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The mbaMission Blog

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GMAT Impact: Help! The Deadline Is Approaching and I Do Not Have My Sc [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   28 Jun 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: GMAT Impact: Help! The Deadline Is Approaching and I Do Not Have My Score!
With regard to the GMAT, raw intellectual horsepower helps, but it is not everything. In this blog series, Manhattan Prep’s Stacey Koprince teaches you how to perform at your best on test day by using some common sense.

It is that time of year again—business schools are announcing their application deadlines, and I am hearing from candidates who do not yet have the score they want. What to do?

First, do a little research. What kinds of scores are posted for the schools to which you plan to apply? Check their Web sites; most will publish scores for admitted students. If you cannot find scores for a certain program, you can try checking various MBA ranking reports (though many require you to buy the information). How far are you from the goal?

Next, consult the experts. First, talk to an admissions consultant (hint, hint, mbaMission) to gain help in deciding how far you really need to go with the GMAT. The general rule is that you would like to be at or above the average to be competitive for a certain school, but you may need to push higher (or you might get away with a lower score), depending on other aspects of your application profile. Be sure to discuss multiple scenarios: if I apply first round, can I get away with a slightly lower GMAT score? If I wait to apply second round, is the possibility of a higher GMAT score likely to make much of a difference? (Disclaimer: Of course, nobody can tell you whether you will definitely get into any particular school, just as nobody can tell you that taking the test again will definitely net you a higher score. As always, you take your chances!)

When you have an idea of your “ideal” goal score, talk to some GMAT experts to see whether your desired goal score and your time frame are reasonable, given your starting point. If someone tells me that she just scored a 600 and wants a 720 in 30 days, that person has an “expectation adjustment” conversation in her near future, because not many people would be able to raise their score by 120 points (particularly to such a high final score) in only one month.

Next, think about what resources would help you to learn better than you have in the past. Online forums? A friend who has already taken the test? A private tutor? A mix of all three? (I am not suggesting a course here, because I am assuming that we are talking about six weeks or fewer, in which case—if you are going to spend money—you might as well spend it on a tutor. That will give you much more targeted and customized help, which is crucial in such a short time frame. If you have more time, though, add “a course?” to the list of possibilities.)

You may have to make a tough choice between going for your goal score while postponing your application and lowering your goal score while sticking to your application time frame. Either way, take advantage of the expert advice out there to help you with this decision.

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Monday Morning Essay Tip: Make It Personal [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   29 Jun 2015, 08:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Monday Morning Essay Tip: Make It Personal
Business school candidates often fixate on using professional and community-based stories in their MBA application essays. As a result, many forget or neglect to even consider personal stories as possible differentiators. Because so many candidates have similar professional experiences, their personal dimensions should be highlighted whenever possible—considering that few lives are truly similar. Stories of commitment to oneself or others can have a strong emotional impact on an admissions committee and can help distinguish you from other applicants.

What types of experiences should you discuss? This question has no easy answer. For personal stories to work in your application essays, they need to be truly distinct. An example of a unique personal story might be that of an individual who helped his/her cousin, who was adopted at birth, relocate his/her birth mother; another might be one of an individual who took a six-month leave of absence to take his/her disabled grandmother on a tour of her home country. Clearly, not everyone has these exact experiences, but each of us has interesting anecdotes we can share about ourselves. These are the kinds of stories that can be showcased in your essays with a little bit of thought and creativity.

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MBA Career Advice: Individual Contributions [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   30 Jun 2015, 07:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: MBA Career Advice: Individual Contributions
In this weekly series, “MBA Career Advice,” our friends at MBA Career Coaches will be dispensing invaluable advice to help you actively manage your career. Topics include building your network, learning from mistakes and setbacks, perfecting your written communication, and mastering even the toughest interviews. For more information or to sign up for a free career consultation, visit www.mbacareercoaches.com.

We have been talking about three tests to apply to your resume to ensure that each bullet showcases your accomplishments and how you excelled. The Cause and Effect Test requires you to show not just the results you produced, but also the actions you took that led to those results. Let’s explore some of the reasons bullets fail the Cause and Effect Test.

Cause and Effect Test Fail:

  • Implemented cost optimization program for a major CPG company, successfully reducing costs by $8M in their raw material sourcing
If your bullet is not focused on your individual contribution, it will fail the Cause and Effect Test. This candidate has highlighted the result of the project in this bullet – the outcome of the entire team’s efforts– not the result of her individual work. This makes it impossible for the reader to understand what she did and how it translated into impact. So even when the overall result was a team effort, you need to highlight your specific contribution and how it helped lead to the outcome.

Here is another phrasing of this bullet that would fail the Cause and Effect Test.

Cause and Effect Test Fail:

  • Reduced client costs by $8M by modeling alternative sourcing scenarios
That is because this bullet is overreaching. It is clear this candidate did not single-handedly produce the result of $8M in cost reduction because we all know that modeling does not itself directly reduce costs. That is nonetheless what the bullet implies. She was one component of a process involving many others that led to that result. An easy fix for this problem is to start the bullet not with the result, but with the action, and then connect it to the result.

Cause and Effect Test Fail:

  • Modeled alternative sourcing scenarios, leading to client cost reduction of $8M
But this bullet still fails the Cause and Effect test because there is a link missing. How did we get from modeling to cost reduction? The bullet needs to draw a logical connection from actions all the way to results.

Cause and Effect Test Pass:

  • Modeled alternative sourcing scenarios and developed a strategic recommendation for CPG client that led to a cost optimization program which reduced client sourcing costs by $8M
To pass the Cause and Effect Test, your bullets need to reveal your individual contribution and then clearly relate that to the ultimate result, while using language that acknowledges when that the outcome was not due to your single-handed efforts.

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Mission Admission: Taking the GMAT Again [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   30 Jun 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Mission Admission: Taking the GMAT Again
Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday.

When candidates ask us whether they should take the GMAT again, our instinct is always to reply with this key question: “Do you think you can do better?” If the individual does indeed believe that he/she can improve, the next question we get is inevitably “What do the business schools think of multiple scores?”

Fortunately, most MBA programs do not frown on candidates taking the GMAT more than once. Many applicants feel that they have to be “perfect” the first time and that any subsequent test they take—particularly if they receive a lower score—might be damaging to their candidacy. This is not the case. In fact, Dartmouth Tuck, for one, anticipates that applicants will take the exam more than once and openly states its willingness to “consider your highest quantitative and highest verbal scores,” if they occur on separate tests. Meanwhile, other programs have been known to call candidates and tell them that if they can increase their GMAT scores, they will be offered admission.

From an admissions perspective, accepting a candidate’s highest GMAT scores is in an MBA program’s best interest, because doing so will raise the school’s GMAT average, which is then reported to rankings bodies (Bloomberg Businessweek, U.S. News & World Report, etc.) and could positively influence the school’s position in these surveys. So, do not be afraid to take the test two or even three times. It can only help.

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Professor Profiles: Lubos Pastor, University of Chicago Booth School o [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   01 Jul 2015, 07:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Professor Profiles: Lubos Pastor, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
Many MBA applicants feel that they are purchasing a brand when they choose an MBA program, but the educational experience you will have is what is crucial to your future, and no one will affect your education more than your professors. Each Wednesday, we profile a standout professor as identified by students. Today, we focus on Lubos Pastor from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.



Still relatively young, Lubos Pastor has already received considerable recognition for his research on the stock market and asset management and is featured among “The Best 40 B-School Profs Under the Age of 40” by Poets & Quants. Pastor’s work has been influential, earning him such high-profile accolades as the NASDAQ Award, the Goldman Sachs Asset Management Prize, and the Barclays Global Investors Prize, as well as the McKinsey Award for Excellence and Teaching, and two of Chicago Booth’s own Faculty Excellence Awards for MBA Teaching. One student quoted in the Poets & Quants article said that “his witty style elevates classroom conversations and facilitates retention of core concepts.”

For more information about Chicago Booth and 15 other top-ranked business schools, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

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University of Pennsylvania Wharton School Essay Analysis, 2015–2016 [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   01 Jul 2015, 07:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: University of Pennsylvania Wharton School Essay Analysis, 2015–2016
The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania must have been pleased with the submissions it received in response to its essay questions last year, because the school’s admissions committee is back with the exact same pair of prompts this season. Confusing matters slightly, Wharton also gives you an opportunity to write an “optional essay” of 400 words as well as to discuss “extenuating circumstances” in 250 words. We distinguish between these two essays in our analysis, which follows…

Wharton School Essay 1: What do you hope to gain both personally and professionally from the Wharton MBA? (500 words maximum)

In many ways, this prompt is asking for a typical MBA personal statement. In a mere 500 words, you must discuss your goals, giving very brief context for why they are realistic for you. You will then need to reveal how you will engage with Wharton’s resources in pursuit of these goals, by showing that you truly understand what the school offers and that you have a well-thought-out game plan for immersing yourself in the Wharton experience. You will need to familiarize yourself with the school’s various resources and pinpoint those that truly pertain to you and the direction in which you hope to go—definitely do not just present a list of classes you think sound interesting.

Wharton adds a slight twist to this essay by asking you to discuss personal growth as well. This request might perplex you, but before you get too bewildered, take a step back and ask yourself what personal areas you genuinely need to develop. Maybe you need to challenge yourself to become a better public speaker, so you look forward to debating ideas in the classroom and as part of your learning team—not to mention pushing yourself out of your comfort zone by taking a role in the Wharton Follies. Do not worry about finding the “right” answer for what or how you want to develop personally—no such answer exists!—but focus instead on demonstrating self-awareness and showing that you truly grasp how Wharton in particular will best serve your personal needs.

Because personal statements are generally similar from one application to the next, we have produced the mbaMission Personal Statement Guide, which helps applicants write this style of essay for any school. We offer this guide to candidates free of charge. Please feel free to download your copy today.

And for a thorough exploration of Wharton’s academic program/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment, and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Optional Essay: Please use the space below to highlight any additional information that you would like the Admissions Committee to know about your candidacy. (400 words maximum)

As we noted in our introduction, we feel that this is not a prompt for a typical optional essay, in which you would discuss a problem area (e.g., a poor grade, a low GMAT score, an employment gap), but is instead an opportunity to discuss aspects of your candidacy/profile that you have not yet been able to explore or include in your application—which, in Wharton’s case, is basically the greater part of your entire personal story. We have joked that this is actually a “non-optional optional essay,” because forgoing a chance to flesh out and add color to your application by not writing it simply would not make sense (or be prudent). Interestingly, Harvard Business School noted this year that not a single one of its applicants failed to submit an optional essay last year. We would be curious to know whether Wharton saw similar results with its “optional” essay prompt last season—if the school offered such stats, we imagine that the number would also be miniscule.

As for what to write about, you could use this essay to showcase a single accomplishment, highlight a theme (thereby unifying several accomplishments), discuss a formative moment in your life, identify a time when your personal philosophy was challenged and changed—and probably countless other options. Just remember, you are trying to distinguish yourself from thousands of other eager candidates. To do this, you must own your story, and the best way to do this is to tell it, as it happened, in your voice.

Even though this is a “non-optional” essay, you should still be cognizant—and respectful—of the admissions committee’s time. In short, you need to write something that is truly worthwhile and that clearly reveals that you made good use of this opportunity to provide further insight into your candidacy. You cannot merely copy and paste an essay you wrote for a different school into this space. The information you provide needs to be very obviously crucial to understanding who you are as a person, not just a recounting of something particular you have achieved.

Additional Question for Reapplicants: All reapplicants to Wharton are required to complete this essay. Explain how you have reflected on the previous decision about your application, and discuss any updates to your candidacy (e.g., changes in your professional life, additional coursework, extracurricular/volunteer engagements). (250 words)

Whether you have improved your academic record, received a promotion, begun a new and exciting project, increased your community involvement, or taken on some sort of personal challenge, the key to success with this essay is conveying a very deliberate path of achievement. Wharton wants to know that you have been actively striving to improve yourself and your profile, and that you have seized opportunities during the previous year to do so, because a Wharton MBA is vital to you. The responses to this essay question will vary greatly from one candidate to the next, because each person’s needs and experiences differ. We are more than happy to provide one-on-one assistance with this highly personal essay to ensure that your efforts over the past year are presented in the best light possible.

All applicants, including reapplicants, can also use this section to address any extenuating circumstances. (250 words)

This is the true optional essay! Here is your opportunity—if needed—to address any lingering questions that an admissions officer might have about your candidacy, such as a poor grade or overall GPA, a low GMAT score, a gap in your work experience, etc. In our mbaMission Optional Statement Guide, available through our online store, we offer detailed advice on when and how to take advantage of the optional essay (including multiple sample essays) to help you mitigate any problem areas in your profile.

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Diamonds in the Rough: Luxury Brand Marketing at the GCU British Schoo [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   02 Jul 2015, 07:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Diamonds in the Rough: Luxury Brand Marketing at the GCU British School of Fashion
In the fall of 2013, Scotland’s Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU)—known as a leader in fashion education since the 19th century—inaugurated a new fashion business school in London and soon after opened a satellite campus in New York City. Rather than focusing on the design aspect of fashion, however, the GCU British School of Fashion instead aims to offer a specialized business education with applications to the fashion industry, as the school’s director, Christopher Moore, explained in a FashionUnited article at the time the new campuses were being revealed: “The remit of the School is clear: we are about the business of fashion. While there are other great international design schools, we are quite different. Our aim is to be a leading School for the business of fashion.”

The British School of Fashion’s MBA in Luxury Brand Marketing program aims to impart industry tools and skills related to such topics as consumer behavior, globalization, and strategic management. The school also professes a commitment to social responsibility, sustainability, and fair trade as part of its core values. The MBA curriculum consists of eight core modules. With support from a number of British fashion brands, including Marks & Spencer, House of Fraser, AllSaints, and the Arcadia Group, the school’s faculty also features a team of honorary professors and fashion industry leaders. Moore told the BBC, “Over the past decade, there has been a significant professionalization of the fashion sector, and there is now a need for high-quality fashion business graduates.”

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Beyond the MBA Classroom: Competing in the ISB Super League [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   02 Jul 2015, 09:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Beyond the MBA Classroom: Competing in the ISB Super League
When you select an MBA program, you are not just choosing your learning environment but are also committing to becoming part of a community. Each Thursday, we offer a window into life “beyond the MBA classroom” at a top business school.



A unique institution taking hold at the Indian School of Business (ISB) is the ISB Super League, or ISL. Launched in 2010, the ISL pits teams of ISB students against one another in head-to-head intramural combat in ten different sports—including cricket, soccer, Frisbee, basketball, and water polo—over the course of several months. In 2015, former Indian cricket team captain Bishan Singh Bedi inaugurated the event, while in 2012, Beijing Olympics gold medalist Abhinav Bindra visited campus to kick off the season and even participated in a student volleyball game. Each year, the ISL franchises are selected via a live fantasy auction in which students bid for teams and players using real money. The players for each team are then “sold” in a live auction using virtual currency. The winning team takes home 60% of the money accrued from the bids, the second- and third-place teams split 35% of the funds, and the remaining 5% covers tournament organization costs.

For in-depth descriptions of social and community activities at the ISB and 15 other top MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

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Friday Factoid: Sustainability at UCLA Anderson [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   03 Jul 2015, 07:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Friday Factoid: Sustainability at UCLA Anderson
Applicants to the UCLA Anderson School of Management may be well aware of the school’s strengths in media and real estate, but they might be surprised to learn that Anderson also offers a cutting-edge multidisciplinary program for students interested in environmental sustainability. The school’s Leaders in Sustainability (LiS) Program is a certificate program that allows Anderson students to take courses at different graduate schools within the university network, thereby offering them opportunities to address issues of environmental sustainability in an interdisciplinary manner. Students must apply to the program, which typically has more than 100 participants from graduate programs across the university.



Students in the LiS program must take four specified classes, including the LiS core course “Environmental Science and Engineering” and three sustainability-related courses—one of which must be taught outside the students’ primary graduate school. In total, the greater university offers more than 50 sustainability-related courses that Anderson students may choose from, ranging from “Green Energy and Entrepreneurship” to “Management in Public and Private Nonprofit Sectors” to even “Water Law.” In addition to completing the program’s required four courses, LiS students must complete a project related to sustainability and may do so individually or as part of a team with students from at least two other graduate schools within the university.

For a thorough exploration of what UCLA Anderson and 15 other top business schools have to offer, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

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Monday Morning Essay Tip: Personal, but Not Too Personal [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   06 Jul 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Monday Morning Essay Tip: Personal, but Not Too Personal
Last week’s essay tip focused on how important thoroughly exploring and accessing your personal stories is when writing your business school application essays. Of course, having too much of a good thing is always a risk as well—admissions committees can be put off by candidates who go too far and become too personal.

Some stories are particularly challenging for admissions committees. For example, we have strongly discouraged candidates from writing about divorce as a moment of failure. If an individual were to take responsibility in an essay for a failed marriage, he/she would likely end up revealing intensely personal issues, rather than portraying him-/herself as having learned from a constructive professional or personal challenge.

Always keep in mind that in many ways, the admissions committee is meeting you for the first time via your application. So, a simple way to judge whether you are being too personal in your materials is to ask yourself, “Would I be uncomfortable if, immediately upon meeting someone, he/she were to share this sort of information with me?” If your answer is “yes,” you should most likely consider changing your topic.

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Dartmouth College Tuck Essay Analysis, 2015–2016 [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   06 Jul 2015, 09:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Dartmouth College Tuck Essay Analysis, 2015–2016
The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College’s essay questions are remarkably straightforward this application season—no curve balls here. You must submit a professional essay explaining your need for an MBA, or more specifically, a Tuck MBA. Then, you must write a leadership experience essay that highlights an instance when you shone. Thereafter, you can craft an optional essay to mitigate any weaknesses in your candidacy, should any exist. With a workable limit of 500 words for each essay, Tuck seems to have created a rather applicant-friendly set of questions. Our analysis of the individual prompts follows…



Tuck Essay 1: What are your short- and long-term goals? Why do you need an MBA to achieve those goals? Why are you interested in Tuck specifically?

Because personal statements are similar from one application to the next, we have produced the mbaMission Personal Statement Guide, which helps applicants write this style of essay for any school. We offer this guide to candidates free of charge. Please feel free to download your copy today.

For a thorough exploration of Dartmouth Tuck’s academic program, merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment, and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to the Tuck School of Business.

Tuck Essay 2: Tell us about your most meaningful leadership experience and what role you played. How will that experience contribute to the learning environment at Tuck?

“Meaningful” is the key word in this essay question. Tuck is not necessarily asking you to share your greatest triumph, but rather your most meaningful experience. For some applicants, the two may be one and the same, but this will not necessarily be the case for all candidates. Therefore, you should think carefully about your boldest achievements as a leader and for each one, consider not just the experience itself, but also the values you represented therein. Tuck is not asking simply for a narrative that shows you have experienced some sort of achievement; the admissions committee needs to know that the incident you have chosen to showcase held some personal value for you.

We suggest that you forego any kind of general introduction and launch into your story right away, immediately placing your reader in the middle of the action. From there, let the narrative unfold naturally, making sure that your actions are very clearly explained and that your anecdote involves an obvious conflict that you either resolved on your own or played a definitive role in resolving. You must then explicitly address why this experience was meaningful to you in a way that is neither trite nor clichéd—and that does not come across like a throwaway statement. In short, writing, “This leadership experience was meaningful to me because I challenged myself and was ultimately successful!” would not work. You must demonstrate self-awareness, and the “meaningful” aspect of the experience must be the clear and logical conclusion of your narrative, yet it must also be a thoughtful exploration of that logical conclusion.

A thoughtful example might be something like this: “Speaking out against our existing bonus plan was clearly risky, because any change in compensation structure risks upsetting the apple cart. I was surprised to find that it galvanized my team, but I also knew that our new structure had to be transparent and fair to work. By giving my team ownership of the design of the new bonus criteria and acting as an approval mechanism, I was able to not only get the best results—our sales clearly took off—but also push myself into a place where I was far more hands-off than ever before. I know that my management style is now different, because I have a new tool to deploy when appropriate.” In this fictitious reflection, the writer explores his motivation and learnings, rather than simply reiterating his essay’s thesis.

Of course, you absolutely must not forget or fail to respond to the second half of the school’s essay prompt: the part about how this experience will enable you to contribute to/at Tuck. To most effectively do so, you must first profoundly understand what Tuck is all about. Again, a basic statement that merely glosses over the subject —“I will bring these leadership experiences to the Tuck classroom, where I will be deferential and active”—simply will not work. Instead, you need to reveal that you truly appreciate and grasp the nuances of the school’s environment by referencing specific Tuck resources. For example, you might write something like this: “What I find compelling about Tuck is that teamwork is not just a buzzword. Whether engaging with my learning team or working on my First Year Project, I know that harnessing team contributions will be critical. There will be moments to speak, to listen, and to facilitate others’ contributions, and this final piece is something I now know I can do well.” In this example, the writer clearly shows that he has done his research on Tuck and recognizes how his experience relates to the program; he is not merely nodding his head to the school that he aspires to attend.

Optional Tuck Essay: Please provide any additional insight or information that you have not addressed elsewhere that may be helpful in reviewing your application (e.g., unusual choice of evaluators, weaknesses in academic performance, unexplained job gaps or changes, etc.). Complete this question only if you feel your candidacy is not fully represented by this application.

Applicants may be especially tempted to take advantage of the optional essay, given that the school otherwise offers so few essay opportunities, but we strongly encourage you to resist any such temptation and submit an optional essay only if your candidacy truly needs it. This is most certainly not the place to paste in a strong essay you wrote for another school or share an anecdote you were unable to incorporate into either of the primary essays. Again, only if your profile has a noticeable gap of some kind or would provoke any lingering questions on the part of an admissions officer—such as a poor grade or overall GPA, a low GMAT score, a gap in your work experience, etc.—should you take this opportunity to provide additional information. In our mbaMission Optional Statement Guide, available through our online store, we offer detailed advice on when and how to take advantage of the optional essay (including multiple sample essays) to help you mitigate any problem areas in your profile.

Reapplicant Essay: (To be completed by all reapplicants) How have you strengthened your candidacy since you last applied? Please reflect on how you have grown personally and professionally.

Whether you have improved your academic record, received a promotion, begun a new and exciting project, increased your community involvement, or taken on some sort of personal challenge, the key to success with this essay is conveying a very deliberate path of achievement. Tuck wants to know that you have been actively striving to improve yourself and your profile, and that you have seized opportunities during the previous year to do so, because a Tuck MBA is vital to you. The responses to this essay question will vary greatly from one candidate to the next, because each person’s needs and experiences differ. We are more than happy to provide one-on-one assistance with this highly personal essay to ensure that your efforts over the past year are presented in the best light possible.

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Mission Admission: Are You Employable? [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   07 Jul 2015, 07:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Mission Admission: Are You Employable?
Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday.

Are You Employable? 

We believe that asking MBA candidates about their goals is plainly absurd, because so many students change their goals while they are in business school. Further, an MBA is supposed to be about career development and exploration, right? Regardless of how we feel regarding the subject, though, you must ensure that if a school asks about your goals in its essay questions or an interview, you have a compelling story about where you believe your MBA will take you. Several years ago, getting a banking job may have sounded compelling to you—are you really capable of making that transition today? Certainly, fewer jobs are available now in the real estate world—is this a likely next step for you during a prolonged real estate drought? Venture capital and private equity jobs are challenging to land even during the best of times—are you able to compete with the elite during a downturn?

These are just a few examples of questions you should honestly ask yourself. Keep in mind that not only are the admissions committees examining your story to determine what attributes you might bring to the next class, but if you are a borderline case, they may also send your profile to the career services office to help confirm whether your stated goals are realistic and if you will be difficult to place by or after graduation (i.e., whether you will hinder the school’s employment stats and thereby negatively affect its standing in the rankings). So, pay special attention to your goal statements and make sure that you can credibly stand behind them—and, as we have written in the past, even consider being prepared to discuss some alternate goals.

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MBA Career Advice: Before You Leave That Job Part 1 [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   07 Jul 2015, 11:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: MBA Career Advice: Before You Leave That Job Part 1
In this weekly series, “MBA Career Advice,” our friends at MBA Career Coaches will be dispensing invaluable advice to help you actively manage your career. Topics include building your network, learning from mistakes and setbacks, perfecting your written communication, and mastering even the toughest interviews. For more information or to sign up for a free career consultation, visit www.mbacareercoaches.com.

If you are headed to business school this fall, your life is about to change in a big way. Right now you are surrounded by professional colleagues, mentors, and champions, people who have supported you throughout your career and have helped you get to where you are. You are embedded within the network of your company. Will those connections diminish while you are in business school? You are going to be very busy and it won’t be easy to keep in touch, no matter how well-intentioned you are. But, you have an opportunity to nurture these connections now so that they persist even after you are in a different city doing different work. This is important even if you plan to transition into a different industry in a different geography. The world is round; you never know which relationships will come back around to be important.

Before you leave, seek to establish meaningful contact with everyone you have known in your job to date so that the relationships you have built will last.

Make a list of all the people who fit into one of these categories:

  • Supervisors, mentors, champions, and advocates
  • Collaborators, peers, and colleagues
  • Subordinates, people you managed
  • Important clients and external service providers
  • People you didn’t work with directly but who helped you out at some point
  • People you wish you had gotten to know better
  • Anyone else who comes to mind as someone you want to stay connected to
Give those people your personal email address and let them know how to reach you in the future. Connecting on LinkedIn is also a good idea. But these small steps are not enough. They won’t deepen the relationship. Real relationships require a personal touch.

So for the most important people on your list, schedule appointments to meet with each of them, preferably outside of the office. Why outside? Well, the professional aspect of your relationship is ending, and if you are going to keep the connection alive, you will have to create a personal connection. It will be harder to do so, if you are in a “strictly business,” setting. So, get them into a new environment.

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Professor Profiles: James VanHorne, Stanford Graduate School of Busine [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   08 Jul 2015, 09:01
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Professor Profiles: James VanHorne, Stanford Graduate School of Business
Many MBA applicants feel that they are purchasing a brand when they choose an MBA program, but the educational experience you will haveis what is crucial to your future, and no one will affect your education more than your professors. Each Wednesday, we profile a standout professor as identified by students. Today, we focus on James VanHorne from the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB).



In an interview with mbaMission, a Stanford GSB alumnus described James VanHorne as an “old school professor,” because he addresses students formally, calling them “Mr./Ms./Mrs.” He is notorious for cold-calling students, and once he has selected a student to cold-call, he often focuses on that same student for the duration of the class. As a result, students tend to prepare for his class with vigor. The alumnus added, “He pushes and pushes to make you justify every excruciating detail of your decisions, and will force you to make a definite decision before continuing with the discussion.” VanHorne is professor emeritus at the GSB and is a recipient of the school’s MBA Distinguished Teaching Award (1982, 1997) and Sloan Teaching Excellence Award (1997).

For more information about the Stanford Graduate School of Business and 15 other top-ranked business schools, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

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B-School-Specific Essay Writing Webinar: July 30, 2015 [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   08 Jul 2015, 14:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: B-School-Specific Essay Writing Webinar: July 30, 2015
With so many business schools to choose from and so many different essay questions, how do you decide what to write for which MBA program? And how do you make sure your essays stand out?

Our brand new, first-of-its-kind presentation, “B-School-Specific Essay Extravaganza,” will help you tailor your application essay ideas for your preferred MBA programs and then execute them in a way that ensures your stories stand out. Experienced mbaMission senior consultants will explain the nuances of how to brainstorm topics, structure your essays, and assemble a compelling overall MBA application.

In addition, for this special essay writing webinar, you will select two business schools from the following list. During the session, participants will break out into separate groups and rooms based on their chosen b-schools and attend focused sessions specifically targeting those programs’ essay questions and presenting strategies for answering them.

– Columbia Business School (CBS)

– Duke Fuqua

– Harvard Business School (HBS)

– Stanford Graduate School of Business

– Wharton

Attendees will have the opportunity to ask both general and school-specific follow-up questions at the end of the presentations.

mbaMission Senior Consultant Jessica Shklar will lead the presentation, while school-specific breakout sessions and Q&A will be conducted by mbaMission President and Founder Jeremy Shinewald (Stanford), along with mbaMission Senior Consultants Eric Hollowaty (HBS), Rachel Beck (CBS), Liza Weale (Wharton), and Daniel Richards (Duke Fuqua).

Please join us for this valuable and unique event that will prove essential to your MBA planning!

Space is limited! Register for free today!

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Diamonds in the Rough: Experiential Learning at the Carlson School of [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   09 Jul 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Diamonds in the Rough: Experiential Learning at the Carlson School of Management
MBA applicants can get carried away with rankings. In this series, we profile amazing programs at business schools that are typically ranked outside the top 15. This week, we focus on experiential learning at the Carlson School of Management.

With approximately 20 Fortune 500 companies located nearby—including UnitedHealth Group, Target, and U.S. Bancorp—the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management boasts a robust network of corporate ties and high-profile recruiting opportunities. In fact, the Twin Cities placed first in Forbes’s 2011 rankings of the best U.S. cities for finding employment. Carlson also prepares its students with a pronounced hands-on approach to building leadership, management, and problem-solving skills.

Among the school’s more distinctive offerings, Carlson’s four Enterprise programs expose students to the areas of brand, consulting, funds, and ventures. The Enterprise learning experience is rather unique insofar as it operates as a full professional services firm, serving multiple clients and allowing students to work through real-world business challenges with senior management at major companies. In the Brand Enterprise program, for example, Carlson students have developed key marketing strategies for such brands as Cargill, Boston Scientific, Target, 3M, General Mills, and Land O’Lakes. Students in the Consulting Enterprise program have offered services to such companies as Best Buy, Northwest Airlines Cargo, Medtronic CRM Division, and Polaris. With $35 million in managed assets, the Carlson Funds Enterprise program ranks among the three largest student-managed funds in the world. Finally, the Carlson Ventures Enterprise program puts aspiring entrepreneurs in contact with experts, professionals, and investors.

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Beyond the MBA Classroom: Wharton’s MBA Pub [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   09 Jul 2015, 12:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Beyond the MBA Classroom: Wharton’s MBA Pub
When you select an MBA program, you are not just choosing your learning environment but are also committing to a community. Each Thursday, we offer a window into life “beyond the MBA classroom” at a top business school.



Every Thursday evening, a large proportion of students heads to Wharton’s MBA Pub, where they can enjoy unlimited free beer and pizza (with an annual $225 membership). Formerly housed in its own designated space in Steinberg-Dietrich Hall, the school moved MBA Pub to a new off-campus facility at the historic Armory building in Center City in 2013, thus making the event more proximal to where the majority of Wharton students live. Because Wharton has no classes on Friday, Pub—as it is commonly called—serves as an ideal way for many students to mark the end of the academic week, kick off the weekend, and catch up with classmates and professors (who can be invited as guests).

Pub’s food offerings, drink selection, and decorations vary each week throughout the year, depending on which campus group is the week’s sponsor—though beer and pizza are staples. The event also features a variety of special events and social functions, which in 2015 included the Grand Bazaar, in which members were able to buy and sell furniture and other used goods as well as take part in a charity fundraiser. Pub is obviously separate from Wharton’s academic and recruiting offerings, but according to those with whom mbaMission spoke, many students and alumni consider it an emblematic experience of the program.

For in-depth descriptions of social and community activities at Wharton and 15 other top MBA programs, check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

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Friday Factoid: Hit the Slopes at…Kellogg? [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   10 Jul 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Friday Factoid: Hit the Slopes at…Kellogg?
When you want to hit the slopes, you probably think of the Alps or the Rockies rather than Evanston, Illinois, home to Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. Kellogg students may not do their skiing in Evanston proper, but a remarkable 750 or more first and second years participate in the school’s annual ski trip, which, according to students we interviewed, “remains the biggest of its kind. Like everything else at Kellogg, the trip is student run … from logistics to marketing to sponsorship.… First- and second-year students work together to make it an unforgettable weeklong adventure.” Participating students have traveled to such locations as Steamboat Resort and Telluride, in Colorado, where students stayed in mountainside condos. Those who wish to ski can avail themselves of three-, four-, or even five-day passes, while nonskiers can enjoy such activities as cooking classes, snowshoe lessons, and spa treatments (at reduced prices). The evenings feature theme parties, such as an annual ’80s party.



A first year with whom we spoke expressed how impressed she was with Kellogg’s ski club for “planning the best week of business school for 800 people!” She added that Northwestern Ski Trip is simply not to be missed: “It’s all of your closest friends, taking over a ski town for one full week with amazing parties and social activities—many of which are sponsored!”

For a thorough exploration of what Kellogg and 15 other top business schools have to offer, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guides.

 

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Attention Reapplicants – Free Ding Reviews! [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   10 Jul 2015, 09:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: Attention Reapplicants – Free Ding Reviews!
Did we say free? Why, yes, we did. Via our complimentary 30-minute consultations with potential clients, we occasionally encounter confused and disappointed applicants who were “dinged” from—aka denied acceptance to—their target business school the previous admissions season. To help these candidates improve their chances the next time around, we offer a Ding Review service. This offering typically costs $650 per school, but this is your unique opportunity to get this valuable service completely free!

There is no catch! We are simply offering one free Ding Review service to the first 15 reapplicants who contact us. If you are interested in this free service, simply email a PDF of your complete—yet unfortunately unsuccessful—application (including any letters of recommendation you may have) to info@mbamission.com. We will let you know if you are one of the lucky first 15 respondents.

Within a week of being notified that you have successfully claimed one of our 15 free Ding Reviews, you will receive a detailed written analysis of your previous application produced by one of mbaMission’s Senior Consultants, as well as a 30-minute phone call with that consultant to answer any questions you have about the review or about your reapplication strategy.

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MBA Admissions Myths Destroyed: Do Alumni Connections Help? [#permalink] The mbaMission Blog   11 Jul 2015, 08:00
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FROM mbaMission Blog: MBA Admissions Myths Destroyed: Do Alumni Connections Help?
Do alumni connections help get you accepted into an MBA program? 

From time to time, we at mbaMission visit admissions officers at top schools, which gives us the opportunity to ask rather frank questions. On a visit to a top-five program, we pushed an admissions officer on the extent of alumni influence in the admissions process and ultimately received a surprising response: “We get ten letters each year from [a globally famous alumnus], telling us that this or that MBA candidate is the greatest thing since sliced bread. He gets upset when we don’t admit ‘his’ applicants, but what makes him think that he deserves ten spots in our class?”



Many MBA applicants fret about their lack of alumni connection with their target schools, and the myth abounds that admission to business school is about who you know, not who you are or what you can offer. Of course, these latter qualities are more important, and a standout applicant who knows no graduates at all from the school he/she is targeting is still a standout applicant and should get in—just as a weak applicant who knows a large number of alumni or a particularly well-known graduate is still a weak applicant and should not get in. Clearly, some extreme exceptions exist where influence can be exerted, but the “standard” applicant need not worry that every seat at the top programs has been claimed by someone with good connections, before he/she even applies.

Keep in mind that the admissions committees want to ensure that a diversity of ideas and experiences is represented in the classroom. Every top MBA class includes people from different socioeconomic backgrounds, nationalities, religions, professional backgrounds, ages, etc.  Harvard has approximately 900 students in each incoming class, and the vast majority of these students do not personally know a CEO or the president of a country. And who knows—these days, such connections could even be a liability.

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