B-school Basics – Thank You Emails
Thank you emails are important! Recently, the Managing Editor of Business Insider wrote that the biggest mistake job applicants made was not sending Thank You emails. The same thing can be said for business school applicants. When applying to schools, you should send thank you emails to just about everyone you interact with – students, professors, and definitely admissions officers. Here are a few tips on writing a great thank you email:
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1) Timing
When sending your thank you email, do not send right after you meet or wait for days. While there is some flexibility around this, I generally recommend 18-24 hours after the meeting occurs. If you send a thank you email right after your meeting, you risk looking like you just want to get the email over and done with. But if you wait too long, then you risk looking like you forgot or are not organized.
2) Content
Your thank you email should be memorable while also expressing your gratitude and interest. Showing your gratitude is straight forward – just say “thank you!” but being memorable can be tricky. I usually try to recall a specific aspect of the conversation where I felt a connection with the person or where I felt genuine interest in what they had to say. For a business school interview thank you email, I might write something on how I appreciated an answer to a question: “I really appreciated your insight on Professor Z’s Valuation Course,” or something that came up in the course of conversation: “I enjoyed our discussion about veterans at [insert school here] and I was fascinated on your take on why vets were successful.”
I also recommend saving your thank you emails. To save time, you can sometimes use the same general format to send to multiple people – just make a few personal touches and you are done. Be careful though – make sure you do not send the exact same email to people from the same school. People will talk to each other about you as a candidate and if they see the same email it will make it seem like you are not making a strong effort.
3) Spelling & Grammar
This goes without saying, but double check your emails! Make sure you have spelled names correctly and have no “their, there” or “two, too” mix ups. For best results, run that spell check and read the email aloud to yourself a few times before sending.
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Thank you emails will not be the critical factor that wins you admission – but forgetting to send them can reflect poorly on you and damage your candidacy. To write the best thank you email you can, time your email correctly and make sure that it is memorable.
