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Product Fortuna Admissions Hourly Consulting Services
Consultant Karen Hamou
Karen at Fortuna is an amazing consultant, and I could not have asked for a better person to help me with the overwhelming process of applying to business school. My situation was unique because my decision to work with a consultant came very late in the application process. Some consultants probably would have been turned off by me as a client in this respect, but Karen did not hesitate in taking me on. As we began working together, Karen was always very responsive to my emails; if I sent her a draft of an essay at night after work, she always provided comments by the next day. And when I received interview invitations from schools, she was proactive and available to help me prep at any time that was most convenient for me and for however long I needed. But her speed was not at the expense of the quality of her comments. Karen is extremely knowledgeable about the application processes for all the schools that I applied to, and she provided very thoughtful, school-specific advice on my essays, short answer responses, and interview responses. In our mock interviews, she helped make my responses more crisp and suggested ways that I could weave in important elements of my story. Her comments on every major aspect of my application were crucial in helping me develop and craft my story so that I conveyed it eloquently to the admissions committees. Karen is a pleasure to work with, both professionally and personally, and I highly recommend her and Fortuna to anyone applying to business school.
Product Fortuna Admissions Hourly Consulting Services
Consultant Karen Hamou
I contacted Karen 36 hours before the merit based deadline for Columbia Business School. I initially thought my application was strong but after getting it reviewed by one more person, they insisted that I contact Fortuna. Now typically, 36 hours is not enough time to edit 4 essays and a resume. However, Karen worked expeditiously to give me consistent feedback until we were comfortable with my admissions package. We made the deadline with much time to spare. The most impressive thing about the entire process is that Karen helped me enhance my content without changing the core of what I was trying to relay to the admissions committee. I don't know if this can ever be proven, but I can honestly say that the input Karen provided me in those 36 hours played a significant role in my admission to Columbia. I cannot thank Karen enough for the quick and efficient turnaround! When the rest of my friends start this MBA admissions process, I will 100% send them to Karen and Fortuna.
Product Fortuna Admissions Comprehensive School Package
Consultant Karen Hamou
I decided to work with an admissions consultant because I wanted to be fully informed about the admissions process, and I only wanted to go through it once. I worked with Karen and Fortuna for eight months in what I found to be a very personalized process. From the start, Karen helped me prioritize the correct activities, which gave me confidence knowing that I was making best use of my time. I also really appreciated how responsive Karen was, particularly closer to deadlines: she answered my questions almost immediately, returned edited documents within only a few hours (and sometimes even overnight), and I could schedule calls with her within 24h and at my preferred times. I found this invaluable because I could create much stronger essays shortly before deadlines. The edits Karen and her team offered for my essays were always substantial, constructive, and sometimes even challenging, but I always understood and agreed with the reasoning behind them. Working with experts gave me the confidence to redraft larger sections of my essays to help transform them from intelligible to persuasive while keeping them personal, genuine, and in my writing. Fortuna’s resources are current, extensive, and specific for every business school, which was instrumental for my essays and interviews. After submitting the written applications, Karen and I practiced for the interviews and video questions, and her feedback in our practices clarified my areas for improvement and made me feel more confident in the interviews.
Working with Karen ultimately helped me gain acceptance to INSEAD (despite below-average numbers on almost every metric of my profile), and I am convinced that I could not have done it without Karen’s help. I cannot be more satisfied with Fortuna’s support in the process and highly recommend Karen and her team – thank you!
Product Fortuna Admissions Comprehensive School Package
Consultant Karen Hamou
Working with Karen was great, she was hugely supportive, knowledgeable and helpful. Additionally, I got into my top choice and I am thrilled about that. Would absolutely recommend working with Karen in the future. She responded quickly, happily answered all of my questions, and had a lot of background on the program and plenty of insights into the strategy for managing applications and prioritizing programs. So thankful to Karen for all of her support and insight during this lengthy and time consuming process. Really appreciated all of the help during the application process because there were moments when it was challenging and difficult.
I worked with Karen both in R1 and R@. We worked together on three things - resume, essay and interview. Throughout the process, I was impressed her responsiveness, trustworthiness and flexibility. When I have questions, she usually will get me back with her answers in 4-5 hours, 60% of the times she would get me back within 1 hour. She makes me feel supported alongside.
Karen is also experienced in coaching. I had my interview with CBS right 3 days after I got the invite. Karen did 2 mock interviews with me. In each of the session, she listened carefully to my answers and would identify the inefficiencies in my communication style. The comments she gave me were right to the point. She also helped me structure my answers in later interviews.
She’s also an inspiring coach but someone who won’t make you feel pressured. This quality makes me return to her one time after another. I couldn’t imagine how many more hours I would spend on the application if I were without Karen.