January 23, 2009
HBS MBA Interviews
In my experience, my clients who succeed at HBS interviews go to their interview with a sense of confidence based on having done careful preparation. My clients who have failed the interview stage have generally done so because of related reasons: lack of confidence and/or preparation. While these issues could be the same for any interview, the reality is that HBS admissions interviews are simply more thorough than that of most other schools. Failure to take this interview sufficiently seriously is a recipe for disaster.
In addition to my own knowledge, I have reviewed reports of Harvard Business School interviews found at accepted.com and clearadmit.com. These reports reveal that there are five key things to consider when preparing for HBS interviews:
1. You need to know your application very completely as you will be asked by adcom about its content. Review your entire application (not just resume and essays, but everything including the transcript) very carefully and consider what your interviewer might ask you to explain more thoroughly. Remember: Anything is fair game. Assume that the weakest parts of your application will be topics in the interview. Assume the worst-case scenario and be very prepared to address their concerns. Given the annual failure rate at HBS, if you have any academic weaknesses (low GPA, a relatively weak TOEFL, insufficient proof of a quantitative background), be ready to address those issues. Be prepared to tell new stories and alternative versions of the stories you told in your essays.
2. The questions you get will be specific to you. Most questions will not be odd, but they may be unexpected. On the other hand, a number of reports indicate that the majority of questions are actually common ones. See my previous post on interviewing. Be able to articulate clearly what you want to learn at HBS and what you can contribute. While it is important to be able to discuss leadership, don't assume the interview will be entirely focused on it. The interviewer will come in knowing what they want to ask you.
3. Assume there will be at least one question for which you might not be ready for. Don't panic. Take a deep breath. Answer the question and do not become flustered. Be ready to answer questions about a hypothetical case study, conflict with colleagues, and the latest book you read as these have all been reported frequently.
4. Adcom interviewers are friendly, but to the point. They don't do stress interviewing exactly, but they will question you intensely. They will be taking notes. Anything you say can be subject to inquiry, so speak concisely, answer questions precisely, and try to avoid voluntarily bringing up any topics that you really don't want to talk about. Assume the you will be asking follow-up questions, so expect to be able to analyze/explain in a great deal of depth. Your interviewer will know exactly what he/she wants to ask you because the purpose of the interview is (1) to see if you look as good in reality as you did in paper and (2) to address any concerns that they have about your suitability for HBS.
5. Reported interview length for interviews is 30 minutes.
For more about this interview, please see my more recent post on it.
If you are interested in my interview preparation or other graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant."
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
ビジネススクール カウンセリング コンサルティング MBA留学 インタビュー 面接
January 03, 2009
UC Berkeley Haas Japan Trek 2009 Sponsor
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
明けましておめでとうございます。
I am happy to announce that I am an official sponsor of the University of California Berkeley Haas School of Business 2009 Japan Trek. This trip is a great way to help Haas MBA students from around the world learn about Japan. I know the Japanese students at Haas put significant work into this trip and I am glad that I can support their efforts.
この度、カリフォルニア大学バークレー校ハース・スクール・オブ・ビジネスの2009年度Japan Trek公式スポンサーとなりましたことをお知らせいたします。これは世界各地から来ているハース・ＭＢＡの学生にとって、日本を学ぶ絶好の機会です。また、ハースの日本学生たちが多大な労力を注いでいるこのツアーのサポートをできることを、とても喜ばしく思っております。
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
ビジネススクール MBA留学
明けましておめでとうございます。
I am happy to announce that I am an official sponsor of the University of California Berkeley Haas School of Business 2009 Japan Trek. This trip is a great way to help Haas MBA students from around the world learn about Japan. I know the Japanese students at Haas put significant work into this trip and I am glad that I can support their efforts.この度、カリフォルニア大学バークレー校ハース・スクール・オブ・ビジネスの2009年度Japan Trek公式スポンサーとなりましたことをお知らせいたします。これは世界各地から来ているハース・ＭＢＡの学生にとって、日本を学ぶ絶好の機会です。また、ハースの日本学生たちが多大な労力を注いでいるこのツアーのサポートをできることを、とても喜ばしく思っております。
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
ビジネススクール MBA留学
December 30, 2008
Thank you!
This will be my last post for 2008. I just simply wanted to thank my readers for visiting. I am rather busy assisting my clients. I anticipate more blog posts after the 15th of January.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Cheers,
Adam
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Cheers,
Adam
December 22, 2008
On consistency between your application and recommendations
I am frequently asked questions from MBA, LL.M., MPA, and other graduate school applicants about how much consistency there should between their application (essays, resume, and application form content) and their recommendations. This is a complex and annoying issue for many applicants, especially if they themselves and/or their recommenders come from countries where such recommendations are not a part of the academic and/or business culture.
Since the application and recommendations are not the product of the same person, total consistency would be amazing, unnatural, and highly suspicious. The applicant and the recommenders each have their own perspective. Of course, if you have a recommender who has worked with you on a single or on very few projects, chances are great that the stories they tell in their recommendations will have a significant overlap with the stories you tell in your essays and/or accomplishments in your resume or application form. On the other hand, if the recommender is someone you worked with for a long time on a variety of projects, the differences in the subjects of the stories that are covered is likely to be much greater. Of course, if you have a particularly important project or activity that you want to make certain that your recommender covers, let them know that. Hopefully you have selected someone who will cooperate with you.
I would hope that what you say about yourself in your application is reflected sufficiently in the recommendations that admissions is not left with the feeling that are reading about two different people. For instance, direct contradictions between your application and your recommender about your role in work or of your strengths would look odd. That is why it is important to make sure that you give your resume to your recommender and are certain that they perceive you in a manner similar to the way you perceive yourself. They don't need to tell the same stories you do in essays, but they had better be writing about the same person.
Hopefully you are selecting a recommender whose perspective on you will not be a complete contradiction. There are some situations where this occurs. For instance, female applicants sponsored by their companies might find it necessary to select a male recommender who just happens to be a sexist. In such instances, the applicant might have a guy, usually older, who wants to write about "how charming she is" and completely ignores her real talents. Sometimes, I advise such applicants to simply explain to their recommenders that such statements will not be viewed positively by an admissions committee that includes and is often directed by women. Other times, if the recommender is " a busy man" I suggest my client simply request that such unhelpful comments be eliminated. That usually solves the issue.
If, after selecting a recommender, you find that the person's version of reality is simply too far away from your own and they seem uncooperative, you might find it necessary to get a new recommender. I have advised a small number of clients to "fire" their recommender because it seemed like no other course of action was possible, but this is obviously not an ideal result.
For more about recommendations, please see Steve Green's previous post. Next year, I intend to cover recommendations in much great depth.
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
ビジネススクール カウンセリング コンサルティング MBA留学
Since the application and recommendations are not the product of the same person, total consistency would be amazing, unnatural, and highly suspicious. The applicant and the recommenders each have their own perspective. Of course, if you have a recommender who has worked with you on a single or on very few projects, chances are great that the stories they tell in their recommendations will have a significant overlap with the stories you tell in your essays and/or accomplishments in your resume or application form. On the other hand, if the recommender is someone you worked with for a long time on a variety of projects, the differences in the subjects of the stories that are covered is likely to be much greater. Of course, if you have a particularly important project or activity that you want to make certain that your recommender covers, let them know that. Hopefully you have selected someone who will cooperate with you.
I would hope that what you say about yourself in your application is reflected sufficiently in the recommendations that admissions is not left with the feeling that are reading about two different people. For instance, direct contradictions between your application and your recommender about your role in work or of your strengths would look odd. That is why it is important to make sure that you give your resume to your recommender and are certain that they perceive you in a manner similar to the way you perceive yourself. They don't need to tell the same stories you do in essays, but they had better be writing about the same person.
Hopefully you are selecting a recommender whose perspective on you will not be a complete contradiction. There are some situations where this occurs. For instance, female applicants sponsored by their companies might find it necessary to select a male recommender who just happens to be a sexist. In such instances, the applicant might have a guy, usually older, who wants to write about "how charming she is" and completely ignores her real talents. Sometimes, I advise such applicants to simply explain to their recommenders that such statements will not be viewed positively by an admissions committee that includes and is often directed by women. Other times, if the recommender is " a busy man" I suggest my client simply request that such unhelpful comments be eliminated. That usually solves the issue.
If, after selecting a recommender, you find that the person's version of reality is simply too far away from your own and they seem uncooperative, you might find it necessary to get a new recommender. I have advised a small number of clients to "fire" their recommender because it seemed like no other course of action was possible, but this is obviously not an ideal result.
For more about recommendations, please see Steve Green's previous post. Next year, I intend to cover recommendations in much great depth.
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
ビジネススクール カウンセリング コンサルティング MBA留学
December 13, 2008
Should I be simple or complex?
One thing that frequently arises when I work with my clients on MBA essays is the extent to which they should provide a simple or a complex portrait of themselves. My general strategy is to always say that I am greedy and therefore I want to learn as much about them as possible. Admissions committees, to a greater or lesser extent based on the questions that they ask, are trying to learn about you as a person. Tell them those best stories about you that will show you in all of your remarkable complexity. That said, the realities of page and word limits and the need to have a clear focus require some simplification.
While some schools like Columbia give very little space for the articulation of personality stories, even they are trying to find out about who you are and not merely what you have done. Your resume is a record of what you have done, the essays reveal who you are. Of course, recommendations will provide other people's perspectives on that, but until an interview takes place, the only way an admissions committee can learn about how you think about yourself, your own story, and your future is to read your essays.
Now telling stories about yourself is not an invitation to engage in mere self-indulgent confessions because good taste, discretion, and the necessity to market yourself effectively require that you exercise great judgment about what you write. That is especially why hastily written essays are so often bad. Such rushed content may have energy, but the assumption of "first thought, best thought" is often not only wrong, it is often fatal.
An effective approach to essay writing requires an initial brainstorming phase followed by reflection, revision, and some real serious consideration of overall strategy. Essays are read as a set and as part of a whole application, so it is best to see them as part of that holistic process.
I notice some applicants who think they need to continually repeat the same content from essay to essay within a single essay set. My assumption is if admissions read a story once, reading it again or reading one that is just like it in structure and theme is not likely to have much impact. Use each essay to tell focused stories that reveal a different aspect of who you are, how you think, and/or who you want to become.
Unless you are trying to create the impression that are there is little to you, presenting different aspects of who you are is important. People are complex, contradictory, imperfect and if you want to come across as a person you need to tap into that complexity. Being real, something I have heard admissions officers from such schools as Berkeley, Duke Fuqua, Stanford, Tuck, Chicago, and MIT say, is a core aspect of writing effective essays. Being real means presenting presenting different aspects of who you are.
You most certainly have to sell yourself, but do it authentically, and give admissions sufficient stories to connect to you as a person so that they decide that they want you as part of their community. These stories about your leadership, teamwork, communication skills, innovation, creativity, future vision, and accomplishments need to be in sufficient detail to have an impact on the reader. Merely sprinkling bits of detail will not be sufficient. You will need to choose between stories and can't possibly include everything.
You certainly have to think about your audience and ask what can you tell them that will most likely appeal to them? Don't do this at the expense of eliminating core positive aspects of who you are, but think strategically about what to focus on. For instance, at MIT, as I have suggested in my analysis of their behavioral questions, the ability to think and act differently depending on the kind of situation you encounter is certainly a net positive. In general, the ability to write differently and provide analysis of situations in different ways is an important way to communicate intelligence. This is something of value when applying to any school, but certainly even more so with essay questions like MIT's (or Stanford Essay C) that are specifically designed to gauge your emotional and analytical intelligence.
So back to original question: Simple or complex? Well, some of both actually. The art is all in the combination of the two and one of the core things that separates great essays from the rest.
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
ビジネススクール カウンセリング コンサルティング MBA留学
While some schools like Columbia give very little space for the articulation of personality stories, even they are trying to find out about who you are and not merely what you have done. Your resume is a record of what you have done, the essays reveal who you are. Of course, recommendations will provide other people's perspectives on that, but until an interview takes place, the only way an admissions committee can learn about how you think about yourself, your own story, and your future is to read your essays.
Now telling stories about yourself is not an invitation to engage in mere self-indulgent confessions because good taste, discretion, and the necessity to market yourself effectively require that you exercise great judgment about what you write. That is especially why hastily written essays are so often bad. Such rushed content may have energy, but the assumption of "first thought, best thought" is often not only wrong, it is often fatal.
An effective approach to essay writing requires an initial brainstorming phase followed by reflection, revision, and some real serious consideration of overall strategy. Essays are read as a set and as part of a whole application, so it is best to see them as part of that holistic process.
I notice some applicants who think they need to continually repeat the same content from essay to essay within a single essay set. My assumption is if admissions read a story once, reading it again or reading one that is just like it in structure and theme is not likely to have much impact. Use each essay to tell focused stories that reveal a different aspect of who you are, how you think, and/or who you want to become.
Unless you are trying to create the impression that are there is little to you, presenting different aspects of who you are is important. People are complex, contradictory, imperfect and if you want to come across as a person you need to tap into that complexity. Being real, something I have heard admissions officers from such schools as Berkeley, Duke Fuqua, Stanford, Tuck, Chicago, and MIT say, is a core aspect of writing effective essays. Being real means presenting presenting different aspects of who you are.
You most certainly have to sell yourself, but do it authentically, and give admissions sufficient stories to connect to you as a person so that they decide that they want you as part of their community. These stories about your leadership, teamwork, communication skills, innovation, creativity, future vision, and accomplishments need to be in sufficient detail to have an impact on the reader. Merely sprinkling bits of detail will not be sufficient. You will need to choose between stories and can't possibly include everything.
You certainly have to think about your audience and ask what can you tell them that will most likely appeal to them? Don't do this at the expense of eliminating core positive aspects of who you are, but think strategically about what to focus on. For instance, at MIT, as I have suggested in my analysis of their behavioral questions, the ability to think and act differently depending on the kind of situation you encounter is certainly a net positive. In general, the ability to write differently and provide analysis of situations in different ways is an important way to communicate intelligence. This is something of value when applying to any school, but certainly even more so with essay questions like MIT's (or Stanford Essay C) that are specifically designed to gauge your emotional and analytical intelligence.
So back to original question: Simple or complex? Well, some of both actually. The art is all in the combination of the two and one of the core things that separates great essays from the rest.
Questions? Write comments, but do not send me emails asking me to advise you on your application strategy unless you are interested in my consulting services. Please see my FAQ regarding the types of questions I will respond to. Before emailing me questions about your chances for admission or personal profile, please see my recent post on "Why I don't analyze profiles without consulting with the applicant." If you are interested in my graduate admission consulting services, please click here.
-Adam Markus
アダム マーカス
ビジネススクール カウンセリング コンサルティング MBA留学
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
