Work Experience

What are Transferable Skills and Why Do You Need Them?

What are Transferable Skills and Why Do You Need Them?

Transferable skills are skills that are needed independent of a professional role. These abilities enable you to be successful in any position. Furthermore, they enable you to enter positions, sectors, or departments for which you may not otherwise be fully qualified. There is one universal truth that we have discovered that appears to be largely ignored by the rest of the MBA admissions landscape, and that is the critical importance of adhering to what we call the Art of Transferability. In this blog post, we discuss what transferable skills are, why they are so important, and how to include them in your MBA application.

UPDATES: The Most Important Thing To Do After You Hit Submit

UPDATES: The Most Important Thing To Do After You Hit Submit

After submitting your MBA application, the most important thing you can do is to keep engaging your target business schools. After you’ve completed all your submissions, you should still keep reaching out to your target MBA schools with substantial updates. This will make you stand out and look more competitive.

Turning Your MBA Degree into a Job Offer

Turning Your MBA Degree into a Job Offer

Here you are, you’ve made it through the rigorous MBA program and graduation day is well on the way. The next chapter? Using that knowledge and skill to propel your post-MBA career forward. But searching for a job fresh out of business school can be a complex and daunting process. Here are three post-MBA tips.

2021 MBA New Year's Resolution Ideas

2021 MBA New Year's Resolution Ideas

Ideas for your 2021 MBA New Year's resolutions. What to include? Become more informed. Incorporate project management into your MBA resolutions routine. Make one new professional MBA connection each month. Identify a strength and improve it. Identify a weakness and enhance it. Get extra certifications. Self-care.

Before and After

Before and After

The millennial generation brought with it many new trends, one of which has been an increase in career moves.  Gone are the days of working for one company for 30 years and then retiring.  But should you be concerned about career flip-flopping when it comes to getting admitted to b-school or landing a job afterwards?

Stephen Covey's 4 Pillars of Leadership: The Definition of Leadership You Want in B-school

Stephen Covey's 4 Pillars of Leadership: The Definition of Leadership You Want in B-school

Business school applications are all about laying out how you have exhibited the qualities of a leader.  After all, this is the quality that b-schools, in general, desire the most in their applicants.   A lot of my admissions consulting clients struggle with a succinct definition of leadership.  That is, one that they as the applicant can use as a succinct model.

Who is Reading Your B-school Application?

Who is Reading Your B-school Application?

One mistake applicants often make is to misunderstand their audience.  When crafting a winning MBA application package there is much to consider, but how much thought have you given to who will actually read your essays?  Who is analyzing your resume? Common sense may dictate that an essay about going to a top MBA program should be crafted for an MBA crowd, but did you know that most essay readers at the top schools never attended an MBA program and don’t have an MBA themselves?  Remembering this in the application process can help you communicate your story in a much more effective way to the adcom.   Read on for tips…

Avoid the Biggest MBA App Mistake: Market Your Transferable Skills!

Avoid the Biggest MBA App Mistake: Market Your Transferable Skills!

Today we want to talk about arguably the biggest and most common mistake we see on MBA applications, which is failing to market transferable skills.  More importantly, we want to talk about how to fix that problem. 

In working with clients of all age, gender, nationality, and industry, one thing we're always trying to do is identify things that connect everyone - common elements that become and remain true, regardless of differences. To be honest, there aren't many such elements. Almost everything about the MBA admissions process is a contextual exercise. You can almost never divorce a unique applicant or a specific school from your analysis. It's part of the reason this is such a difficult endeavor for people, part of the reason why so many admissions consultants do a horribly incomplete job of advising candidates, and a huge part of the reason why admissions consulting even exists. You have to do a lot of things right and you have to do them with great contextual specificity.  If you confront "one size fits all" advice, typically you can sprint away from that as fast as possible.

That said, there is one universal truth that we have uncovered that seems largely overlooked by the rest of the MBA admissions landscape and that is how enormously important it is to abide by what we call the Art of Transferability.

MBA Application Advice: How to Build a Compelling Work History

MBA Application Advice: How to Build a Compelling Work History

One of the most important profile characteristics for any b-school applicant is their work history.

Unlike Law School, Medical School and just about every other terminal degree or master’s level program, business school requires students to come with some kind of work experience under their belts in order to “qualify.”

MBA Application Advice: Demonstrating Leadership

MBA Application Advice: Demonstrating Leadership

Out of all the profile characteristics of business school candidates, there is one which seems to consistently rise above the rest as something admissions committees look for in an ideal candidate, and no, it’s not a 750 GMAT score.

It’s leadership.

Are You "Unique" ?

Are You "Unique" ?

It's getting hard to stand out these days. It sometimes seems as if everyone meanders through life with the same or similar routine, all doing the same or similar thing - so when it comes time to differentiate yourself in your b-school application, how do you pull it off?

Always Waive Your Right to View Your MBA Recommendation

Always Waive Your Right to View Your MBA Recommendation

I tell my clients up front that they have to waive their right and that it is not really an option to not do so. Not waiving your right could tell the adcom that you don’t trust your recommenders.  It  could tell them that you are paranoid or overly anxious.

It could tell them that this applicant is a liability.  What happens if he doesn’t get in?  Is he going to go after his recommenders for throwing him under the bus?  Is he going to create more headaches for all involved?  Is the applicant going to create reputational risk for the school?

The adcom would rather just not deal with it.

A Decision Tree for the Ross 2014-15 Essays

A Decision Tree for the Ross 2014-15 Essays

I wanted to try something a bit different today when breaking down the new Ross essays, which is to post the decision tree I am going to be asking my clients to use this year. 

Why would I just share this with the public, you might ask?  In part because the real value of our services with Ross (unlike with some other schools) is going to be in implementation rather than in the setting of strategy - so I don't feel I am cheating my clients at all.  Further, we just don't have that many clients select Ross, to be honest.  This is confusing to me, as Ross is an amazing school and a true value pick ... but that's a column for a different time.  Today, I want to present a really simple way to work through Ross' seemingly wide open essays.  I'll be using one part common sense and one part program knowledge, but both are born out of lots of experience just being someone in this world (by "in this world" I mean working in "higher education" and with "people trying to maximize their lives and abilities").  Let's get into it. 

In Brief - What Counts as Significant International Work Experience?

In Brief - What Counts as Significant International Work Experience?

For international experience to be significant it has to be something that you can write about at length and appropriately in a b-school essay.

Applying to B-School in a Few Years? A Few Tips

Applying to B-School in a Few Years? A Few Tips

A significant portion of my MBA admissions consulting applicants come to be with little to no extracurricular experience since their undergraduate days.  While this is a problem that can be addressed, it can show a lack of proper planning over the long term.  A lot of applicants don't think about the impact of their actions on their applicant competitiveness when the graduate from undergrad.  To a certain extent, even I was the same way. What I like most about some of my clients is the the way some of them are way ahead of the game we call the MBA application process.  Those that have been planning since day 1 to go back to b-school tend to be distinguishing yourself from your peers out of the gate and these habits show when constructing the business school application.