The Application Process

Hi

Background:
I have a CGPA of 6.3/10 from NIT Warangal ,which is consistently in the top 10 National rankings, and I majored in Electronics Engineering.

The major has the toughest curriculum and grading standards among the majors in my college. If I had taken a simpler major my GPA would have been much higher.

GPA trajectory:
I started at 7.x range in freshmen year but once I started to study my major in 2nd year , my GPA crashed. This continued to my 3rd year. In final year I studied harder and raised the GPA up for the 2 semesters but not as high as my freshmen GPA.

Issues:
I chose my major without doing any research on the subject as I was just going after the money I will receive in my job once I graduate the college with that major. As I started to study the courses for the major I realized that I didn't like the subject at all. I lost interest and diverted my full attention to Extracurricular activities for the 2nd and 3rd year.

What changed for me :
But in final year I had some kind of epiphany and realized that I should have worked harder on my GPA as the recruitment season started in final year.

I doubled down on study , along with working on more extracurricular responsibilities as well, and was able t o raise my GPA . In the first semester I got place with a company but I wasn't satisfied. I practiced harder for the upcoming job opportunities.

In the last semester , I got placed in another company with a pay package that was double of that I got in my first job placement.

I was able to get GMAT score of 680 by balancing 10-12 hours of office time . ANd to not repeat the mistake of choosing the wrong major , I did extensive research on the potential schools and the ST and LT goals of my career .

In short : My 2 year low GPA streak was because I lost interest in the course because of my bad research and my post college goal of getting a high paying job.


Should I explain all these points in my optional essay ? Is there any points that you think that shouldnt be mentioned at all ?

I would like to hear your opinions on how I can proceed on this issue. Thanks in advance.

Hello vincemn

1. Making excuses for a low GPA in your essays will not be appreciated by adcoms. The fact that you lost interest in your major, did not research it sufficiently in high school and pursued only for the money will put you in extremely bad light.
Explaining low GPA to adcoms makes no sense unless it was due to severe documented illness.

Get your GPA converted to the 4 point scale officially.

2. Instead of explaining the reasons behind your low GPA what you should be doing is - everything humanly possible to offset it. First, you will need a very good GMAT score if you are targeting any of the top 15 schools. A 680 is just not enough, try to get at least 720. Since an important aspect of your application is on the lower side, every other aspect should be outstanding and this includes - GPA, leadership and organizational skills, work experience, extracurricular activities, volunteer experience, etc.

3. Unless you are from an IIT, your undergrad university may not make a lot of difference as only IITs are internationally recognized. I know this puts student from NITs at a slight disadvantage. In any case, in additional sections of your essays, you can mention how competitive NITW is, your rank, etc. This may not make a lot of difference but it may be worth trying.

Tell me more about your work experience, Post MBA goals and extracurricular activities.

You can take a look at this article to know how to deal with a low GPA while applying to business schools. https://www.interviewbay.com/blog/how-ca ... ss-schools

All the best
www.InterviewBay.com
Application Reviews & Mock Interviews by Alumni of your Target Business School.

interviewbay22 wrote:Hello vincemn

1. Making excuses for a low GPA in your essays will not be appreciated by adcoms. The fact that you lost interest in your major, did not research it sufficiently in high school and pursued only for the money will put you in extremely bad light.
Explaining low GPA to adcoms makes no sense unless it was due to severe documented illness.

Get your GPA converted to the 4 point scale officially.

2. Instead of explaining the reasons behind your low GPA what you should be doing is - everything humanly possible to offset it. First, you will need a very good GMAT score if you are targeting any of the top 15 schools. A 680 is just not enough, try to get at least 720. Since an important aspect of your application is on the lower side, every other aspect should be outstanding and this includes - GPA, leadership and organizational skills, work experience, extracurricular activities, volunteer experience, etc.

3. Unless you are from an IIT, your undergrad university may not make a lot of difference as only IITs are internationally recognized. I know this puts student from NITs at a slight disadvantage. In any case, in additional sections of your essays, you can mention how competitive NITW is, your rank, etc. This may not make a lot of difference but it may be worth trying.

Tell me more about your work experience, Post MBA goals and extracurricular activities.

You can take a look at this article to know how to deal with a low GPA while applying to business schools. https://www.interviewbay.com/blog/how-ca ... ss-schools

All the best
www.InterviewBay.com
Application Reviews & Mock Interviews by Alumni of your Target Business School.

Thank you for the honest take on my situation.

Here are the details you requested.

Business Highlights
"¢ Helped to create a procedure that reduced miscellaneous delays in processing of transactions , bringing down the lead time by 1.5 days ; presented to the client CIO and received commendation
"¢ Maintained a personal minimum of 95% fulfillment of service delivery performance indicators, without causing any major violation of service level agreement ; actively advised the team making sure that 90% fulfillment of performance indicators was met
"¢ Analyzed and found the major cause of the service violations made by the team ; suggested change in process to higher-ups, reducing no. of violations by 50%.
"¢ Fixed many major stoppages in transactions , saving the client tens of thousands of Euros in losses cumulatively
"¢ Proactively analyzed the 6 hour delay in prioritized flow of tax transactions to and from Sabrix Co. ; established the root cause after discussing with all involved HP teams in the chain
"¢ Created the checklist and guidelines that was used to assign tasks to members of the team , raising accountability and streamlining responsibility within the team

Leadership and Teamwork Highlights
"¢ Interacted daily with client and vendors located in 12 countries and collaborated across HP teams present in 15 countries, resulting in timely resolutions of issues
"¢ Mentored new members of the team and guided them in the intricacies of handling international clients
"¢ Only one among my 5 peers in India to conduct meetings and presentations for the clients
"¢ Represented my team to carry out inter-departmental upgrade of European and South American supply chain

Projects :

SKF Global - An HP project for Manufacturing Vertical
Worked in a team spread across India, Sweden and Brazil, providing solutions and fixes to the supply chain management system, which handles millions of transactions required for invoicing , shipping, billing ,pricing, taxes etc. for various sales units , factories and customer locations around the globe. All issue seen in the flow of transactions are solved reactively and proactively.
Westpac Bank Australia -An HP Project for Banking Vertical
I worked on supporting mortgages and loans system handling complex of calculations, valuation of securities and risk analysis.


EXTRACURRICULAR
University
"¢ Co-created and fully marketed the Annual Inter-university Model UN event ,which was first among the NITs in India. Under my watch
o Increased the no. of participants by 150% over 3 years; the event got promoted and became one of the 5 star events of the College Cultural Fest.
o Received prestigious accreditation from UN through UNIC office of India and Bhutan
o Coordinated with 10 volunteers involved in logistics, marketing and event management
"¢ Led a team that came first in an ad creation and marketing round
"¢ Member of the Logistics team of the College Tech Fest in freshmen year.
"¢ Led a 3 member team and won the college literary and debating club event.
.
School
"¢ Democratically elected President of my School , which has about 10000 students , where I led a team of 8 secretaries and 20 prefects running student events and maintaining order.
"¢ Won Interschool quiz event in Qatar , appearing twice on Indian national TV representing the school's Quiz team
"¢ Led the team of 11 delegates to the Georgetown International Model UN Conference ,which was attended by delegates from 5 continents .

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT
"¢ Through Model UN , trained engineering students in developing the interpersonal skills required for deal making, negotiations, debating; the training prepared them to handle the rigors of interviews and group discussion during recruitment process by companies
"¢ Worked in National Service Scheme team , which is involved in carrying out social work in and around the college town

Goals: Right after MBA from Foster, I want to see myself as an associate product manager at Microsoft or Amazon , 'owning' a product.In the long term, I will become the corporate SVP of Product Marketing in a major wearables and Internet of things company , spearheading the global marketing of product portfolio


penultimate list of Bschools : Kelley, Mendoza, Madison, Foster, Scheller , Smith-Maryland, Fisher, Tippie, Krannert, Urbana-Chaimpaign and Mays

Thanks in advance.