousing leading around 10 people. Experience involves commissioning of a plant and a takeover of another plant as a key member of Projects team of around 30 people.

Nationality: Pakistani

Languages: Urdu, English

short term goals: Switching to management consulting

Voluntary work: teaching underprivileged children at a school for free seeing that the root cause of many problems in my country is illiteracy and a lack of exposure

Thanks a lot in advance

Hello NITUNKUMAR2018

Let us break this down- While past acads look decent, the GMAT, though good, is not stellar to help you stand out in the tough competition.
Moving on to work ex- it looks interesting and different from most Indian applicants, and could be a potential strength in your application. However, unlike academics, work experience is subjective and is measured by the depth of your experiences- career progress, achievements. These seem to have potential, will further depend on how you choose to present the same. Now you do not have any international experience (that always helps at INSEAD), showcase international motivation in your work ex, interests and career goals.
Extracurricular activities look weak (except for the borewell story)- as school/college activities do not carry much weight (unless you have accomplished something spectacular)
Lastly, the career goals are too disconnected, the operations role seems more realistic and organic looking at the limited information in this post.

Best
Varun Sharma
+919137133507
MBAkarma.com
GMAT Score Predictor
info@mbakarma.com

Hi! I am planning to apply for the January 2020 intake, and would like know my chances of acceptance. Below is the brief summary of my profile:

Age: 29
Sex: Male
Nationality: Pakistani
GMAT: 650 (Q 45, V 35, IR 6)
Bachelors: Oxford brooks – First class honours (Considered 4.0)
ACCA: 65% - Completed in 1.5 Years, which at that time was an achievement. Not sure if it is the case nowadays
Languages: English (PTE 90), Urdu, Punjabi, (Arabic very basic)

Work Experience – Total 7.5 Years

1 - EY – Pakistan

Audit Junior – 1 yr
Audit Semi Senior – 1 Yr
Audit Senior – 1 Yr

Secondments

EY – Saudi Arabia
Tax accountant 1 Yr

Commercial Officer - Engor – Pakistan (Biggest listed company of Pakistan)
4 months

Team leadership – Lead teams of up to 20 people
Promotions – Every year

2 - Tech Company (Leading recruitment portal in UAE) – United Arab Emirates

Accountant – 1 yr
Senior Accountant – 5 months
Assistant Finance Manager – 2 Years

Key responsibilities:

Reporting directly to CEO, I am fully responsible of the finance function of our Dubai and UK office. Other key aspects:

• Overseeing the fund raising process of the company
• Make strategies for the business’s expansion into other countries
• Will be promoted to finance manager position in the next couple of weeks
• CEO is Insead alumni and would give excellent recommendation

Extracurricular:

Endurance obstacle races (Spartan trifecta)
Hiking
Squash and table tennis

I have not been involved in volunteer work recently. But have worked on assignments of UNICEF and several other NGO’s in the past.

Post MBA motivation -

Want to work in the finance function of a tech giant before setting up my own company within next 5 years.

Hello,
Could someone please help evaluate my profile and suggest what I can improve on before I submit my application.
Planning to apply for
R4 Sep2019 intake
Or
R1 Jan 2020 intake
Education: Master’s in Computer Aided Manufacturing (branch of Mechanical Engineering), NIT Warangal, 8.85
Bachelor’s in Mechanical Engineer - Osmania University, India 74.5%
Current Role: Lead Engineer
Work Ex: total of 6 years with General Electric.
1. 4 years in Switch gear industry:
• Owned the design and testing of the new product
• Travelled to the manufacturing facility in Mexico to set-up manufacturing line for the new product. Educate the teams on the assembly steps and procedures
• New product launched in 2016 generated $4M annually and increased GE’s market share by 3 points
2. 2 years in GE Aviation (present role):
• Switched industries from Switch gear to Aviation and profile from Product Design to Product + Digital
• Identified issues with the engine services shop in South Asia. As a program lead, led the team to build a digital platform that will aid the shop in taking informed decision based on data rather than perceptions. This is helping the shop save around $1M annually.
• Working with leadership on scaling this platform to other global shops.
• Filed 2 patents & 1 trade secret. 4 more patents in pipeline to be filed
Extracurricular:
Nothing standing out but I have represented my university for volleyball.

Post MBA Goals:
I am presently working on the technical aspects of project management and would like to learn more about the financial aspects such as learning how to read P&L statements, how mergers & acquisitions work. I feel learning these through an MBA, which has a diverse student group, will bring in another dimension to the learning experience.
GMAT: 640(45Q+34V), 5.0 – AWA, 7-IR
Thank You in advance for your perusal of my profile.

Kind Regards

Sent from my SM-A710F using GMAT Club Forum mobile app

Hi All,
Would appreciate a profile evaluation. Targeting R1 next year.

Background and nationality: Indian Female

Undergrad Information: B.Tech - ECE. Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University(MSIT). CGPA: 8.9(one of the toppers of my stream)

GMAT: 760

Work experience and leadership : 4.5 years at present in a techno-functional role. Working as a Senior Software Engineer in Infosys Ltd serving domestic and international banks. Have worked with private, public sector and international banks, all at client site. Currently heading all clients in Africa and Sri Lanka region (about 2 years of international work ex). Regarded as a domain expert and have worked as a team lead in multiple project implementations.

Awards: Top Performer in the Entry Level Training, Most Promising Joinee Award, Listed as Infosys Pride Factor, Awarded by multiple clients for contribution to the project.
Was the head of Self-Governance Team in Infosys for a year.

Community and others : Associated with Leaders for Tomorrow and part of their project – Igniting Young Minds to provide life skills to the disadvantaged; Member of Help Age India in higher secondary for care of disadvantaged elderly.
Recently Joined Toastmasters. Awarded as Best Table Topic Speaker in the guest meeting. Event Head of Technical Fest in college ensuring a footfall of more than 2500 people in the event. Member of the organization committee of Infosys Finacle Fever’15.

Post MBA goals: Investment Banking, Consulting.

Thank you for your help.

Hi aroraishita02,

thank you for sharing your profile.

Overall, you have good elements to be a serious candidate for INSEAD.

Just a few considerations.

In order to set yourself apart from other Indians from tech, make sure to stress your experience leading teams and how you have impacted the business (either your company's or your client's).

Also, in your application, it is very important that you highlight your international experiences and show that you are able to adapt easily to other cultures and work in multicultural teams.

I would recommend you also to give it some more thought to your career goals, as IB and Consulting are quite different. I would probably go with Consulting, given that your current skillset is probably easier to leverage in consulting than in IB.

I hope this helps.

Thank you very much.

Warm regards
Alex
_________________

Hi Saisaripella,

thank you for sharing your profile.

First of all, I strongly recommend you to not apply in R4 for the Sep 19 Intake.

But in any case, your 640 GMAT score will put you in a serious disadvantage in whichever round and intake you apply. I strongly recommend you a retake and get at least 720-730.

Also, I'm still unclear as to your career goals. I feel you told us what you would like to learn during your MBA, but not your career goals. Please, think about your target industry, function and geography post-MBA (both short and long-term).

I hope this helps.

Thank you very much.

Warm regards
Alex
_________________

I am planning to apply for the Jan 2020 Intake. Appreciate if you can evaluate my profile.

Indian - Male - 27 years
GMAT - 740 (V40, Q50)
Undergrad - B.Tech Chemical Engineering from one of the top 3 National Institute of Technology (NIT) (Top 15 Engineering College in India)

Professional Experience: (Total - 5.5 years at Matriculation)

First Job - Converted internship to a full time role at Reliance Industries, India's largest publicly traded company by market capitalization. Worked with the production data analytics team there. Gained interest and experience in data analytics.

Second Job - Joined a Big-Data startup in the Ad-Tech industry as analyst. Promoted to Manager within eight months. Was responsible for marketing performance delivery for and revenue from all the clients in South East Asia and Australia- New Zealand Geographies. Mentored and managed a team of 3 associates. Responsible for $1M of quarterly revenue.
Was chosen one among 5 managers to work with a small team to develop a new SaaS Tech Product from scratch. Scaled the new product from 0 to $1M Revenue and team from 1 to 6 product analysts and account managers. Worked mainly with the product strategy team at the end stages of my stint here. Traveled to Dubai and Malaysia for work but wasn't there for more than a month at a time.
- Won two STAR Performer of the quarter awards.
- Won one SPOT Award for outstanding performance.

Current Job - Core team member (Founding Team) of an early stage startup in the Ad Tech industry. Heading product and business operations. Scaled the business from $100K - $1.1M within eight months.

Extra Curricular Activities and Positions of Responsibilities Held:
- Vice-Captain of College Cricket team
- Additional Secretary - Innovation and Entrepreneurship Club at College.
- Taught Mathematics and Physics to underprivileged children for six months (Weekends).
- Took a month's Sabbatical from Work after my second job and went to my native village. Helped the farmers and students build a common platform to help learn from each other.

Post MBA Goals:
Short Term - Work as a Product Manager in a Tech (E-commerce, Internet) Firm and help build Products and Businesses.
Long Term - Build a new tech company.


Question:
Heard INSEAD looks specifically for International Exposure. While I have significant experience of working with top global brands in E-Commerce and Banking Industries, I have never lived in a country other than India. How to undermine this?

Hi sushforgmat,

thank you for sharing your profile.

Overall, your profile is quite strong. I particularly like your career progression and professional achievements.

What INSEAD looks for is International Motivation. Of course, one of the best ways to show your international motivation is through your international exposure. Although somewhat short, your travels to Dubai and Malaysia will help, so make sure to leverage these well in your application.

Also, you could show international motivation in other ways: e.g. exposure and adaptability to work in multi-cultural teams, interest for cultures other than your own, global career goals, fluency in foreign languages, international trips for leisure, etc...

You'll be competing against lots of Indians with +740 GMAT scores and several years living in different countries, but if you're able to articulate well your international motivation then you could be a serious competitor in the Indian applicant pool.

I hope this helps.

Good luck!
Alex
_________________

ARLeeConsulting

Alex, Thanks for sharing your thoughts on my profile. I will try and see how I can present my International motivation.

MBAkarma ExpertsGlobal. Any thoughts from your side?

hello sushforgmat

While Alex has answered the 'International Motivation' part pretty comprehensively, and I agree with him that you seem to have a good shot at INSEAD from the data points provided (You will still need to present your case strongly via the written application), I'd add the following pointers-

1. The extracurricular activities seem more like a laundry list right now, and showcase less depth/quality. School/university activities usually carry less weight, unless you have achieved something spectacular. A good extracurricular must have had long term/serious commitment and a positive impact on your life/someone else's life.
2. Career goals need to be tied with why studying at INSEAD is the most logical step.
3. If you can focus on your cross-cultural experiences and international motivation in future goals- you will benefit.
From here it is all about tying your Academic background, professional experience, diversity factors and career goals into one seamless narrative that presents how INSEAD is the right place for you to be in the short term.

Best
Varun Sharma
+919137133507
MBAkarma.com
GMAT Score Predictor
info@mbakarma.com

Greetings all.

Hi zoomer,

thank you for sharing your profile.

You have very positive things going on in your profile that will be of the interest of INSEAD (and Kellogg).

However, let me focus on the main areas of concern.

As you may know, with 80% of INSEAD's class ranging from 26 to 32 years old, your age is perhaps the biggest vulnerability in your profile (I'm assuming 34 is your current age, and not your age at matriculation). It's not that your age will automatically disqualify you, but it means that INSEAD will expect more from you in terms of career progression when compared to younger candidates. You are definitely quite accomplished, so make sure to leverage this and present yourself as someone who is senior, and yet, needs an MBA precisely now.

Although you have been in multiple international assignments, you'll need to show that you are very adaptable to working in multi-cultural teams and that you are curious about cultures other than your own. As you know, speaking several languages also helps in this regard. Which languages do you speak and what's your fluency level?

Your extra-curriculars are a bit on the weak side. However, what INSEAD looks for is candidates with interesting lives in and outside of work. Therefore, in your application, try to talk about all those interests and hobbies you're passionate about and that can help you stand out from the rest of applicants.

I hope this helps. I wish you the best of luck.

Thank you very much.

Warm regards
Alex
_________________

Hello all!

Recent INSEAD graduate here and will be happy to help do any deep dive free profile evaluations over the phone if anyone is keen! Details below.

Paying it forward
Abhinay

<deleted>

Hello MadhaviRS

I don't think that your age will be a major concern.
There are some positives in your profile as well- diversity due to industry/work experience for instance. But don't rest on that- If I were you, in the written application, I'd focus on showcasing the depth of this experience- namely career progress and accomplishments.
No need to convert the GPA really- the GMAT will matter too, with missing information on actual or expected score, the feedback is incomplete.
Extracurricular look interesting too. Just like work ex, this is a qualitative aspect and will require you to talk about achievements and impact.
Lastly, career goals- the most important piece of the admissions puzzle is actually missing. While on a personal level, I understand that an MBA will add to your profile, but to what end? What are your specific goals? Not very clear from the current post.

You may want to read here on what factors work in a profile and here to add to your research on career goals.

Best
Varun Sharma
+919137133507
Free Profile Review
MBAkarma.com
GMAT Score Predictor
info@mbakarma.com