2005 September » Clear Admit: MBA Admissions Consultants Blog

Regional Ranking
1. Purdue University (Krannert)
2. Michigan State University(Broad)
3. Ohio State University (Fisher)
4. Thunderbird (Garvin)
5. IPADE

International Ranking
1. IMD
2. ESADE
3. Carnegie Mellon (Tepper)
4. IPADE
5. London Business School

While the rankings are always fun to debate, we’d like to call your attention to a very interesting article that accompanies this year’s WSJ report. The article is titled The Full Time Advantage. Written by the Ron Alsop, this piece examines recruiters preference for full-time MBA students and argues that despite the increasing popularity of part-time and executive MBA options, the full-time degree still reigns supreme.

Also of note alongside the rankings and the various articles is a podcast from Ron Alsop, where he discusses the recent declines in application volume, positive outlook on the recruiter/employment front and how schools have been juggling these trends.

How Important Are Essay Word Limits? This is a very popular topic in the discussion boards we moderate, so here’s the official Clear Admit stance on MBA essay lengths:

As a rule, candidates should try to stay within +/- 10% of the suggested word limits for their essays. It is important to keep in mind that the admissions person reading your file may also have 10-15 other files to get through in a sitting, so if you consistently extend your answers beyond the suggested limits you are asking them to give you more time than they are devoting to the other applicants. In other words, if you were to ignore the word limits and overshoot by 20% throughout, you are essentially saying that you are 20% more interesting than everyone else who applied. Although there are certainly times where this may be true, it is rarely the case.

Caveat #1: If a school gives you a range (e.g. 250-750 words), you should stay within that range.
Caveat #2: If a school gives you a page limit (e.g. 2 pages), you should stay within that limit - without excessive margin manipulation.
Caveat #3: It is likely a bad idea to consistently fall 10% below the word limits, since this means that you are depriving yourself of additional space in which to communicate elements of your candidacy.

Scheduling Change
Clear Admit’s Alex Brown will be appearing as a panelist at the World MBA Tour in Washington DC this Thursday night (September 22nd) instead of in Philadelphia tonight. The MBA discussion panel, which was originally scheduled as a part of the Philadelphia World MBA Tour, has been moved to the Washington DC event. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience due to this scheduling change.

The new dean at the Yale School of Management (SOM) has extensive plans to push the program into the top tier of elite business schools. The Yale Daily News published an article/interview with dean Joel Podolny, who has his roots at Harvard (as a former professor and student), but seems to be settling in nicely with Yale.

According to the article, Podolny’s plans for the school include the following:

1) Building a new, centralized campus for the program
2) Reassessing the core curriculum and pushing the theme of social responsibility
3) Using the move to a new campus to increase enrollment from 215 to 300 students

Additional plans seem to be in the works as well, so we’d recommend that Yale SOM applicants read over the article and continue to learn more about the program.

In other news, we’d like to remind our readers that the World MBA Tour hits Philadelphia tomorrow night. Schools like Wharton, Columbia, Chicago, NYU, Tuck and more will be on hand to speak with prospective applicants. Clear Admit’s Alex Brown will be participating as a special guest panelist at the event to discuss the MBA degree, career options, admissions strategies and more!

Philadelphia World MBA Tour
Tuesday, September 20th
6 PM - 9 PM
Convention Center
1101 Arch Street
register online

We kick off this week’s edition of FFF with some words from bloggers looking to join the MBA class of 2008. Reporting back from his trip to the World MBA Tour in Los Angeles, Vatsa describes his interactions with admissions officers and alumni while offering some insights on Duke, Yale, Tuck, IMD and the ISB. As a reminder to our readers, the World Tour hits New York City this Saturday and Philadelphia on Tuesday (see our prior posting for details).

Turning to another blogging MBA applicant, we find Anand Rao, who used a recent entry to outline a check list for his Kellogg R1 application. While it may be daunting for applicants to see the sheer number of tasks associated with each school’s application, it’s always better to plan accordingly than to be hit with unknowns at the last minute. Along similar lines, we’d like to return to Vatsa’s blog, this time for a solid entry about researching career goals and program fit.

Checking in with members of the MBA class of 2007, we find a great deal of 1st year orientation news from the Chicago GSB - likely due to their somewhat later start to the academic year. Bloghorn8 offers some insight on the LOE (Leadership Outdoor Experience), while Wakechick and Alator offer nice summaries of their first week in the program.

Elsewhere in first-year MBA-land, we have a report from Brit-chick on classes at Wharton, thoughts on coursework and email overload at Columbia (courtesy of Maragitaluvr) and an update on outward-bound team/leadership exercises at LBS from the DivineMissN. Finally, Majlo checks in during a much needed break from orientation at Kellogg and Risitos offers a summary of pre-term at NYU/Stern (part-time).

In more general blogging news, we’d like send our kudos to Chicago for investigating the use of blogs in their marketing strategy. It’s only a matter of time before other programs join Wharton and Chicago in the blogosphere. Finally, we’d like to ask any new Class of 2008 bloggers to email us if we haven’t been covering your blog in Fridays from the Frontline (we try to stay on top of new blogs, but sometimes fall behind).

Many MBA applicants will be burning the midnight oil over the coming weeks in order to polish their essays and increase their chances of admission. After all, in the world of MBA admissions counseling, nearly everyone focuses on the essays as the key area to focus one’s efforts (once the GMAT is out of the way).

One often overlooked aspect in the process, however, is the application form itself. Most candidates leave the forms for the last minute or rush to fill out online applications from work on D-day, but the truth is that a weak effort on these forms can do all kinds of harm to your candidacy. As such, here are a few tips for applicants who will soon be approaching the application forms:

1) Follow instructions. If the schools asks you to list activities in chronological order, then do not list them in order of importance to you (as you may have done for another school). If the school asks for a contact person, title or the number of hours/week, do not leave these fields blank.

2) Make things clear. The last thing you want is for your admissions reader to have to play detective in determining your career progression (gaps in employment) or undergraduate career. Admissions officers are busy people and they don’t have time to connect the dots on your background. If your listings are not clear, the reader may assume you are hiding something. Once they make this assumption, your chances will evaporate. Given the level of competition in the applicant pool, the admissions office can afford to avoid files that seem a bit confusing.

3) Don’t be lazy. Since it’s likely that you’ll be ‘burned out’ from your essays, the temptation will be to zip through the application forms. In many cases, the forms are a great opportunity for you to list outside activities in depth, offer a quick explanation for a bad grade, etc. In fact, your application forms will often be the starting point for the admissions officer’s review of your file. Put your best foot forward.

4) Avoid going overboard. Admissions officers typically review several files in a sitting - devoting much less time than you might imagine to each file. As such, try to avoid listing 18 activities, 22 awards and 17 publications - especially if some of those items date back to high school (or are more than 10 years old). Stay focused on the elements of your background that are most relevant. Also, when asked for a short-answer, do not draft an essay. If your admissions file is twice as thick as the rest of the files, it will not necessarily be twice as good. How do you think the admissions officer will feel when they go to pick up a thick file for a ‘quick’ review?

Following up on our China-related posting from last week, we’d like to call our readers attention to an article about the rise of another sizeable market for the MBA. BusinessWeek’s Francesca Di Meglio reports on India’s MBA Gold Rush, citing an increasing need for skilled managers in the Indian market and the subsequent premium that is placed on the MBA degree.

We need only look at the latest numbers from the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) to support the case for growth in the Indian market. According to GMAC, international test taker volume has gone up more than 5% this year - with countries like India and Korea leading the way.

World MBA Tour Update….
Following up on Monday’s posting about the World MBA Tour’s stops in NYC and Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Business Journal has published an article to highlight the Tour’s arrival in town.

Here is a bit more information about each event:
New York City
Saturday, September 17th
2 PM - 6 PM
Hilton Hotel
1335 Avenue of the Americas

Philadelphia
Tuesday, September 20th
5 PM - 9 PM
Convention Center
1101 Arch Street

Please remember that Clear Admit’s Alex Brown will be on hand at both events as a special guest for the MBA panel discussions!

This week’s edition of The Economist features an extensive survey of higher education. The survey is an interesting read for anyone contemplating an MBA. It’s also food for thought in the Europe vs. US education debate (an issue that is currently being raised in the BW Forums).

The key articles from the education survey are as follows:
The Brains Business (How to organize education as it becomes a global commodity.)
Secrets of Success (America’s system as a model?)
Head in the Clouds (Is Europe dreaming of a brighter future?)
A World of Opportunity (How are developing countries are approaching higher education?)
Wandering Scholars (Education without borders?)
How Europe Fails Its Young (State of education in Europe)

One of the interesting features of the survey is the reference to a global university ranking that is produced annually by Jiao Tong University in Shanghai. The ranking devises a pecking order for universities by measuring the level of faculty publications, alumni and faculty Nobel prize winners, alumni and faculty field medals, etc. Essentially, the ranking looks at the amount of knowledge that’s being produced by universities across the globe.

The top 20 universities, according to this ranking are as follows:
1) Havard
2) Cambridge
3) Stanford
4) Berkeley
5) MIT
6) Cal-Tech
7) Columbia
8) Princeton
9) U. Chicago
10) Oxford
11) Yale
12) Cornell
13) UC San Diego
14) UCLA
15) U. Penn
16) U. Wisconsin
17) U. Washington
18) UC San Francisco
19) Johns Hopkins
20) Tokyo University

Needless to say, there are many intriguing stats in the survey, so we encourage our readers to have a look.

The World MBA Tour is presently making the rounds in the USA. As the main event of its kind, the Tour assembles dozens of leading MBA programs in one convenient place, allowing applicants to gather brochures, chat with admissions officers, meet alumni, participate in panel discussions, sample MBA classes and more.

We are pleased to report that Clear Admit’s Alex Brown will be on hand at the New York and Philadelphia World MBA Tour events, where he has been invited as a guest member of the MBA Panel discussions. We strongly recommend attending the Tour, since it provides an unparalleled opportunity to gather information on the schools you may be considering.

Visit with schools
Hundreds of MBA programs participate in the World MBA Tour. Here’s a partial listing of several leading schools that are involved: Wharton, Columbia, NYU (Stern), Chicago GSB, Cornell (Johnson), UVA (Darden), Dartmouth (Tuck), Duke (Fuqua), Berkeley (Haas), Georgetown (McDonough), Emory (Goizueta), IESE, INSEAD, London Business School, UCLA, Michigan (Ross), UNC (Kenan Flagler) and more.

MBA Panel Discussions
The panels include MBA alumni, admissions officers and experts in the field. Clear Admit’s Alex Brown will be offering his expertise on panels at the New York City and Philadelphia events. Topics of discussion will include MBA Admissions tips, the role of the MBA degree in one’s career, the recruiting process and more.

Details:
New York City (click to register)
Hilton New York
Saturday, September 17th

Philadelphia (click to register)
Marriott Convention Center
Tuesday, September 20th

The World MBA Tour is $5 if you register in advance or $10 if you buy a ticket at the door. At either price, it’s really hard to have an excuse not to attend.

Of course, while we agree that it’s a great idea to attend the events, we’d also like to remind our readers what not to do at an MBA Tour event.

This week’s installment of Fridays from the Frontline starts with an update from several first-year MBA students in the blogosphere. The Chicago GSB got orientation underway this past week. Reporting on life in the Windy City, are Bloghorn8 and PowerYogi, the former detailing the first day of school and the latter celebrating the attributes of the incoming class. With Stanford’s orientation in full swing, Lady Rattler offers an excellent account of her struggles getting back into good study habits (”Studying is not like riding a bike. You forget how to do it.”). MBAwana offers some additional news from the first week at Stanford, citing immigration concerns and discussing exemption exams.

In MBA-applicant blogland, we turn to Cubicle Lady who raises the age-old debate of Round 1 vs. Round 2 for her MBA applications (a subject we’ve covered in this blog). Meanwhile, Vatsa discusses the subject of grade nondisclosure - a topic that has been popular of late in the BW Forums, press and this blog. Our congratulations go out to TakeTwoBskool, who performed well on the GMAT and has dramatically increased his chances of success as a reapplicant!

In closing this week’s edition of Fridays from the Frontline, we’d like to point to blogger Beau Giles’ entry on the Darden school’s offer to take 4-6 students from Tulane’s MBA program (which has been shut down this semester due to the damage from hurricane Katrina). Other schools offering support to Tulane students include Cornell, Vanderbilt and Emory (who will each take some second-year students) and UT Austin (who have offered Tulane professors their facilities to pursue research). BusinessWeek’s Francesca DiMeglio covers the details of this story.

# posted by Clear Admit @ 10:45 am in Fridays from the Frontline

Thursday, September 08, 2005

MBA Gaining Ground in China

Following several years of declining application volume, Chinese students seem to have rekindled their interest in the masters in business administration degree. Today’s edition of China View (an online publication) includes an article about increasing GMAT test taker volume in China and greater interest in the MBA among those in the Chinese business world.

Here’s a short quote from the article:

“With the new round of business expansion in China, investment banks, consulting firms and multinationals are eager for professionals with an MBA education from a top business school.” Promising employment prospects also are behind the rise in MBA applicants.

There’s also a great article about Rose Martinelli (former Director of Admissions at Wharton and current Dean of Admissions at Chicago GSB) in the Wall Street Journal’s College Journal publication. It offers a sneak peek into the life of an MBA admissions officer, along with some tips for applicants to leading schools.

Finally, there’s a somewhat strange article in the Guardian (a publication from the UK) that suggests that business school applicants are no longer as concerned with the MBA rankings (otherwise known as “league tables” in UK-speak). What makes the article strange is that while the students surveyed did not list rankings as the driving force behind their decisions, they did list ‘reputation’ as the most important factor. Since many would argue that ranking and reputation are closely intertwined (or that rankings strongly influence reputation and vice versa), the article’s premise seems a bit flawed.

# posted by Clear Admit @ 9:52 am in General

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

Chicago GSB Revises Essay Topics

Back on July 7th, we posted the Chicago GSB essay topics for 2005-06, along with some analysis for the benefit of our readers. These questions were taken directly from the Chicago web site. This week, it came to our attention that the essay questions currently on the school’s site had been altered somewhat. The core questions remained the same, but appeared in a more abbreviated format. Here’s an example:

Question from the Chicago web site on July 7th:
Essay 1: To complete, we require that you answer all parts of A, B, and C below. (1500 words maximum total)
A. Explain the path that has led you to pursue an MBA as the next step in your professional/ personal development. What steps did you take and how did you reach your decision?
B. What or who has influenced your choice of schools? What criteria will you use to decide where you will attend? What is it specifically about Chicago GSB that is going to help you succeed?
C. Describe your short and long term post-MBA career goals. What steps will you be taking in order to achieve your goals?

Question from the Chicago web site on September 7th:
Essay 1: Complete all parts below (1500 words maximum)
Explain the path that has led you to pursue an MBA as the next step in your professional personal development. Describe your short and long term post-MBA career goals. What or who influenced your choice of schools, and what is it specifically about Chicago GSB that is going to help you succeed?

Upon noticing these subtle differences, we contacted Rose Martinelli (the Dean of Admissions at Chicago). Rose indicated that the essay topics had been revised slightly - to “remove the implied questions” - and that the most up to date version of the essay topics was now available on their web site.

While this may seem a bit confusing to some of you, the changes actually represent an opportunity. First, those of you who read our blog can still see the more lengthy original questions. Our readers can then look at the current, revised questions to better understand the emphasis the committee is looking for as well as the implied questions that are beneath the surface, etc.

# posted by Clear Admit @ 10:56 am in Essay Topics, School: Chicago

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

Admissions Tip: Handling a Weakness

Many applicants to business school need to address a weakness in their candidacy. In some cases it’s a lower than average GPA or GMAT, in others it’s a lack of international experience, limited outside activities or a circuitous career path and ambiguous goals. Luckily, one’s MBA application is really a multi-variable equation, where weakness in one area can often be balanced by strength in another and so on.

While balancing weaknesses with strengths is crucial, one should also keep in mind the fact that many weaknesses must be addressed directly. In other words, it’s often not enough to simply push your strengths and hope that they distract from your weaknesses.

Let’s use an example to make this point clear. Assume there exists a candidate with the following profile:
JOHN DOE
-GPA: 3.6 from a leading school
-GMAT: 630 (has taken the exam once)
-4 years of excellent work experience with international exposure, leadership, etc
-extensive outside activities
-clear and logical career goals

Most of our readers should instantly spot the weakness here - since John Doe’s GMAT is roughly 70 points below the average at the top 10 MBA programs. The first strategy one might employ in this case would be to emphasize John’s GPA and highlight all of his other attributes in hopes of balancing out the GMAT weakness in the MBA admissions equation. The argument would be that the GMAT has not accurately measured the John’s ability and that the committee should use his GPA as a better predictor of academic performance. This argument would typically be made in a supplemental/optional essay.

While the above strategy is certainly a valid one to pursue, it may not hold much water in this instance because John has only taken the GMAT once. In other words, John knows that he is significantly shy of the schools’ average score (he’s written a supplemental essay about it) yet he’s opted to settle for 630 and move on. Since most MBA programs take your highest GMAT score, this might suggest that John has missed an opportunity to give the exam another shot. Worse, it could suggest that John is lazy (e.g. that he knows the exam is important to admissions officers but isn’t willing to put the effort into a second test).

Let’s assume that John does the right thing and resits the exam, earning a 650. While disappointed in his score (which still falls below the average at top schools), John can now make the following argument to the admissions committee:
1) I am unhappy with my GMAT performance, which is below the average at your school
2) Because I recognize the importance of the exam in the admissions process, I worked hard to sit the exam twice and improve my score
3) Despite my efforts, my second exam was only slightly better than my first result
4) I do not feel that the test is accurately measuring my academic abilities - in fact, I’ve never been strong on standardized tests
5) I encourage the committee to consider my GPA and course selection in college, both of which should indicate that I will be a strong performer in the MBA classroom

While this is just one example, our goal is to highlight the fact that many weaknesses need to be BOTH balanced by strengths and properly addressed head-on. Contact Clear Admit directly to learn more about our services and how we can help you strategically address weaknesses.

# posted by Clear Admit @ 11:33 am in Admissions Tips

Monday, September 05, 2005

Grade Nondisclosure

BusinessWeek’s Geoff Gloeckler has penned an interesting article on the use of grade nondisclosure (GND) at leading MBA programs. For the uninitiated, GND is a policy that forbids b-school students from sharing their grades with recruiters. This policy is designed to relieve pressure and reduce competition among students, while promoting a more collaborative academic environment.

The following top schools have GND programs in place:
(click in the school name for details on the nature of their GND program)
Harvard Business School
Stanford GSB
Wharton
Chicago

The BW article offers an interesting take on this contentious topic, citing pros and cons and highlighting the perspectives of students, recruiters, faculty and administration. The author of the article has also created a discussion thread in the BW Discussion Forums where members of the MBA community are talking about the issue.

As for our viewpoint on the subject, we’d like to offer a few pros and cons for our audience to consider:

Grade Nondisclosure Pros
-GND eliminates much of the fierce competition among students - exchanging it for a more collaborative environment (many MBA programs were criticized for being incredibly cutthroat in the 80’s and early 90’s - before GND policies were put into action).
-GND allows students to take risks, pursue challenging coursework and not worry about how a slightly lower grade might look on their transcript.
-GND allows students to focus on all aspects of the MBA experience, including outside activities (clubs, forums, lectures) and recruiting - without the fear of GPA repercussions.
-GND allows top programs to make a clear statement to recruiters about the caliber of their curriculum - essentially saying that any student who goes through the course is at a certain level.

Grade Nondisclosure Cons
-GND forces some recruiters to resort to other tactics when ranking candidates (asking for GMAT scores, using challenging case interviews, etc).
-GND has a poor effect on some students, causing them to do the minimum and coast through the program without contributing to the their study group or the broader MBA community.
-Classroom discussion may be less fruitful at programs with GND (if students aren’t feeling any pressure to do the readings and professors aren’t using cold calls or taking attendance to ensure participation).
-GND may deprive stronger students of a way to stand out from the pack.

Of course, we’d like our readers to keep in mind that each school has a slightly different policy. For example, Wharton is commonly thought to have a pass/fail system in place, yet, the school actually offers the following grades to students: Distinguished Pass, High Pass, Pass, Qualified Credit, Fail. While these grades cannot be shared with recruiters, students are clearly being given feedback on their performance.

This subject highlights the importance of doing research into the schools you are considering. It clearly pays to be up to date on critical campus issues, since this is all part of the process of making an informed decision and demonstrating knowledge of the school in your essays, interviews and alumni interactions.

# posted by Clear Admit @ 11:50 am in General

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