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标题: 【必读】Essay写作宝典《Essay Help Course》 [打印本页]

作者: lhpunk    时间: 2014-9-26 11:41
标题: 【必读】Essay写作宝典《Essay Help Course》
本书详细讲述了MBA Application Essay的写作方法和技巧,并附有6类经典Essay样文以及修改前后的对比,既可为摸不清头脑的小白扫盲,也可为初稿成型的大牛增色。

本书来源于:http://www.essayedge.com/business/essayadvice/course/,但是由于网站已改版,内容链接均已失效。

还好CD前辈将内容记录在了论坛帖子中:http://forum.chasedream.com/foru ... say%2Bhelp%2Bcourse,但是帖子形式不便于阅读,没有目录读不懂文章层次。

因此楼主用半天的时间将帖子转换成PDF并标出了层级,增加了目录,方便大家打印、阅读。

由于时间仓促,难免有疏忽,欢迎大家私信我指出。

附件回复可见





作者: ruanmw    时间: 2014-9-26 11:42
thx for sharing
作者: maisw    时间: 2014-9-26 13:04
好好休息天天向上
作者: zoey31    时间: 2014-9-26 13:06
thanks~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
作者: godson911    时间: 2014-9-26 13:14
thx for sharing
作者: xiaocuicuimm    时间: 2014-9-26 13:36
thanks~~~~~~~~~`
作者: HannesFan    时间: 2014-9-26 14:46
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作者: bobisyouruncle    时间: 2014-9-26 14:48
Thanks for sharing
作者: lugolugo    时间: 2014-9-26 15:24
感謝分享
作者: fairysmile0611    时间: 2014-9-26 16:39
thanks——————
作者: senesce    时间: 2014-9-26 16:59
Thank you so so much!
作者: w33312    时间: 2014-9-26 18:26
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作者: lindalong    时间: 2014-9-26 23:39
thx for sharing
作者: dreamlander    时间: 2014-9-27 00:50
thx for sharing
作者: baifaheipi    时间: 2014-9-27 05:21
thanks for sharing
作者: chasingfate    时间: 2014-9-27 08:06
Jiayou xie xie!
作者: harry409609    时间: 2014-9-27 09:08

感謝分享
作者: xuanyuangelair    时间: 2014-9-27 09:42
谢谢分享

作者: 雪红小主    时间: 2014-9-27 10:02
谢谢,学习啦
作者: ywdking    时间: 2014-9-27 10:07
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作者: 185420243    时间: 2014-9-27 11:29
谢谢~~~~~~~~~~
作者: 傻傻沙沙分不清    时间: 2014-9-27 11:58
辛苦辛苦
作者: tufarmer    时间: 2014-9-27 13:27
赞楼主啊
作者: hunteruibe    时间: 2014-9-27 16:08
谢谢了,好东西看一看
作者: tanht    时间: 2014-9-27 16:51
thanks for sharing
作者: JIERONG1019    时间: 2014-9-27 18:54
Thanks for your help.
作者: Athena8    时间: 2014-9-27 20:26
thx for sharing
作者: deepeye83    时间: 2014-9-27 20:58
赞楼主!!!!!!!!
作者: ruyi8922    时间: 2014-9-27 21:33
谢谢!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
作者: pissunrise    时间: 2014-9-27 21:36
thanks in advance. LZ is a good man
作者: wdliangjiatun    时间: 2014-9-27 23:20
谢谢分享!!!
作者: bbs19871003    时间: 2014-9-28 00:00
Thanks very much
作者: vivian727403    时间: 2014-9-28 00:27
kankankankankankankan
作者: gw4475    时间: 2014-9-28 02:09
let me see it is a good one
作者: mashimarolily    时间: 2014-9-28 05:56
thx for sharing!
作者: Bilibily    时间: 2014-9-28 07:12
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作者: fellowong    时间: 2014-9-28 08:10
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作者: fzm_fzm    时间: 2014-9-28 09:36
谢谢~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
作者: icelilywang    时间: 2014-9-28 09:38
好好学习了
作者: rorokeating    时间: 2014-9-28 10:02
Thanks a lot for sharing!
作者: vvvvvvvzhang    时间: 2014-9-28 10:09
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作者: xxxyumixxx    时间: 2014-9-28 10:14
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作者: mikecn    时间: 2014-9-28 10:27
Comments on the CV

--------------------------------

1) Describe "achievements" rather than "responsibilities". Right now it looks like a well-written yet rather plain job decription, not something that gets the adcom excited and makes them want to know more about the candidate.

IMHO, a CV/resume for b-school application differs from what is used for job application--it should portrait the candidate's career progresses and professional milestones, rather than his/her work experience and technical/business skills.

So how do you give it a make-over? -- Numbers speak louder than text. Try to use sentences like "achieved xx% of growth in revenue", "doubled client base in one year", etc. For example, in the decription of your previous job, you gave an example using numbers/percentages. It immediately caught my attention. Try to do the same with your current job, because the adcom will start reading from there and usually if they don't see a good example of achievement by the third or even second bullet point, they will lose interest.

2) Need to use more "powerful" verbs. Currently the tone is a bit weak and again, sounds like a job description. It does not show your unique contribution so why would YOU be chosen, not some of your colleagues who are doing similar work?

B-school adcom wants to find traits of leadership potential and pro-active attitude in the candidate. So, show them these qualities by describing how you "drove/managed" a project, "created" a new working method, "initiated" an exciting plan, and "led" a team.

Even if you are not in a leadership/management role, think about how you affected outcomes positively by causing others to act in their best. Made a difference, basically.

3) Refrain from the urge of providing too much info. Rearrange/prioritize your "selling points" and make the key ones stand out by trimming the unnecessary details.

Right now each job description contains 5+ bullets and many of them are longer than three lines. Is that really necessary? You are not interviewing for a job so your reader does not need to know EVERYTHING you've done. The adcom just want to know, in the 90 seconds that they spend on average reading a resume, "what this person wants to tell me about him/herself?" and "what makes him/her shine?"

Suggestion: Cut down to 3-4 or fewer bullets per position and clean up words that only provide info rather than paint a portrait of a unique you.

4) Finally, all verbs in a CV/resume must be in past tense even if it's about your current job.

And don't use the phrase "responsible for" which sounds too passive. For example, instead of "Responsible for devising ABC strategies and executing DEF plans", say "Devised ABC strategies and executed DEF plans". Much neater and more powerful, isn't it?

-------------------------------------------

Comments on the Essays

-------------------------------------------

1) Don't just "answer" the essay questions. Treat each essay as an individual piece of written art work instead of an examination paper. This means:

- No repeating of the question (even partially) in your opening sentence. For example, when the question is "What is your biggest professional decision so far?" don't begin your essay by saying "My biggest professional decision so far is ..." Makes you sound like a "repeat-after-me machine 复读机" (no offense!)

- The opening paragraph sets the tone of the full essay so be a bit more creative. Make a little drama, tell a story, describe a scene -- visualize your ideas!

- Use more powerful words. Vary the length of paragraphs (by the way, they look too long.) Don't be mono-tone. Use a little artistic writing techniques. Be interesting.

Like your CV, the essays serve as a vivid portrait of you and you don't want it to look like a thousand other people.

Think about your poor readers (adcom) who go through hundreds of essays a day. They need something that catches their eyes and keeps them from dozing off. Something that makes them want to read on, and better, makes them laugh or ponder.

Recollect your personal experience and bring yourself back to the day that important decision was made or that idea was created. Relive it in your essay and excite yourself and your readers!

2) Maybe it sounds contradictory to my first point, but your essays must "answer" the questions. Ie. tailor-make them for each school and each question.

- Don't repeat your resume. Your first essay was like an elaborated version of your resume. It does not go straight to the topic -- "choices". Giving a bit background is okay, but too much background makes adcom wonder if this was adapted from some generic "describe your professional experience" essay.

- Hit the most important point and hit it hard. Don't just give a list of things that you will only spend 1-2 sentences on. Since you cannot cover everything in 1/3 of an essay, it's better to cover 1-2 things only. What gave the biggest impact to your life so far? Write about that.

- Identify the key words in the questions. For example, "personal" experience with a school is not some presentation that maybe 200 people saw at the info session. It is who you talked to at the session, what you learned from him/her, etc. Why does the adcom emphasize the word "personal"?Because they don't want to be a back-up school that you only researched by browsing their website. They want to see your personal commitment.

- Think like a consultant if you aspire to be one. A consultant identifies clients' issues/needs and tackles their most important problems first. For example, a school in NYC does not want to be overshadowed by the glory of the city, although they probably sell their location hard on their website. They face the competition from nearby schools, so what does this school differ from all the nearby ones? That's the thing you are going after.

3) For most situational questions (tell us a time when you...) and achievement/failure questions, consider using a "STAR" (situation, target/task, analysis/action and result) approach.

Situation: Set up the background and identify the issue(s). About 10-15% of the space, no more than 20% for a really complicated issue. Don't drag on by including too many details. You'd be surprised to know how many people can get carried away by nostalgic emotions when they "relive" the memories that they forget the 500 word limit. If you cannot cover the situation part in 100 words, you may want to use another example.

Target/task: What you needed to do. Just a simple sentence will suffice. Sometimes this part is combined with the "situation" part.

Analysis/action: 50%. This is where you dig into your issue, find a solution and act on it. Be logical with the analysis and support it with facts/data/research. Don't jump into the conclusion like "it suddenly dawned on me that..." Business decisions are made based on facts and figures, not someone's light of wisdom (智慧之光).

Results/learnings: Another 20%. Rather than describing what awards you won or praises you got, focus on what you learned from it and how you'd do things differently in future. Adcom want to see someone who keeps making progress, instead of taking a nap on the glory (躺在荣誉上睡大觉) or sobbing over spilt milk.Comments on the CV

--------------------------------

1) Describe "achievements" rather than "responsibilities". Right now it looks like a well-written yet rather plain job decription, not something that gets the adcom excited and makes them want to know more about the candidate.

IMHO, a CV/resume for b-school application differs from what is used for job application--it should portrait the candidate's career progresses and professional milestones, rather than his/her work experience and technical/business skills.

So how do you give it a make-over? -- Numbers speak louder than text. Try to use sentences like "achieved xx% of growth in revenue", "doubled client base in one year", etc. For example, in the decription of your previous job, you gave an example using numbers/percentages. It immediately caught my attention. Try to do the same with your current job, because the adcom will start reading from there and usually if they don't see a good example of achievement by the third or even second bullet point, they will lose interest.

2) Need to use more "powerful" verbs. Currently the tone is a bit weak and again, sounds like a job description. It does not show your unique contribution so why would YOU be chosen, not some of your colleagues who are doing similar work?

B-school adcom wants to find traits of leadership potential and pro-active attitude in the candidate. So, show them these qualities by describing how you "drove/managed" a project, "created" a new working method, "initiated" an exciting plan, and "led" a team.

Even if you are not in a leadership/management role, think about how you affected outcomes positively by causing others to act in their best. Made a difference, basically.

3) Refrain from the urge of providing too much info. Rearrange/prioritize your "selling points" and make the key ones stand out by trimming the unnecessary details.

Right now each job description contains 5+ bullets and many of them are longer than three lines. Is that really necessary? You are not interviewing for a job so your reader does not need to know EVERYTHING you've done. The adcom just want to know, in the 90 seconds that they spend on average reading a resume, "what this person wants to tell me about him/herself?" and "what makes him/her shine?"

Suggestion: Cut down to 3-4 or fewer bullets per position and clean up words that only provide info rather than paint a portrait of a unique you.

4) Finally, all verbs in a CV/resume must be in past tense even if it's about your current job.

And don't use the phrase "responsible for" which sounds too passive. For example, instead of "Responsible for devising ABC strategies and executing DEF plans", say "Devised ABC strategies and executed DEF plans". Much neater and more powerful, isn't it?

-------------------------------------------

Comments on the Essays

-------------------------------------------

1) Don't just "answer" the essay questions. Treat each essay as an individual piece of written art work instead of an examination paper. This means:

- No repeating of the question (even partially) in your opening sentence. For example, when the question is "What is your biggest professional decision so far?" don't begin your essay by saying "My biggest professional decision so far is ..." Makes you sound like a "repeat-after-me machine 复读机" (no offense!)

- The opening paragraph sets the tone of the full essay so be a bit more creative. Make a little drama, tell a story, describe a scene -- visualize your ideas!

- Use more powerful words. Vary the length of paragraphs (by the way, they look too long.) Don't be mono-tone. Use a little artistic writing techniques. Be interesting.

Like your CV, the essays serve as a vivid portrait of you and you don't want it to look like a thousand other people.

Think about your poor readers (adcom) who go through hundreds of essays a day. They need something that catches their eyes and keeps them from dozing off. Something that makes them want to read on, and better, makes them laugh or ponder.

Recollect your personal experience and bring yourself back to the day that important decision was made or that idea was created. Relive it in your essay and excite yourself and your readers!

2) Maybe it sounds contradictory to my first point, but your essays must "answer" the questions. Ie. tailor-make them for each school and each question.

- Don't repeat your resume. Your first essay was like an elaborated version of your resume. It does not go straight to the topic -- "choices". Giving a bit background is okay, but too much background makes adcom wonder if this was adapted from some generic "describe your professional experience" essay.

- Hit the most important point and hit it hard. Don't just give a list of things that you will only spend 1-2 sentences on. Since you cannot cover everything in 1/3 of an essay, it's better to cover 1-2 things only. What gave the biggest impact to your life so far? Write about that.

- Identify the key words in the questions. For example, "personal" experience with a school is not some presentation that maybe 200 people saw at the info session. It is who you talked to at the session, what you learned from him/her, etc. Why does the adcom emphasize the word "personal"?Because they don't want to be a back-up school that you only researched by browsing their website. They want to see your personal commitment.

- Think like a consultant if you aspire to be one. A consultant identifies clients' issues/needs and tackles their most important problems first. For example, a school in NYC does not want to be overshadowed by the glory of the city, although they probably sell their location hard on their website. They face the competition from nearby schools, so what does this school differ from all the nearby ones? That's the thing you are going after.

3) For most situational questions (tell us a time when you...) and achievement/failure questions, consider using a "STAR" (situation, target/task, analysis/action and result) approach.

Situation: Set up the background and identify the issue(s). About 10-15% of the space, no more than 20% for a really complicated issue. Don't drag on by including too many details. You'd be surprised to know how many people can get carried away by nostalgic emotions when they "relive" the memories that they forget the 500 word limit. If you cannot cover the situation part in 100 words, you may want to use another example.

Target/task: What you needed to do. Just a simple sentence will suffice. Sometimes this part is combined with the "situation" part.

Analysis/action: 50%. This is where you dig into your issue, find a solution and act on it. Be logical with the analysis and support it with facts/data/research. Don't jump into the conclusion like "it suddenly dawned on me that..." Business decisions are made based on facts and figures, not someone's light of wisdom (智慧之光).

Results/learnings: Another 20%. Rather than describing what awards you won or praises you got, focus on what you learned from it and how you'd do things differently in future. Adcom want to see someone who keeps making progress, instead of taking a nap on the glory (躺在荣誉上睡大觉) or sobbing over spilt milk.
作者: flyinginsh    时间: 2014-9-28 10:47
thanks for sharing
作者: blueloveice    时间: 2014-9-28 10:57
求看!!!!!!!
作者: loro    时间: 2014-9-28 11:56
thanks and good luck on everything
作者: 漾yang    时间: 2014-9-28 13:37
THANKS A LOT
作者: zhseven7    时间: 2014-9-28 13:46
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作者: baochangzx    时间: 2014-9-28 13:52
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作者: 565558827    时间: 2014-9-28 14:23
谢谢分享,!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
作者: niki1901    时间: 2014-9-28 14:31
thanks,LZ
作者: bigfatwhiterabb    时间: 2014-9-28 14:36
Tks for sharing
作者: rodmanshi    时间: 2014-9-28 15:50
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作者: nemoye    时间: 2014-9-28 17:13
顶!!!
作者: jiacolele    时间: 2014-9-28 17:21
谢谢楼主分享!
作者: yexiaohan02    时间: 2014-9-28 20:34
顶起                   学习一下
作者: kathy1233    时间: 2014-9-28 21:25
thanks for sharing
作者: surongw    时间: 2014-9-28 21:53
thank you for sharing
作者: gsg740    时间: 2014-9-28 22:29
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作者: sherry8730    时间: 2014-9-28 23:17
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作者: Obscuritas    时间: 2014-9-29 01:47
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作者: SCMLouis    时间: 2014-9-29 12:12
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作者: SKYLIMI    时间: 2014-9-29 14:28
学习一下~~~~~~
作者: Libintopten    时间: 2014-9-29 14:51
谢谢分享!!!
作者: blue1919    时间: 2014-9-29 16:04
thx for sharing
作者: leadyo2akira    时间: 2014-9-29 16:17
thank you so much for sharing!
作者: mikiniki    时间: 2014-9-29 20:32
hao~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
作者: fengfenglee    时间: 2014-9-29 21:37
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作者: kokoloveamanda    时间: 2014-9-29 21:52
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作者: jimmyjimi    时间: 2014-9-29 22:35
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作者: lxz11tc    时间: 2014-9-29 23:07
太牛逼了!!
作者: clover_duan    时间: 2014-9-29 23:29
thanks a lot for sharing
作者: yvette726    时间: 2014-9-29 23:53
Thank you for sharing!
作者: sdf321    时间: 2014-9-30 01:54
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作者: 劲乐狂歌    时间: 2014-9-30 05:29
写写分享!!!!!!
作者: zhlqn    时间: 2014-9-30 10:55
谢谢分享
作者: m.mbean    时间: 2014-9-30 10:56
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作者: gaobei1981    时间: 2014-9-30 12:17
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作者: fernandez    时间: 2014-9-30 13:38
Thanks a lot.
作者: 智慧书    时间: 2014-9-30 14:01
好贴,好文,收藏!
作者: qqianlee    时间: 2014-9-30 17:04
Thanks a lot
作者: wuzhusong    时间: 2014-9-30 19:56
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作者: kellytian111    时间: 2014-9-30 20:13
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作者: w61311    时间: 2014-10-1 01:24
thanks for sharing!
作者: dinoacca    时间: 2014-10-1 10:34
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作者: Vivian05421    时间: 2014-10-1 11:39
哇塞!谢谢楼主!
作者: ayoyoyo    时间: 2014-10-1 15:00
赞赞赞赞赞!
作者: cielwang    时间: 2014-10-1 17:40
thanks to share
作者: linarius    时间: 2014-10-1 19:59
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作者: zbjzxnzl    时间: 2014-10-1 20:25
顶!!!!!!!
作者: cuixrui    时间: 2014-10-1 22:28
严重感谢
作者: 121121zxd    时间: 2014-10-2 00:39
谢谢分享~~
作者: jolinlee44    时间: 2014-10-2 01:32
thx thx      
作者: ryj1988    时间: 2014-10-2 04:46
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作者: 没头脑太高兴    时间: 2014-10-2 07:07
谢谢楼主
作者: 腐乳披萨    时间: 2014-10-2 09:52
非常不错!挺需要的
作者: avierse    时间: 2014-10-2 12:37
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作者: daisy127    时间: 2014-10-2 13:54

作者: yakyakrp    时间: 2014-10-2 14:32
Thank you for sharing
作者: david14898    时间: 2014-10-3 05:12
Thanks for sharing!!!!!!!




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