Mr. Navy Officer

Hi Mr. Navy Officer, Kristen from MBA Prep School here. Firstly, thank you for your service. I have no doubt your stats alone will grab the attention of the adcoms at Stanford and HBS. Your perfect GPA at the Naval Academy in quant econ, Div I athletics experience, and 770 GMAT already give you an edge, Add to that being a SEAL and you are sure to rise up to the top of the pool. Although you haven’t shared much information here about your professional experiences (understandably so), I know from experience working in admissions at MIT Sloan that you undoubtedly have some solid leadership experiences under your belt. Your decision to pursue consulting is a popular one for military MBA candidates transitioning to civilian life, as it allows you to use your strategic problem -solving expertise and exposes you to a broad range of industries. If you want to go the finance route, investment banking would be the entry point to eventually move to PE/VC. Either way, you want to present some focus and a general career vision. Although I think your stats will get you pretty far in the process, if you can’t tell a compelling, connected, and clear story you can sabotage your odds. This is especially true for Stanford, which looks for the “it” factor in its applicants. Please feel free to reach out for a complimentary consultation if you’d like to chat more about how to position yourself for success!

Clearly, you have a story to tell, even though there’s not a hint of it in your writeup. Everything else here is totally in line with an admit decision from HBS and possibly Stanford. But a lot will depend on your narrative. Having dealt with a fair number of military candidates to elite business schools, I am going to bet you have more than enough material for a truly compelling essay that could SEAL the deal.