Rejected By Harvard B-School? Don’t Feel Bad. You’re In Great Company

female designer

Ms. E-Commerce Startup

 

  • 740 GMAT (44Q/48V)
  • 3.98 GPA
  • Undergraduate degree in religious studies from a top-three public research institution, graduating summa cum laude on a full-ride merit scholarship; minor in environmental science
  • Work experience includes five years at a food/e-commerce startup, moving from an operations associate to a vice president of marketing; lots of leadership credibility, having built two successful core business function teams from scratch, hiring and managing teams of about eight people in both cases; company is probably unknown to admissions but has shown significant growth in past five years
  • Extracurricular involvement at school involved co-founding a community garden, interning on a farm, leadership in a diversity-focused organization; currently on leadership team of a local nonprofit
  • Goal: To go back into the food industry, trying to increase food access and health education through a mission-based startup or to join a management team focused on this area at a larger institution
  • “Have gotten interviews with Darden, Berkeley, and Emory. Still waiting for Stanford”
  • 29-year-old white female

     

    Sandy’s Ding Analysis: Well, I would have interviewed you. The reason you were dinged without an interview beats me. This is real solid and it all fits together. I don’t think being slightly older was the issue. Instead, it could very well be that you work for a no-name company, but that would not usually stop them in this instance because this seems tight, interesting, rare, important and also that you can use an MBA.

    Stumped, quite frankly. I don’t think your ding was related to your quant score on the GMAT. In all likelihood, it had more to do with your work experience at a no name company and in an industry they may not be familiar with. If you had quant courses in your enviro science minor that would have been worth highlighting, too.

    Questions about this article? Email us or leave a comment below.