Hear From a Wide Array of Expert Guests on Applying for Your MBA
Kim Janulewicz, IE Business School: When I asked, “Well, what do you do in your free time now?”They said, “Oh you know, I like to pump iron.”
Mia Saini: Welcome to MBA PodTV.I’m your host Mia Saini. This week we bring you special coverage of an MBA admissions panel that I moderated at the Access MBA Panel in
The topic of the panel is how to get admitted to a top MBA program.The panelist will go over some of the common mistakes applicants make when writing their essays, during the MBA interview, and when prepping for the GMAT. You’ll also get valuable insight on what schools are looking in candidates.The panelists include Eric Allen, Director and Co-founder of AdmitAdvantage; David Malloy, a GMAT instructor with ManhattanGMAT; John Roeder, Director of Admissions at Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management; and Kim Janulewicz from IE Business School.
Thank you so much for taking the time to join us today. My name is Mia Saini. I’m a second year MBA student at the
John Roeder, Director of Admissions, Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management:The MBA, and certain career paths, is becoming a required credential to have to get in to certain levels within organizations, so it’s something that, looking at your own personal career path, you may find that it will be essential at some point in the line.I would also say it really elevates your career to that ‘next level’. What I found to be the difference between undergraduate business and graduate business was really in the undergraduate classes, and the setting that you are in, it often was very siloed between marketing and accounting and operations and all these other areas. Whereas, once you get into the graduate perspective within an MBA program, you’re really looking at the holistic approach of looking strategically at an organization and really how decisions on, for instance, the accounting aside, can impact finance or marketing or operations. And I think that really being able to take all those pieces and put them together within an MBA world where you’re devoting perhaps two years of your life to this experience, where you’re actually able to apply what you’re learning in the classroom to the various experiences that you have in your career and your background, but also learning from those around you within an MBA program, because half of what you’re going to learn in an MBA program is going to be from the people sitting to your right and your left, and that’s very unique among graduate degrees. If you’re looking at a med school or law school and that’s what they tell you, I’d be very worried about going to that med school or law school.
Mia Saini:Next question I have is how many schools is the right number of schools to apply to? Many schools offer round one versus round two versus round three.When is the ideal time to apply?
Eric Allen, Director & Co-founder, Admit Advantage: So it’s not round three, and I would say that you should apply when you’re ready.So a round two application that is well thought out, you’ve taken the time to invest in it is much, much better than a round one application that you rushed in and submitted 11:59 the day before.So I’d be curious to hear John’s opinion but I think that there is a little bit of a difference between round one and round two but it’s slight. Again, I mean I think you should really focus on applying when you’re ready.In terms of number of schools, I would say you want to think about what you want in the process.Some people come in and they say, “All right, I want to get into these three schools and if I don’t get into those schools, I’m not going to business school,” and that’s okay. So in that case it will be those particular schools.
If you are saying, “Hey, I’m in a position in my career where I’m ready to go this year pretty much no matter what,” then you need to have a balance of schools.Maybe you have a couple of schools that are a little bit outside of your range, the ‘stretch’ schools, you probably hear that term, and then have a core set of target schools.But target schools that you put time into, the point earlier, that perhaps you visited. If you haven’t visited, hopefully you’ve talked to alums. Schools that you thought about, that you actually will go to if you don’t get in to some of those stretch schools.So is there a number?No, but I think you need to think about what your strategy is for applying whether or not you’re kind of going to shoot for the stars, and if I don’t get in I’m going to do it again in a year or two, or I’m going to business school this year and I need a more balanced set of schools.
John Roeder, Director of Admissions, Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management: Another thing to think about when you’re thinking about the rounds, and certainly ask all the schools that you’re seriously considering, is the financial situation that you will be in. Certain schools, you have better opportunities for scholarship in earlier rounds for instance, and you’ll want to take that into consideration as you target what round to actually apply in if you apply in. If you apply in the final round and it turns out that there are no scholarship opportunities in that round and that was a big difference maker for you, then you would have been better off going earlier or waiting a year.
The other aspect on ‘how many’, it actually applies to you, it really differs person-to-person.I’m one who applied to one school.I had an interesting situation because my wife was working at KPMG. I was working at
Often times the Admissions Committees actually will ask you, whether it be in the interview or whether it be in the actual application, where else you’re considering and where you applying to. We’re interested in learning a little bit about your decision capabilities and how you go about making decisions. And if you say that you’re absolutely -- you want to be in a smaller school on the East Coast -- and then we ask you where you’re applying and you’re applying to Stanford and
Mia Saini:Thank you.I’m curious, and I’m sure some of the members of our audience as well, what are some of the horror stories that you’ve seen over the years in terms of maybe candidates who have haphazardly put together their application or horror stories within the interview process or even through the actual application itself? I’m curious to hear your opinions.
Dave Malloy, GMAT instructor, Manhattan GMAT: One thing I definitely see all the time from the students who are preparing for the GMAT is like I have a student who I meet for the first time with private tutoring and they’ll come and they’ll say, “Okay. Well I just, in the last five days, I took five diagnostic tests. I took one this day and I got a 570, the next day I got a 580, the next day I got a 560, the next day I got a 550, and I’m not seeing any change.”I’m saying, “Well, of course you haven’t because you’re just trying to do as many problems as possible without actually going back and reviewing those questions really, really carefully.”So that’s a big myth with the GMAT preparation that people just tend to think, “If I just go into every single question in the official guide, I’ll do really well in the GMAT.”Whereas, I’d much rather see people do half the questions but then spend twice as much time reviewing those questions and really going into them deeply.
Kim Janulewicz, IE Business School: I had an interview with a person who told me that they applied to business school because they had been out of work for a year and a half and they just didn’t have really anything else to do. When I asked them what they’ve been doing in their job search they said, “Oh, well I’ve applied to some companies and that just didn’t work out,” and when I asked, “Well, what do you do in your free time now?”They said, “Oh you know, I like to pump iron.”So make sure that what you’re telling about yourself is going to be relevant and it’s going to be interesting to the school.
John Roeder, Director of Admissions, Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management:One of the areas that all schools will be looking at is your letters of recommendation, and I think one of the biggest mistakes you can go do is go for whatever the highest ranking official possible, the CEO of the company or maybe a senator or whatever it may be.When that person really doesn’t know you well or does not know your work abilities, or what you did, it’s very obvious when the letter comes in to the Admissions Committee, the amount of detail that is in the letter that the person perhaps didn’t even know you.So I would absolutely go after the people that can really speak to your work, abilities, and how you performed.Previous supervisors are great to have, current supervisors, if you’re going to tell your company you’re going back to pursue your MBA, are great to have as well.
Take that person to lunch. Sit down with him, talk to him about why you’re looking to get an MBA, what you’re looking to do with your career. It will certainly make for a much better recommendation when they actually sit down to write it.The other aspect on the interview side is be aware, for instance if you’re visiting campus that potentially you’re being interviewed by everyone you interact with, a big mistake would be to assume your interview is over when you’re done meeting with the admissions representative and then go treat a receptionist badly or someone, a student host, because those people might actually have input that gets back to the Admissions Committees. I know in a lot of schools that is the case and you may not know that but it’s better to be aware of that now than find out later.
Mia Saini:With that, I want to thank Eric Allen, John Roeder, Kim, as well as Dave Malloy. Thank you so much for your time. We really, really appreciate it.
Well, that’s it for MBA PodTV. I’m your host, Mia Saini. Join us on MBAPodcaster.com to register for our weekly audio and video shows.And of course, join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.