Essay editing

Why Aristotle's Poetics is relevant for your MBA application essay

Why Aristotle's Poetics is relevant for your MBA application essay

Here’s why MBA applicants should know Aristotle’s guidelines: If a story, in this case your MBA application essay, is not working, and you can’t put your finger on why — the reason usually is that you left one of Aristotle's rules out, or you broke them. Let’s try to diagnose why with these ten structural tips.

What are the MBA application readers looking for?

What are the MBA application readers looking for?

What are the MBA application readers looking for? Get into the mind of how MBA application readers think. Avoid too much jargon. Understand how the admissions committee is constructed. Remember that you are APPLYING to attend b-school & not yet graduated. Do NOT submit the same resume you would for a job opportunity.

Thoughts on the incoming 2021 HBS application

Thoughts on the incoming 2021 HBS application

Thoughts regarding the HBS application: THE POST-INTERVIEW RESPONSE ASSIGNMENT (when they see something free, cool and confident, they are impressed), THE UNUSUAL WAITLIST SCENARIO (Only respond if you don’t want to stay on the waitlist), THE OPEN-ENDED ESSAY (can you confidently share something they don't know).

MBA Candidates: Knives Down!

MBA Candidates: Knives Down!

PSA time. 

To all MBA Candidates out there, especially those of you racing to hit the HBS deadline on September 9th ... please, for the love, know when to set your essay down, put your hands in the air, and say "time."  I borrow from Top Chef and call it "put your knives down!"  It's that moment in the show when the buzzer has sounded and they have no choice but to put the chef's knife down, put their hands in the air, and accept that their dish is finished.  In our situation, there isn't a buzzer (yet), but we can still use the principle.  In fact, one of the great ironies of the Top Chef "quick fire" challenge that gave me this expression is that some of the best dishes on that show come because there IS a buzzer - it keeps the contestants from noodling and tweaking and, basically, ruining a great plate of food.  So ... how can we use this for our MBA apps? 

Yale SOM's 2015 Essays - Read the Fine Print

Yale SOM's 2015 Essays - Read the Fine Print

Today we are analyzing Yale's 2015 Essays ... sort of. What we are really doing is taking a look at them and using this essay set as a way to remind everyone to read the fine print when it comes to dealing with applications and even schools in general. I'm not blowing the whistle on some grand conspiracy or anything like that, but just illustrating that you can't take everything at face value. This is especially relevant at a time when applicants are killing themselves to try to hit Round 1 deadlines because an admissions officer "told them to," or when candidates make horrible errors in judgement based on the same logic. The truth of the matter is you have to keep your eyes open and use your own common sense when navigating this process.

Fuel for the Wharton 2014-15 Essays

Fuel for the Wharton 2014-15 Essays

It's time to cover Wharton, as it looks like I've locked myself into a pattern of covering every school's set of essays. The common response to Wharton's new essay set (one of which is required, one is optional) is "another case of schools shrinking this essays!" This is technically true, as the total words went from either 1,000 to 900 (if you use the Optional) or from 1,000 to 500 (if you don't). However, the next leap is almost always "as schools continue to try to make things easier for applicants." I'm sorry, I simply don't buy that line of reasoning. Almost everyone who truly knows admissions knows that fewer words makes things harder, not easier. This is because it requires confidence and clarity to approach such a task, it requires concise and structured writing to execute it, and it makes it far less likely that you will "accidentally" come up with something great, just by virtue of spewing out words. Now, it might be a byproduct of the essay shrinking that it's easier on the readers or that a few people might (mistakenly) think it's easier to apply, but I highly doubt that is the intent.