We have occasionally talked about formatting essays in terms of double spaced or single spaced and hopefully you already got the memo about font size. Because everything matters in your MBA essay submission. Premium content starts here… ———– ———– Premium content ends. As with so many aspects of your application process, a mistake […]
Continue reading...($) Job titles can be their own form of jargon!
More and more admissions teams are becoming more and more directive in how they present information and guidance to applicants like you, and more and more we’re seeing them be quite explicit on something important: NO JARGON IN ESSAYS AND APPS We say this so many times here on the blahg but it’s worth repeating […]
Continue reading...“I will exploit this opportunity to go on to build greater success.”
That sentence sounds innocuous enough, doesn’t it? At risk of turning into the hypersensitive language police, we have to offer a caution on it. Words like “exploit” or “dominate” or another word like “ammunition” are commonly used in the business world. “We’re going to exploit this market opportunity to dominate the competition.” Or: “We’ve got […]
Continue reading...($) This may be the most meaningful advice that we can offer for anyone trying to write powerful essays.
Yeah that’s a click-baity headline, and wwe’ve probably promised something similar in gobs of other posts in the past. But really, this one is important! Our advice is to… Premium content starts here… ———– ———– Premium content ends. Ha! Apparently there’s a whole opus on these most-important posts from The […]
Continue reading...($) Identifying stellar stories of leadership and impact for MBA apps
When you’re developing content for an MBA essay, or even for your resume, you’ll need to focus on stating what you did in the specific situation. That’s the essence of the “show, don’t tell” advice that you hear over and over here on the blahg. Speaking in generalities is never going to help the reader […]
Continue reading...($) You can’t write your introduction first. It won’t make any sense.
Way back in September, we ripped to shreds a BSer’s essay for Harvard that started out talking about “curiosity” – and we wanted to circle back to that same essay today and discuss more on why the opening didn’t work. That BSer’s essay was written for Harvard, but the advice we’re offering here is relevant […]
Continue reading...There are two parts to your pitch: What you say, and how you say it.
This may sound so obvious as to be useless, but hear us out. The way you write about your career goals is at least as important as what the career goals actually are. Or to put it another way: If the reader can’t figure out what you’re saying you want to do with the MBA, […]
Continue reading...($) “This is overwritten.”
This is a tough thing to self-diagnose but it’s really important to understand if you’re going to present essays of authenticity. If your essay starts getting very flowery — if you are introducing metaphors about life and your writing sounds earnest — it’s likely suffering from being overwritten. Premium content starts here… ———– ———– […]
Continue reading...($) Storytime
You may have thought that we were going to tell you a story today, based on that title. But no. It’s more writing advice. And, you’re probably not terribly excited by hearing more writing tips from the ‘Snark — butchyaknowwhat? You’ll be writing essays this weekend, probably. And this technique around essay storytelling is actually […]
Continue reading...($) Is it OK for your essay to be overlimit?
In most cases: Yes! By a little. Except in cases where it’s not. Last week we talked about whether it’s OK for your essay to be underlimit, and when you saw that, you were probably all, “Gee thanks EssaySnark but that is not the problem I have.” Let’s dig into some scenarios when overlimit is […]
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