Profile Evaluation

[pattrow]

Undergraduate : BTech Mechanical Engineering - Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)- Madras (2009)
CGPA : 8.59/ 10
Others : State ranker during school board exams

Extra Curric :
Undergrad : (1) Organizational head for a national level bridge tournament in association with the State Assoc. in 2009(2) Core Committee member for the Guidance & Counseling Unit
Post College : (1)Initiated a setting up a school for 'dalit' kids (2) Organized a 2 day counseling camp for students to help select their undergraduate engineering major at the different IITs

Work Ex : Technology Deployment - Applied Research, Caterpillar India (since July, 2009)
(1) International stint of 6 months at CAT Inc., USA (2) Personal Initiative to set up a new team in India - Youngest Team Lead at CATerpillar, India (3)Youngest member at the CATerpillar VPD US-India Global Strategy Forum (4) 6 Sigma Green Belt - associated with projects with a total value prop of US $30K

GMAT : 740 (q50 v40) and 6/6 (March, 2010)

Target Career post MBA : Operations/ Logistics
* My story is that pre-MBA,(in the past 3 years) I have worked through the entire product dev cycle before manufacturing (i.e - research, virtual validation and testing) and MBA is the bridge to make the jump to the world that lies beyond manufacturing (i.e ops and log).

Target Schools : MIT Sloan - LGO
Kellogs - MMM
ISB, Hyderabad
Ross
HBS

Intended Year of Appllying : 2012-2014 session

* I have few nice stories to talk about. I am more concerned about the fact that because of certain personal constraints I am being forced to apply with 3yrs wrk ex at matriculation.

Is it too early - Should I hold on for another year ? Ideally I would like to apply this year because of some personal issues. What would my chances be like ?

[mbaMissionJessica]

Hi and thank you for your profile request. Three years of work experience is on the low end (for example, at HBS the mean months of work experience is 44; at Ross, the work experience for the middle 80% of the class ranges from 37 months to 96 months). However, although it is on the low end it certainly is not unheard of - as you can tell from the statistics I just posted.

What is more important in terms of timing for when you apply is what you have accomplished in that time, and what more you would accomplish with another year of work. However, if it is true as you say that you are "being forced" to apply now, it really doesn't matter how much stronger your application could be in a year, right? What matters is how to make it as strong as possible right now. If you have the option of applying in another year, consider how much more you can accomplish in that year. At the same time, keep in mind that some of your stories could "age out" - MIT for example requires that all stories have occurred within the last three years. At this point, perhaps you could still use a late-college story, but in another year you would not be able to use it.

I know I am not giving you a definitive answer but it really comes down not to the titles you've held (e.g. "youngest team lead") but what you have accomplished with that title. If that is all strong now and for other reasons this is the best time for you to apply, then do what you can to make your application the strongest it can be, and don't worry about whether it could be better in a year.

Good luck,

Jessica