The University of Toronto Rotman School of Management does not require applicants to provide any prewritten essays as part of their application. However, after submitting their application, candidates will receive a link to a timed written assessment, for which they must compose spontaneous responses to two questions. Read on for our analysis of this portion of the Rotman application for the 2025–2026 admissions season.
Toronto Rotman 2025–2026 Essay Tips
Written Assessment: Two (2) timed written questions. Applicants will have 10 minutes in length to answer each question. Applicants will receive the link to complete the timed written assessments after submitting their online application form, within 1-2 business days.
Through the timed written assessment, you will have the opportunity to tell us more about yourself and your motivations for the MBA. Questions may cover topics and themes including: your short and long-term professional goals, and specific instances in your career as they relate to teamwork, leadership, resiliency, innovation, and conflict resolution.
Your written, professional communication skills in English will also be assessed through this exercise, so make sure to pay attention to your grammar and organization of thought.
Very simply, this written assessment is meant to help the Rotman admissions committee understand how (and how well) you think and express yourself on the spot. Schools often use the interview or a video component to make this assessment, but Rotman takes a bit of a different angle by asking you to spontaneously respond to questions in writing. This is likely—at least in part—because your writing will play a key role your studies, job search, and career in the long run, so the school wants to get a baseline understanding of your skills in this area. And having you craft a response extemporaneously will, at the same time, better reveal your natural, authentic instincts and nature. However, we encourage you to not see this exercise as something bad or scary. You undoubtedly have much to offer as a potential Rotman MBA student, so view this as an opportunity to showcase your communication skills. We simply cannot say this enough: as with all MBA application essay questions, there is no “right” answer.
You will not know in advance what questions you will be asked, but the prompt does offer a slight hint as to what kind of content you might need to provide and should therefore be ready to discuss: “your short and long-term professional goals, and specific instances in your career as they relate to teamwork, leadership, resiliency, innovation, and conflict resolution.” , to a limited degree, you can still prepare yourself, and the best way to do so is by identifying several stories—from your job and from outside of work—that illustrate attributes and accomplishments that you most want to share with the admissions committee. Then, before submitting your application, make sure that you have thought about how you would write about each of those stories, in terms of the context, the actions you took, and the result or impact of your actions. Ideally, you will be ready and able to tweak the stories you have chosen to answer almost any behavioral question the admissions committee might ask. For example, your favorite leadership story from work could likely also be used to respond to a question about a time when you were innovative, a time that you showed resilience, and a time that you worked well on a team.
Because Rotman’s prompt references several components of a traditional personal statement, we encourage you to download a free copy of the mbaMission Personal Statement Guide, which offers in-depth guidance on how to identify, frame, and convey the key elements of one’s profile that most MBA programs are interested in learning about—along with multiple illustrative examples.
