Ask Jon Frank- P69-Q&A:WHY MBA? 7 OVERLOOKED REASONS TO GET AN MBA

JonFrank

While the application requirements for every MBA program are different, the MBA interviews are not. No matter where you go or who you speak to, there’s not much variation in the questions they’ll ask and the responses they’re hoping for. And after spending countless hours writing and editing and re-writing all those essays, that’s a very, very good thing.

Less work for you, right?

So how does one ace an MBA interview, wow the interviewer and guarantee admission into their dream MBA program? Well, to start….

1) Think about your BEST stories. The greatest hits, if you will. Know them inside out, and be able to tell them. Get comfortable to the point where if someone asks you a question with unusual wording, you can quickly adapt your story to accommodate. The only way people get tripped up in interviews is when they are ”stumped” by questions.

The guy says, for example, “describe a time when you did X and Y,” and you cant think of an instance! That’s bad. You don’t want that. Ever.

Come to the table with 3-4 amazing stories. Stories that work no matter what. Stories that, if you need to, you can tailor them to fit the need. You will NEVER be stumped, because you have these great, cool, leadership-oriented stories ready to go. You will tweak them all by 15% or so, to answer whatever questions come your way.

Go into the interview with the stories that YOU will tell–no matter what he asks you. Rehearse them, tell them in different ways, know them backwards and forwards. Don’t MEMORIZE them, of course; you need to get into a conversation, not deliver a programmed response. That’ll just encourage them to TRY to throw you off guard. It (and every aspect of the interview) has to come naturally; the goal of repetition and rehearsal is to make you SO comfortable with these stories that you should be able to ad-lib and tell it in different ways.

2) Get them talking. Adcom folks (especially at places like HBS, Wharton, etc) are notoriously… type A. Self-centered. Get the person talking about himself. The more he/she talks, the better he will feel about the interview. Remember, b-school (and perhaps business in general?) is about hanging out with people, building trust, drinking beers. Get this person talking, enter into a dialogue, make it….normal. Jon Frank, PE’s founder, tells the story that the best interview he ever gave was when he lost his voice with a cold and could barely speak. So he listened. And the interviewer loved him.

Don’t talk too much–you just increase the chances that you’ll say something he/she doesn’t like.

3) Know every stitch of your resume. Some folks will scrutinize the thing and ask you ridiculous questions. Some will ask you walk them through your resume. Just know it cold. Shouldn’t be hard, after all… that thing is a version of your greatest hits. But be familiar with any specific numbers in there in case you get a nit-picker.

4) Know your backup plans. Don’t just have a plan B, have a plan C. and D, etc etc. Show these cats that you are gonna succeed no matter what.

“What if you don’t get into b-school?”

“Well, my people love me at work, I will go back and kick ass, take on as many new projects as I can to beef up this and that, I’ll do this and that to boost xx yy and zz, and reapply next year.”

“What if you don’t get that job at McKinsey?”

“Well, McKinsey’s ideal for this and that reason, but there are a bunch of excellent firms where i can get tremendous experience like x y and z. The important point is for me to xxx and yyy. If the job market is unseasonably bad, that’s okay; I can learn xxx by doing THIS instead. One way or another, I’ll keep myself on track to do XXX and YYY in a few years.”

Just show them that you’ve thought everything through, that you’re not depending on 1 thing to create magical opportunities.

5) Practice, practice, practice. In front of a mirror. Record yourself. Get comfortable with your answers. Practice will help you eliminate oohs and uhs, and nervous laughter or weird conversational ticks. Get your answers down to 2-3 minutes or so. Know them in your sleep.

And…that’s it.  You master these 5 things and you’ve mastered the MBA interview. For every single interview. At every single school.

Jon Frank

yiyi00

Hi Jon, your guide in interview is excellent. I've been interviewed by 4 mba schools till now. I deeply felt what you had said was really really...important and helpful for me!

darkdoug

Hey Frank, I have some questions about writing the "Why MBA?" or "career goal" essay, the most important and essential essay for all the schools. Sometimes the career goal essay is divided into 2-3 sub-questions which are required to be answered respectively. Let's take the Emory's question for example:

"Complete each of the following questions. Please limit your response to 150 words each.
-Why have you decided to pursue an MBA at this time?
-What are your short term post MBA goals?
-What are your long term professional aspirations? "

Since the 2nd and 3rd question are very clearly defined, it seems that I have to provide all the other related information into the first question, including: 1.my career summary, 2.why MBA?, 3.why now? and 4. why this school? Due to 150 words limit, it is a mission impossible. So the question is: should I mention all these information more or less? OR should I just focus to answer exactly what is asked: why mba? and why now?

Another question about career goal essay is should  I write in a story-telling style? In other kinds of essays such as achievements or failures, it is natural to write a vivid story to show yourself. But I think career goal essays are different. The point here is to tell what you have (a,b,c...) , what you want (x,y,z...) and explain the reasons for that.  So you have to mention many points and organize them properly to make it logical and reasonable. Moreover in the Emory case, the word limit makes it even difficult to tell a story. Am I right about that?

Many thanks as always.

JonFrank

Hey Frank, I have some questions about writing the "Why MBA?" or "career goal" essay, the most important and essential essay for all the schools. Sometimes the career goal essay is divided into 2-3 sub-questions which are required to be answered respectively. Let's take the Emory's question for example:

"Complete each of the following questions. Please limit your response to 150 words each.
-Why have you decided to pursue an MBA at this time?
-What are your short term post MBA goals?
-What are your long term professional aspirations? "

Since the 2nd and 3rd question are very clearly defined, it seems that I have to provide all the other related information into the first question, including: 1.my career summary, 2.why MBA?, 3.why now? and 4. why this school? Due to 150 words limit, it is a mission impossible. So the question is: should I mention all these information more or less? OR should I just focus to answer exactly what is asked: why mba? and why now?

Another question about career goal essay is should  I write in a story-telling style? In other kinds of essays such as achievements or failures, it is natural to write a vivid story to show yourself. But I think career goal essays are different. The point here is to tell what you have (a,b,c...) , what you want (x,y,z...) and explain the reasons for that.  So you have to mention many points and organize them properly to make it logical and reasonable. Moreover in the Emory case, the word limit makes it even difficult to tell a story. Am I right about that?

Many thanks as always.

-- by 会员 darkdoug (2012/11/29 16:14:38)

Hey there, great questions!
Well, first of all, when approaching an essay question, you only ever need to answer what is asked. And anything that isn’t asked you can skip. So in the example you gave me, for the first question you only need to answer: 1. Why MBA 2. Why now. No need to get into why our school or your career
history, because it isn’t asked. And this is true for all schools and all questions – always answer what is asked!


In general, you are right that writing essays in story form is often far more effective. However, in this case, the nature of the question is such that you will probably write them out as simple answers to questions. In fact, since the question doesn’t really ask you anything about your career history, you don’t really need to have stories at all… although you should think about how your goals fit into the “big picture” that you are presenting the Adcom.



Hope this help and goooood luck


Jon Frank

JonFrank

Question:

How important is my GMAT score when applying to MBA programs?

Answer:

There’s no really “clean” answer to this question, but we like a challenge around these parts, so let’s see if we can give you a pretty good idea.

When b-schools are looking to admit new students, they only have so many ways that they can try to compare candidates to one another to determine who’s the best fit for their program. Now, just because two candidates are coming in with undergrad business degrees and three years of business experience doesn’t mean that you can compare them directly and get a good sense of how they match up. Undergraduate degrees are not created equal (a BA from Harvard and a BA from Hicksville College are NOT the same thing), and even comparing two different people’s “business” experiences can be tricky, depending on what kind of business they were in and what amount and type of leadership experience they gained.

So, what else can an adcom look at to try and compare candidates “side-by-side?” The simple answer is the GMAT. The GMAT is the equalizer, a single test that EVERY MBA applicant can prepare for and take, making it the “fairest” way to take Candidate A and compare him to Candidate B. Now, is the GMAT a perfect way of showing how much you know about management? Of course not. Some (like the guys over there trying to get you to take the GRE) might even say it doesn’t prove anything about someone’s ability to manage. But it doesn’t matter – at the end of the day, if you want to get into business school, you gotta take the GMAT.

Which brings us back to the question: how important is your GMAT score in the application process? Short answer: pretty damn important. The GMAT is kind of like the “first impression” the adcom gets of you before reading your essays, resume, etc. And you know what they say about first impressions… you only get one.

Sure, a low GMAT score can be explained with an essay… because almost ANYTHING can be fixed with a great essay. But, the GMAT is way more important than your undergrad GPA. It really shows the adcom that you’ve got what it takes to handle the workload coming your way in b-school. That you’ve got the chops to take on all that quant work, etc.

So what does that mean for you? Well, if you’ve already taken it and are finding that your score doesn’t measure up to the schools you’d like to apply to, do some test prep (study guides, practice tests, formal prep classes) and retake it. Don’t let one bad day of test taking limit your chances of getting into the best b-school you can. We know TONS of people who have taken the test 2, 3 even 6 times! So give yourself another shot to do better. Besides all that extra time lost to studying (again), you have nothing to lose.

And if you don’t have time to re-take it? Should you forge ahead anyway and apply to a school if your GMAT is lower than their minimum or average? Of course. The GMAT isn’t the end-all, be-all, friends. If there are OTHER parts of your app that are fantastic (great work experience, compelling essays, amazing recommendations, etc) that will make the adcom forget about that GMAT score for a minute, well, that can be a very good thing.

Hope that helps.
Good luck out there,

– Jon Frank

dreamercm

Hi, Jon. Waiting for the decision is uneasy. Could you give some advice about what should I do during this phase?

Should I keep in touch with admission member to show my commitment? Do what kind of additional things chould improve my chance? Or waiting in silence is the best?

Thank you!

piscalab

Hi Jon,

I just graduated from LBS with a masters in finance and not until now when I began to realize I would like to switch careers and probably location as well. Would it be harder to persuade ADcom in my case? Or should I just don't mention I have a masters  at all in my CV? I did graduate from a top 2 school in China.  My work experience is 6 years and GMAT 710 kind of low, but still will try to apply for a few schools this year just to try my luck.

JonFrank

[quote]
Hi, Jon. Waiting for the decision is uneasy. Could you give some advice about what should I do during this phase?

Should I keep in touch with admission member to show my commitment? Do what kind of additional things chould improve my chance? Or waiting in silence is the best?

Thank you!

-- by 会员 dreamercm (2012/12/18 14:25:48)t

Hello there,

I know this is a very very tough moment! Probably checking your inbox every five minutes, right? J
Well, at this point, you’ve pretty much done everything you can, and you just gotta give the schools the chance to give you your answer! So just sit tight and wait for their answer. Contacting them won’t add anything to your application. (maybe if you got some HUGE improvement, like a promotion, you could contact them to tell them about that)

I really hope you get some good answers back from those schools!


JonFrank

JonFrank

Hi Jon,

I just graduated from LBS with a masters in finance and not until now when I began to realize I would like to switch careers and probably location as well. Would it be harder to persuade ADcom in my case? Or should I just don't mention I have a masters  at all in my CV? I did graduate from a top 2 school in China.  My work experience is 6 years and GMAT 710 kind of low, but still will try to apply for a few schools this year just to try my luck.

-- by 会员 piscalab (2012/12/18 14:44:23)

Hey there,

Thanks for dropping us a line… but I’m not 100% sure I understood the question. You just graduted from LBS with an MSF?? Super!!! Now which adcom do you need to persuade? Are you saying you now want to apply to an MBA? It’s no problem to do a MSF and then an MBA (although it’s better if you work a year or two between). If you can clarify me your question, I’ll be happy to help you further, good sir…


JonFrank

JonFrank

Hi Jon,

I just graduated from LBS with a masters in finance and not until now when I began to realize I would like to switch careers and probably location as well. Would it be harder to persuade ADcom in my case? Or should I just don't mention I have a masters  at all in my CV? I did graduate from a top 2 school in China.  My work experience is 6 years and GMAT 710 kind of low, but still will try to apply for a few schools this year just to try my luck.

-- by 会员 piscalab (2012/12/18 14:44:23)

Hey there,

Thanks for dropping us a line… but I’m not 100% sure I understood the question. You just graduted from LBS with an MSF?? Super!!! Now which adcom do you need to persuade? Are you saying you now want to apply to an MBA? It’s no problem to do a MSF and then an MBA (although it’s better if you work a year or two between). If you can clarify me your question, I’ll be happy to help you further, good sir…


JonFrank