These days, many MBA applicants are fretting about their futures, because of the ongoing investigation into users of the Scoretop.com website, a site designed to provide those studying for the GMAT with actual questions. In 2005, one-hundred and nineteen applicants were rejected by HBS for trying to access their admissions decisions online prior to the release date.  In 2003, Darden rejected an applicant for making statements on the BusinessWeek message boards which were not consistent with the school’s Honor Code. In short, people have a tendency to think that the web is an anonymous place, where their actions won’t follow them. Of course, as the scandals above show, they are wrong. Whether you are publicly displaying your private life on your Facebook or MySpace page or you are surfing the web without identifying yourself, you should certainly be careful not to violate any principles of good practice. Such violations can follow you and adversely affect your fate.

With Harvard Business School’s retreat to four essays (from five last year and six two years ago) and with a similar reduction at Stanford, (its main essay has “shrunk” from a 7 page limit two years ago to a 750 word limit today) Kellogg now stands as the most demanding school in terms of volume of writing required to complete an application. It seems that the loosening of these demands at other schools has a great deal to do with rising application volumes and taxed admissions staffs. So, Kellogg’s Admissions Committee might be lauded for taking on such a challenging task. Last year, Kellogg made its first major changes to its essays in years and this year, they have merely tweaked essays three and four, with essays one and two remaining as longstanding traditions.  

All applicants are required to answer questions 1, 2 and 3 in addition to 2 of the essays in question 4.

For questions 1-3, please limit responses to 2 pages.

1: Briefly assess your career progress to date.  Elaborate on your future career plans and your motivation for pursuing a graduate degree at Kellogg.

Because Personal Statements have similarities from one application to the next, we have produced the “MBA Mission Personal Statement Guide.” We offer our guide to candidates free of charge, via our online store.  Please feel free to download your copy today.

2: Describe how your background, values, academics, activities and/or leadership skills will enhance the experience of other Kellogg students.

This essay is broad and sweeping in nature so it allows you to strategically showcase a mix of your greatest strengths – professional, community, academic and personal. You should attempt to select a diversity of experiences and present them in such a way that you will be able to relate them back to your ability to contribute to Kellogg in a variety of areas – for example, the classroom, your study group and the community at large. A successful essay will be one that not only details unique personal strengths, but also clearly illustrates how these strengths will be put into action at Kellogg, meaning that you will have an opportunity to show your intimate understanding of and connection to Kellogg.

Please see our Monday Morning Essay Tip: Your Contribution.

3: Describe your key leadership experiences and evaluate what leadership areas you hope to develop through your MBA experience.

Because essay two is so open-ended, you will have to think carefully as you consider how and where to “spread” your stories. In this essay, you will need to discuss leadership experiences (note: “experiences” is plural). So, you will have to “save” certain stories for this essay and not expend all of your ideas in essay two. You might offer two simple vignettes where your leadership is showcased through a narrative and then evaluate yourself and illustrate certain areas of development. Although you do need to be critical in discussing these areas of development, you should not deride your existing skills. Instead of thinking about areas in which you are lacking, you should discuss true opportunities to become a more complete and capable leader. Again, in this essay (much like in essay two) there is specific reference to your MBA experience. In answering this question, you should seize the opportunity to connect yourself to Kellogg by showing that you understand how Kellogg’s resources will facilitate your leadership development.

Choose two of the following three essays…

4. Applicants must answer 2 of the below essays.  (Re-applicants must answer question 4D and 1 other essay).  Please keep responses to two paragraphs.

4A - Describe a time when you had to motivate a reluctant individual or group.

Because of the space limitations, you will need to start this essay in a detailed and descriptive way to help convey the intensity of the experience – paint a picture of the troubled dynamics. Then, you will need to transition quickly and analyze the actions that you took to diplomatically navigate this situation and motivate the seemingly immovable member. As the reader completes this essay, he/she should understand that you exercised sound judgment and discretion. Implicitly, the reader should understand that if you are in a study group at Kellogg, you will be an effective facilitator and leader, who cares about others’ contributions, even if others are reluctant to contribute.

4B  - I wish the Admissions Committee had asked me…..

This is essentially an open opportunity for you to discuss anything vital — compelling stories or differentiators — that you have not yet showcased. Basically, you could not ask for a better opportunity to show the Admissions Committee how you are unique. Many candidates use this essay to discuss a hobby or interest. It is important that, if you make this choice, you express an inordinate passion — otherwise you are offering a boring window into your life. Ask yourself, “How can I show that I take this passion further than others?” This essay should not be a default option, because you have run out of creative ideas. Instead, it should be an opportunity to offer something new and add some “character” to the mix.

4C - What do others admire about you?

This essay challenges our notion that MBA candidates must remain humble and let their actions do the talking for them. If you choose to answer this question, be careful not to brag or display arrogance. You will need to show that you have truly excelled in a certain area and possibly show “proof” of others admiration, through a well-placed quote or award. In general, we recommend that candidates tread carefully in this space. There is a fine line between displaying a favorable trait and offending others with a lack of self-awareness. To be honest, we are surprised that this question was asked.
 
4D - For re-applicants only:

Since your previous application, what are the steps you’ve taken to strengthen your candidacy?
Whether you have improved your academic record, gotten a promotion/taken on a new and exciting project, increased your community involvement or taken on a personal challenge of sorts, the key to this essay is that you convey a very deliberate path of achievement. Kellogg wants to know that you actively strived to improve and that you seized the opportunity during the past year, because your Kellogg MBA is vital to you. This essay question will be vastly different from candidate to candidate. We are more than happy to provide one-on-one-guidance to ensure that the above agenda is met.

Akiba’s Corner is a weekly series of thoughts on the MBA admissions process and the MBA itself by MBA Mission Senior Consultant, Akiba Smith Francis (HBS ’05).  

Have you been arrested? Suspended during college? The occasional client asks us whether and how to disclose these types of experiences as a part of a business school application process.

If you have a challenge that you would rather not disclose, but it is a part of your academic or legal record, it is best to openly address it, not just in your short answer section, but also in your optional essay. Be completely honest about what happened and let the Admissions Committee know how you have grown and what you learned from the experience. This does not mean that you should get into the details of the partying that led up to your DUI (see Monday Morning Essay Tip: Personal and Too Personal), but it does mean that you should not lie or omit important information in your application.

Admissions Committees understand that mistakes happen. If you let them know that you have learned the error of your ways and are a much more mature person now, you will get ahead of the “scandal” and not have to hide from it forever.

On the same day that Wharton released its new essay questions, it also announced the departure of  Thomas Caleel, now the former Director of MBA Admissions and Financial Aid. Caleel, a former Wharton student, had served in this capacity since 2005. Wharton offered no explanation for Caleel’s departure and named Anjani Jain, Vice Dean and Director of Wharton’s Graduate Division as Acting Director until a permanent replacement is found.

 What does this mean for Wharton aspirants? Not much for now. Until a new Director is found, it is unlikely that there will be any major changes to the approach of Wharton’s Admissions office. 

Many of you have been following the ongoing battle between GMAC and Scoretop.com, and now the potential battle between GMAC and the students who accessed the Scoretop.com website. Yesterday, BusinessWeek posted a set of questions and answers provided by GMAC. In short, GMAC wants GMAT test takers to know that:

1. GMAC will investigate and prosecute any individual or company offering real GMAT questions to the public in order to protect the integrity of the test and defend its copyright.
2. GMAC is now focusing its punitive actions on test takers who shared actual questions and/or paid to access a bank of such questions. It is too soon to know what punishment will be levied and when.
3. Test takers who did not pay to access the site, but visited the sites free content have nothing to worry about.
4. Test takers gained very little by accessing the data, as the GMAC question bank is enormous and the odds of seeing the same ones on the test were quite remote. Nonetheless, GMAC has subsequently removed the questions found on Scoretop.com’s site from the pool.

We will keep readers apprised of developments….

This afternoon, Wharton released its 2008-2009 MBA Application Essay Questions. We have posted them below and will follow-up with our analysis shortly:

1. Describe your career progress to date and your future short-term and long-term career goals. How do you expect an MBA from Wharton to help you achieve these goals, and why is now the best time for you to join our program? (1,000 words)

2. Describe a setback or a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself? (500 words)

3. Where in your background would we find evidence of your leadership capacity and/or potential? (500 words)

4. Please respond to one (1) of the following questions:

a. Describe an experience you have had innovating or initiating, your lessons learned, the results and impact of your efforts. (500 words)

b. Is there anything about your background or experience that you feel you have not had the opportunity to share with the Admissions Committee in your application?  If yes, please explain. (500 words)

OPTIONAL: If you feel there are extenuating circumstances of which the Committee should be aware, please explain them here (e.g., unexplained gaps in work experience, choice of recommenders, TOEFL waiver request, inconsistent or questionable academic performance, significant weaknesses in your application). (250 words, maximum)

Last week, we wrote about how important it is to thoroughly explore and access personal stories. Of course, there is always the case of too much of a good thing – Admissions Committees can be put off by candidates who go too far and become too personal.

Some stories are particularly challenging for Admissions Committees. For example, we have strongly discouraged candidates from writing about divorce as an example of a moment of failure. If an individual took responsibility for a failed marriage, then he or she would likely be revealing personal problems, rather than portraying him/herself as having learned from a constructive professional or personal challenge.

What you have to keep in mind is that in many ways, the Admissions Committee is meeting you for the first time. So, a simple guide for judging whether you are being too personal is to ask yourself, “Would I be uncomfortable if, immediately upon meeting someone, he/she were to share this sort of information with me?” If your answer is “yes,” then you might consider changing your approach.

Even though the admissions season is in its earliest stages, many eager MBA candidates are aggressively moving forward (as they should be!). One step that you might consider taking now is selecting your recommenders and then meeting with them to discuss your experiences together and your path going forward. Some candidates may wonder if such meetings are appropriate. At MBA Mission, we not only think that they are appropriate,  but we recommend them — as does Derrick Bolton, Assistant Dean and Director of Admissions at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, who blogged about this a few years ago in a post that remains on the GSB website. Bolton stated,

You then have occasion to have several candid conversations about your personal and professional development with these individuals who are committed to your success. Through these discussions, you can get feedback that will help you better understand your own strengths and development needs, make a larger impact in your current position, build stronger working relationships, and refine your personal and professional aspirations… If you do so, I believe your recommender will produce a more powerful letter of reference because the process itself will have been so compelling. Further, you will learn more this way!

Recommendations are a key part of the admissions process. While we strongly recommend that recommenders write their letters independently, we still suggest that candidates take time to reflect on their relationships with their recommenders in order to bring long forgotten stories to the surface and thus ensure that these letters are sincere and powerful.

The other day, we finished our blog post on the recent GMAT scandal (in which students accessed a website which had illegally obtained GMAT questions) with the line: “it is fair to write that this could be the beginning of an enduring saga.” Well, it seems that our words were prescient. On Friday evening, BusinessWeek reported (“GMAT Cheating Controversy Grows”) that GMAC’s initial estimates of one-thousand students being implicated has now been dwarfed by a more recent estimate, also from GMAC, of six-thousand.

BusinessWeek stated that GMAC is studying Scoretop’s hard drives and that, “it vowed to cancel the scores of anyone who used the site to cheat on the exam, prohibit them from retaking the test, and notify the schools that received the tainted scores.” BusinessWeek then speculated: “That could mean rejection for applicants, expulsion for current students, and unspecified sanctions for graduates.”

Unfortunately for nervous MBA candidates/students, the results of the investigation will not be known for weeks and different MBA programs may take different approaches in terms of how they deal with Scoretop clients. As we wrote before, this saga is just beginning.

This morning, the New York Times cited a report by independent research firm Portales Partners and speculated that “bloodletting will continue at a fast and furious pace.” What is at the heart of this speculation? Portales studied the banks headcount and revenue growth since 2004 and determined that if revenues were to fall back to 2004 levels, approximately 20 percent of current employees would need to be let go. How many have been released thus far? Portales pegs that number at 1 percent. So, the remaining 19 percent may be hanging in the balance as these firms adjust. What does this all mean for MBAs right now? Well, the banks should still be on campus, but they may eliminate some non-core schools in order to streamline recruiting costs, as they did in the years following the tech bust. Further, as we have noted before, MBA students will definitely lack leverage in negotiating salaries for the foreseeable future.