Please evaluate my profile - indian female - media backgroun

Question

Hello ,

I request you to scan my profile and suggest some colleges as I would apply for MBA September - 2020 intake .

GMAT :710

Bachelor's : 3.1 GPA 
Post graduate diploma in advertising and Marketing communications - 75%
St. Xavier's , Mumbai

Work experience - 19 months

I would be entering the batch with a work experience of around 2.5 years

Work profile : Brand Strategist

I have worked at a national experiential agency for above a year where I would conceptualize events , activations and campaigns for various multinationals such as HUL , SAP , SIEMENS , ORIFLAME etc.

Worked as both - leader in projects worth 7 million dollars for SAP and team player for other projects , I have extensively worked in conceptualization and execution of Advertising and marketing communication for a range of industries that span across IT , FMCG and AUTO .

Number of employees in company : 250-300

Company background : 
One of the largest and oldest experiential agency in India with work heavily skewed towards designing on ground consumer experience. 
Shobiz Experiential communications

My projects constantly involved heavy interaction with the Account Management team , design team and the main client to align the Marketing communication and thus , I have heavy cross-functional team experience.

Extra curricular : 
Worked on a start-up project while pursuing PGD that leveraged the concept of upcycling and succeeded in producing the product. This required me to team up with professors at my PGD .

LED a group of volunteers to impart education and certain set of skills to less privileged kids

Served in the capacity of Cultural President at high school for a year that helped me in organising all the events and co-ordinate with a team of juniors.

During Bachelor's , I served in the capacity of marketing manager for a state-level initiative of organising a business festival for 15 days .

I will be waiting for feedback.

Posted from my mobile device

MG4MBACrystalBall · Answer

Consider the following points  vaibhavijobalia :
 
  The academic arc looks a bit of mixed bag. Undergrad GPA is pretty low - was it from a good brand college? Xavier's is a decent brand - any gaps between the two degrees? The GMAT looks ok too - but that really depends on the type of colleges you are looking at.  
  Most good GMAT based MBA programs expect 4-5 years of   solid professional experience  . Given this perspective, applying this year would ideally be quite early. Even more so given this will be your second management degree. So think again on the timing ideally. 
  The nature of your work is pretty interesting and not very common in the Indian applicant pool. That also means you'd have to think hard on your post-MBA prospects well and communicate those well. An old Indian brand is good but also make sure you do enough to educate the adcoms on your firm's scale/professionalism.  
  On ECs, it's not very clear on what is recent, if any. High school level stuff is likely to be largely irrelevant.

Hope this helps some.

Cheers,

vj1994 · Answer

Hey 
Thanks for the feedback .

The start-up project is the most recent one 
I hold a bachelor's in business administration from maharaja Sayajirao University in Vadodara , a good brand as well .

ECs - I will work on developing them before applying but I am planning to apply for sept - 2020 intake .

Do you think I should give GMAT again ? 
How much of a difference would that make ?

Also , if I apply for sept - 2020 intake - what kind of colleges will I be looking at ?

Posted from my mobile device

MG4MBACrystalBall · Answer

Right so the startup project is no longer on I presume. Yes, it would be good to get some of the ECs back online - recency effect is quite crucial for bschools.

I am afraid that for reasons mentioned   here  , we do not speculate on school selection.

If you are sure of targeting the Sept'20 intake, go ahead but don't think that there are some schools which may look at that particular metric more softly than others. So don't make that as a selection criteria, instead look for ways to better   select the right MBA program   for you.

MBADecoder · Answer

Hi Vaibhavi,

I will concur with Manish's advice to you. Given the stiff competition Indian applicants face, a 710 GMAT score will not be considered high. Your WE is going to be low for most MBA programs (typically 5 years average), so you will have to present an otherwise solid profile. Having worked in direct marketing arms of national advertising agencies myself, I can understand what your work entails- excellent interpersonal skills, always a pressure situation, and tackling one issue after another - such problems also give one the chance to shine and make impact. Such experiences will be fodder for your application.

Your extra curricular activities are dated and unfortunately will not add much to your profile. If you take up some new activity, I'd advise you pick up the threads of an activity you have done in the past, so as to maintain continuity. Unless ofcourse there is something you wish to pursue passionately in the next few months ahead of you.

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