Profile Evaluation Request from Someone Working in the Family Business

Thank you for your candidate evaluation request! You certainly have some differentiating aspects of your profile -- sustainability-oriented ambitions coupled with real energy sector experience, family business stories with real financial impact, a challenging major and decent GPA from a top global school. Your current GMAT of 670 will probably limit you a bit if you can't raise it to 720+ as you are thinking. The good news is that at 26 you are about average age for the US schools and young for INSEAD so if you wait a year to apply (to give you time to hopefully earn a titular promotion at work and a higher GMAT score), you won't be "too old" to go for it next year.

I probably don't need to tell you that the schools you mentioned are exceptionally competitive. Wharton, NYU, Stern, MIT and Sloan are comprised of about 40% international students. In general, that raises the bar for international students vs. US students unless you are from a seriously underrepresented country. (Lebanon is not an under-represented country. Still, your demographic is not as competitive as India, China or Bangladesh.) Your GMAT really matters to differentiate you from the other male engineers who will be applying from the Middle East energy sector (as you might imagine, most middle east applicants come from the energy sector, through you do have a leg up, I think, since you are coming from a family business if you pitch it the right way). With a 720+ GMAT, you will be competitive at the schools you mention, through of course nobody can guarantee or predict your chance of success.

If you aren't able to raise your GMAT score (and, as an aside, I believe you can and will -- Double E from American U of Beirut!!), you should check out some other schools like Notre Dame, Michigan State, UT McCombs (great for energy), Indiana Kelly, Minnesota Carlson. In general, you want to meet or exceed the GMAT score and GPA averages to have a good shot a school. There's a *tiny* bit more give on GPA if you go to a school that's internationally renowned or study something that's generally considered very difficult (both are true in your case).

A special note on family business -- make sure that you don't come across as too entitled in your essays and be sure that you don’t spend too much essay real estate talking about the family business patriarch/matriarch. Remember, these essays are supposed to be about YOU. Also, all the schools you mentioned have clubs EXPRESSLY dedicated to family business. The most famous among them is probably Wharton’sFamily Business Alliance. Several of these have family business concentrations and treks that you can be a part of. Make sure to research these resources (Fam Biz classes, professors, alums, companies) so that you can thoughtfully reference them when answering the "why XYZ school" questions.

After a top GMAT score, you'll need to make sure that your strategic positioning is solid. There will be A LOT of Middle Eastern engineers coming out of energy who want to be more sustainability-oriented in the future (this is a very common applicant these days and if you spend some time reading candidate eval requests on the website you'll see how over-represented that goal is among your geographic and professional demographic). What differentiates you, at first blush anyway, is your work experience with your family business, that has led you to be able to functionally cross-train and drive impact beyond the narrow silos that confine most people at corporate jobs at 26 and your cool athletic experience. If you'd like to have a free consultation with an admissions consultants about strategic positioning in your essays or school choice, feel free to sign up here: https://admissionado.com/free-consultat ... sultation/