The MBA Admissions Studio » Harvard

Surviving the HBS ‘Answer a Question You Wish We’d Asked’ Question

Avi Gordon — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 17:43:13 +0000

Following the various HBS applications I’m seeing, it’s clear my post today should be about how to approach the HBS “Wished-We’d-Asked” question. The first thing, which I hope is obvious, is there are two tests here: (1) can you find a question that is appropriate and important, and ask it in an interesting way – [...]

How Not To Fall Down on the Harvard Business School Setback Essay

Avi Gordon — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 15:04:40 +0000

Over many years I’ve written extensively — both here and in my book — about the weakness-failure MBA admissions essay and how to approach it. In fact, it has to be about 8 years since I pioneered the notion of using the failure essay to position the applicant as a leader, because all successful leaders have [...]

Unemployment Setback Can Set You Apart for MBA Admissions

Avi Gordon — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 14:39:28 +0000

As things roll towards R1 deadlines I’ve been seeing quite a few unemployment stories used in the setback/failure essay slot, for example in the HBS “Tell us three setbacks you have faced” essay. This makes sense. Unemployment is a real setback. And it’s understood by Adcoms that many applicants have been laid off for no [...]

HBS augments case method teaching: a call to ‘doers’

Avi Gordon — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 14:46:46 +0000

Harvard Business School this week announced first moves toward its long-awaited curriculum reform in an email from Dean Nitin Nohria and Senior Associate Dean Youngme Moon to incoming students. The essence of it is: HBS is creating a new required first-year course called “Field Immersion Experiences for Leadership Development” (FIELD), and will provide greater modularity and [...]

New HBS Dean talks of competence, character, internationalism, and dirty boots. Adcom will follow suit

Avi Gordon — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 12:14:00 +0000

The soul-searching at Harvard Business School over business ethics and the relationship between business and society has been widely documented. From Anderson to Enron to Lehman Bros., risktaking, dodgy, and sometimes outright criminal companies have been loaded with HBS alumni (as well as many from other schools as well, let’s not forget.) But somehow, of [...]

How Mr Swatch can take you past management consulting as an MBA admissions platform

Avi Gordon — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 14:19:46 +0000

The Economist recently ran an obituary of Swatch magnate Nicolas Hayek, and this offers me a concrete example to explain why management consulting is a weak long-term goal for MBA admissions. (Yes, I’m always pushing clients to give clear examples or anecdotes to back up their MBA admissions claims. So this is me “practicing what [...]

‘Ivy League East’ MBAs unite to brand themselves as ‘Top 4 Asia B-schools’

Avi Gordon — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 14:27:58 +0000

Many industries have seen a shift from the US / Europe to Asia, yet, somehow, education has been one of the slowest sectors to make this transition. Certainly at the elite level there has always been, and remains, a significant migration westward to attend brand-name universities. Institutions such as Harvard and Oxford have unbelievable prestige [...]

Wharton’s MBA admissions essays for 2010-2011: a challenging set of questions

Avi Gordon — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 18:10:28 +0000

Wharton’s MBA essays for 2010-11 are great; and very significantly reformulated from previous years, demanding new comment and analysis here. The required question: What are your professional objectives? (300 words) This is in some senses the classic Why-an-MBA? question. What’s new is that it is really short, particularly when compared with the longer questions that [...]

“What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

Avi Gordon — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 14:15:42 +0000

The “goals” question remains the core of any MBA admissions application. Continuing on past posts I’ve put up here on how to manage it — beyond the usual blah of clearly enunciating your short-term and long-term goals and connecting that to why you need an MBA — here’s something worth considering on the HBS site: [...]

The little story of the business school and the avocado

Avi Gordon — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:40:02 +0000

In my book ‘MBA Admissions Strategy’ I offer the following advice: ‘Proofread to show your hunger’ (that is, hunger for admission, a real desire to be selected.) Typographic or other careless errors in your text immediately clues Adcom in as to how (un)careful you were with your text, and this tells them not only how [...]

Listening to HBS Adcom, and other MBA Admissions Committees too

Avi Gordon — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:43:09 +0000

It’s important to listen, to really, really pay attention when Adcom talks, because they do tell applicants everything they need to know. Below are extracts from an interview with Deirdre Leopold (57) executive director of MBA admissions and financial aid at Harvard Business School, recently published in the Boston Globe. It’s low on the usual [...]

HBS Adcom is answering applicants’ questions every day until the R1 deadline. Answers so far…

Avi Gordon — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:39:09 +0000

Deidre Leopold, Harvard Business School’s Managing Director of Admissions and Financial Aid is answering applicant questions at the rate of two a day on the HBS ‘From The Director‘ blog, until Harvard’s Round 1 deadline on October 1. The following are the questions that have been selected so far, and HBS Adcom’s answers: September 25, [...]

A little parody on MBA ethics and the Harvard MBA Oath, from Comedy Central

Avi Gordon — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 08:16:05 +0000

Hey it’s August, and even though it’s definitely, seriously, MBA application season we can still have a little fun, right? Here’s a video from Comedy Central / The Daily Show, featuring intrepid reporter John Oliver who enlists the “help” of a former convict to convince hold-out MBA students at MIT and Harvard to sign the [...]

Some great interview advice between the lines in “Harvard is my hump”

Avi Gordon — Fri, 08 May 2009 16:34:08 +0000

For better or worse most Adcoms like idealism. They don't want naivete, but they do like world-changing visions. If you are not a dreamer at 25, you'll never be, and they are not looking to put the HBS brand on money-grabbing cynics. See Gina Valeria Chua's Harvard Business School admissions story.

Peering into the MBA classroom is good preparation for MBA admissions

Avi Gordon — Wed, 06 May 2009 14:39:58 +0000

A week or so I blogged about Harvard case method and included the HBS promotional video featuring the case method. Here’s another one, this time from Darden (University of Virginia Business School). The video “Highlights of a Darden Case Study Class” is here: First, this shows how widespread the case method is in b-schools. In [...]

Some Harvard puffery, but good insight into what HBS looks for

Avi Gordon — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 17:48:21 +0000

Harvard Business School has a promotional video up at http://www.hbs.edu/mba/academics/ The video can also been seen here. [youtube]eA5R41F7d9Q[/youtube] It’s an ad for HBS of course, highlighting its main point of distinction: the case method, which, according to HBS creates “special moments that pull everything we have learned into focus. When theory, practice, experience and talent [...]