EssaySnark

Success Story! A post-MBA retrospective (part 1)

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We’re of course always thrilled when a Brave Supplicant makes it into a school of their dreams, and even more gratifying is when we get to follow them through the process and back out into the Real World again! It’s always slightly disconcerting to realize how quickly the time passes. Any of you BSers who are currently in the throes of MBA admissions: This will be over soon and before you know it, you too will be starting at your fancy-dancy MBA program — and then in the blink of an eye, you’ll be graduating!! Today we have some words of wisdom shared by a BSer from an admissions season in the past, who has generously written up a few response to questions we posed a few months ago (and apologies to said former BSer; regardless of how much we really do enjoy hearing from these folks, sometimes we’re super lame about responding to them when we do!!!).

Here’s the Q&A format — first question today, more of them coming in the next few weeks!

 

## **EssaySnark:** What priorities did you have or criteria did you use when selecting your bschool program? Did they change as you went through the process of applying?

**former BSer:** Well, this requires a brief flashback and a little background.

I was an engineer for the US Navy for over a decade, and had specialized in modeling underwater sound and submarine sonar. I was also looking for something more, although I wasn’t exactly sure what that was, so I became interested in consulting.

After several months of networking—this was before I was interested in an MBA—I was invited to interview with BCG as an experienced hire. I didn’t get the offer, but I still wanted in, so I decided an MBA would help me address the gap that prevented me from getting an offer from BCG. As a result, I was looking at schools traditionally known for consulting. I was also interested in the case method. And I was interested in schools that would admit someone in their very late 30’s.

Insead was the first school I took an interest in. It was European, exotic, and notorious for consulting, so I started an application. I began studying french to meet the language requirement. Heck, I even bought Jean-Louis Barsoux’s history, “Insead: From Intuition to Institution”. (It’s a really interesting story, by the way!)

But then I scored a 770 on the GMAT, and suddenly the top US schools suddenly seemed within reach. I added Wharton, Tuck, Kellogg, and Darden to my short list.

Actually, my reasoning was sadly generic up to this point. “Engineer wants to become a consultant, looks at top business schools” is a tale as old as time. Rankings, employment data, and my estimated probability of admittance were all that really mattered to be back then.

 

Sound familiar?? Stay tuned to hear more on this former BSer’s experience in moving from that undefined state of uncertainty into the next phase of clarity and the stepping stones taken to success!

Success Story! “I decided to get feedback on what I am doing wrong.”

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This update from a BSer came in last Spring and we saved it till now (posted with permission) because it is hopefully timely, useful, and inspirational!!

 

 

Hello Team Essaysnark!

I have began the application season with 3 dings in R1 from top schools (no interview in any).
After all the hard work I felt so frustrated, I felt that I have put a lot of thought and effort into the applications.

I was already subscribed to the blahg for quite some time then and I got the impression that you always give the truth – even when it’s not pleasant to hear (not a trivial thing in this field of admission consulting in my humble opinion).
 So I decided to send one of my apps for your Post-Mortem review (Wharton) to get feedback on what I am doing wrong.
After carefully reading how my application may be perceived by someone who doesn’t know me, I understood that my GMAT was holding me back a bit, and I realised that my essays were good (Not a trivial thing for an international applicant such as myself who never had to write essay to get admitted to a university).
But most importantly, you had this one sentence that really brought my motivation back up (i’ll copy it here) :

The most important message we can offer is: You’re totally going to make it into bschool if you don’t give up! Please let us know if we can help out along the way – we’re rooting for you from the sidelines. 🙂


That sentence (specifically the part I put in bold) gave me the motivation to believe in the path I was taking, the effort, and most important – the faith in myself (did I already mentioned you sounded harsh in the blahg? 🙂 ) [ES: We don’t mean to be harsh! The exact opposite!]

I applied to 3 schools in R2.
 This time I had 3 interviews, you even helped me prepare to one of them.
And I am excited to update that – I GOT IN !!!!!!! – I am totally going to bschool this year 🙂
I still can’t believe it myself yet.
 
I want to thank you for being part of this process! from reading your blahg to your school guides to the custom feedback – all provided me with insights into the process and the motivation to push harder.
Wishing you all the best, keep doing you.
I will definitely spread the word (you deserve it) !!

 
 
Those emails are always exciting to receive!! Especially in this case, where it was 100% proof of our statement that all admissions decisions are independent events.

Special Feature: (Last Year’s) Journey Complete!!!

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Last year we shared with you the journey of one Brave Supplicant who was reapplying to top U.S. schools. This came in the form of audio posts where he recapped what he did differently and how his approach changed after not making it in the first time.

In case you missed it (which most of you did since you weren’t applying to bschool last year!) you can get caught up with his story:

Episode 1: What happened last year, and gearing up as a reapplicant

 
Episode 2: Progress in Round 1!!

 

Today – finally!!! – we are sharing the last installment.

Episode 3: Interviewing

 
He talks about “Round 2 interviewing” at the end because he recorded this in January; we held off on posting till now because we knew that there would be lots of you BSers coming up in Round 1 who would benefit!!
 
 

Disclaimer: The content produced for this series was provided as a contribution to the EssaySnark blahg in exchange for free EssaySnark consulting services. In creating these submissions, EssaySnark offered some ideas of what to present, however the BSer created this on his own. All opinion, advice, and ideas are his own (though obviously we believe he has good ones, or we wouldn’t have invited him to share!).

Success Story! What we’re looking forward to at Christmas.

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Here’s a dose of hope for all you struggling through this challenging phase – you have this to look forward to in a few short months!! Posted with permission.

 

 

Merry almost Christmas EssaySnark,

Thank you for the awesome Comprehensive Profile Review you did on me in August. It was extremely valuable to help me target my overall application and interviews.

So here’s the overall results for you, hopefully the data is useful and allows you to help others more effectively!

Applied: Berkeley Haas, Yale SOM, Michigan Ross, UCLA Anderson, UT Austin McCombs

Interview Invites: Michigan Ross, UCLA Anderson, UT Austin

Admission Offers! Michigan Ross, UCLA Anderson

I was a bit surprised at getting dinged by UT Austin, but since Ross was my #1 I’m not feeling too down about it.

Once again, thanks for the awesome analysis and helping me put my best foot forward.

 

 
And, here’s the history (as you can guess, there were some challenges in the profile):

The Target Schools that this BSer had prioritized when we did the Comprehensive Profile Review were:

1. Ross
2. Yale
3. Berkeley
4. UCLA
5. McCombs
6. UNC

EssaySnark’s assessment (after reviewing the whole profile) was that these were most likely:

1. McCombs and UNC comparable chances and best likelihood
2. Ross and UCLA comparable chances and also good likelihood
3. Not bullish on Berkeley but maybe
4. Not seeing Yale as an option 🙁

(We go into way more detail on explaining things but that’s the order of probability that we captured in this person’s review.)

 

So, if you’re looking for some advice on which schools to target BEFORE you target them — or, which schools you’ll need to work your butt off for if you’re truly serious about trying there — then our Comprehensive Profile Review can tell you! We’ve got a pretty strong track record of predicting these things based on, you know, a comprehensive review of the profile.

And, if you’re serious about going for a school that we place further down on the list, we really would suggest going for the whole Complete Essay Package or at minimum getting those essays decimated. This BSer did not use us for anything else and the outcomes speak to what this person pulled off independently (or possibly using some other consultant, no idea) — and it’s probably unfair to say this but if we were so good at predicting things upfront then maybe we also might be good at providing input into the development process to increase those chances along the way?

It’s always up to you to do the work, but having a coach behind you who knows what they’re doing is a wise move when the stakes are so high!

This BSer ended up at their #1 school (GoBlue!) so congratulations to them!! They set their sights and pulled it off and it’s thrilling to hear of such successes.

Regardless of which route you take or whether you use us or anyone else to help you get there, we wish you tremendous success of your own! We cannot wait to get many more “Merry Christmas EssaySnark!” emails from all of you in the very near future.

Success Story! “Trust the Process”

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Happy June! Let’s celebrate by hearing about a former Brave Supplicant who was very diligent, and very successful, this past season!!

 

 

Trust the Process

Trust the process. It’s mainly a sports mantra, but one that pertains to any arduous task. It means, have faith that each step, from beginning to end, is important to achieving your goal. Applying to business school is a well-traveled path; if you seek and embrace good advice you will move from a treacherous trail to a suitable sidewalk. By sharing my process, I hope that you can improve yours.

With the goal of attending a top business school in 2-3 years, my process began in 2015 with the GMAT. After two months of studying, I decided that I was ready to sit in a fluorescent room for four hours. I finished the test, scanned my palm for the fifth time (while fighting the urge to say, “ma’am there’s only three people in this room and I can’t walk through walls”), and walked away with a 680. I compared this score to those at the top schools and concluded that I would need to retake. My plan for a brief study hiatus turned into a year-long break. If you are thinking of retaking, I would advise doing it soon after your first test. If you wait a year, as I did, you will spend a lot of time refreshing material that would otherwise be top-of-mind. Regrets aside, I retook in 2016 and scored a 710. After another two months of studying, I believed that was a satisfactory score. I now know people who spend much longer than two months studying and if I could go back I would take more time to maximize my score. I wouldn’t suggest delaying the test indefinitely while extracting every morsel of your ability, but there’s no reason to rush.

Post-GMAT, my attention turned to school search. My main criteria were T15 and northeast-ish, but not NYC. I went to undergrad at a small public liberal-arts school, so I wanted to attend a well-known program for grad school. I knew that I’d rather pay full tuition at a top school than received a scholarship to a lower ranked school. As for the northeast, it’s where I grew up and want to return. Why not NYC? One of my oddities is that I enjoy seeing more than a thin rectangle of the sky. In reality, I interned there for a summer – great experience, but never again. Your reasons don’t need to be complex. I found it useful to set filters like this, as it narrowed down my choices considerably.

With my curated list of schools, I set off to learn about them. I traveled to a different city to attend prospective student events, as my city was not a target. “You came from City X?!?”, other prospective students would ask, shocked at my herculean feat. “Yes, it’s about an hour train ride”, I would respond. While these events are a nice way to hear straight from the admissions teams, I don’t remember them being particularly important to my process. I would advise attending just a few; after that they get repetitive.

I planned to apply Round 1 in 2017, so I began visiting schools early that year. One tip here, which also applies to interviews, consider choosing Monday as your visit day. Thursdays and Fridays are often busy or fully booked but Mondays are not. The perk with Monday is you can travel to the school on Sunday, or even make a weekend of it beforehand. I enjoyed my campus visits; some of the more memorable parts were: watching the Penn State men’s lacrosse team explore Harvard Square like it was Diagon Alley, waiting out a snowstorm in the Wharton admissions office while the campus was shut down, going to a club the night before my UChicago visit and running into 100+ Booth students in Hawaiian shirts, warming up on a frigid New Haven morning with crepes at Choupette’s (the owner, Adil, is quite nice), and visiting Dartmouth with my dad (despite getting stuck in another snowstorm). My memories are of the environments and not of the schools themselves, which I think is just as well. Visiting schools is the most fun part of the application process and gives you a multitude of things to compare; don’t neglect this step.

After campus visits, I focused on the application itself. I met with an admissions consultant for a general overview. While nice and generally knowledgeable, the consultant was a “yes”-person. When I talked about applying to Harvard, they encouraged me without caveat. When I proposed a long-term goal of starting my own fund, they didn’t question whether it was realistic in the time that schools consider long term. I found their lack of critique unhelpful and searched elsewhere. I found EssaySnark (shoutout) and found them to be pragmatic. I learned a lot from their guides and essay reviews, and liked their systematic approach to the application. Their snarkiness is also a good reminder to keep things in perspective. When you seek admissions guidance, find someone with the following three attributes: an intimate knowledge of the current admissions landscape, a willingness to critique frankly, and a genuine interest in the admissions process.

With my application plan set, I spent the summer honing my stories, writing essays, and coordinating letters of recommendation (be sure to thank your recommenders! I gave mine a handwritten note and gift card to a local restaurant). I’m glad that I chose to focus on a small number of schools, as I was able to produce strong applications while keeping my sanity (for the most part). By September, however, I was burnt. My head hurt from proofreading data sets for the tenth time, so it felt good to be nearing the end. Over the next two weeks, I hit the submit button three times.

When December rolled around, I received two rejections (actually, one earlier than that since I wasn’t invited to interview) but one admission! Jackpot! Was I bummed that I didn’t get into the other two schools? Sure, but in the grand scheme of things, it’s irrelevant. I had achieved my goal of getting into a top business school. [A **very** top one, we might add! -ES] Schools have reputations, fair or not, that cause applicants to think, “I have to go there” or “I can’t go there, that’s not me”. In reality, every top school has a similar variety of personalities and talents. Where you go is less important than what you do once you get there. In order to get there, trust the process.

There are so many awesome comments, tips and perspectives in this story!! And the memories shared from the school visits were great. Hopefully all of you will be scouring through this multiple times to pick up on some of those excellent ideas. —- oh HEY! we have a little tip for blahg members that shows up here — if you’ve got an active membership, please log in to see it! —-
 
What impressed us most about this particular BSer through working with him in Round 1 last year was how willing he was to accept feedback, and willing to WORK! This essay writing thing is not easy for most people and that was also true for him. Yet he never had a bad attitude about any of it, he always just greeted the news of another revision with, “Okay, let me work on it and I’ll be in touch.” That attitude is all you need if you want to succeed! And he ended up in an excellent place indeed. Once again, CONGRATS to this particular Success Story and THANK YOU to him for sharing it — and EssaySnark hopes that all of you gearing up for Round 1 will be in a similar happy place yourselves at the end of this season!!!

Success Story! And some incredible tips for all of you trying this year!

by EssaySnark 2 Comments

REBLAHGGING THIS FROM LAST AUGUST BECAUSE THE ADVICE IS SO TIMELY!!
 
 

This most generous contribution was sent in by a former BSer back in April 2017 and we must share it with all of you who are facing the same challenges ahead! Thank you so much, Former BSer Sender Inner!!! Greatly appreciated indeed.

 

 
As an EssaySnark “Power User” whose journey from step zero to admit took nearly 2.5 years, I thought I’d provide some details on how EssaySnark can help with applications to the top-tier business schools.

When I first considered applying to business school, I knew the GMAT had to be the first step. Like the Snark says, you can’t begin to seriously examine target schools and build your application strategy until you have a score in hand. Practice tests don’t count; we’re talking official scores from a no-kidding GMAT exam. There are ample resources to get you to a competitive GMAT score, but for most people, myself definitely included, it’ll take some diligent study to get to that point. From cracking my first book to the point where I felt ready to take the GMAT, I studied for nearly 5 months, to include taking 5 full-length practice exams. Key takeaway: start studying for the GMAT a full year before the point you intend to apply to business school. Doing it this far out will give you ample study time, the opportunity for retakes if needed, and still leave you with time for all-important school visits prior to Round 1 kicking off.

I was pleased with my first GMAT score (710) but not blown away. As a transitioning military officer who’s quite a bit older than the average MBA student, I knew that I effectively had one shot at getting into b-school as I made the move to civilian life. For this reason, I wanted to make sure that every single asset in my application was as perfect as I could make it. It was in this spirit that I first approached EssaySnark, obtaining my Comprehensive Profile Review to get an objective assessment of what schools might be in range for me.

The CPR, as many on this site will attest, was invaluable. The Snark scrutinized every detail of my background. Using what I can only assume are reams worth of data, ES let me know what in my profile stood out from the pack and what was less impressive. The CPR also gave me a chance to ask whether retaking the GMAT would be a good decision in my specific case (it was, even though I didn’t manage to improve!) In all of its offerings, EssaySnark is generous and responsive in clarifying any ambiguities within the feedback it provides. In fact, some of the best advice I received was in the “comments” threads of the products I purchased.

Key takeaway for the CPR: take some time to thoughtfully fill out the questionnaire! ES gave me some really solid advice, but it took me several hours to put together a resume, select some preliminary school targets, and think about the career goals I might like to pursue.

With a full year between my 2nd GMAT exam and Round 1 of application season, I took advantage of the time to clarify my career goals. No prior business experience meant I really had no idea what I might like to do with my hoped-for MBA. Using EssaySnark’s Foundations package, I re-worked the resume I submitted for the CPR. For someone who’d never before had to write a resume, I found the Snark’s feedback very instructive in the crafting of “impactful” accomplishments, not to mention all the helpful formatting tips. Foundations also included the opportunity to submit my preliminary career goals for two rounds of review. I received valuable back-and-forth regarding the realism and achievability of what I envisioned myself doing post-MBA. It would take another year of research for my goals to finally solidify, but the exercise of thinking critically about my career was really useful even in the early stages. Those tenuous beginnings encouraged me to think more about options I hadn’t even considered – and taught me just how powerful a polite email can be in helping to learn about potential career paths. Without the counsel of EssaySnark, I would have put forth vague, unrealistic, uninformed career goals in my b-school applications. Definitely not where you want to be! Key takeaway: start thinking early about how your work experience and background will help you bridge the
gap to your desired future career, and how you might “connect those dots” in your application assets.

As ES advises, I also made time to visit some of the schools that interested me. I took a week of leave and hit a total of five schools on both coasts. It was a fun little vacation and I enjoyed the chance to participate in a “day in the life” at a real b-school. I took advantage of everything on offer: class visits, admissions presentations, student Q+A sessions, and guided tours. From what I’ve read, some people find these experiences very helpful in determining
whether a school is a cultural “fit”. I didn’t leave my visits with any strong feelings one way or the other on fit, but I did leave with a much better understanding of each school’s curriculum structure, academic offerings, surrounding community, and student life. These little tidbits proved invaluable come essay time; referencing a class I’d attended and tying it to my career goals helped make for a more authentic essay that showed genuine enthusiasm for the program. Key takeaway: take good notes during your visit! Even little things like the name of a particular case discussed in class have the potential to make your essays shine. I neglected to do this, and having to reconstruct these details made for more work when essay writing time rolled around. Though it was tempting to “work ahead” based on prior year essay prompts, heed the Snark’s advice and wait for the prompts to be released in the May-June timeframe. And then, once they’re out…get to work! DON’T PASS UP THE CHANCE TO SUBMIT A ROUND 1 APP! It’s a nice bennie that it’s a *slightly* less competitive round, but there’s another advantage: You’ll have decisions prior to the holiday season. From here, you can simply kick back and celebrate (the preferred course of action), or knuckle down and finish out a set of Round 2 submissions if your first applications don’t turn out how you’d hoped. Key takeaway: if going to business school in the fall is critical to your life’s plan, you owe it to yourself to maximize your chances by starting your applications in Round 1!

Once the prompts were out, the Snark quickly updated the school-specific strategy guides. The essay-writing advice in these is second-to-none, and each offers a great discussion of what the school historically values from its admits. I read these over and over while writing my essays as I tried to maximize my limited word counts to effectively answer the questions.

Though the guides are great, there is truly no substitute for EssaySnark’s signature product. If you’ve read this far, odds are you already know what that is: the Essay Decimator service. I applied to 3 schools in Round 1, and I used the Essay Decimator for each school’s submissions. Some may get the hang of essay-writing after their first tangle with Decimation, but I wanted to make my essays as polished as possible to counter a lower-than-average GMAT score for my target schools.

The Essay Decimator definitely helped make my essays shine. Within 3 days of sending my essays out for review, ES responded with fully marked-up drafts of each essay, pointing out incoherent phrasing, unconvincing logic, purple prose, time shifting, and every other essay writing misstep I may or may not have perpetrated. I appreciated that they offered a rebate for essays that are submitted in good shape, i.e. free of obvious typos and grammar/usage errors. Not only does it incentivize you to do your best work, it results in more effective feedback for you since ES doesn’t have to spend so much time correcting basic mistakes that can be caught with a good proofread. Separate from the revised drafts, EssaySnark also offered a summary analysis of the essays as a whole, thoroughly commenting on the effectiveness of my messaging and whether I answered the prompts in a convincing and authentic manner. ES pulls no punches in its feedback, but that’s not to say they aren’t professionals through and through. In every draft I sent their way, it was obvious that EssaySnark put in significant time to construct advice that made me better. Aside from the GMAT score and undergraduate performance, the essays are the most important part of your application – and you have ample time to get them into fighting shape! Key takeaway: enlist EssaySnark’s help on at least one set of your essay drafts.

Though I took what some might call a more leisurely pace writing my essays, I still worked on them in some form nearly every day from June through Round 1 deadlines in September. Like any creative endeavor, writing essays will take some time. Don’t try to force them out in one draft over a long weekend. The results will be lackluster, and in a landscape as pathologically competitive as b-school admissions in 2017, the odds are stacked heavily against any application with superficial or poorly-executed essays. Your draft may turn on a single phrase that comes to you at 2AM a week after you’ve hit an impenetrable writer’s block.

Key takeaway: give your brain the time it needs to mull over your essays and bring them from good to great– start early! As everyone says, the transition from essay obsession mode to deadline fretting mode is a rough one. Luckily, the Snark’s timely blog entry helped pass my days, until lo and behold, the interview invites started rolling in. With these interviews being the first I’d done in over 15 years – the last were for my undergraduate school – I didn’t want to leave anything to chance. I used EssaySnark’s custom interview prep service for one of my schools, and took advantage of the automated prep system for another. Both were great; one of the custom interview questions actually came up during my real interview, and the automated system helped me distill my rambling answers to succinct, well-structured responses. Key takeaway: practice your interviewing skills by going over likely questions beforehand, even if it’s just with a friend or family member.

With all my interviews complete prior to Thanksgiving, I waited anxiously through the first couple of weeks of December. I think the best way to recap the events of December 14th, 2016 is simply to share the message I sent to EssaySnark that evening:

Team Snark,
Apologies for the late word as it’s been a busy, eventful day.

At 9AM (PST) this morning, I logged on to the HBS applicant website and learned I had been admitted to the MBA Class of 2019! W00t!
Though I was stuck in class all day, I was busy checking my phone during the breaks. In the midst of one of my afternoon lectures, I received a call from an “Unknown” number that kindly left a voicemail. When I checked the message, I learned I had been admitted to the Stanford GSB MBA Class of 2019! Double w00t!!
As I drove home from class, my phone buzzed again from a number with a 510 area code. It was the Haas admissions office, informing me that I had been accepted to the MBA Class of 2019!

Triple w00t!!!

I wanted to say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for everything you’ve done. By my count, it’s been 2.5 years since I first cracked a book for the GMAT, and nearly 2 years since I first enlisted the services of the EssaySnark Team on this journey.

It goes without saying that I could not have realized these successes without the dedicated help of the EssaySnark team. You never shied away from the truth, and constantly pushed me to make my essays better in every way. The highest praise I can give? Besides my husband and my parents, I can’t think of anyone to
whom I was more excited to relay this news. And that’s no BS.

For someone like me with his heart set on business school, having a trusted adviser like EssaySnark was worth every penny. As I prepare to join the Class of 2019 this fall in the Bay Area, I am fully convinced I would not have earned the opportunities I did without the Snark’s guidance. ES is equal parts coach and friend, always ready with encouragement and laserfocused advice to keep you on the right path. I cannot recommend their services highly enough, especially for military candidates who don’t have the first idea about where to begin in this daunting process. Thank you, Team Snark – I couldn’t have done it without you!

 
 
 
 
 
This incredible write-up of this BSer’s journey was produced completely by them, with no input from us – they did it solely out of the goodness of their heart! Can’t believe we let it lounge in the inbox for four months before getting off our duff to share it with you. THANK YOU, KIND HEARTED FORMER BSER!! You’re probably off doing MBA things now. HAVE FUN IN BSCHOOL!! You worked hard for this big win – you deserve all this success that you’ve gotten.

To all of you current BSers: EssaySnark will be around this weekend, if you’re feeling like you could use some help right about now!