[分享]what does the Adcom want to see from essay

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The article is from BW,for your info:

Author and consultant Paul Bodine explains what admissions committee members look for and how to make your application unique and personal .

Paul Bodine is the author of Great Application Essays for Business School (McGraw-Hill, 2005), Great Personal Statements for Law School (McGraw-Hill, 2005), and a past contributor to the Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic History. He is a graduate of the University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins University. A senior editor at the online admissions consulting service Accepted.com, Bodine has helped clients earn admissions to top B-schools.

Bodine (AuthorBodine) recently fielded questions from an audience of applicants and B-schools channel editor Francesca Di Meglio (FrancescaBW). Here is an edited excerpt of the live chat event:

FrancescaBW: The first question comes from someone who could not join us today. The member writes, "I work with Ernst & Young in China and have three years of work experience. I want a career change with the MBA. I hope to work for the World Bank or a nonprofit organization. How can I articulate the reasons for a career change?"
AuthorBodine: It is acceptable to tell the admissions committee that you want to work for nonprofits. You need to explain why, if you had that as a goal your whole life, you didn't pursue it earlier. You also need to show what you've been doing outside of your current career that demonstrates your interest in nonprofits. You don't have to have experience in the career that you want to change into, but you have to have a really good reason for wanting to switch industries, and you have to demonstrate some concrete knowledge or due diligence about the career you want.

jps: How do business school essays compare to undergraduate essays?
AuthorBodine: In general, business school essays are probably less creative (see BW Online, 11/3/05, "Cover Letter Essay"). The things [admissions committees] ask are a little less off-the-wall than college essays. In terms of your response, you're expected to show more maturity and self-knowledge. Since you're applying to business school, it's important to demonstrate your business experience and to know what your specific goals are. For a college essay, you don't necessarily have to know what your career goals are.

theashish: Won't I sound boastful if I talk about my qualifications and achievements in my essay?
AuthorBodine: It's a question of tone. If you show that what you value in your achievements is the impact they've had on your organization or the people within it, then you don't sound boastful. But if you talk about how many people you stepped over to get where you are, then that paints a different picture. The schools understand that it's about self-marketing. This is not the time to be overly modest. I think you need to express your achievements in concrete factual terms, rather than subjective "I'm great" terms.

FrancescaBW: Next, we have another question from someone who could not join us today. The member wanted to know what kinds of extracurricular activities she should write about in her essays -- volunteering, doing your friends' taxes, etc.?
AuthorBodine: I think volunteering is an excellent extracurricular activity, because it shows selflessness and the kind of community orientation that schools value. Those extracurriculars that are solitary are less valuable. At the same time, there are two other factors to keep in mind. One is how passionate you are about the activity. The more passionate you are, the longer it's been part of your life, the better addition it will make to your essay. The other is basically showing leadership wherever possible, whether it be sports, a club, or volunteer organization. An activity that shows leadership is better than one that does not.

FrancescaBW: We often hear that applicants look to get help on their essays from editors or admissions consultants. How do the schools feel about that?
AuthorBodine: I think that schools are definitely against services that provide prewritten essays or that write it for you. But most schools are open to the idea of working with someone, whether it be a consultant, friend, or family member who can help you write your best essay. Most schools know that admissions consultants are out there, and they feel that as long as the line isn't crossed in terms of putting words in the applicant's mouth, then it's a valuable service. As a consultant, I have to help communicate who the person is, as opposed to what I think the school wants to hear.

FrancescaBW: Here's another question from someone who wasn't available to join us today. What's the best way to organize the essay explaining why you want to earn an MBA?
AuthorBodine: There are basically three essential parts of the goals essay. One of them is "career progress" (see BW Online, 9/12/05, "Career Progress Essay"). It's the reflective part of the essay where you explain where your goals came from and talk about your accomplishments. You create a context for discussing what your goals are, and show that they extend from who you are and what you've done. The second part is the statement of the goals themselves. And that can be broken down into short-, intermediate-, and long-term. You want to be as specific as you can be.

And the third major part is the "why our school" section, which is when you must explain why a given school is the best one for you. The best way to show why a particular school is ideal is to do some research on the curriculum and resources. In other words, link some of your post-MBA career goals with the specific strengths of the program. And the other way to show that you're interested in a particular school is to refer to particular members of the school who you've actually spoken to. You want to show that you've taken steps to know the place, through talking with the alumni, professors, and students. By the way, these sections don't have to be in that order.

kdhong: If I spoke with alumni of the school I want to attend, would there be any value to putting their specific names in my essay?
AuthorBodine: It's an excellent idea. But you have to do more than just drop names. You have to talk about what impressed you about what they said and how what they told you deepened your knowledge of the school. It might even help you if you did more than drop their name, but also show that you know something about their career track, because it might be relevant to your goals.

lilydj: What should I be focusing on when writing for Executive MBA application essays?
AuthorBodine: The level of your accomplishment is expected to be much higher than if you were applying for an MBA. You have to demonstrate greater impact and leadership/management experience. Also, your goals should be much more highly defined. The other big difference is that the EMBA application is usually for someone who is looking to advance in their existing career path, whereas the full-time MBA is more often than not used to make a career change.

tkovalsky: What is the best way to figure out your long- and short-term goals?
AuthorBodine: Short-term is from when you get your MBA to five years out, maximum. And long-term can be anything after that -- five years until the end of your career. The best way to figure out your goals is to ask yourself what you like and dislike about your current job. Then do some research into the careers that might allow you to maximize the things you enjoy. After that, you should do some information interviews with people who work in that field, so you can determine if you'd like this industry. Most people's goals stem from their work experience. In other words, they find out what they want to do as their career evolves because they get exposure to a new career that interests them.

MBAShelly: How do you show the personal side of yourself in the essay?
AuthorBodine: I think you have to have both factual and subjective information. By subjective I mean that you should show them what your values are and what you enjoy. Those are subjective things, but you have to provide evidence or examples that demonstrate those subjective assertions, that illustrate you live by those values. It's important to illustrate your personal side with specific stories.

hiarlin: How would you recommend someone who has a relatively short amount of work experience (three years) emphasize the quality of experience?
AuthorBodine: You need to make sure that you are focusing on only a few achievements, so that you can give each the depth they deserve. You can have an experience that only lasted a couple of months but changed your career and goals. Your job is to explain how it had that impact on you. The essays aren't supposed to be overviews. They're supposed to be focused on specific events. So even if you only have a couple of years of work experience, you will definitely still have a couple of experiences or events that you can share.

Guddu: Does it matter that I was more technically oriented and shied away from leadership responsibilities until now? How do I present this in the essay?
AuthorBodine: I would not tell them that you have shied away from leadership responsibility. You have to explain why you want a management degree, if you're not really interested in management. It'll be a challenge to find leadership stories on which you can draw. But you have to identify those leadership stories. It harms your application if you come across primarily as a technical profile with weak leadership skills. And whatever leadership experience you do have, I would emphasize as much as possible in the essays.

midpitch10: I am an undergraduate. Are top B-schools open to applicants coming straight out of college?
AuthorBodine: They are increasingly open to applicants coming out of college (see BW Online, 3/30/05, "MBA Youth Movement"). Harvard Business School is one of the schools that has come right out and said that. Business schools are definitely skewing younger, but undergrad applicants have a much higher hurdle to pass. You have to show maturity in your goals. And you have to show demonstrated leadership. In a sense, you have to compensate for your youth by being really outstanding.

Rajk: What should be the tone of the essay for part-time MBA programs?
AuthorBodine: You still have to show seriousness of interest and a highly focused need for the MBA. The difference comes in explaining how you can handle the part-time program -- showing that you have the time-management skills to handle two commitments. That should be part of your essays, but the tone itself wouldn't be different. You need to focus on the reasons why you need admissions to a part-time program as opposed to a full-time one.

theashish: Can it be true that even if we write a good essay, we still might not get admitted if it's not what the school is looking for?
AuthorBodine: All schools value a well-written essay that shows that you know who you are, where you're going, and that you'll add a distinctive set of experiences to their program. It is true, however, that different programs have different cultures, and you want to be aware of a program's self-image. If you're applying to a school that emphasizes leadership, then you need to make sure your essay is not only good but that it's also talking about leadership. For the most part, you can reuse your basic set of essays for multiple schools, but you have to tweak them for each school's culture.

methos49: As a young applicant with military experience, how should I position myself in the essays? And which schools are generally more favorable toward young applicants?
AuthorBodine: One school that I mentioned that is particularly open to young applicants is HBS. But most schools are broadening the pool of applicants. A school where the average age skews older is Wharton, so that might not be a school you'd want to focus on. But in terms of positioning yourself, it's still a question of knowing what your goals are, and being able to talk about them in a concrete and savvy way. And a younger applicant has to go out of his way to explain why he needs the MBA now as opposed to two years from now. I definitely think you should include your military experience.

jps: If there are multiple essays in an application, some that are more creative and others that pertain more to career goals, do the admissions departments tend to value one type more than another?
AuthorBodine: The schools understand that any of the essays can be good at showing who you are, so they don't value one over the other. Take them all seriously and do your best on each. Those different essays are asking you to show different parts of your profile. You want to be sure that you're presenting the full mix of your uniqueness factors. The goals essay is basically the most important essay because it's the first one they read (see BW Online, 9/26/05, "Personal Achievement Essay"). It directly addresses why you want an MBA and why you want to go to their school, and it should introduce the themes that will be discussed in later essays.

A creative personal essay that explains some kind of obstacle you've overcome, a difficult childhood, or a defining moment -- and does so in a vivid way -- can be much more effective than a traditional leadership or accomplishment essay (see BW Online, 11/7/05, "Creative Essay").

learner: I stepped out of a management trainee program in a large multinational to join a startup because the opportunity to learn seemed far larger to me. How do I present this information in my essay?
AuthorBodine: As long as the reason you joined the startup ties into your career goals after the MBA, even indirectly, and you can show why that startup experience had value to you and helped shape your goals, then it can only be a positive. You need to treat your decision to move to the startup as a well-considered move. You don't want to portray it as something you did on a whim. But I don't think the schools value a startup experience less than one with a big firm. It's all about what you got out of the experience and your accomplishments there. The startup experience could have, and probably did, give you cross-functional exposure at a high level that you couldn't get with the larger corporation.

Guddu: When asked to describe a failure, does it have to be work-related or can it be personal?
AuthorBodine: I don't think it matters whether the failure is work-related or personal, but you don't want the personal failure to be too personal, like a failed relationship or something like that. What really matters is how you responded to the failure and what actions you took to learn from and build on that failure. Yes, a failure essay can expose your weaknesses. If it shows you have poor ethics or serious interpersonal problems, then that will hurt your application. But if you show that you had a maturity problem to overcome, or if you simply made a mistake, then that's not going to be held against you.

MBAShelly: How do I assess the strengths and weaknesses of my application (and specifically my essays) given that I recently applied and was rejected by a top school that doesn't provide feedback?
AuthorBodine: Consultants like myself can help. But you can also get feedback on your application to MBA students, friends, and colleagues. It's usually possible, even without the school's help, to figure out the problem. Then it's important to understand how to address those weaknesses, especially if you intend to apply again. Usually, being vague about goals or why the school is the one you want to attend is the problem. Of course, the GMAT score is often a factor, too.

SHIVA: Who reads the essays? What is the primary background of the committee members? Do they really care about the thesis, topic sentence, and supporting details? Or do they focus mainly on the content and the stories that go with them?
AuthorBodine: For B-schools, it's usually career admissions staff, not professors as it is in law school. But it's also sometimes second-year MBA students. They do care about thesis and topic sentence and details, but they're not checking them off like it's a term paper. It's primarily about the content and concreteness of detail.

theashish: Would this statement be appropriate for introduction: "I will demonstrate how my work experience and events in my life have led me to choose this career path and this college"? If not, how can I write it?
AuthorBodine: That intro is a little too plain. It's not individual enough. You should consider starting out with an example or event that helped to define your career path. In other words, dramatize or make an experience come to life in that first paragraph. That way, you'll grab the reader's interest. Then, after telling that story, you can make your general theme statement about how that experience helped define your goals.

FrancescaBW: Any parting advice for applicants?
AuthorBodine: The biggest mistake applicants make is not getting into enough detail about their own experiences, their reasons for needing an MBA, and their reasons for choosing that particular school. I really recommend that you do some introspection before you start writing and that you think in terms of creating stories about things that make you unique.