While I dreamed about pursuing an MBA in a US university, I was aware that, with only 16 months of work experience at the time of the applications and 22 months upon enrollment, my chances of landing a place on a top-tier business school were low.

Although aware of my problem, I was still extremely skeptic about paying to admissions consultants to help me prepare my MBA applications – thinking I could easily do everything by myself -, until one friend told me to visit www.squareoneprep.com and have a 30-min call with Kathryn.

After my call with Kathryn (who gladly gave me 1 free hour instead of the classic 30 minutes), I immediately decided I was going to hire SquareOne Prep: extremely high-achiever, pragmatic and results-oriented consultants made my choice easy.

As I sit writing this testimonial and think about the journey I embarked on with Lara Avsar (in the end having been accepted by Stern and Darden), I can now gladly tell myself that going with SquareOne Prep was the best choice I made. Lara (and the rest of the team) besides intelligent and creative, was what you need in a consultant: extremely available. I always felt that Lara (and the team) was always there for me. I knew I could email Lara with every dilemma I had (regardless of its relevance) and I would get a reply from her with great advice. (in fact, I just wrote an email to Lara yesterday about a topic other than MBA applications and I got an awesome reply!).

If you, like me at the beginning, still think that hiring consultants is not worth it or that Square One is too pricey, I challenge you to hop in a call with Kathryn and, as you talk to her, see with your own eyes how good these guys are. Their work does wonders, and I recommend them to anyone who wants to pursue an MBA: SquareOne Prep is an advantage you want to have when competing with the thousands of MBA applicants every year.
(side note: I got a scholarship at Darden that itself paid for the services I hired SquareOne Prep for).

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Square One prep has been instrumental in my efforts to help me land an admission offer into a top business school program. Kathryn has amazing knowledge about all the programs and has a very quick judgment on your candidature. She's able to use the two to give critical advice on school choice, career narratives, advisor selection etc which set the tone of the process. Lara Avsar was my advisor who I worked with on a weekly basis. She is a miracle worker when it comes to telling a story. She's uncompromising and relentless in making sure your story is told in an authentic manner. I felt we had very compelling applications given my profile. Despite not landing the offer into my top choice programs, Lara and Kathryn were instrumental in picking me up and showing me my options in an objective manner. I wouldn't have gone through with the rest of my applications without their support. I was able to finally land a spot at a program that was best suited for me and am glad I had Lara and Kathryn along the way.

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When I got my first interview invite, I realized that I had no idea how to prepare for MBA interviews and only a few weeks to figure it out. I heard about Square One Prep through a co-worker and was so impressed that Kathryn gave me a phone consultation the very first day I reached out. I liked that Square One was willing to spend as much or as little time with me as I wanted until I felt confident in my interview skills. The feedback I got from the mock interview was so insightful. I do not think any of my friends or family members could have given me the caliber of advice I received. Square One helped me navigate four interviews in a month and come out with no rejections, including, most importantly, an acceptance from my top choice school.

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As I had heard many positive reviews of Square One Prep from my friends long before I started applying for my MBA, the decision to work with SOP came instinctively to me. I worked with Kathryn and Lara from the scratch - from assessing my profile and drafting my narrative to writing and proofreading the components of the application. The entire process was run by SOP in an enthusiastic, methodical and disciplined manner. Kathryn's optimistic approach with school selection instills confidence in the applicant. She has an impeccable knack of crafting tightly-knit narratives and ensuring that they are neatly reflected in the essays - She knows what the schools want. I thoroughly enjoyed working with Lara as well. She was creative, efficient, and patient throughout (we did numerous iterations!). Most of all, she is a very compassionate person because of which I could comfortably share my stories with her. During my first call with Kathryn when I asked her about my chances of making to a good business school, she told me, "You should come out of the process very happy". I most certainly have! I am grateful to Kathryn and Lara for their assistance in the process, and would strongly recommend Square One Prep to all MBA aspirants.

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Kathryn and Lara were absolutely instrumental to my business school application process. Being somewhat late to the game, I only started to consider attending business school 4 months before the R2 application deadline. Kathryn had to counsel me through (1) deciding whether to apply this year or next year and (2) figuring out which schools to apply to. At that point, I had called 4-5 different consultants and received 4-5 different recommendations. I eventually went with Square One because Kathryn's advice made the most sense to me and I really felt like she believed in me.

Coming from a traditional investment banking/private equity background, my main concern was crafting a story that would differentiate me and make-up for my lack of post-college extracurricular activities. Kathryn and Lara were with me every step of the way, from brainstorming ideas to editing my essays for grammar. Lara, especially, had to deal with chasing me down to hit the interim deadlines, hopping on the phone at various hours of the day to troubleshoot writer's block, and responding to mildly panicked emails. She was always encouraging, patient, and responsive. I have no doubt that Square One was the reason why I got the interview and was eventually admitted to two top 3 business schools.

I was very lucky to be able to work with Kathryn and Lara and would recommend the Square One team to anyone who is considering business school.

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