DINGED? Let Sandy Tell You Why

reject ding

As many as 3,000 applicants to Harvard Business School will get bad news today (Oct. 12) right about noon EST. Most of them will be, in the euphemistic words of HBS admissions, “released” with several hundred candidates put on a waitlist and moved to the second round.

“By ‘releasing’ those of you who will not move forward with our process on October 12—rather than waiting until December to let you know—we hope to give you time to explore other potential options,” says Chad Losee, the new managing director of admissions and financial aid at HBS.

If there’s any solace in getting dinged from Harvard’s MBA program today, it’s this: In all probability, you are among the most highly qualified candidates in this year’s applicant pool, and you have plenty of company. After all, HBS accepts only 11% of its applicants and most of those who don’t get in have solid chances at rival prestige schools.

Sandy Kreisberg, founder of HBSGuru.com

Sandy Kreisberg, founder of HBSGuru.com

If you’re like most dinged candidates, you are probably perplexed by the turn down. Often times, prospective students who have great stats and careers are turned down for subtle and not easily understood reasons. Last year, for example, several dinged candidates boasted GMAT scores as high as 780 or GPAs as high as 4.0 from the very best Ivy League schools. They worked for Fortune 100 companies and major global consulting firms, investment banks, and startups. We’re talking Goldman Sachs, Google, Procter & Gamble, and McKinsey, Bain or BCG.

So, as we have in the past, we’ve asked Sandy Kreisberg, founder of HBSGuru.com, a leading MBA admissions consultant and an astute reader of all HBS tea leaves, to take a look at the profiles of “released” applicants and explain why they didn’t make the first cut.

If you would like Sandy to explain your HBS ding, just post below in the comment section your profile, your GPA, GMAT, company information, and any other facts you think made your application different. The more detail you provide, including what you wrote in your essay to HBS, the easier it will be for Sandy to determine why HBS turned you down.

To give you an idea of how this plays out, here is one our of ding reports from last year: You Won’t Believe Who Harvard Business School Rejected

And Don’t Miss: HBS Interview Invites Start Rolling Out

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