Ms. JMZ

Wish I knew a little more about you through your extras, work history and big wins to give you a more thoughtful assessment. You clearly have the stats and smarts to get into Harvard Business School. Your GMAT is 20 points above Harvard’s 730 median and your GPA is just a tad below HBS’ 3.7 average. Frankly, the most appealing part of your candidaqcy is your international work experience with stints in Bejing and London. And if you’re working for a global bank, I would assume it’s a major player that is highly selective in its hiring practices. That is clearly a plus since you earned your undergraduate degree from a non-elite university. So two points: Be more open about yourself, especially to admissions folks, and apply to more schools than just HBS, if you aren’t alreadying doing so. Because HBS rejects 88% of the self-selecting pool of candidates who apply, you need to give yourself other viable options. And if you are serious about using the MBA as a springboard to launch a startup, you can do that in a large number of places that provide students lots of support, including places that obviously are not on your radar screen. On our top ten list for the best MBAs for entrepreneurship are Washington University, Babson, MIT Sloan, Michigan, and UCLA. These schools should be in your mix.

I agree with John’s analysis but I am more skeptical. Not about you per se, just that finance is real crowded bucket for white people (I assume) and it takes some X factor to break out of it –that is not visible in your current write-up. A lot depends on names of your employers, etc. but assuming those a major players, it is still a little bit of a lottery.

I’m placing the odds somewhat blindly – there is just so much more I’d want to know about you first! Why business school, why entrepreneurship (starting your own company feels like a pretty big jump from finance), what’s driving you, how you’ve made an impact… All of these will be critical components in convincing HBS – or any school! – that you’re a great candidate. That said, if you’ve got the additional stories, I might place your chances higher. One of my clients from a few years ago was “older” (and by that, all I mean is out of the sweet “27-28 year old” spot) and had built her career to date in finance – first overseas and then in the States. She wanted to transition into brand marketing. She had some powerful stories that reflected her fire and determination and I believe it’s why she stood out in HBS’s application process. So, my headline to you: the non-business stuff matters, the “who you are as a person” matters, and the impact/legacy that you’ve already begun to create matters. Tap into these parts of you – it’ll make your acceptance at top b-schools much more likely! (And sorry for the duplication – I wasn’t signed in when I wrote this assessment yesterday!)

Hi, it’s Nisha from mbaMission. Like the others, I would need a lot more information on your profile. Your academic stats seem solid for HBS, but a few things I’m curious about

1. In your 6-year finance career, what has been your progression in terms of title, responsibility, compensation, and impact? Have you built strong relationships with recommenders who can attest to your performance, potential, and growth (esp. vs. peers)? The international experience is a strength.

2. Why do you want to do entrepreneurship post-MBA? And on this note – I nearly ALWAYS advise clients to frame entrepreneurship as a long-term goal that you’ll start laying the groundwork for while in the MBA program through its resources. Bschools want employable candidates, so think about specific roles/companies you’d want right after graduation that’ll prepare you to be an entrepreneur eventually (and why they interest you).

3. You don’t seem to have any extracurricular involvement – this isn’t mandatory per se, but for a school like HBS you’ll really want to think about how you’ll tell your story, and a big part of the story typically is what has shaped you into who you are today and what’s important to you aside from your career, so do some reflection. It’s not too late to get involved in something meaningful to you, especially if it’s a continuation of something you were involved in back in college, for example. So, do some reflection on your stories and think about how you might be able to get more involved in your community, in any capacity.

Hi, it’s Jennifer Jackson at Stratus Admissions. It’s very hard to make much of a judgment with so little information here, but there are several positives I see. The GMAT score is quite high and will certainly serve you well. The GPA is fine and won’t keep you out of any school even if it’s under the median at the top schools. You have a substantial amount of work experience in finance, even above the average. What I don’t know anything about is what might set you apart. I suspect you have very interesting stories about being a Canadian national working in China. Maybe you can bring some of what you learned — perhaps an ability to connect with many different types of people and adapt to new cultures and norms — into your essays to illustrate how you’re different from the average female in finance with a high GMAT. It’s these intangibles separate from your stats that will make a school interested in you. You say your goal is entrepreneurship, but be careful to be specific in your applications. If you just like the idea of having your own company but there’s no way to connect that with anything you’ve seen or experienced, it could seem disjointed or fanciful. If you can tell that story and tie it into who you are, you have a chance at HBS!