MIT Sloan seeks students whose personal characteristics demonstrate that they will make the most of the incredible opportunities at MIT, both academic and non-academic. We are on a quest to find those whose presence will enhance the experience of other students. We seek thoughtful leaders with exceptional intellectual abilities and the drive and determination to put their stamp on the world. We welcome people who are independent, authentic, and fearlessly creative—true doers. We want people who can redefine solutions to conventional problems, and strive to preempt unconventional dilemmas with cutting-edge ideas. We demand integrity and respect passion.
Taking the above into consideration, please submit a cover letter seeking a place in the MIT Sloan MBA Program. Your letter should conform to a standard business correspondence, include one or more professional examples that illustrate why you meet the desired criteria above, and be addressed to the Admissions Committee (300 words or fewer, excluding address and salutation).
MIT Sloan Video Essay Prompts
Video Prompt #1 – Introduction
Video Question 1: Introduce yourself to your future classmates. Here’s your chance to put a face with a name, let your personality shine through, be conversational, be yourself. We can’t wait to meet you! Videos should adhere to the following guidelines:
– No more than 1 minute (60 seconds) in length
– Single take (no editing)
– Speaking directly to the camera
– Do not include background music or subtitles
Video Prompt #2 – Random Question
Video Question 2: All MBA applicants will be prompted to respond to a randomly generated, open-ended question. The question is designed to help us get to know you better; to see how you express yourself and to assess fit with the MIT Sloan culture. It does not require prior preparation.
Video Essay 2 is part of your required application materials and will appear as a page within the application, once the other parts of your application are completed. Applicants are given 10 seconds to prepare for a 60-second response.
MIT Sloan Short Answer Question
The World That Shaped You: The Admissions Committee is excited to learn more about you and your background. In 250 words, please respond to the following short-answer question:
How has the world you come from shaped who you are today? Please use this opportunity to share more about your background.
MIT Sloan Pre-interview Essays
Pre-interview essay analysis by Debbie Choy. Debbie is a Managing Director at mbaMission and Stanford GSB MBA with a decade of consulting experience advising U.S. and international applicants. Fluent in Mandarin and Cantonese, she draws on her background at JP Morgan and Booz & Company, and in healthtech product management, to help candidates from diverse industries craft authentic, standout application narratives.
Those candidates fortunate enough to be invited to interview at MIT Sloan (congratulations!) must respond to one of two additional essay questions.
MIT Sloan wants analytical business leaders who can think strategically and communicate with clarity and purpose. Before you commit to a prompt, think through the story you would like to tell and consider how it complements the rest of your application. You might find that one version writes itself, while the other feels forced. The strongest submissions are not the most technically sophisticated; they are the ones where the data and story presented feel genuinely authentic to your background and experience.
So start by reviewing your key achievements. Do you have examples that better fit Prompt 1 or 2? What key skills are you seeking to demonstrate? Choose Prompt 1 if you want to demonstrate strategic thinking and intellectual curiosity. Choose Prompt 2 if you want to show analytical strength.
Either way, the prompt you select should feel like a natural extension of your broader application narrative. If you are aiming to bolster your analytical strengths, Prompt 2 might allow you to reinforce that story. On the other hand, if you would like to position yourself as a strategic thinker with a distinctive lens on your industry, Prompt 1 might be the stronger choice.
We are interested in learning more about how you use data to make decisions and analyze results. Please select one of the following prompts to respond to:
Pre-interview Essay 1: Please select an existing data visualization and, in 250 words or less, explain why it matters to you. The data visualization should be uploaded as a PDF. Examples may come from current events, a business analysis, or personal research.
This prompt allows you to show how you garner strategic insight from data. The worst thing you can do for this prompt is choose a well-known, generic chart, such as S&P 500 performance or global temperature anomalies, unless your angle on it is genuinely original and surprising. The admissions committee has likely seen these choices hundreds of times. Instead, look for something tied to your professional experience or career goals, such as an industry-specific dataset, a public policy chart, or a business trend in your target sector that is not publicly well-known.
Your 250-word response should follow a tight narrative arc that covers the following: what the visualization is, what it actually reveals beneath the surface, and why it changed or confirmed how you see the world. Do not just describe the chart, interpret it. The best responses use the visualization as a launching pad for insight, rather than merely offering a summary of it. For the PDF upload, make sure the chart is clean, clearly labeled, and properly sourced.
Pre-interview Essay 2: In 250 words or less, please describe a recent data-driven decision you had to make, and include one slide presenting your analysis. The slide may include a data visualization example and should present data used in a professional context. Your slide must be uploaded as a PDF.
This prompt allows you to show your analytical strength. Choose a decision with real stakes and measurable outcomes that were tied to a specific choice you made, backed by data. The slide you submit will be doing half the work of presenting your analysis, so treat it as a standalone document: one clear thesis, supporting data points, a visual element (even a simple one), and no clutter. If the reader cannot understand your slide without reading your 250 words, revise it.
In your written response, focus on your reasoning process, not just the outcome. What data did you look at first? What did you initially assume, and where did the data give you insights to base your decision? What other barriers did you have to overcome to make the decision? A decision where data were incidental to the outcome will not serve you here—the data need to have been genuinely useful.
MIT Sloan Reapplicants: How to Approach the Essays Differently
Reapplicants: We strongly encourage you to submit new application materials and emphasize what has changed since you last applied. Re-applicants may submit their applications in any round, and will have an opportunity to highlight changes since their previous application in a short-answer question.
The Next Step: Mastering Your MIT Sloan Interview
MIT Sloan School of Management Interview GuideMBA Essay Tips and ExamplesNorthwestern Kellogg School of Management Essay Tips
Michael Guttman is a Senior MBA Admissions Consultant and Michigan Ross MBA with more than a decade of experience in Big 4 finance, recruiting, and career development. Drawing on his background at Deloitte and with Michigan Ross Career Services, he helps applicants craft standout MBA applications so they can achieve their professional goals.
A first-of-its-kind, on-demand MBA application experience that delivers a personalized curriculum for you and leverages interactive tools to guide you through the entire MBA application process.
