The Application Process

Hello,
I amlooking for people to assess my profile and give me some tips on how I can improve it. My goal schools are Northwestern and U. Of Chicago, and I want to take a shot at Harvard.

PROFILE:

Basics: 23 years old, white male (I won't be applying for another 2 years)

GMAT: 760 (50Q/44V), no re-takes, and studied for 3 weeks while working full time

Undergrad:

Mechanical engineering from Purdue University at West Lafayette
3.36 cumulative

Though my cumulative is nothing to brag about, I maintained a 3.88GPA over my final 3 semesters (after getting my first internship). Getting a taste of real work experience completely turned my work ethic around.


Extracurriculars:

1) I just registered to start volunteering with boys and girls club of america where I would mentor young kids from low income households. Ideally, I want to try to get some of these kids interested in science and math and to get them to pursue engineering when they are older. I'm looking to dedicate 10+ hours a week regularly.

2) I'm really into health and fitness and run in races occasionally(10k's and half marathons, though I hope to run a full marathon in the next year)


Work experience:(SO FAR)

1 Year of experience in the steel industry (global Fortune 100 company).

I Spent the first 6 months as a shift manager supervising a crew of hourly mechanics in the mobile maintenance department of a steel mill. I directly managed work in each of the different departments of a fully integrated steel mill. Steel mills are dirty and extremely dangerous (even in America - someone literally died yesterday) - so I am hoping this experience will classify as "unique".

Currently I work as a reliability engineer where I work with different departments to implement a reliability maintenance program (trying to initiate change in an unwelcome environment is challenging)

MAJOR QUESTIONS/CONCERNS I HAVE:
1) What can I do to improve my chances at a top 5 program?
2) How would you rate my chances now?
3) what are my profile's biggest flaws?

Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated! Best of luck to all of you.

You need to work on the creativity and leadership part.

Seriously speaking, you should apply after a few years. Get at least 3 years of total work experience or you stand in the less than 2 percent bracket.

what are my profile's biggest flaws?
There are no flaws. It just requires numbers/meat in a few sections and that is work experience.

Try gaining appreciation, awards, promotions etc at work place. I would like to know more about your EC to suggest. At this experience level and since you have a very good GMAT, you can hit Stanford.

Hi,


Looking at the 2012 class profile at Harvard the students scored in the range of 550-790 in their GMAT and the median GMAT score was 730. Hence a GMAT score of 700 plus is advisable if you are aiming for top institutes abroad. Similarly looking at the 2012 class profile at Columbia the students scored in the range of 680-760 in their GMAT .
So congratulations aon your gmat score. Often candidates overweigh GMAT score and under weigh the importance of essay Now as you are secure gmat wise you should leverage rest of the profile. Make sure you balance the profile well and plan the things to utilize your time properly across different activities that play vital role in getting admission and your profile building.
GMAT alone won't determine your chances of admission; academics, beyond the academics will and your work experience plays a vital role as well.
If you wish to apply to top business schools then one of the prerequisites is having significant work experience. Generally candidates have around 4-5 years of full time experience in spite of several term time projects or jobs; so you may be competing with other candidates who have 4-5 years of full time experience and have started significant initiatives at college. Make sure you showcase in your work experience things like-what were your achievements, what initiative you took, what changes you drove in your workplace etc
Hence, we would advise you to gain some full time work experience before you decide to apply for an MBA. During this time you can work on building your profile.

Thanks for all the quality advice!

I feel that career progression and EC's are my profile's major weaknesses.

While I still have another 1.5 years to develop my career - I am not convinced any major break throughs will happen before then. I will be putting forth 110% but the quality/quantity of work I get is sometimes pretty poor. Working on changing that but as of now this is a huge concern for me.

EC's are a tricky one for me, because I never really thought abuot graduate school until midway through my junior year of school (and really didn't participate a ton in college). I'll be going into overdrive mode volunteering and getting involved now (not just for my applications, but I also live alone and am bored a lot of the time- it will be good and satisfying for me). Hoping that being a marathoner / heavy involvement with a nonprofit will be enough to fill out my profile.

Right now i feel like my GMAT and unique industry help my cause, while my GPA hurts it. Additionally, I feel that my EC's / WE progression will be mediocre compared to the competition. I'll probably have a shot @ top 5's - but I am not convinced it will be a great one.

Hi Cheby,

Given you are going for ECS now you should try to highlight your leadership and other qualities through this effort. Like we said before everything has to be matched well as you are aiming for schools which receive on of the best applications and select the better out of them. Just academics or just EC's wont make a difference. Make a well rounded application
All the best

Hey Cheby,

I LOVE that you worked as a manger in a steel mill. That's going to make for some great stories. Ordinarily, I would say that you'd want to volunteer for a smaller nonprofit, but since I'm very familiar with how each B&G Club is like its own little center, you should have plenty of opportunity to make an impact at the local center at which you choose to volunteer. Put some of your business skills to use at the B&G Club in addition to mentoring the kids! I'm sure that if you approach them with humility and enthusiasm, they'd be more than happy to have you take on a project or two to help them run more efficiently, get more funding, etc. I like to have my clients branch out of the mentoring kids framework and tie their extracurricular activities to their professional development goals as well.

Good luck and let us know how volunteering turns out! I bet you'll love it.
Kaneisha