{"id":15679,"date":"2014-09-30T10:04:19","date_gmt":"2014-09-30T16:04:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?p=15679"},"modified":"2022-02-09T11:53:45","modified_gmt":"2022-02-09T16:53:45","slug":"our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

At mbaMission, we constantly strive to learn more about what makes a successful application and what the leading schools want\u2014and do not want\u2014from prospective students. To accomplish this, we communicate regularly with admissions directors at the top MBA programs, and in this two-part blog series, we want to share with you some of our favorite advice we have collected from these experts over the past few application seasons. <\/em><\/p>\n

Kurt Ahlm, Associate Dean for Student Recruitment and Admissions at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cTake time to thoroughly think through your objectives for business school. Why do you want an MBA? What skills or experiences do you hope to gain? How do you prefer to learn? How do all of these things put you in a better position to accomplish your short- and long-term goals? These are just some of the questions I push people to consider as they begin their application preparation. The more focused and on point an applicant is, the more compelling their application will be and the more prepared they will be to successfully start an MBA program. A two-year MBA program moves quickly, regardless where you go, and if you have not fully vetted your reasons for being at that school, you can fall behind pretty quickly. The more thinking and planning you do on the front end, the greater overall success you will have throughout the entire MBA experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amanda Carlson, Assistant Dean of Admissions at Columbia Business School<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cYou should still prepare [for your admissions interview] as you would for a professional interview. Reread your application. The admissions committee is of course going to look for consistency in your story. It should not come as a surprise to anybody that if a person who\u2019s interviewing says, \u2018Well, I\u2019d like to go into health care\u2019 to the interviewer but said, \u2018I want to go into real estate development\u2019 in their application, that\u2019s clearly going to be something that gets our minds percolating.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dawna Clarke, Former Director of MBA Admissions at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cA successful interview, I find …, is when people don\u2019t just make broad sweeping statements, but they have some really good, tangible examples of things that they\u2019ve done. So if they say they have strong leadership potential, then they tell a story to illustrate that, or if they identify themselves as being a strong team player, then they would tell us a story, an anecdote, or a vignette that illustrates that they are a team player. It\u2019s very hard if you interview a lot of people, you\u2019re not going to remember that so-and-so said that they were a strong team player, but I very well might remember a very compelling story that somebody told me. So I would tell people to really identify what are the three things that you\u2019re most proud of that you think are relevant to business school, and how am I going to convey those in the interview, and what kind of specific examples do I have to tell that would be memorable and compelling?\u201d<\/p>\n

Dustin Cornwell, Former Director of MBA Admissions at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we like to see is applicants who are focused on why they\u2019re pursuing an MBA. They have a career goal in mind, and they\u2019ve done their research enough about our program to know that we\u2019re able to help them in achieving that goal. Many candidates don\u2019t know exactly what they want to do. They know they need to get an MBA to gain more experience, perhaps, or if they\u2019re switching careers from marketing into finance or vice versa, for example, that\u2019s a good reason to get an MBA. And I always encourage candidates, when I\u2019m talking to them on the road and at recruiting events, to take that next step further. Okay, now you\u2019ve identified why you need an MBA, what do you want to do with that? How are you going to make that transition? If you are making a rather dramatic career switch from one industry to another, think about the skill set that you have, be ready to talk to recruiters about how you can transfer what you\u2019ve done to that new position…. There are all these different areas, and students may not have had exposure to all of them yet, so the MBA program certainly can open their eyes to opportunities. But I think you have to come in with some<\/em> direction. You have to have some idea of where it is you want to go, because we can\u2019t start from square one. You need to have at least walked down that path a little and meet us halfway so we can help you get where you\u2019re going.\u201d<\/p>\n

Isser Gallogly, Assistant Dean of MBA Admissions at the Stern School of Business at New York University<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you look at the three areas\u2014the academic, the professional, and the personal\u2014you don\u2019t want to give an admissions officer a reason to say no. You want them to look at everything and say, \u2018Wow, this looks great across the board.\u2019 … Obviously for undergraduate [GPA], there is only so much you can do, and it\u2019s usually too late, but with the GMAT, we only look at someone\u2019s best scores. So if your score is not reflective of your ability, then retake it. Retake it several times. Put yourself in the best position to demonstrate academic ability. In the application itself, when you\u2019re talking about r\u00e9sum\u00e9s and things like that, again, people should really try to highlight what they have achieved and quantify those results. Answer questions that may be out there, and if you have been unemployed, take the time to explain what happened and what you were doing in that time. Don\u2019t just leave us guessing. … Help us understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rodrigo Malta, Director of MBA Admissions at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, Austin<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cTreat the interview professionally, no matter if it is done by a student, an admissions officer, or an alumnus of the program. I think it\u2019s really important to prepare questions for the end, because after all, the interview is a two-way street. We\u2019re getting to know the applicant a little bit better, but we also expect that this is an opportunity for the applicant to get to know us as well. So, I would advise them to prepare some good questions that can\u2019t usually be found on the Web site.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soojin Kwon, Director of Admissions at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWe highly encourage prospective students to visit and sit in on a class, get a feel for the class dynamics\u2014with the professor, with each other\u2014walk around the campus and get a feel for the culture. Visits can help applicants make informed decisions about which school to apply to and ultimately attend, because they\u2019ll get better sense of fit. Some schools are going to be a better fit based on someone\u2019s personality and goals, and you can\u2019t really make that determination based on view books or Web sites or rankings. You really need to experience it firsthand. That said, we understand that applicants\u2019 budgets and schedules are tight, and it may be tough for prospective students to visit all the schools they\u2019re considering. At a minimum, prospective students should talk to current students and alumni at each school.\u201d<\/p>\n

Niki da Silva, Former Director of MBA Recruitment and Admissions at the University of Toronto\u2019s Rotman School of Management<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIf they do [not know what they want to do after graduating], they should not be investing a hundred thousand dollars in an MBA program until they figure it out a little bit. But … lots of people, even the ones who think 100%, \u2018I know exactly what I want to do\u2019 will come in, and they\u2019ll have an experience that changes their mind. They\u2019ll shift. So what we really look for is, do they have an understanding of what they\u2019re great at, what they want to do, what they\u2019re passionate about doing? Can they articulate that? Do they seem flexible? Are they coachable? Are they resilient? Because even if you know that you want to be a strategy consultant at McKinsey [& Company],\u00a0 … you might not land there for your first job out of the MBA program. And we want to ensure we\u2019re admitting people who are still going to feel like they had a good experience and are open to coaching, to other options, to working really hard. If they don\u2019t get that summer internship, are they going to come back and try again, or are they just going to kind of give up and feel like they\u2019re entitled to a specific role …?\u201d<\/p>\n

Sara Neher, Former Assistant Dean of MBA Admissions at the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the mistakes people make is regurgitating the Web site back to us. You telling me that you want to take so-and-so\u2019s class or the case method is important because of what we put on our Web site is just a waste of your word count. It shows me that you can read our Web site, but it doesn\u2019t show me anything about who you are. Really spend that time with personal examples, incidents, specific stories that you think tell me something about yourself that would make you a fit for the case method. For example, something about presenting at a board meeting and the questions you were asked and how you had to manage that on your feet and what kind of preparation you had to do beforehand\u2014that would completely tell me that you could accomplish the case method, right? But it doesn\u2019t tell me exactly what I already know about the case method that I\u2019ve told you on the Web site. Really personal examples from the workplace or from an activity, that\u2019s how you can convey that the best. The best essays are always about a moment in time and not a laundry list or a chronology of everything you\u2019ve ever done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bruce DelMonico, Assistant Dean and Director of Admissions at the Yale School of Management <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWe ask applicants to tell us what they want to do after they get their MBA, and a lot of times we get applicants who want to do something different than what they\u2019re doing now, and that\u2019s perfectly understandable. A lot of people use an MBA to make a career shift. But one thing, one red flag that will often raise, is if we see someone who wants to make a career shift to an area that they don\u2019t really have any experience in or any exposure to. If you\u2019re making a career shift, you\u2019re necessarily not in that area now, so we don\u2019t expect that someone will have work experience in a certain area\u2014but they should at least have some exposure, whether it\u2019s an activity or some volunteer work, to that area so that they can have some sense of what they\u2019re getting into and have a bit of an idea to get from where they are now to where they want to go.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At mbaMission, we constantly strive to learn more about what makes a successful application and what the leading schools want\u2014and do not want\u2014from prospective students. To accomplish this, we communicate regularly with admissions directors at the top MBA programs, and in this two-part blog series, we want to share with you some of our favorite … Read More  <\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-admissions-officer-interviews"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nOur Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1 | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1 | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"At mbaMission, we constantly strive to learn more about what makes a successful application and what the leading schools want\u2014and do not want\u2014from prospective students. To accomplish this, we communicate regularly with admissions directors at the top MBA programs, and in this two-part blog series, we want to share with you some of our favorite … Read More  \" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-09-30T16:04:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-02-09T16:53:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Aimee Lukin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@mbamission\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Aimee Lukin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"10 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1 | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1 | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","og_description":"At mbaMission, we constantly strive to learn more about what makes a successful application and what the leading schools want\u2014and do not want\u2014from prospective students. To accomplish this, we communicate regularly with admissions directors at the top MBA programs, and in this two-part blog series, we want to share with you some of our favorite … Read More  ","og_url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/","og_site_name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","article_published_time":"2014-09-30T16:04:19+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-02-09T16:53:45+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":675,"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-fallback-image.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Aimee Lukin","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@mbamission","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Aimee Lukin","Est. reading time":"10 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":["Article","BlogPosting"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/"},"author":{"name":"Aimee Lukin","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/e2a8ab013f1e32cf7d70068036dd8f1e"},"headline":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1","datePublished":"2014-09-30T16:04:19+00:00","dateModified":"2022-02-09T16:53:45+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/"},"wordCount":1927,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"articleSection":["Admissions Officer Interviews"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/","name":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1 | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2014-09-30T16:04:19+00:00","dateModified":"2022-02-09T16:53:45+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/our-favorite-advice-from-mba-admissions-directors-part-1\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Our Favorite Advice from MBA Admissions Directors, Part 1"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","description":"World's Leading MBA Admissions Consulting Firm","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"mbaMission","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/mbam-yoast-organization-logo.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"mbaMission"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/e2a8ab013f1e32cf7d70068036dd8f1e","name":"Aimee Lukin","description":"Aimee Lukin has been part of the mbaMission team since 2010. She leads all marketing, advertising, and partnership efforts, in addition to running day-to-day company operations and overseeing the marketing, operations, and content teams.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/who-we-are\/team\/aimee-lukin\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/aimee-lukin\/","https:\/\/x.com\/mbamission"],"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/author\/aimee\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15679\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}