The Application Process

Submitted round 1. Chose LBS for the entrepreneurial focus of the curriculum and you can't get more international than LBS. Considered my chances to get in to be pretty decent since I had 2 years of expatriate experience, French recommendations, strong numbers, and a long term goal to work internationally in various parts of the world.

Alas, dinged without interview. Oh well it happens!

Bad luck, I feel sorry for you.

what do u think might have been the reason ?


wat was ur GMAT score
grad. GPA
total XP.

Please explain so that we can assess our selves, where we stand.

I have my options locked for LBS, Cambridge and Oxford.

How long does did it take to get a response from LBS? Other schools seem to have a turn around of about a week. Does LBS wait till the posted interview deadline date to offer interviews?

hamxa wrote:Bad luck, I feel sorry for you.

what do u think might have been the reason ?


wat was ur GMAT score
grad. GPA
total XP.

Please explain so that we can assess our selves, where we stand.

I have my options locked for LBS, Cambridge and Oxford.

My information can be found here:

https://www.beatthegmat.com/mayo-s-admis ... 26434.html

Overall, my numbers are very solid. For LBS, I was actually confident about my application because I seemed to fit the bill nicely: expatriate experience, long-term goal to work abroad, short-term goal to start an entrepreneurial venture.

I can only guess why I was rejected. My best guesses are:

1) Unknown undergrad school - I went to UCSD and outside of California that school is completely unknown. Compared to a Harvard, Stanford, or Berkeley grad, my school would be nothing in an adcoms eyes

2) On the LBS recommendation form, there is a question about what the recommender thinks the applicant will be doing 10 years from now. One of my recs wrote that I'd be a software architect, but this was completely out of the blue as it was in no way connected to my own goals and did not truly illustrate leadership. This was a good example of how you, the applicant, should communicate with your recs to ensure a consistent story that the adcom will be excited about. In this case, I believe that rec actually weakened my app.

Those were the two main weaknesses I saw in my application, but I could be completely off base since the adcom provided no info on my ding.

stevebcwm wrote:How long does did it take to get a response from LBS? Other schools seem to have a turn around of about a week. Does LBS wait till the posted interview deadline date to offer interviews?

LBS was quick - I think 2 months was about the length of my wait. Their application was very early in R1 so I was in the middle of doing my Columbia app when I found out - the time flew by.

myonnai:

why do you think your work exp might not be a reason for ding at LBS. their avg age is 29-30 yrs which makes avg exp to be 8-10 years. Also the Eu schools look for at least 3 years of mangerial experience. I guess you have just spent 5 yrs in s/w industry.


thnks,
abhay

Ahbay, yes the average age is 29, but if you look at the stats (year book) you will see that the average work ex is 5.5 years. And you don't necessarily need managerial experience (most consultants, for example, which make up a large portion of each class, don't have any managerial experience). LBS students have a wide range of different backgrounds, ranging from doctors, to military officers, engineers, bankers, consultants, lawyers, IT, entrepreneurs, etc.

I think the length of your work experience or your age is irrelevant. What matters is the quality of your experiance. People tend to get caught up in a numbers game by looking at averages for a school. Just write some good essays that prove you 1) know what you're doing. 2)Fit in the school, and you should be good to go.

The thing which surprises me the most is that they rejected you without an interview. I know this year with an influx of applicants, all schools (let alone LBS) can be picky but I feel bad for ya mayo.

I applied LBS 2nd round as well and I think if those are the two only reasons(reco - future goal, unknown university) why you got jipped I will most definitely get the same.

But hopefully not!

I think if a school rejects you after an interview I personally wouldn't feel so bad but without an interview makes an applicant(me) feel a lot worse. Us applicants spend hours, days, weeks some even months contemplating what to write and how to write and they spend 4-5 minutes reading our essays and put us in the reject pile. Pfffff.

I am actually quite put off by the whole b-school application process as you can tell. My oxford app is due tonight and I have spent 5 days worrying and missing sleep and so Im just a tad cranky.

- take care

S.

I attended one of QS topmba tour and almost every school ( I went EU schools only) booth I went to were insisting on management experience (people management / project management / client management). Although unique work experience in terms of industry, location or role may balance lack of management experience but IT industry I am not sure is a unique work ex. I my view following may be order of importance of diff factors in an application:

Wok experience > GMAT > essays > recos


thnks,

abhaypratapsingh wrote:myonnai:

why do you think your work exp might not be a reason for ding at LBS. their avg age is 29-30 yrs which makes avg exp to be 8-10 years. Also the Eu schools look for at least 3 years of mangerial experience. I guess you have just spent 5 yrs in s/w industry.


thnks,
abhay

I don't think it's the length of experience, but the type of experience. Working a very large defense contractor means that even talented engineers stay at the bottom rungs - no direct management - for years. Things probably would have been different at other software companies, but in the defense industry, things are not quite as dynamic as other commercial enterprises.

Also, I see the order of importance as the following: work experience > essays > recommendations > gmat > undergrad school > gpa

If you have great work experience, but terrible essays the game is up. If you have great essays, but your work experience does not match your lofty dreams/goals the game is also up. The recommendations are important to validate your work experience and essays. Finally, a great gpa from an unknown school is not going to compare well to an average gpa from an ivy league. That's my take on it, but I could be way off base.

Any R2's get their interviews yet?

Hi,

I have only applied to LBS and have not yet heard anything from them.

Is there a way to check if there is no issue with the documents or something?
How does LBS invite for interview. I could not find any place on the website to check status of application.?
How does one know if you are rejected?
Does anyone have any clue on number of applicants for 2011?

Regards
Anuroop

tallynik wrote:Hi,

I have only applied to LBS and have not yet heard anything from them.

Is there a way to check if there is no issue with the documents or something?
How does LBS invite for interview. I could not find any place on the website to check status of application.?
How does one know if you are rejected?
Does anyone have any clue on number of applicants for 2011?

Regards
Anuroop

I don't know the answers to your other questions, but I was sent an email for the rejection.

Application deadline Interview decision sent on Admit Decision
14 October 2008 12 November 2008 18 December 2008
06 January 2009 12 February 2009 31 March 2009
03 March 2009 15 April 2009 22 May 2009
30 April 2009 03 June 2009 08 July 2009

Based on this I don't think they send anything out until Feb. 12 for R2.