{"id":16868,"date":"2015-04-28T12:00:23","date_gmt":"2015-04-28T16:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/?p=16868"},"modified":"2022-07-25T02:33:29","modified_gmt":"2022-07-25T06:33:29","slug":"mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/","title":{"rendered":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Letters of recommendation are an important part of your overall application package\u2014they provide the only outside information the admissions committee receives about you. One of the most stressful parts of the application process can be picking your recommender. The first question you should ask is <em>who can write a valuable letter on my behalf?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Like many candidates, you may believe that your recommenders must have remarkable credentials and titles to impress the admissions committee. However, what is far more important is selecting individuals who can write a personal and knowledgeable letter that discusses your talents, accomplishments, personality, and potential. If senior managers at your company can only describe your work in vague and general terms, they will not help your cause. Lower-level managers who directly supervise your work, on the other hand, can often offer powerful examples of the impact you have had on your company. As a result, their letters can be far more effective.<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless, not everyone who knows you and your capabilities well will make a good recommender. For starters, you should of course feel confident that your potential recommender likes you and will write a positive letter on your behalf. As you contemplate your choices, try to gather some intelligence on your potential recommenders. Have they written letters for anyone else? Are they generous with their time with regard to employee feedback and review sessions? Will they devote the effort and time necessary to write a letter that will really shine? (See also our blog post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-choosing-safe-recommenders\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mission Admission: Choosing \u201cSafe\u201d Recommenders<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p>If your prospective MBA program asks for two letters of recommendation, you should generally approach two of your recent supervisors, with one ideally being your current supervisor. Your letters will have added credibility if they are written by individuals who are senior to you, because your recommenders are in evaluative positions and will not have anything to lose by critically appraising your candidacy.<\/p>\n<p>If you are unable to ask your current supervisor for any reason, do not panic! Read how to handle this situation in our blog post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-what-if-i-have-no-supervisor\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mission Admission: What If I Have No Supervisor?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. Letters of recommendation are an important part of your overall application package\u2014they provide the only outside information the admissions committee receives about you. One of the most stressful parts of the application process can be picking your recommender. The &hellip; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/\">Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;<i class=\"fal fa-sm fa-angle-right\"><\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mission-admission"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters | 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\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. Letters of recommendation are an important part of your overall application package\u2014they provide the only outside information the admissions committee receives about you. One of the most stressful parts of the application process can be picking your recommender. The &hellip; Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-04-28T16:00:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-07-25T06:33:29+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=\"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters | 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\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","og_description":"Mission Admission is a series of MBA admission tips; a new one is posted each Tuesday. Letters of recommendation are an important part of your overall application package\u2014they provide the only outside information the admissions committee receives about you. One of the most stressful parts of the application process can be picking your recommender. The &hellip; Read&nbsp;More&nbsp;&nbsp;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/","og_site_name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","article_published_time":"2015-04-28T16:00:23+00:00","article_modified_time":"2022-07-25T06:33:29+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":"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":["Article","BlogPosting"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/"},"author":{"name":"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/8239bb74f0e5086e58417043b2ff94c6"},"headline":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters","datePublished":"2015-04-28T16:00:23+00:00","dateModified":"2022-07-25T06:33:29+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/"},"wordCount":376,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#organization"},"articleSection":["Mission Admission"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/","name":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters | mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-04-28T16:00:23+00:00","dateModified":"2022-07-25T06:33:29+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/mission-admission-finding-writers-for-your-recommendation-letters\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Mission Admission: Finding Writers for Your Recommendation Letters"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/","name":"mbaMission - MBA Admissions Consulting","description":"World&#039;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\/8239bb74f0e5086e58417043b2ff94c6","name":"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen","description":"Erika V\u00e4\u00e4t\u00e4inen has been mbaMission\u2019s Writer\/Researcher since 2015. She is in charge of updating and revamping most of our publication materials, ranging from the extensive Insider\u2019s Guides series, the Interview Guides, and the International Program Guides to our shorter publications, including the HBS 2+2 and Deferred Admissions Guide and numerous blog posts.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/who-we-are\/team\/erika-vaatainen\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/erikavaatainen\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/author\/erika\/"}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16868","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\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16868"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16868\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbamission.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}