For 17 years I’ve worked on every side of MBA admissions: as Dean of Admissions at Babson, Managing Director of GMAC Tours, and advising schools at EAB. In short, MBA admissions is what I know best (and love most). Today I work with a handful of serious MBA candidates each round, meeting with them every week, because distinctive applications get built through human conversation, not over email or basic line edits. More at mymbapath.com.
Reality check for Round 1
Deadlines are out, and the countdown to Round 1 is on!Harvard Business School has released their deadlines for the Class of 2027, sending MBA candidates into a frenzy with announcements of upcoming changes to the MBA essay prompt. (Will it become promptS this year, with HBS breaking down their essay into multiple ones? Maybe!) Before that, Columbia Business School, Yale SOM, INSEAD, UC-Berkeley Haas, and UCLA Anderson had already posted their admissions timelines. And this week, Wharton, Stern, and Ross announced their deadlines too. With 80 days until the first Round 1 MBA application deadlines, it’s crunch time, MBA hopeful!This Sunday, I want to share with you what you should already have in place to be a strong R1 candidate. This is based on where your competition stands – and I know this well, as I'm already working with Round 1 candidates. Here we go: 1. Your resume should already be in excellent shape, ideally finalized. Remember, most adcoms start your app review with the resume! 2. Your recommenders should be lined up and your to-do-list should include preparing a briefing document for them. 3. Your school engagement should be under way and should not be surface level. 4. Ideally, you should have a competitive test score already. One of the biggest reasons candidates have to delay and submit in Round 2 is because they schedule the test close to the deadline and score lower than they hoped. Also, having your test scheduled too close to the deadline ends up eating up time and mental bandwidth that should be spent on the your application materials. 5. Your overall story should start to take shape. You should brainstorm and then start planning how your differentiation will be clearly and strategically communicated through all parts of the application. 6. You should start brainstorming your essays. They have to include strong examples of the four stories MBA adcoms seek in winning candidates. The biggest obstacle candidates face at this point is balancing all the moving parts of the MBA application process. Where are you in the process? Are you on track? Onwards and upwards, Petia P.S. With zero exceptions, the most successful MBA candidates are the best prepared ones. Join me on June 27 to learn how to be a competitive MBA candidate in the 2024-2025 MBA Admissions Cycle. Preparation means understanding how MBA Admissions works and how the essence of candidates who gain admission to the most selective MBA programs has changed over the years. It's the investment with the highest ROI in the MBA Admissions race. |
My MBA Path
For 17 years I’ve worked on every side of MBA admissions: as Dean of Admissions at Babson, Managing Director of GMAC Tours, and advising schools at EAB. In short, MBA admissions is what I know best (and love most). Today I work with a handful of serious MBA candidates each round, meeting with them every week, because distinctive applications get built through human conversation, not over email or basic line edits. More at mymbapath.com.
It’s no secret that not all MBA admissions consultants are created equal. But a new dividing line is emerging and I’m making a bet it'll be a really important one. Before, the delineation was around expertise I’m not going to sugarcoat this one. Those of us who have actually worked in admissions do have a vantage point that is different than those who have simply been helping MBA candidates and trying to reach insights about how MBA admissions works empirically, based on reverse engineering....
With the exception of Booth and MIT Sloan, my R1 candidates are done submitting. We won't get much of a break. MBA interview invites will start popping up quite soon. And one thing has become really clear this admissions cycle. This feels different As I was wrapping up the R1 work this week, I kept thinking about just how much the MBA application game has changed. Four years after ChatGPT "burst onto the scene," to use the obligatory cliché, we've reached a point where what used to be a...
How the "why MBA" question got twisted I saw a version of this maddening mistake three times on r/mba this week alone. Sometimes I chime in but it's, of course, a futile battle. The myth persists, kept alive by MBA candidates (or admits) and MBA admissions consultants alike. As a rule, these are people who never sat on the other side of the table as admissions directors. But somewhere along the way, they decided that "why MBA" means you, MBA hopeful, have to prove well beyond reasonable doubt...