Am I Stanford, Sloan or Haas material?

Launched August 9, 2011
This topic has expert replies
Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Posts: 10
Joined: Sat Jul 04, 2009 2:06 am
Location: Bangalore

Am I Stanford, Sloan or Haas material?

by sahilkumar » Mon Jul 30, 2012 2:31 am
GMAT : 770 (50Q, 47V) 6.0AWA
UnderGrad : 7.5/10 BE (Computer Science Engineering) (Manipal Institute of Technology)
Age : 24
Work Exp : 4 years at the time of admissions (Fall 2013)

Worked for a large (50,000+ employees) multinational, EMC Corp., for about 10 months. Realized that I was stifling my innovative side by working there due to very little room for out-of-the-box thinking, hence quit the job and joined a startup.

Worked on the Business Development team for the startup (40 employees, US and India) and was a key member of the team(4 members) responsible for its monetization (which reached $5M revenues) and eventual profitability .
Saw the startup through an acquisition of $120M and still work here, now as a part of the larger corporation.

I am currently working to establish my own startup centered around the concept of social responsibility. Guess I am turning into a somewhat social entrepreneur. However, this has not taken off yet and is in its initial conceptualization phase. Have a 3 member team, where I have taken the central role.
Since this has not been launched yet, I am apprehensive about mentioning this anywhere in the application essays, as it may seem fabricated.

Additional experience : Working with an NGO for the welfare of stray dogs in our cities. I am a core member and working towards building their online presence and mobilizing volunteers and funds for the organization.

Post MBA goals
Short Term : To work for internet based startups(preferably in North America) in a Product Management role to get an end-to-end understanding of a product lifecycle. I would like to do this for a span of 2-3 years, which would give me time to repay the education loans incurred for an MBA as well.
Long Term : Want to start my own venture to work in the emerging e-commerce sector in South East Asia.

Target schools : Haas, Sloan, Stanford GSB, ISB, and open to suggestions :oops:

Programs of interest : An MBA in Entrepreneurship and Business Strategy

Letters of recommendation : Hopeful of securing these from the CEO (Berkeley alum), VP Business Development (UCLA Andersen alum) and Product Manager (ISB alum), all of whom I have worked with directly.

In terms of the strength of my credentials please advise whether the schools I am aiming at are realistic or not, also please suggest 1 or 2 additional schools to apply to.

Thanks a lot..
I really appreciate this.

GMAT/MBA Expert

User avatar
Elite Legendary Member
Posts: 3135
Joined: Fri Apr 01, 2011 8:55 am
Location: Everywhere
Thanked: 589 times
Followed by:332 members

by Jon@Admissionado » Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:27 am
Everything looks great, only why's your GMAT so low?
I'm kidding dude. ;)

770! How did you pull that off?

Anyhow: let's start with your title question: You never know if you are Stanford Haas or Sloan material until you try. Your numbers are in place, that's for sure. Work experience, right now it's hard to tell how much of an impact you will get with your part in the BusDev team. Have you had any leadership? What for successes? What you gotta do essentially is play up the leadership, your impact on the company and its success as a whole, and your personal achievements.

As for your not-launched startup, it's tricky, and whether or not you should mention it will depend on how far you have gotten and what goals you will present. But unless you have some sort of concrete result, your intuition of leaving it on the side may be right.

Right now though your goals are a bit messy. I get the sense that you do want to do something that is all your own. but your goals are kinda all over the place. To "work for internet based startups" that's a very wide target to aim for. And then later to go to e-commerce (shouldn't you then start in e-commerce???) Anyhow lots of things to think about regarding your goals. And here's one more: The folks who get into Stanford are more than just people with good grades and work experience, it's people with a passion a vision, a dream. So what is yours? that's the key, dude.

Obviously having a rec from the CEO of your company who went to the school you are applying to is awesome. (and BTW Anderson is an excellent school too. I know it's not as prestigious as the others on your list, but you might at least visit :) )

So that's one more suggestion for you. Otherwise Kellogg is very good for the commerce side of the e-commerce (and I guess you already know the "e" stuff pretty well). Stern and Columbia are both great schools for entrepreneurs... lots of options out there...

And of course of course, all the best to you...
"Hands down the best MBA admissions consulting firm of all-time, and boy, what an incredible founder!" -- Raj Patil, Founder of Admissionado

Something for everyone:
https://admissionado.lpages.co/admissio ... nter-2018/
https://admissionado.lpages.co/50-essay ... ked-vol-4/
https://admissionado.lpages.co/case-studies-lp/
https://admissionado.com/mba/reviews/
https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Admis ... 700945.htm

Reach out, and let's gab. Our only requirement is that you don't prefer warm milk over cold milk. Everyone else, 100% welcome.
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 866-409-4753
Hit us up on WhatsApp.
Ping our satellite: 0884#&@-2#101101
Contact us via web form you lazy git: https://admissionado.com/contact/
Mostly, email Claudia.