AAR: Reflections of a Recent HBS Admit – Part I

A recent HBS admit helps us understand how to get into a top business school. This is the first of two posts: the first is a Service to School testimonial and a discussion on how to figure out fit. The second post will give us an in depth understanding on letters of recommendation and suggest how you can get the best LORs that you can.
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You can’t do it alone. You must do it alone. These are the titles of two separate chapters in Bill Murphy Jr.’s The Intelligent Entrepreneur, which tells the story of three MBA graduates’ entrepreneurial adventures. These seemingly contradictory phrases highlight two important similarities between the MBA application process and entrepreneurship:

You must rely on others. If you think that gaining admission into a top-tier MBA program is something you can accomplish alone – simply by acing the GMAT and spending hours upon hours on your essays – you’re in for a surprise. Everything from letters of recommendation to essay revision and interview prep requires leveraging others’ experiences and support. With that said…

You must rely on yourself. Stellar letters of recommendation and polished essays will only get you so far. No one will spend hours studying for and take the GMAT for you. Additionally, writing and rewriting essays, managing letters of recommendation, taking additional coursework if needed, and preparing for interviews requires unwavering dedication. The MBA application process is a test of desire and perseverance. However, trust me and the long line of individuals who has gained admission into a top program: receiving an offer of admission from one of your dream schools is worth the effort. If you’re committed to attending an MBA program, shoot for the best programs you have a chance at – and go all in.

Below, I’ll focus on the former aspect of MBA applications and offer my reflections on the support I received from others throughout my admissions process. I’ll begin with a broad overview of the help I received from Service to School and then delve into the topics of school selection and letters of recommendation – two areas where I was glad to have spent some extra time and effort.

Service to School
I was introduced to Tim Hsia and Gus Giacoman, co-founders of Service to School, by a friend of mine who was finishing his Cornell S.C. Johnson School MBA program as an exchange student in Korea. He encouraged me to reach out to Tim and Gus via the Service to School website in its earlier stages. Tim and Gus were incredibly responsive and provided me immense help with the following aspects of the application process:

Resume. Tim and Gus provided me a template to use, along with a number of sample resumes, and took a look at my draft resume. Based on their feedback, I learned that focusing on actions and results rather than roles and responsibilities is essential to preparing a successful MBA application resume.
Reaching out to school ambassadors. Tim and Gus suggested the following advice: speak (via phone call, Skype chat, or e-mail) with a current student in order to get a feel for each school. I felt I could literally “fit in” with each school that I researched and experienced no red flags. However, reaching out to current students and alumni is an incredibly useful means of gaining real-life perspectives and tips at navigating the application process – and can provide valuable essay/interview fodder.

Essays. I asked Tim and Gus both to look over my essays for two of my top choice schools. They provided incredibly honest and straight-forward feedback. Probably the most useful feedback I received was to be more direct and specific into my career goals. Apparently being vague about career goals is a common mistake among many MBA applicants – not just military veterans. With that said, when approaching career goals essays, I’d look to narrow down a “target” industry, function, and geographic location. Don’t worry about being held to these objectives down the road – admissions committees are simply looking for well thought out, realistic goals.

Interview preparation. I conducted a mock HBS telephone interview with Gus, who kept the interview right at 30 minutes. Gus offered me two great pieces of advice: 1) be more “punchy” and really focus to answer behavior questions using the STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Results) method and 2) don’t be afraid to showcase your passion. These schools want you to be energetic and excited about your dreams. The earlier on in an interview you’re able to “tap into” things you’re passionate about, the better. As a general piece of advice, I would conduct mock interviews with friends and family using questions from ClearAdmit’s interview wiki. I also purchased the Harbus Interview Guide to prepare for my HBS interview.

Overall, the guidance and support I received from Tim and Gus was fantastic. They were incredibly knowledgeable and reliable resources and undoubtedly helped me gain admission into two of my top choice programs. As a result, I stand by as a school ambassador and will gladly talk with any prospective military applicants about the MBA application process. As I noted earlier, the application journey should not be trod alone. Now, onto the topics of selecting schools and managing letters of recommendation.

School Selection – Which Schools and When to Apply?
When choosing which schools to apply to, I focused on schools with high job placement, global brand recognition, and desirable geographic locations. As a transitioning military officer with no previous business experience hoping to transition into consulting, I looked for programs with high placement in the management consulting field. You really can’t go wrong with any of the top 20 MBA programs as far as job placement goes. However, global brand recognition was an important factor for me, since I am open to the idea of working abroad at some point in my career and understand the benefits of having an accessible, global network. Also, I wanted to apply to at least one school in New York due to the strength of the veterans’ network there.
I began by checking out a number of schools’ websites in order to get a grasp of the culture, curriculum, teaching style, and general “feel” of each program. Prior to finalizing my list of schools to apply to, I also reached out to current students at each of the schools to assess “fit” and to confirm or deny any impressions I had about the school – a tip I received from Gus Giacoman. Each of the school ambassadors I spoke with was more than helpful to share his experiences and, as I mentioned earlier, I easily felt I could “fit” into every program I explored. However, I’ve spoken to numerous other applicants where this was not the case, as they definitely felt preference for specific programs based on students/alumni they’d spoken with.
I ultimately chose to apply to four schools, all in Round 1 (with the exception of Columbia Business School, which has rolling admissions): Harvard Business School, the Stanford Graduate School of Business, the Wharton School’s MBA Program, and Columbia Business School. Needless to say, these were all “reach” schools and I would have been happy with acceptance into any one of them.
When selecting schools to apply to, I encourage a prospective applicant to look at the schools’ class profiles and see how he or she stacks up. If an applicant is well below the median GPA and GMAT, there’s still a chance for the applicant to leverage their leadership experiences to gain an edge on the competition. However, this would still be the exception, not the norm. Therefore, if you fall well below your dream schools’ stats and are set on attending business school, I’d encourage you to apply to one or two safety schools. When selecting a safety school, however, ask yourself: If this were the only school I got into, would I still leave active duty and sacrifice two years of income to attend this program? If the answer is not a resounding “yes,” I would not apply to that program. In my case, I planned to apply to a few other top schools (Chicago Booth, MIT Sloan, Berkeley Haas, and Kellogg) in Round 2 in case nothing panned out in Round 1.

If feasible, I strongly encourage applicants to apply in Round 1 rather than the later rounds. Sound familiar? This is a general piece of advice that admissions officers often throw around. Round 1 is typically less competitive than Round 2 and, I believe, applying early shows the admissions committees that an applicant has adequately planned for and committed to the process. In my case, I had taken the GMAT by April of the year I planned to apply, leaving ample time for the remainder of the application process. If you still have ample time to prepare for (next year’s) application season, you owe it to yourself to plan ahead, take the GMAT or GRE early, and give yourself the best chance of admission.