Accelerated MBA Programs have steadily gained popularity in the U.S. due to the growing reluctance of applicants to take two years out of the workforce. Tuition costs for accelerated MBA programs – another major consideration for MBA applicants – are often a fraction of the cost of a two year program. Currently, over 90 accredited business schools around the world offer a one-year MBA program with many schools expected to add the option in the future.

The curriculum in Accelerated MBA Programs typically covers the same material as a traditional MBA, albeit at a quicker pace. Some programs require students to have taken some business courses prior to enrolling in the program to ensure that they will be able to keep pace and manage the heavy workload. Most accelerated programs typically do not offer students an opportunity to do an internship.

The information below shows the student profile of people currently enrolled in Accelerated MBA programs, both in the U.S. and abroad:

Median Age:     29

Gender:            73% Male

Median Yrs of Experience        6

Median Pre-MBA Salary          $55,000

Median Post-MBA Salary        $90,000

Promoted post-MBA   78%

Switched Industries post-MBA 5%

Source: WSJ Survey

Recruiters and hiring managers typically view the accelerated MBA degree in the same light as a “regular” two year degree, so anyone looking for a quicker – and cheaper – way to give their career a boost should definitely consider this option.

MBA365.com is a provider of fairly-priced admissions consulting services, information and resources for current and prospective MBA applicants.

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For more about one-year MBA programs listen to this MBA Podcaster show: Top One Year MBA Programs: Is A Shortened MBA Program Right For You?

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Being placed on the waitlist of a top MBA program is a frustrating experience. It feels anticlimactic after such a long process and it can also lead to a period of ambiguity as you wait to see where you will ultimately enroll in the fall. The key to surviving a waitlist process is to create and follow a plan of action, just as you would for your initial application. Putting together a checklist can help you gain valuable insight and perspective into your situation and will allow you to maximize your chances of gaining admission off of the waitlist.

Here is the course of action that Veritas Prep admissions experts recommend for anyone who has been waitlisted by a top business school:

1. Understand the waitlist. Some schools rely heavily on the waitlist to fill their incoming classes, while others rarely take more than a handful of waitlisted candidates every year. This often depends on a school’s yield — the percentage of its admitted students who actually matriculate. The higher the school’s yield, the less it needs the waitlist to fill up its class. Being able to determine which schools will use the waitlist heavily allows you to prioritize your approach and lock in on a true top choice.
2. Follow instructions. Often, in their anxiety-fueled attempt to act quickly, waitlisted candidates will rush to respond to a waitlist letter without actually following the school’s instructions. Typically, the admissions office will ask for a response showing continued interest and will provide several optional ways to submit materials. However, you should never simply assume that each school’s process is exactly the same. Take a deep breath, re-read the letter, go to the website to see what you can find out about the waitlist, and then set everything aside for 24 hours. You will be able to return to the task at hand with some clarity and ensure that you follow all instructions.
3. Reach out. So long as you are following the admission office’s instructions, you are always better off being more proactive in this situation. Don’t simply check a box and send it in — get in front of people. Be top of mind. This is the stage where programs want to know your level of interest, first and foremost. So aggressively tell them. You have little to lose at this point, as your waitlist status suggests that you are a qualified candidate still in the running for an unknown number of spots. If you have a contact in the admissions office, email that person right away to let them know you have responded formally and that you will be sending in additional materials. Ask if you can check back in for a status report. You can even be so bold as to ask whether that person thinks the school will be aggressive with the waitlist or not.
4. Review. Once you have followed instructions and put yourself on the school’s radar, the next step is to retreat back into your own application. You are going to want to take advantage of optional submission opportunities to both express your interest and also bolster your candidacy. In order to make effective use of this opportunity and keep it from being an “information dump,” you should review your application carefully to see what needs to be augmented. This is where a company like Veritas Prep or a trusted advisor can really help — understanding what you might have left out or what the committee’s key question was is an important step in a waitlist game plan. There are two important things to look for when reviewing your application materials:
   1. That you have achieved balance as a candidate and addressed each of the critical application themes.
   2. That you have expressed the proper level of fit with the program in question.
5. Augment. Once you have taken inventory of your application and any weaknesses that remain, the next step is to augment that information through any available submission options. The most common is a waitlist response letter or an update letter, which allows you to express your interest and fit, as well as provide any updates that help address weaknesses. You want to avoid simply restating your application materials or delving back into your personal statement. This will be a strong temptation, but must be avoided, simply because you need to be as efficient as possible in a limited amount of space. A good way to ensure that you are using available options effectively is to follow the following “messaging hierarchy”:

1. 1. Showcase your desire to attend their MBA program
   2. Express fit with their school
   3. Mitigate the weaknesses that may have kept you from being admitted and that were not properly balanced in your initial application
   4. Provide updates (especially if they help to mitigate a weakness or offer balance)
   5. Address general business education themes

You will note that tackling business school themes — normally the first priority in an application — is the least of your worries when drafting a waitlist letter. You simply don’t have space to present a full (and new) picture of your entire candidacy, nor is the school looking for that. They want to know if you will enroll and why. If you can get out in front of your biggest weakness and provide some updates in the process, then that is ideal. Just don’t lose sight of the highest-priority messages.

Finally, keep in mind that business schools use a waitlist for a reason: they might need to bring qualified students off of that list and add them to the incoming class. Taking advantage of any opportunity to solidify your story and advertise your qualifications is a way to turn waitlist limbo into a great opportunity. It simply requires stamina to finish the race and total attention to detail.

If you find yourself on a business school waitlist and need more assistance, contact the MBA admissions experts at Veritas Prep. We can help you maximize your chances of gaining admission off of the waitlist in a very competitive year.

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Thanks to Veritas Prep for this article. MBA Podcaster listeners receive a $150 discount on any Veritas Prep GMAT course, private tutoring, or admissions consulting school package by registering with the code “pod150″. Learn more at veritasprep.com

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-As a leader in global business, Wharton is committed to sustaining “a truly global presence through its engagement in the world.” What goals are you committed to and why? How do you envision the Wharton MBA contributing to the attainment of those goals? (750–1,000 words)

- What are you most passionate about? Why? (250 word maximum, Haas)

Applicants find questions like these challenging because they necessitate intellectual and emotional honesty and authenticity. Most of us are rarely afforded an opportunity to reflect like this in our day-to-day careers, particularly in the early stages. To start, it is helpful to demystify ‘the admissions essay’ and what the best admissions essays really look like.

In the broadest sense, an admissions essay is a not just a meditation on your past, it is a forward-thinking advertisement. You must consider your audience—strategically aligning your strengths with a program’s culture and offerings—and also introduce a point of view that is different from the rest. What exactly constitutes “the rest?” The range of response styles from MBA applicants can be broken down into the following major buckets:

1) Applicants who fail to fully target the full prompt, e.g. adequately address the ‘why’ component, balance a situation, action and result, or focus their content (the majority)

2) Applicants who effectively target the questions, but do nothing more; their essays read like resumes in narrative form (the majority)

3) Applicants who not only fully target the prompt and cover all its dimensions, but who also use the space to humanize themselves and enrich their full application package (the rare minority)

The best admissions essays that we read each year—and the types of essays we partner with our clients to compose—share a number of commonalities: they target the prompt, but also expand upon it; they create a compelling story; they toy with new structural frameworks; they demonstrate thoughtful self-reflection and meaningful connectivity between life events; they feel undeniably authentic and the ‘voice’ is unique to the author.

However, most MBA applicants, regardless of their background or industry, have a tough time speaking about their careers with a sense of unbridled passion and inspiring conviction. However, this is the kind of energy responsible for driving the most successful careers, it is the kind of energy that admissions committees want in their programs, and the fact is, most applicants must actually ‘fake it until they make it.’ Consider the following from an MBA applicant:

“1. What are you most passionate about? Why? (250 word maximum)

I am most passionate about corporate responsibility and social justice, and exploring how businesses can profitably advance human rights. My mother fled Cambodia in 1976, leaving dozens of family members behind. As an undergraduate at the University of Texas, I learned about the brutal 1994 genocide in Rwanda and was shocked that despite the historical lessons we have learned as a society, another genocide had occurred in my lifetime. Shortly thereafter, I joined a group of students working to raise awareness about the ongoing conflict in Iraq.”

This candidate might be the envy of an applicant with a more black-or-white, less socially-driven career path; however, even the applicant with a social cause fails to connect here. With this opening paragraph, we suggested that the applicant truly target the prompt. The prompt says it all here, and we encourage all applicants to convey passion from the onset of the essay. We might ask: what are the real details of your family history? How can the transition from a family history linked to Rwanda to Iraq be strengthened and substantiated? In addition to conveying a sense of passion—you must also demonstrate a real sense of purpose. How can you show that a personal history cemented values which translated into action? What new ideas do you have to introduce to the corporate responsibility model—what companies do you think really make it work?

With any form of writing, in the admissions, academic or business context, the ability to ask the toughest questions delineates between “good” and “exceptional” prose. Ultimately, assuming that a person has a story to tell—anyone can translate that story into an exceptional essay. With our clients, we work within their individual capabilities as writers to harvest the details that bring life and energy to an essay. Asking pointed questions is a fundamental part of that process.

To summarize, think about the following best practices when crafting your MBA admissions essays:

-Before you start the writing process, think about all that you have to tell. Start with a stream-of-consciousness listing of major life events (personal and professional), accomplishments, and shifts in thinking.

-Consider your essay (and application) package holistically—do your essays and resume convey a complete, consistent brand?

-Don’t let prompts dictate structure. Though this is not your college essay, exercise some creativity and narrative elan.

-Get a second opinion from a person that knows you, and a person that doesn’t. Does your essay ask the toughest questions? Does it connect the dots between experiences, and dig deep?

- The very architecture of your thinking and your ability to form an argument must be worthy of an
MBA community and education. Push yourself to go even further with connecting the dots and anchoring your goals to your story. Become the expert. Find a role model, read business literature—and make sure that your goals are informed by a convincing business acumen or instinct.

Lastly, remember that MBA admissions writing demands a certain degree of strategy, but not rigidity. Ultimately, while there are certain pitfalls to avoid, as with all types of writing, there are no strict formulae that dictate success or guarantee a compelling narrative. So, dare to break the mold—tell your own story—and tell it well.

Sincerely,

Janson Woodlee

Ivy Eyes Editing

www.ivyeyesediting.com

*Visit us today for a free assessment of your admissions essay, resume, cover letter and more*

If an interview is offered, take it. In person, you may be a more compelling candidate. You can further address weaknesses or bring dull essays to life. More importantly, you can display the kinds of qualities—enthusiasm, sense of humor, maturity, drive—that fill in the blanks and often sway a decision.

A great interview can tip the scale in the admit direction. How do you know if it was great? You were calm and focused. You expressed yourself and your ideas clearly. And you developed a solid rapport with the interviewer. A mediocre interview may not have much impact, unless your application is hanging on by a thread.

What to Expect
Business school interviews don’t tend to be rigid or formal. This doesn’t mean that it won’t feel like a job interview. It just means that they want to get a sense of you as a whole person.

Your interviewer may ask specific questions regarding your job responsibilities or broad questions about your history, personality and goals. You may talk about your hobbies, a recent cross-country trip or the worst job you ever had.

Interviews are conducted by students, faculty, admissions staff or alumni. Don’t dismiss students as lightweights; they follow a tight script and report back to the admissions committee. Because they are relatively inexperienced as interviewers, however, these sessions are more likely to be duds. You may have to work harder to get your points across.

How to Prepare
You can prepare for the interview in several ways: Practice speaking about your accomplishments. Be ready to go into greater depth than you did in your essays (but don’t assume the interviewer has read them). Prepare two or three points about yourself that you want the interviewer to remember you by. Come armed with examples, or even a portfolio of your work, to showcase your achievements. Limit your use of business jargon. Finally, be prepared to give a strong and convincing answer to the interviewer’s inevitable question, “Why here?”

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Be sure to listen to MBA Podcaster’s show about Acing Your Interview:
http://www.mbapodcaster.com/MBA_MoreInfo/AcingMBAInterview.asp?iEpisode=10
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Here is a list of do’s and don’ts to keep in mind as you begin to write:

The Do’s:

• Communicate that you are a proactive, can-do sort of person. Business schools want leaders, not applicants content with following the herd.
• Put yourself on ego-alert. Stress what makes you unique, not what makes you number one.
• Communicate specific reasons why you’re a “fit” for a school. Simply stating “I am the ideal candidate for your program” won’t convince the admission committee to push you into the admit pile.
• Bring passion to your writing. Admissions officers want to know what excites you. And if you’ll bring a similar enthusiasm to the classroom.
• Break the mold. Challenge perceptions with unexpected essays that say, “There’s more to me than you think.”
• If you’ve taken an unorthodox path to b-school, play it up. Admissions officers appreciate risk-takers.
• Talk about your gender, ethnicity, minority status or foreign background—but only if it has affected your outlook or experiences.
• Fill your essays with plenty of real-life examples. These will support your thesis and bring your story to life.
• Demonstrate a sense of humor or vulnerability. You’re a real person, and it’s okay to show it!

And the Don’ts:

• Write about your high school glory days. Admissions committees don’t care if you were editor of the yearbook or captain of the varsity team. They expect their candidates to have moved onto more current, professional achievements.
• Submit essays that don’t answer the questions. An off-topic essay, or one that merely restates your resume, will frustrate and bore the admissions committee. More importantly, it won’t lead to any new insight about you.
• Fill essays with industry jargon. Construct your essays with only enough detail about your job to frame your story and make your point.
• Reveal half-baked reasons for wanting the MBA. Admissions officers favor applicants who have well-defined goals. However unsure you are about your future, it’s critical that you demonstrate that you have a plan.
• Exceed the recommended word limits. This suggests you don’t know how to follow directions, operate within constraints or organize your thoughts.
• Submit an application full of typos and grammatical errors. A sloppy application suggests a sloppy attitude.
• Send one school an essay intended for another—or forget to change the school name when using the same essay for several applications. Admissions committees are (understandably) insulted when they see another school’s name or forms.
• Make excuses. If your undergraduate experience was one long party, be honest. Discuss how you’ve matured, both personally and professionally.
• Be impersonal in the personal statement. Many applicants avoid the personal like the plague. Instead of talking about how putting themselves through school lowered their GPA, they talk about the rising cost of tuition in America. Admissions officers want to know about YOU.
• Make too many generalizations. An essay full of generalizations is a giveaway that you don’t have anything to say
• Write in a vacuum. Make sure that each of your essays reinforce and build on the others. Think of each statement as one note in a song.

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Be sure to listen to the MBA Podcaster shows all about Business School Essays:

MBA Application Essays and Recommendations: Where to Begin? http://www.mbapodcaster.com/MBA_MoreInfo/MBA-Application-Essays.asp?iEpisode=5

Your Application Essays: Strategic Recommendations for Writing Your Admission Essay http://www.mbapodcaster.com/MBA_MoreInfo/EssayStrategicRec.asp?iEpisode=23

Creating the Killer MBA Application: A Step by Step Guide to Creating the Best Application http://www.mbapodcaster.com/MBA_MoreInfo/Killer_Application.asp?iEpisode=48

The finishing touches on your application: How to make the most of your application in the short time left http://www.mbapodcaster.com/MBA_MoreInfo/finishingtouches.asp?iEpisode=29

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How is on-campus recruiting different from off-campus recruiting? You’ll hear a lot about ‘on-campus’ and ‘off-campus’ recruiting once you start your MBA program.   On-campus recruiting refers to the structured and organized recruiting process that a school schedules with firms that happens, as the term implies, on-campus.  Typically occurring in January – March for internship opportunities and September – November for full-time positions (depending on the school), the actual on-campus interviews will occur after several weeks of recruiting events held by firms, including corporate presentations at the school, informal meet n’ greets or coffee chats, formal dinner with company reps and other social events, depending on the firm.

Key advantages and disadvantages of on-campus recruiting include:

Advantages

• These firms have the strongest recruiting relationship with the school and are actively targeting the school’s MBA talent. 
• Opportunities to network with on-campus firms are essentially planned and scheduled for you.  All you need to do is show up prepared to meet with company reps (although additional individual networking is also highly recommended).
• In general, offers given from on-campus firms are competitive as compared to market rates, as these firms value MBA talent and understand they have to pay for that talent.

Disadvantages

• Many students will be competing for the same opportunities, which makes it more difficult to differentiate yourself from the pack.
• The ‘herd mentality’ of MBA recruiting is very prevalent during on-campus recruiting.  This is the phenomenon of students gravitating towards popular job functions (e.g. consulting or investment banking) because they see many of their classmates focusing on these opportunities.
• On-campus recruiting doesn’t simulate a ‘real life’ job search in the sense that all these companies will be coming to you.  This translates into limited opportunities to develop MBA-level networking skills outside of a controlled job search environment.

Off-campus recruiting is a different beast that is comprised mainly of companies and opportunities that you uncover through your own efforts.  This can take the form of reaching out to target companies on your own, applying to opportunities through job boards, and heavy networking to support the above.  This takes a lot more self-discipline and networking skill to execute effectively.

Key advantages and disadvantages of off-campus recruiting include:

Advantages

• You direct your own job search, which means you’ll likely uncover amazing opportunities you would never have known about if you just focused on on-campus recruiting.
• When you go off-campus, you often compete with a smaller pool of candidates, so it’s easier to differentiate yourself to firms and use your school’s brand as part of that differentiation.
• During the off-campus search you develop very sophisticated networking techniques that will serve you well throughout your career in many different types of business situations.

Disadvantages

• Because the search is self-directed, it’s tempting to put off your search or not put in as much effort as you should.
• A prolonged off-campus search is tiring and it’s easy to get discouraged, particularly if you have reached out to a large number of firms and you don’t hear back from them.
• Given the heavy networking required in the off-campus search, if you’re hesitant to reach out to people, this will undoubtedly hurt your search and limit your effectiveness.
• Off-campus firms that do not have a formal MBA recruiting process may give offers that vary widely from MBA market norms.  This could work in your favor or work against you.

Most new MBA students don’t realize how competitive the recruiting process is at the MBA-level until they find themselves in the middle of recruiting season.  The smart student will be sure to plan for both an on- and off-campus job search, which will increase your chances of landing an offer you’re excited about.

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Thanks to ZoomInterviews for this article. Zoominterviews.com provides you with an insider’s view to the admissions interview process. MBA Podcaster listeners will save 10% on the purchase of any video package by using the code “MBAPODCASTER” on zoominterviews.com 

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Part of the holy grail of a good application to business school is to show why the particular nature of the b-school you are applying to fits with you and what you want out of your MBA. That is, each program has a slightly different ’signature’ in terms of curriculum, type of students, faculty interest, clubs and extramurals, internship-recruitment opportunities, alumni network and so on, and the task is to show that you understand what that signature is and why it fits with you.

You won’t get a lot of help from looking at the glossy brochure or the school’s glamour Website. That won’t make you enough of an ‘insider.’ The only way to know enough about a program is to get inside it for a while — by interacting with people who are there, or visiting the campus and talking to people who are there.

Social media networking forums have created new options for doing this. You can connect with or ‘follow’ current students or clubs via their blogs or tweets, or their identities Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. If there is a Stanford club entertaining Steve Jobs, it will be on someone’s blog. If Wharton students are on a trek, someone will have uploaded video to YouTube, and so on. Following this assiduously and interacting (politely) where appropriate will give you a window into the nature and culture of the program you are targeting in a way that just was impossible to imagine a few years ago. Beware, quality is mixed to say the least. You will get many perspectives from parties with vested interests that are not aligned with yours. Use them wisely. But overall this is the way to go.

Some admissions officers blog too, and currently Adcoms in general are rapidly revamping their own marketing (seeking to find and attract great applicants) to include social media. More and more authentic and useful insight in each school from the school itself is being offered in this way. See, for example, Chicago Booth Adcom director Rose Martinelli’s very personable blog, The Rose Report. You can follow, interact, and absorb the school’s culture in this way. (Again, be appropriate. Don’t, for example, use a blog comment facility to ask about your own personal application…)

But the downside of social media is this: If you can find and know them in this way, they can find you. Be careful about what you say online and what you have said. I’m not saying that Adcoms “google” an applicant or routinely look them up on identity sites to find out more about them or corroborate what they put down on the forms. They probably don’t. But they very well might.

Expect Adcom to treat you in some ways like a potential employee or client. It’s well known that these days prospective employers or prospective clients, or anyone who wants to look you up on the Web, can and will do so. And when they do they may find that beery and not-altogether-clean bachelor party photo on MySpace. Or they may find a Doostang profile that doesn’t adequately match what you’ve told them. And it’s quite hard, once something is out there on the Web, to take it back.

So be smart about it. Use social networking to get inside a program to research and develop your ‘fit’ argument. Be scrupulous about what is out there under your name, make it consistent with your application platform, and try to take down unprofessional material where you can.

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Thanks to The MBA Admissions Studio for this article. MBA Studio is offering a FREE review of any 500-word MBA Admissions essay as trial of service, or a free spot assessment of an MBA applicant’s strengths, weaknesses, and admissions prospects to all MBA Podcaster listeners. Email contact@mbastudio.net for more info

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The GMAT is a marathon, and not a sprint! I like to use the analogy of an endurance athletic event like a marathon or a stage of the Tour de France. At that point, you’re well trained and primed for action — you really can’t improve your conditioning the day before the race, but you could certainly downgrade your performance by draining your energy or taxing your muscles. The same is true of the GMAT — you won’t get any “smarter” the night before the test by studying; you may, however, wear yourself down by staying up late to get to one more set of problems, or make yourself nervous by happening to hit a patch of ten monster questions in a row and struggling through them.

Now, on the flip side, you’ve worked too hard and are too antsy before the test to simply “do nothing”…doing that will probably increase your nerves to the point of being counterproductive, as well. So I’d steal a page from the Tour de France cyclists, who ride their bike trainers on a low gear before events, basically “spinning their wheels” with little-to-no resistance in an effort to replicate the motion of riding and keep their muscles fresh (plus burn off any “just sitting around” anxiety) without taxing themselves before a monumental challenge.

You should attempt to do something similar by working through old problems and just going through the mental steps necessary to solve them and remind yourself of any special-circumstances items you need to remember (e.g., “It’s a Data Sufficiency problem with an inequality, so I need to rearrange the algebra in statement 1, but be careful to not multiply or divide by a variable because it could be negative, in which case I would have to flip the sign”). By doing this, you’ll remind yourself of how to succeed, but you won’t tax yourself mentally or run the risk of encountering a few tough problems that shake your well-earned confidence.

Remember: Rest and relaxation, coupled with perhaps a little “light exercise” for your brain, are your best bets for maximizing your GMAT score on test day!

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Thanks to Veritas Prep for this article. MBA Podcaster listeners receive a $150 discount on any Veritas Prep GMAT course, private tutoring, or admissions consulting school package by registering with the code “pod150″. Learn more at veritasprep.com

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In my book ‘MBA Admissions Strategy’ I offer the following advice: ‘Proofread to show your hunger’ (that is, hunger for admission, a real desire to be selected.) Typographic or other careless errors in your text immediately clues Adcom in as to how (un)careful you were with your text, and this tells them not only how organized and detail-oriented you are — whether you are a ‘finisher’ — but also how much you actually really care about your application to their particular school.

In this sense MBA admissions works just like a resume you send out for a job. If there’s one error in it, eyebrows will be raised. Two errors and you may as well not have sent it.

The longstanding ‘pet peeve’ across all schools is that the wrong school name often appears in the text. That is, Stanford GSB Adcom gets essays that say: “I would contribute to my peer learning environment at Wharton by …” Ouch.

Famously, the spellchecker will help you a bit, but is not foolproof. It will happily let you say your first mentor was your high school principle. It will not replace Booth with Tuck. Nor does it know that Haas is a business school, but Hass is an avocado.

The tricky thing is that you, the essay-writing applicant, can’t proofread your own work. Obvious errors will go undetected because you will be focused (rightly) on content and value delivery. The MBA Admissions Studio, where I provide elite business school admissions consulting, does not offer this service either – for the very same reason. Proofreading should be done by someone who is seeing the essays for the first time, and who is tasked with looking for errors (not reading for content or value assessment.)

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Thanks to The MBA Admissions Studio for this article. MBA Studio is offering a FREE review of any 500-word MBA Admissions essay as trial of service, or a free spot assessment of an MBA applicant’s strengths, weaknesses, and admissions prospects to all MBA Podcaster listeners. Email contact@mbastudio.net for more info

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The ‘criticism-weakness-failure’ essay is common in MBA Admissions essays because it is a test of an applicant’s maturity, self-knowledge, honesty, and ability to learn from mistakes. It is, in other words, the biggest indicator of real leadership ability and potential.

Sample questions are:

Tuck 3. Discuss the most difficult constructive criticism or feedback you have received. How did you address it? What have you learned from it?
Wharton 3. Describe a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself?
HBS 2. What have you learned from a mistake?
Columbia 3. Please provide an example of a team failure of which you’ve been a part. If given a second chance, what would you do differently?

Applicants to business school very often struggle with these essays because they feel that admitting a weaknesses or sharing a time when they failed erodes their candidacy. In fact, it does just the opposite. Leaders know their weaknesses, and can admit them to themselves and others — in order to work on them, or work around them. It shows self-insight and points to seniority. No one is comfortable talking about their weak spots and failure. But nobody is perfect or has not failed. Not Bill Gates, not Richard Branson, not me, nor you, nor the admissions officer.

So it is not admitting a weakness is what will get you dinged, because it’s like waving red beacon that betrays inexperience and a junior mindset. If you “have no weaknesses” that just tells Adcom that you don’t know what they are yet or that you’re too immature to face them. It says you don’t know yourself, therefore you don’t yet know where you will mess up. You are a liability to yourself and your company.

Take a tip from George Soros, self-made billionaire, philosopher, philanthropist, social reformer, and fund manager extraordinaire – famous for “breaking the Bank (of England)” by shorting the pound sterling in 1992 – who shares this candid account of his weaknesses …

“I’m a very bad judge of character. I’m a good judge of stocks, and I have a reasonably good perspective on history. But I am, really, quite awful in judging character, and so I’ve made many mistakes. It took me five years and a lot of painful experiences to find the right management team. I am please that finally I found it, but I cannot claim to be as successful in picking a team as I have been in actually managing money. I think that I’m very good as a senior partner, or boss, because I have a lot of sympathy for the difficulties that fund managers face. When they are in trouble I can give them a lot of support, and that, I think, has contributed toward creating a good atmosphere in the firm. But I’m not so good at choosing them.”

– ‘Soros on Soros: Staying Ahead of the Curve,’ Wiley & Sons, NY, 1995, p.18

See, the greatest business leaders all have weaknesses and all have made significant mistakes in their careers and their lives. And note his tone – Soros is candid, straightforward, and objective in his self analysis. He shares measured self-insight with the reader. He doesn’t try to slip in softening or deflecting phrases, or hide behind humor; nor is he self-excusing or whining and looking to blame others – the mark of a too-junior applicant. The point is not to prove that you don’t fail, or won’t fail. It is to prove that you have the insight into yourself to be able to recognize and compensate for your weaknesses.

What Adcom wants to know is not how you avoided failure, but how you managed it, what you learned, what insights into yourself you gained, and how you grew from there. They want to see that you have the will and the insight to locate and understand the source of your mess up – the underlying weaknesses that caused it – and that you have the maturity to face and work on the issue.

To summarize: the weakness / failure essay is not testing to see if you have weaknesses. We all do. It is a test of your self-knowledge and maturity. The committee wants to see if you can candidly face, discuss, and work on your flaws, or if you will you try to hide them or blame circumstances or other people. This is a significant test of your readiness for senior leadership.

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Thanks to The MBA Admissions Studio for this article. MBA Studio is offering a FREE review of any 500-word MBA Admissions essay as trial of service, or a free spot assessment of an MBA applicant’s strengths, weaknesses, and admissions prospects to all MBA Podcaster listeners. Email contact@mbastudio.net for more info

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