So i've been out of here for over ten days now and was supposed to be working on my apps. I sure was working and slogging at that! in office and on my essays. while focussing on my essays i lost track of dates and before i know it i wake up on 27th December telling myself that 'damn u idiot you havent sent the recommendation links yet!'. To top this my most important recommenders are on vacation, one till 5th and other till 10th which is going to kill me now. My apps won't be complete even if I get my essays out on time and which also means I'm going to have to drop one application out of what feels like a zillion I'm working on. One of the worst mornings this year!
List of mistakes I made (till now) -
* Delayed booking my GMAT date, I had very few options when I booked
* Less planning around IMD application, applied for round 4 which was pointless
* Chose only one essay reviewer initially, should have picked 3-4 diverse views
* All the apps have gone on till last minute, none of my essays were done before time
* Bad scheduling of application deadlines, applying to three schools on same deadline
* School selection wasn't smooth, I never intended to apply to US and then it was all rushed
* Lack of discipline... never planned things well before working on them and didn't keep to my plans when I did plan
There is a lot more on timelines but I'll leave that for later and get back to finishing my essays and sending them for review.
My biggest learning always work on Plan B!!!
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Frozen toes
Its sunny outside but even a little cold in the air combined with fear of not getting my MBA apps right has had my toes cold almost all the time for the last week.
Progress so far is little because I keep deleting everything I do. I did make progress in my NYU Stern essays this morning. Got the draft done for one of them.
So in january I'm aiming to apply to -
* Johnson at Cornell
* Duke Fuqua
* Darden
* NYU Stern
* HEC (with some luck and effort)
Two major things happened this last week -
First, I attended webinterview with Sara Neher. Now I know a little more about Darden. It was a killing session in the middle of the night. I had a few questions which I got good answers to and more through other's questions. The best hour spent on Darden research. The audio is available here - http://www.accepted.com/chat/transcripts/2010/mba12132010_darden.aspx
I looked up for other schools I'm applying to and here is a transcript and audio for Cornell - http://www.accepted.com/chat/transcripts/2010/mba10212010_cornell.aspx
Second was a question I posted on forum for profile evaluation and help with school selection. I was impressed with the answer I got. It was realistic and told me of the glaring challenges in my profile. The response was from mbamission. The consultant told me which schools were unrealistic and this has helped me shortlist. I have wanted Stanford for like forever but I guess I just wanted to hear a no to drop it from my list of schools I'm considering.
For my school research, I'm also regular on clearadmit.com and accepted.com blogs to help me with school research. But the biggest resource is always businessweek. I was able to read through some sample essays and realized that mine are not too bad which is encouraging and a bit scary at times. There are so many good people out there and I have my moments of self doubt which is not a good thing to happen.
Progress so far is little because I keep deleting everything I do. I did make progress in my NYU Stern essays this morning. Got the draft done for one of them.
So in january I'm aiming to apply to -
* Johnson at Cornell
* Duke Fuqua
* Darden
* NYU Stern
* HEC (with some luck and effort)
Two major things happened this last week -
First, I attended webinterview with Sara Neher. Now I know a little more about Darden. It was a killing session in the middle of the night. I had a few questions which I got good answers to and more through other's questions. The best hour spent on Darden research. The audio is available here - http://www.accepted.com/chat/transcripts/2010/mba12132010_darden.aspx
I looked up for other schools I'm applying to and here is a transcript and audio for Cornell - http://www.accepted.com/chat/transcripts/2010/mba10212010_cornell.aspx
Second was a question I posted on forum for profile evaluation and help with school selection. I was impressed with the answer I got. It was realistic and told me of the glaring challenges in my profile. The response was from mbamission. The consultant told me which schools were unrealistic and this has helped me shortlist. I have wanted Stanford for like forever but I guess I just wanted to hear a no to drop it from my list of schools I'm considering.
For my school research, I'm also regular on clearadmit.com and accepted.com blogs to help me with school research. But the biggest resource is always businessweek. I was able to read through some sample essays and realized that mine are not too bad which is encouraging and a bit scary at times. There are so many good people out there and I have my moments of self doubt which is not a good thing to happen.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Duke research
What do you do when you're down sick? Stay home and rest I suppose... I'm staying home researching Duke and burning my eyes into the laptop. With most of my US apps going in R2 I need to work hard on getting them out on time - there are 3-4 wit deadline of 4th to 6th Jan.
And in between one of my ex flatmates and a very good friend is visiting me for 20 days. She'll stay with me and work from here. We're meeting after I guess three years now so I'm guessing this will impact my apps plus its xmas new years time too so I need to work get most of my essays done before 15th which is less than a week away.
The first I'm working on is Duke.
First question I answer to myself is why duke? I have several reasons, my dream companies recruit here in the field I want to work in. Here's how I begin shortlisting schools step by step -
* Find someone I know in the school - there are three reasons to why i do this
1. I like talking to current students/ alums to find more abt the school
2. there are some prodigies around me and I can never hope to get into
schools they are in.
3. do I feel I will want to be where this person is or was? This may sound a
bit condescending but the truth is that I consider some people are not worth
where they are which tells me that either they bluffed thr way to the school
or the school did not take pain in selecting students. Okay this I take with
pinch of salt and don't get stuck to if I like other stuff about the school.
This friend of mine is at duke and he kept motivating me to apply and is helping me understand more about duke.
* Employment report - do the companies I want to go to hire at the school do they hire in my field of work
This fits at duke
* Curriculum - Duke has some electives I want to take up. Some are similar to what I liked at London Business School. They also do research in leadership and ethics which is perfect for me.
* Student life - I think most of the b schools do well in partying and extracurriculars. I look at them to get a feel of what I would want to do. This also helps me answer the question Why Duke?
* Faculty - There are professors who have written some great books and articles. I read through the book excerpts,will see if I can get hold of the book too.
* Other stuff - Duke has COLE Center on Leadership and ethics that drives some clubs and activities along with curriculums.
Right now I'm reading through student blogs, swarming my friend with questions, looking up youtube videos and answering the long essays.
My essays started bad - I couldn't go beyond half a page at first but now am catching up and writing more about how I feel and what I believe in. Hoping the draft is done by tomorrow.
And in between one of my ex flatmates and a very good friend is visiting me for 20 days. She'll stay with me and work from here. We're meeting after I guess three years now so I'm guessing this will impact my apps plus its xmas new years time too so I need to work get most of my essays done before 15th which is less than a week away.
The first I'm working on is Duke.
First question I answer to myself is why duke? I have several reasons, my dream companies recruit here in the field I want to work in. Here's how I begin shortlisting schools step by step -
* Find someone I know in the school - there are three reasons to why i do this
1. I like talking to current students/ alums to find more abt the school
2. there are some prodigies around me and I can never hope to get into
schools they are in.
3. do I feel I will want to be where this person is or was? This may sound a
bit condescending but the truth is that I consider some people are not worth
where they are which tells me that either they bluffed thr way to the school
or the school did not take pain in selecting students. Okay this I take with
pinch of salt and don't get stuck to if I like other stuff about the school.
This friend of mine is at duke and he kept motivating me to apply and is helping me understand more about duke.
* Employment report - do the companies I want to go to hire at the school do they hire in my field of work
This fits at duke
* Curriculum - Duke has some electives I want to take up. Some are similar to what I liked at London Business School. They also do research in leadership and ethics which is perfect for me.
* Student life - I think most of the b schools do well in partying and extracurriculars. I look at them to get a feel of what I would want to do. This also helps me answer the question Why Duke?
* Faculty - There are professors who have written some great books and articles. I read through the book excerpts,will see if I can get hold of the book too.
* Other stuff - Duke has COLE Center on Leadership and ethics that drives some clubs and activities along with curriculums.
Right now I'm reading through student blogs, swarming my friend with questions, looking up youtube videos and answering the long essays.
My essays started bad - I couldn't go beyond half a page at first but now am catching up and writing more about how I feel and what I believe in. Hoping the draft is done by tomorrow.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
US R2 applications
This is not easy its worse than what I thot it would be. I have shortlisted some schools and am looking at what else. The problem is that its not easy to write essays for multiple schools together. I wish I had some breathing space. And some of these need so much effort. For example even the first look at fuqua essays tells me its simple but they want all the details. Cornell is looking for creativity and Stern surpases them all by asking us to get creative with personal statement... so now I got to think whether I'm recording myself, writing something or what else. I'm sure gona lose some hair and get dark circles by the end of it all.
Music in the background is starry starry night to keep my mind cool and hopefully put me to sleep.
I don't know if I have a chance at any of these schools but I sure want to try and think I'm worth it. Its time I find some alum n current students and start talking to them.
Music in the background is starry starry night to keep my mind cool and hopefully put me to sleep.
I don't know if I have a chance at any of these schools but I sure want to try and think I'm worth it. Its time I find some alum n current students and start talking to them.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
ISB application
I finally got my ISB application through... this was one of the quickest, i spent only 4-5 days on it. I owe this to one of the alums who was very helpful. I even sat in his house for a few hours asking him to review my essays every few minutes.
This was also the only application where i had my nerves in control, i dint panic even once.
What I liked about the questions they ask is that its only 300 words. It makes putting everything difficult but asks you to make a choice and brings out what you believe to be most important to you. Its about selling self and given the option to highlight one thing that defines you makes it easier in a way.
The funny thing is that where people usually struggle to bring the essays down to word limit, I was struggling to write.
I started my essays with looking at the questions and writing down what each question is looking for. Next I made a list of things I wanted to highlight, things I wanted to mention and things that were desirable but I would still be okay without mentioning them.
The first essay was if ISB has to choose one more why should that person be me.
I decided to mention three points of my personality or achievement. I started this all wrong and was struggling with this question till last minute. Its only on the deadline I thought of what to write - well this was suggested by my frend but I hadn't included in my essays in detail(the ISB alum). I deleted this essay 5 times and started from scratch without using anything i had written earlier.
The second essay was to the typical short and long term goals and why ISB. This was fairly easy considering I have written this quite a few times earlier. The good thing with the review my frend did was on how it is perceived by people who don't know much about my work. He helped me bring more clarity and layman language in this essay.
The third was additional thoughts. There was something weird, when I started the application months back I remember this to be optional but when I was finishing my application it said that it was a mandatory one. Not sure whether I read it wrong or it changed or whatever. I had anyway written an answer to this. I wrote about a professional achievement I consider significant. This was the easiest of all to write.
As a reapplicant I had to write why again and blah which I had some response to. My frend asked me not to mention change in GMAT because that is something they will anyway be able to see. I wrote about more responsibility, promotion and some more stuff on personal improvement.
I did the scholarship essay the last day. Again I loved the essay as I did not have to repeat and they specifically mentioned don't repeat just write about the need.
So the app is done and wait is on. Time to look at R2 for US schools.
This was also the only application where i had my nerves in control, i dint panic even once.
What I liked about the questions they ask is that its only 300 words. It makes putting everything difficult but asks you to make a choice and brings out what you believe to be most important to you. Its about selling self and given the option to highlight one thing that defines you makes it easier in a way.
The funny thing is that where people usually struggle to bring the essays down to word limit, I was struggling to write.
I started my essays with looking at the questions and writing down what each question is looking for. Next I made a list of things I wanted to highlight, things I wanted to mention and things that were desirable but I would still be okay without mentioning them.
The first essay was if ISB has to choose one more why should that person be me.
I decided to mention three points of my personality or achievement. I started this all wrong and was struggling with this question till last minute. Its only on the deadline I thought of what to write - well this was suggested by my frend but I hadn't included in my essays in detail(the ISB alum). I deleted this essay 5 times and started from scratch without using anything i had written earlier.
The second essay was to the typical short and long term goals and why ISB. This was fairly easy considering I have written this quite a few times earlier. The good thing with the review my frend did was on how it is perceived by people who don't know much about my work. He helped me bring more clarity and layman language in this essay.
The third was additional thoughts. There was something weird, when I started the application months back I remember this to be optional but when I was finishing my application it said that it was a mandatory one. Not sure whether I read it wrong or it changed or whatever. I had anyway written an answer to this. I wrote about a professional achievement I consider significant. This was the easiest of all to write.
As a reapplicant I had to write why again and blah which I had some response to. My frend asked me not to mention change in GMAT because that is something they will anyway be able to see. I wrote about more responsibility, promotion and some more stuff on personal improvement.
I did the scholarship essay the last day. Again I loved the essay as I did not have to repeat and they specifically mentioned don't repeat just write about the need.
So the app is done and wait is on. Time to look at R2 for US schools.
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