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At mbaMission we are constantly trying to expand our reach and services – particularly those that are free. This year, via our partnership with ManhattanGMAT, we have been and continue to host live events (see our upcoming events) on school selection, long term planning, essay writing, interview preparation and more in New York City, Chicago, Silicon Valley, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, DC and Atlanta — as well as “live online”. Via our blog, free consultations and message board activities on BusinessWeek, Pagalguy and ManhattanGMAT, we offer free advice each day to thousands. Via our own newsletter and the GMATTERS newsletter, we offer specialized tips to tens of thousands. Now, we are once again expanding our scope to include a Twitter feed and yet another dedicated message board, through the vibrant online community at Beat the GMAT.  We are proud to have been asked to join the Beat the GMAT community and look forward to adding our own unique voice. 

Essay 1: (750–1,000 words) 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?

As you approach this essay, you should recognize that the first sentence about Wharton is a bit of an unintentional diversion. Wharton is not expecting every candidate to write about his/her “global presence through (his/her) engagement in the world.” The Admissions Committee does not want you to parrot the school’s goals, but rather to write sincerely about your own goals and then explain why they are important to you. Remember, there are no “right” or “wrong” goals for Wharton—applicants who try to cater to what they perceive the school wants end up writing essays that do not fit their personalities and experiences, or that are entirely bland and generic.

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

For a thorough exploration of Wharton’s academic program/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to Wharton.  

Essay 2: (750–1,000 words) Tell us about a time when you had to adapt by accepting/understanding the perspective of people different from yourself.

Many MBA candidates who approach this essay will no doubt be troubled by the phrasing “different from yourself.” This phrase is intentionally left vague, because the school probably does not want to limit candidates by asking specifically about a cross-cultural experience. While such an experience is certainly fair game as a topic for this essay, the question essentially allows you to define your group “of people different from yourself” as anyone “separate” from you—for example, you may have once been persuaded by a team of unpaid interns at work, or a group of citizens changed your perspective on a particular political measure in your community, just to note two possibilities.

Of course, merely revealing that you accepted the opinions of others is not sufficient. Via a well written essay, you should impart the manner in which you weighed your own opinions against those of others and then took action to adapt—to change your approach to a problem or your opinion on an issue. In many, but not all, cases, your adaptation will act as the catalyst for change that enables the group to then achieve a positive outcome that otherwise would have been unachievable.

Essay 3: (500 words) Describe a failure that you have experienced.  What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself?

The best failure essays are often those that show reasoned optimism and tremendous momentum toward a goal—a goal that is ultimately derailed. In most cases, you will need to show that you were emotionally invested in your project/experience, which will enable the reader to connect with your story and vicariously experience your disappointment. If you were not invested at all, discussing the experience as a failure or learning experience is hardly credible.

Notably, in previous years, this question allowed candidates to discuss a “setback or failure,” but this year the setback option has been eliminated. We suspect that this is because discussing a “setback” can allow candidates to offload responsibility. For example, an athlete who experienced a “setback” in the form of a broken leg just before the start of a college sport season can discuss the trauma of dashed expectations without ever having to truly accept any blame for the problem, because it was happenstance. However, in the case of a failure, you must take some, if not all, of the responsibility for the results and reflect on what you would have done differently or what you would do differently going forward.

Indeed, the second part of the question, the reflective element, is vital. It is very easy to offer trite and clichéd statements about your response to the problem and what you learned about yourself. (Note: everyone learns resiliency, so consider another key learning.) Creating a truly unique statement about your road forward and lessons learned takes time, but the payoff will come in an essay that is much more personal and revelatory than thousands of others.

Essay 4: (500 words) Choose one of the following:

a.       Give us a specific example of a time when you solved a complex problem.

The key to writing a successful essay for this option will be explaining a complex issue in a simple manner. It will be easy to get bogged down in writing about the specifics of the central problem—particularly if it is a technical problem—but what is more important is discussing the solving of that problem. Your solution need not be novel, though if it is, that is certainly fine. However, in most cases, the reader will want to learn about your creativity and people management skills more than your operational prowess, and will want to know that these qualities came to bear in resolving a situation that seemed otherwise intractable.

b.      Tell us about something significant that you have done to improve yourself, in either your professional and/or personal endeavors.

In this essay, you should put far more weight on the road that you traveled than on the final destination. The Admissions Committee will be interested in how you identified an aspect of yourself that was ripe for improvement and will want to know exactly how you sacrificed and persevered to improve. By reading about your efforts in this area, the Admissions Committee will come to understand your personality—the path you took will illustrate your commitment to your professional, intellectual and/or personal growth and likely the achievement of an important goal.

We believe that before we even begin our analysis, the following quote from Stanford Admissions Director Derrick Bolton bears repeating:

“Because we want to discover who you are, resist the urge to ‘package’ yourself in order to come across in a way you think Stanford wants. Such attempts simply blur our understanding of who you are and what you can accomplish. We want to hear your genuine voice throughout the essays that you write and this is the time to think carefully about your values, your passions, your hopes and dreams.”

At mbaMission, we constantly tell candidates not to attempt to become something that they are not—something they mistakenly believe the Admissions Committee wants them to be. The schools want a class made up of diverse individuals, and by pandering to some expectation, you are basically aspiring to create a generic application, rather than one that will separate you from the pack.

Without further ado, our essay analysis follows:

Essay 1: What matters most to you, and why?

Clearly, because of the very personal nature of this essay, you must thoroughly contemplate your response. At mbaMission, we always brainstorm in depth with our candidates, pushing them to explore the psychological and philosophical motivations behind their goals and achievements to best help them determine their Stanford themes. We cannot emphasize this enough—you should not make a snap decision about the content of this essay. Even after candidates have identified their themes, we encourage them to discuss their ideas with those with whom they are closest; this step helps to validate deeply personal and authentic themes and thereby results in an essay that truly stands out.

Once you have challenged yourself and identified your main themes, you should not simply provide a handful of anecdotes that support your idea—or worse, recycle the ideas you used in your HBS three accomplishments essay. The best Stanford essays are true explorations of the concept or issue posed by the essay question, involving a thorough analysis of decisions, motives and successes/failures. In other words, your anecdotes constitute a recounting of moments of personal exploration and so are not ends in and of themselves. If you are merely telling stories and trying to tie in your preconceived conclusions, you are most likely not analyzing your experiences, but rather forcing a theme on the reader—and this will be transparent to the experienced eyes of Admissions Committee readers. In short, be sure to fully consider and develop your most sincere answers, outline your essays accordingly and then infuse your responses with your personality, thoughts and feelings. These are the first steps in crafting a compelling essay.

Essay 2: What are your career aspirations? How will your education at Stanford help you achieve them?

You will notice that Stanford does not explicitly ask about your short- and long-term career goals but instead about your “career aspirations.” Short- and long-term goals can be somewhat confining; Stanford’s “aspirations” offer a level of flexibility and allow you to provide a broader and more reasoned compendium of your objectives and the path you hope to take to reach them. Once you have provided this sketch, you must explain precisely how Stanford will help you achieve your goals. Essay 2 is not an opportunity to simply sing the school’s praises, but rather to profoundly connect with Stanford’s pedagogy and resources. You must convincingly explain how Stanford has the resources necessary for you to make your dreams and goals a reality.

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

For a thorough exploration of the GSB’s academic program/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to the Stanford GSB.  

Essay 3: Answer two of the four questions below. Tell us not only what you did but also how you did it. What was the outcome? How did people respond? Only describe experiences that have occurred during the last three years.

Option A: Tell us about a time when you built or developed a team whose performance exceeded expectations.

Although this question is somewhat straightforward, the difference between a strong and a weak essay will be contained in the cause-and-effect relationship between the actions you took to create/develop the team and the team’s subsequent effectiveness. You must be sure that your essay reveals that you played a direct and integral role in the makeup, character and performance of your team and that your intent/actions had the desired effect.

Option B: Tell us about a time when you made a lasting impact on your organization.

Again, demonstrating the “how” element in this essay is every bit as important as presenting the results. When writing this essay, consider a before-and-after scenario—one in which the distinction between the situation you inherited and the situation you created is clear, thereby establishing yourself as the catalyst for the change. Further, you must establish that your influence was not fleeting, but enduring. Your impact need not be completely revolutionary—a training initiative, a change in process that brings efficiency, a new product or service could all work—but it should be indelible.

Option C: Tell us about a time when you motivated others to support your vision or initiative.

In these essay questions, Stanford tends to err on the side of minimalism. You should certainly focus on how you inspired others to join or encourage your initiative; however, this is only a starting point. You must complement this with information on how you motivated this group to achieve something special. In a short essay, incorporating conflict into the narrative can be difficult, but showing that your idea(s) met with some initial resistance is important in ensuring that your story is interesting to the reader. If, in your essay, you simply put forth an argument and everyone readily agrees, you will likely not have proven that you truly “motivated” others.

Option D: Tell us about a time when you went beyond what was defined, established, or expected.

In this essay, you can show yourself to be an independent thinker, capable of finding your own “true” path and/or adhering to morals and principles that you hold dear, particularly when those with influence are advising you otherwise. Alternatively, somewhat in the spirit of Option A, you can show that you had a bold vision and achieved ambitious goals, though in this case you may have achieved independently rather than as part of a team. In either case, by creating a clear picture of what was expected of you and then contrasting your choice—by describing your actions and outlining your reasoning and thoughts—you can present a compelling picture of yourself as a strong-minded and adventurous “hero.”

Last year, we posted a simple offer on the BusinessWeek message boards: “free ding review!” We had noticed that there were a few confused and disappointed applicants out there, and we wanted to do something to help them improve their chances for the coming year. Well, the response was overwhelming, so we are back this year. But, there is a catch: we are only going to commit ourselves to 20 free reviews this year. So, if you are interested in a free session with a member of the mbaMission team, simply email a PDF of your complete—yet unfortunately unsuccessful—application to [email protected].

We will get back to you to let you know if you are one of the first 20.

Essay 1: (750–1,000 words) 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?

As you approach this essay, you should recognize that the first sentence about Wharton is a bit of an unintentional diversion. Wharton is not expecting every candidate to write about his/her “global presence through (his/her) engagement in the world.” The admissions committee does not want you to parrot the school’s goals, but rather to write sincerely about your own goals and then explain why they are important to you. Remember, there are no “right” or “wrong” goals for Wharton—applicants who try to cater to what they perceive the school wants end up writing essays that do not fit their personalities and experiences, or that are entirely bland and generic.

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

For a thorough exploration of Wharton’s academic program/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to Wharton. Further, for unique insight into the application process, please read our exclusive interview with Wharton Admissions Director, J.J. Cutler.

Essay 2: (750–1,000 words) Tell us about a time when you had to adapt by accepting/understanding the perspective of people different from yourself.

Many MBA candidates who approach this essay will no doubt be troubled by the phrasing “different from yourself.” This phrase is intentionally left vague, because the school probably does not want to limit candidates by asking specifically about a cross-cultural experience. While such an experience is certainly fair game as a topic for this essay, the question essentially allows you to define your group “of people different from yourself” as anyone “separate” from you—for example, you may have once been persuaded by a team of unpaid interns at work, or a group of citizens changed your perspective on a particular political measure in your community, just to note two possibilities.

Of course, merely revealing that you accepted the opinions of others is not sufficient. Via a well written essay, you should impart the manner in which you weighed your own opinions against those of others and then took action to adapt—to change your approach to a problem or your opinion on an issue. In many, but not all, cases, your adaptation will act as the catalyst for change that enables the group to then achieve a positive outcome that otherwise would have been unachievable.

Essay 3: (500 words) Describe a failure that you have experienced.  What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself?

The best failure essays are often those that show reasoned optimism and tremendous momentum toward a goal—a goal that is ultimately derailed. In most cases, you will need to show that you were emotionally invested in your project/experience, which will enable the reader to connect with your story and vicariously experience your disappointment. If you were not invested at all, discussing the experience as a failure or learning experience is hardly credible.

Notably, in previous years, this question allowed candidates to discuss a “setback or failure,” but the setback option was eliminated last year. We suspect that this is because discussing a “setback” can allow candidates to offload responsibility. For example, an athlete who experienced a “setback” in the form of a broken leg just before the start of a college sport season can discuss the trauma of dashed expectations without ever having to truly accept any blame for the problem, because it was happenstance. However, in the case of a failure, you must take some, if not all, of the responsibility for the results and reflect on what you would have done differently or what you would do differently going forward.

Indeed, the second part of the question, the reflective element, is vital. It is very easy to offer trite and clichéd statements about your response to the problem and what you learned about yourself. (Note: everyone learns resiliency, so consider another key learning.) Creating a truly unique statement about your road forward and lessons learned takes time, but the payoff will come in an essay that is much more personal and revelatory than thousands of others.

Essay 4: (500 words) Choose one of the following:

a.       Give us a specific example of a time when you solved a complex problem.

The key to writing a successful essay for this option will be explaining a complex issue in a simple manner. It will be easy to get bogged down in writing about the specifics of the central problem—particularly if it is a technical problem—but what is more important is discussing the solving of that problem. Your solution need not be novel, though if it is, that is certainly fine. However, in most cases, the reader will want to learn about your creativity and people management skills more than your operational prowess, and will want to know that these qualities came to bear in resolving a situation that seemed otherwise intractable.

b.      Tell us about something significant that you have done to improve yourself, in either your professional and/or personal endeavors.

In this essay, you should put far more weight on the road that you traveled than on the final destination. The admissions committee will be interested in how you identified an aspect of yourself that was ripe for improvement and will want to know exactly how you sacrificed and persevered to improve. By reading about your efforts in this area, the admissions committee will come to understand your personality—the path you took will illustrate your commitment to your professional, intellectual and/or personal growth and likely the achievement of an important goal.