Mr. F500 Consultant

Nisha has given you excellent advice. It’s hard to add to her smart suggestions. I would reaffirm that your stats are in line and you would bring valuable experience to the class at either Yale or Tuck. It’s especially impressive that as a history major you successful made the transition to business consultant, getting a promotion in the process and working on a major media/technology project as a junior consultant without assistance. So while you are on the older side, I give you good odds of a successful outcome, though I agree it would be helpful to hedge their bets just in case.

Hi, it’s Nisha with mbaMission! I see that you’ve had a progressive career within consulting at a major firm. Do you have very strong recommenders who can vouch for your exceptional performance, potential, and growth vs. your peers? This will be key to the positive evaluation of your professional profile. I’m glad to see that you have meaningful community involvement within and outside of the firm too – AdComs always look to see if consultants are taking advantage of opportunities for internal firm leadership. Your academic stats are within range for Yale and Tuck – since you’re applying from a competitive demographic, and if you plan to expand your list of schools and apply to any others in the top 10, you might retake the GRE if you think you left any points on the table.

You do have 7 years of work experience, which is on the higher end for full-time MBA applicants, so that could pose a challenge. However, schools are always seeking the strongest applicants in a pool. In order to maximize your chances of success, I suggest the following: 1.) research each target program thoroughly (including talking to students and alumni) so that you can communicate in your essays and interview why each program is a fit for you based on its culture and resources within and outside of the classroom 2.) Apply in Round 1 – this is important for consultants since there are so many of you in the pool 3.) Dig deep into your career goals – why do you want to pivot to tech? What drives your passion for it – perhaps you were inspired by that major media/tech project you mentioned? What type of impact do you want to make, and what do you aspire to in the long term? 4.) Owning your story: What are your values and passions, and what has shaped you into who you are today?

Here are a few other schools I’d add to the list since you want to enter Tech, as the programs are very strong in this area: Michigan Ross, Kellogg, and UCLA Anderson.