Ask Jason@沃顿 (my essays inside!) Free essay advice again~

cannedpineapple

I recently asked the Wharton adcom for copies of my own essays (I'd lost them). Here's my failure essay.

Question: Describe a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself? (500 words)

Absolute US was an annual event in Singapore that helped prospective students meet those of us who were already schooling in USA. It is now defunct, but I’d once tried- and failed- to resurrect it.

When I took this up, Absolute US had been on the brink of death, and I’d begun the project by formulating a three-faceted revival plan. First, it’d previously been held at Singapore’s largest club, and I decided on a smaller and cozier venue instead. Second, some games would be organised to spice things up. Finally, a team of motivated shareholders- rather than low-energy volunteers- would be assembled by pitching Absolute US as a money-making venture. Besides arming myself with a good plan, I also worked extremely hard, playing whatever role was necessary- be it the leader who’d formulated the entire plan; the more hands-off project consultant; or the event’s game designer- to make my re-conceptualization a reality.

I had a good plan, a dedicated team, and had been doing whatever it took to succeed. But in spite of this, Absolute US 2006 boasted historical attendance lows and didn’t make a profit. What’d gone wrong?

Having reflected upon the affair, I now realize that the project had been doomed from the start, because of three errors in execution.

First, we’d ignored local contexts. Making plans from abroad left the project without proper intelligence on the ground. I’d designed the new, apparently perfect, plan and organized the team when I was in Chicago in April 2006. When my team returned to Singapore in June after school had ended, I went to Thailand for a month of social work. As students who’d spent the year abroad, we eventually picked a venue that turned out to be a has-been so past its popularity peak that it folded a month after our event. A better appreciation of the need for ground-level research would have served us well.

Second, as leader I’d failed to strike a balance between involvement with the project vision and its details. I’d worked hard, involving myself in all the project nitty-gritty’s. However, my trying to go it alone working out every detail, rather than trusting others to execute, not only caused a breakdown in communication of the project vision to my team, but also left them without a leader for a short period when I was in Thailand. Though I’d immediately stepped down and become a project consultant instead after realizing the problem, it’d been too late. The leaderless period had already demoralized my team.

Third, I’d lacked a backup plan. I’d taken for granted that no hiccups would occur, and when one did, I was caught unprepared. In particular, I’d planned to communicate from Thailand via email, but this eventually proved unfeasible because I’d unexpectedly lacked internet access.

What I’d learnt, in short, was that having a neat idea is no guarantee of successful execution. This had been a painful but educational experience, and I look forward to doing things differently- and succeeding- in future endeavors.

cannedpineapple

Analysing my own essay.

Question: "Describe a failure that you have experienced. What role did you play, and what did you learn about yourself?"

"Describe a failure that you experienced."
1) I described the failure very clearly. In the first paragraph I said what was the event in a short and succinct manner. In the third paragraph I also made clear why this was a failure: "historical attendance lows and didn't turn a profit". No ambiguity whatsoever, and no excuses posed. The event was a disaster.

"What role did you play"
2) In the second paragraph I reference "playing whatever role was necessary- be it the leader who’d formulated the entire plan; the more hands-off project consultant; or the event’s game designer- to make my re-conceptualization a reality." It is also clear that this was my project, so I owned it.

"What did you learn about yourself?"
3) I answered this in a less direct way. I learnt that I tended to focus on the "neat idea", but in future had to focus more on "successful execution" as well. I didn't say this outright, but it was clear throughout my essay I was honestly trying to "learn" something- I had come away from the experience having identified three errors, rather than trying to find excuses.

Other things to notice:
1) I did not find excuses to "frame my failure as a success". Many applicants spend half the essay talking about the failure, and then half the essay trying to apply the lessons to a later situation to show they had 'succeeded'. Instead, I assure the adcom that I will succeed in future, because by my very approach- no excuses- I show that I have internalised the lessons learnt. Rather, someone who is concerned with excuses, may lead to the adcom questioning if an applicant has truly understood that he had screwed up.

2) My essay is very critical of myself. This shows confidence, honesty, and humility. I use phrases like "I'd failed".. "I'd lacked"... "I'd taken for granted"... These are very critical, and aren't, "Because of this, I chose to... Unfortunately it failed". Again, no excuses.

3) The essay is very analytical. This tells them that I will approach business questions in a logical, structured manner.

4) The trick to failure essays is to show how what you had done makes sense, but you still screwed up and so still have something to learn. My second paragraph is aimed at showing that, "hey, I wasn't dumb. I had some good ideas and did some good things too." This has two effects: 1) it shows you're not totally hopeless 2) it shows that, you are able to learn from something EVEN WHEN you had a good plan to begin with. It's often easy to say, "I screwed up, something must change". But it's harder to say, "I may have done well, but how can I do better?"

5) I first -showed- them what I learnt in paragraphs 5, 6 and 7 (First... Second... Third), showing an attention to detail. Then I showed the ability to extrapolate to bigger learnings: ("What I’d learnt, in short, was that having a neat idea is no guarantee of successful execution."). A successful communicator needs to be able to look at detail in order to support your point, but also be able to sum things up in one sentence.

Interesting things:

1) I write in short paragraphs. This might irritate some people (...one sentence cannot be a paragraph!). But that's my style.

2) Although I have no work experience, notice how this extra-curricular activity could easily be 'running an event at work'. The scale of the event is not important. This does not involve the whole school: I am not a leader of the entire UChicago. But leadership can be shown in almost everything you do- regardless of the scale (number of people attending..) or context (work vs school).

3) I include 'small details' like "I went to Thailand for a month of social work". This is another way to talk about other activities you did, that may not justify a whole essay, or that you may not want to over-emphasising, in case the adcom suspects that I'm just doing social work so that it looks good on an essay/resume.

4) I spent about 50 hours on this essay. I went through about 5 different versions. Each of them looked very different to the last.

Hope this helps!
Jason

cannedpineapple

Thanks for sharing...as you mentioned previously, no 'silver lining'...Very well-written....

Now I think one of the biggest reasons why Wharton dinged me was my writing skills.

-- by 会员 maxdaddy (2010/2/23 4:53:32)

See "other things to notice", point 1 and 2. Choosing to have a "silver lining" is not a problem of writing. It's that you end up NOT showing those point that I had shown (self-confidence, humility, etc.) Good writing is often a matter of what you choose to write and not write (eg. a silver lining); what you choose to put in and not put in (eg. a structure for analysing decisions). It is less about "what word did you use? How is your grammar?" and so on.

In short, there are two types of "writing skills": "thinking skills" (what did you choose to put in?) and "execution skills" (what words did you use?). The former is very relevant to a business leader; the latter is more relevant to a writer/author. That's why business schools emphasise the essays so much: they're not looking for good writers (the second type of "writing skills")... they're looking for good thinkers. You can outsource writing, but you can't outsource thinking. (this, btw, is why many 'application consultants' fail. They are good at helping with writing, but not thinking.)

cannedpineapple

There's a deeper point here.. if these people had gotten into their original choices, they would not have been able to reject it, and perhaps there wouldn't be a Warren Buffet today. That's important to think about when you think about 'should I apply to xyz school'. Sometimes the problem is not that you can't get in, but that you DO get in, and you end up forcing yourself to go to a school where you're not a good fit. This probably doesn't make sense to most people (after all more choices is always better?? well not to me!) but it's what I believe

Anyway, "Rejected once, and then again, by business schools at Stanford and Harvard, Scott McNealy practiced the perseverance that would characterize his career. A brash economics graduate of Harvard, he was annoyed that "they wouldn't take a chance on me right out of college," he says. He kept trying, taking a job as a plant foreman for a manufacturer and working his way up in sales. "By my third year out of school, it was clear I was going to be a successful executive. I blew the doors off my numbers," he says. Granted admission to Stanford's business school, he met Sun Microsystems co-founder Vinod Khosla and went on to head Sun for 22 years."

Taking a job as a plant foreman and working his way up in sales?? This is inspiring to me- I'm going to be doing similar operational type things, but sometimes in business school if you're not doing 'banking, consulting, PE, VC', it can be very lonely. Just hope I'll have even half the success of Scott McNealy!!

cannedpineapple

June,

There are many things I have learnt over the years. For example, I've learnt that successful delegation means that you need to accept that others might choose to do things differently from you, and sometimes even if you see them headed for failure, you have to let them take responsibility for that and not step in. In a sense, to let them 'conform' to your spirit of delegation, you need to give them the freedom to decide, explore and fail- in short, to 'not conform' to your success.

Another thing I've learnt is, it is important to not be so confident, and ask for help. Often times, the more confident you seem, the more people think you don't need help.. and so they don't help! Indeed, some people might even think, 'since you're so confident, let's see you succeed by yourself'. On the other hand, if you come out and say, 'I really can't handle this.. can someone help me?' All of a sudden, the willingness to put yourself out there, to admit your own shortcomings, gives others the freedom and incentive to step in and contribute.

One last thing is that it should really be about the team and not about you. You need to know where you fit in, and act accordingly. If you're not suited to lead from the front, then don't. If you want the team to succeed, successful leadership also often means knowing when to keep quiet, so that you can build support for the guy who is in front talking. Good leadership comes not only from standing in front of others, but also being willing to give up your authority and invest it in someone else.

Cheers,
Jason

PS, even if you have work experience, the point of a learning from a failure is that you can learn from it without creating excuses. This has nothing to do with whether 'you have the right to make excuses because you have work experience.' Rather, it's whether 'you can look past your ego, be humble, and learn from your mistakes'.

cannedpineapple

I don't know what happened there... mindysu's post was the Jason加油, and mine was the one in English. Somehow they got combined!!

cannedpineapple

June, agreed. Thanks.

cannedpineapple

Bump.

cannedpineapple

No offense taken. I'd like to think I'm trying to act out what I say (with the key word being trying..). I am embarking on a non-traditional post-MBA route because I think it is important to me; I continue to work on starting a non-profit because such things speak to my passion.

But I have much to learn too. As you say, I am young. I make mistakes. There are certainly things I wish I could redo. For instance my internship this summer didn't turn out too great- I just wasn't very committed and didn't produce much results for my company. It was, basically, a failure. I think the way I approached the internship was rather immature. That aside, sometimes I can also get stuck 'thinking' too much and not 'acting' as much. Hopefully that's something that will change as I get more mature, as well..


Jason

cannedpineapple

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