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Before you commit to buying any product or service, you should always test it out first. A commitment-free “practice run” will inform your decision and help you feel confident that you are making a worthwhile and rewarding investment. (Frankly, this is exactly why test drives, real estate tours, and trial subscriptions exist!)

We at mbaMission believe that this kind of pre-purchase test is just as important when you are looking for the right MBA admissions consulting firm to help you with your business school applications.

This is why we offer a free 30-minute consultation for all business school candidates so they can preview the process of working with a consultant, better envision what the relationship might look like, and understand what to expect on a day-to-day basis.

Each year, our team of expert admissions advisors connects with literally thousands of aspiring MBAs who have their sights set on being accepted to a top U.S. or international business school. Via our free 30-minute consultation, we have counseled these applicants on such topics as what their next steps should be, what challenges they might need to overcome, and what the overall process tends to look like.

If you are considering booking a free consultation with mbaMission, read on to learn more about what you can expect from the meeting and how you can ensure you will get the most from it.

How mbaMission’s Free Consultation Works

First, we ask that you fill out our Free Consultation request form and provide information about yourself and your candidacy, such as your background, work history, extracurricular activities, test scores, and business school aspirations. This input is crucial to the productivity of your free consultation, because prior to your scheduled call, the admissions advisor you will speak with will thoroughly review it and come prepared with notes and talking points based on their initial impression of your MBA candidacy.

Once you have booked your virtual meeting with an mbaMission consultant, you will receive a confirmation email with the toll-free number or Zoom/Skype link to use for your one-on-one session.

At the time of your free consultation, your mbaMission consultant will begin with a comprehensive profile assessment that covers your strengths and weaknesses as an applicant. The consultant might point out your “pain points”—elements of your profile that could inhibit your ability to gain admission—or areas where you have excelled in your career or leadership trajectory. They might give suggestions on your timeline (e.g., applying in Round 1, waiting until next year) or on ways you could strengthen your candidacy before you submit an application (e.g., completing supplemental coursework, earning a certification, engaging in community service). Your mbaMission consultant will always be candid and professional, offering advice based on their years (or in some cases, decades) of experience helping thousands of candidates gain admission to the world’s most competitive MBA programs.

Near the end of the session, your consultant will open the floor to your questions. “Am I a competitive applicant for my target schools?” “What do I need to do to improve my profile?” “What GMAT/GRE score do I need to get accepted?” “How can I stand out?” All these queries and more are fair game. We encourage you to make the most of your consultation time by asking all your most pressing profile- and application-related questions.

What Is Not Included in a Free Consultation

As we have explained thus far, in your free consultation, your mbaMission advisor will be candid in answering your candidacy and application questions and honest in their assessment of your profile, resume, and goals. On the other hand, here are some things they will not do:

• Give you false hope – Your consultant will never encourage or advise you to apply to a program for which they do not genuinely feel you are a competitive candidate. Our goal for your free consultation is to give you the most candid and truthful advice possible for your specific circumstances, so you are better informed when taking your next steps, no matter what those might be.

• Be punitive – Just as your consultant will never give you false hope, they will never judge or condemn the circumstances of your application materials or their condition. Over the years, we have had candidates at every stage of the application process come to us for advice—from applicants who are just starting out, with few ideas and little written work to share, to those nearing their deadline with impressive and fully polished narratives. In every case, our goal has consistently been to offer guidance that would enhance their overall application in ways that best fit their unique circumstances.

• Provide written edits on your essays or other application components – Performing written edits on materials such as personal essays, resumes, and short answers is simply beyond the scope of a free 30-minute consultation. However, we do offer this kind of help in our Complete Start-to-Finish Package and our A la Carte Hourly Services, if you decide to continue working with our firm.

• Push our services – If you have any questions about our firm, team members, or services, we will be more than pleased to answer! But we will not do so on your time. Your free consultation with mbaMission is about you and your business school aspirations, not us. We encourage you to save all your firm-, process-, and payment-related queries until after your consultation, so your entire session can be focused solely on your MBA candidacy and getting your application questions answered first!

What Happens After Your Free Consultation

After you have had your free session with an mbaMission consultant, you will receive an email outlining and summarizing your discussion, along with action items and tips for moving forward.

Think of your mbaMission consultant as your guide; after your consultation, they will serve as your point of contact with our firm and will keep the lines of communication open as you move toward constructing your application. However, if/when you decide to hire an mbaMission consultant, you are in no way obligated to work with the one who conducted your free consultation—though you are certainly welcome to do so, if they have sufficient availability. They can offer suggestions on your timeline, describe what your collaboration would look like, and recommend members of our team who might be a strong fit to work with one-on-one (based on your profile, target schools, goals, or even your personal preferences, such as application timing, time zone, or other detail). We will take the necessary measures to ensure that you are matched with the best possible advisor for you.

Simply fill out this form, and we will get back to you within one business day to schedule your call.

What to Beware of in a Free Consultation

If you are shopping around for an MBA admissions consultant, you have likely connected with other firms besides mbaMission and taken advantage of their free consultation offerings (or thought about doing so).

We believe that everyone considering this important investment in themselves—not just going to business school but also hiring an admissions consultant for support—should be well informed before making a final decision, so we want to alert you to some things to look out for during your consultation sessions. These tactics will ultimately not be helpful to you during your application journey.

• The gimmick  – “You have a 450 GMAT and no managerial experience to speak of, but I can get you into Harvard Business School! Just buy a premium package, and I’ll do the rest.” This one is self-explanatory. Avoid anyone who claims to have the “special sauce” or “magic bullet” that will guarantee admission!

• The “limited-time discount”  – This approach goes hand-in-hand with “the gimmick.” The firm promises a big reward for a relatively smaller monetary commitment, but only if you sign on right away! In our opinion, MBA admissions consulting is the wrong place to look for a deal, because comparisons should be based on the quality of the service provided, not on price. When you pay less for assistance that will be crucial to your educational and professional development, you have to ask yourself what shortcuts and compromises in quality are making those savings possible. As the saying goes, you get what you pay for.

• The “success rate” pusher – Click here for our thoughts on the topic of success rates and why you should be wary of anyone who touts them. We suggest that rather than judging a firm on its self-proclaimed stats, you take some time to research what its past clients have to say about working with the firm in their reviews.

• The evasive or opaque question dodger – Be wary of consultants who find a way to avoid directly answering your questions or are unable to back up their claims with evidence from their testimonials, reviews, or website offerings. The primary purpose of mbaMission’s free 30-minute consultation is to provide you with clear, candid advice you can use in navigating your application journey—not to muddy the water with confusion or doubt!

• The car salesman – In this approach, the consultant provides very little advice on applying to business school and a lot of reasons the candidate should work with their firm. Some MBA consultants conduct the free consultation much like a car salesman—offering fast talk about why their model is the best and brightest, without really taking the time to address you, the applicant, at all. Remember, your free consultation should be your time, and you should be in control of what is discussed, whether that is school selection, reapplication strategies, or something else entirely. Before your meeting, take time to think about what you want to get out of the conversation, and be ready to ask your most pressing questions. If they go unanswered, that is probably a bad sign!

We hope you have found this blog post helpful in terms of understanding what to expect and look for in a complimentary consultation with an MBA admissions consultant.

If you are ready to sign up for a free 30-minute consultation with mbaMission, fill out this form, or simply contact us at any time. We look forward to hearing from you!

The mbaMission team has helped more than 15,000 applicants from diverse paths and backgrounds gain admission to the MBA programs of their dreams. Today, we are thrilled to announce the launch of the mbaMission Fellowship Program, which will allow us to support even more MBA hopefuls on their journey to business school.

The mbaMission Fellowship will provide selected applicants with tuition-free enrollment in our comprehensive, on-demand MBA admissions course, onTrack by mbaMission. In addition, Fellows will have access to exclusive Q&A sessions with mbaMission President and Founder Jeremy Shinewald, as well as Fellows-only networking events. 

About onTrack

onTrack by mbaMission is an innovative, in-depth program that guides you through every step of the MBA application process. The course is led by Jeremy Shinewald (recently honored with Poets&Quants’ first ever Lifetime Achievement Award in MBA Admissions Consulting) and was created collectively by the entire mbaMission team. onTrack contains more than 80 modules that cover every aspect of the MBA application process, including school selection, goal setting, essay writing, resume polishing, securing strong recommendations, and mastering interviews. Each applicant’s learning path is individually curated, based on their unique background, goals, and target MBA programs. For more insight into onTrack’s myriad offerings, check out our five-minute introduction video here.

Although onTrack curates a targeted curriculum for each applicant, all users—including our mbaMission Fellows—have access to onTrack’s entire resource library, which contains more than 500 pieces of learning content, including the following: 

• More than 400 video lessons (totaling 25 hours)
• Dozens of sample essays and resumes, with detailed, illustrative analyses 
• Templates, guides, and checklists for every stage of the application process
• School-specific application modules on more than 15 of the top MBA programs
• An interactive interview practice tool

Eligibility

To be considered for the 2025 mbaMission Fellowship, you must fulfill the following two criteria:

• Have completed or be currently enrolled in a bachelor’s degree program (or equivalent)
  
• Plan to apply to a full-time, part-time, deferred, or executive MBA program in the 2025–2026 admissions cycle

Fellowship applicants will be evaluated based on leadership potential, professional experience, and academic and personal achievements.

Fellowship Benefits

• One year (12 months) of unlimited access to onTrack by mbaMission ($1,599 value)
  
• Exclusive Q&A sessions with mbaMission Founder and President Jeremy Shinewald
  
• Fellows-only networking opportunities

How to Apply

To apply for the mbaMission Fellowship, please visit our Fellowship page to complete the application form and submit the following:

• Your resume
  
• Your Fellowship application essay (up to 400 words). Please include the following information:
  • Why you are pursuing an MBA
  • What type of program you are applying to (full-time, part-time, deferred, or executive MBA)
  • What your post-MBA goals are
    
• Your Fellowship application video (up to 90 seconds)
  • Introduce yourself and explain why this Fellowship would be meaningful to you.

Important Dates

Applications for the 2025 mbaMission Fellowship must be submitted by February 28, 2025. Fellows will be selected the following Friday, March 7, 2025. Best of luck to all who apply!

Human nature dictates that while engaged in a competitive MBA application process—exaggerated by the pervasiveness of rankings and the chatter surrounding them—some candidates will perceive that they are “ahead” of others because they were accepted at a top school, while others will perceive that they are “behind” their peers because they were accepted at a lower-ranked school. What is often lost amid all this worrying is that you, not your target business school, are the independent variable. You, not your target school, will determine your success.

Performing well in interviews is both a required and acquired skill to land your next job. We at mbaMission offer interview preparation guidance not only through one-on-one career coaching but also via our career advice blog posts, which cover job search–related topics, such as the following:

• Strategically Answering Behavioral Interview Questions
• Ending the Interview Strong
• Fixing Two of the Most Common Interviewing Mistakes

In today’s post, rather than talking about how to tell your stories, we want to focus on how to identify the right stories to tell. 

Step 1: Research the job requirements to understand the needs of the role.

• Talk to people at your target companies and in your desired positions; ask specific questions to learn the basic and nuanced characteristics of a compelling candidate. 

• Read the job description and/or look at the LinkedIn experience profile section of people who hold your target job. 
• Use ChatGPT to understand more about the requirements for target roles. Try prompts like “Based on the job description, what specific skills or experiences should I highlight during my interview for [insert job title]?” and “Based on this job description, create a list of skills the recruiter is looking for.”

Step 2: Identify eight to ten stories from your past experiences using the following strategies:

• Review your brainstorming materials and final business school essays. 
• Examine each bullet point on your resume, and think about the situation, your actions, and the results of those actions. Ask yourself what competencies you demonstrated in each of the circumstances highlighted in those bullet points. 
• Talk with past colleagues and managers about your most impressive accomplishments at work or your strongest skills. Read past performance reviews.
• Reflect on your biggest accomplishments and your proudest moments. 

Step 3: Choose your best, most compelling stories using the following checklist (these will be the stories for which you can say “yes” to all—or at least most—of these questions):

• Can this story be pivoted to reveal more than one skill (or address more than one potential interview question)? You need at least two stories for each skill required for your target role. 
• Does this story require a lot of technical or industry-specific knowledge or substantial context to be understood? Find ways to help the interviewer quickly understand the situation you are relating without using a lot of jargon or background information. You will need to tell your story in approximately two minutes and do not want to spend too much time on details that do not relate to how you contributed to solving the problem.
• Did this situation happen recently? Ideally, you want to share stories that happened within the past two to four years, because you are likely to have had more significant responsibility and will better remember the details of the situation. This will help you tell the story in an authentic and engaging manner.
• Does this story demonstrate your ability to navigate unexpected situations? Often, interview questions seek to uncover how you behaved in a challenging circumstance (e.g., “Tell me about a time when you led a team with conflicting opinions on how to approach a problem”). 
• Was the outcome important or impressive? What was at stake if you failed to perform? Use numbers to show the scope or complexity level of your work, as well as the results of your actions. Hiring managers want to know that you can contribute and help them achieve their key business objectives. 

The bottom line is this: pick and share stories that demonstrate your relevant skills and expertise.

In our first episode of The mbaMission Podcast for 2025, mbaMission’s Harold Simansky, Jeremy Shinewald, and Jessica Shklar share their takeaways from the 2024 MBA application season and make predictions for the upcoming application season. They discuss such topics as macro trends related to the economy, the impact of AI on business school admissions, and trends in GMAT scoring.

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