Seeking help on Essays for Ivey (Canada) and ESMT Berlin

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Hi Admission Experts,
Do you provide any Analysis/assistance for the Essays for Ivey (Canada) and ESMT Berlin ?

It'd be great if you can get me any feedback on how to write the following two Essays from these two b-schools :

1. Ivey (Canada) : What is the most important issue that you've ever changed your mind about? (250 word limit)

2. ESMT Berlin : Imagine you have just finished your MBA. You have two months until your next career adventure is due to start and have decided to go on a cross-country automobile trip. You can afford to invite two fellow travelers. Who (can be people alive or historical figures) would you take with you and why? (1500 characters maximum)

BOTH the essays appear to be pretty unique.

P.S: Admissionado/ARINGO/Clear Admit/Stacy Blackman/mbaMission/Personal MBA Coach/Veritas -- Would much appreciate any feedback on them. Other experts on the forum also feel free to share your insights. Thanks in advance!
Last edited by RBBmba@2014 on Mon May 07, 2018 11:24 am, edited 1 time in total.

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by MargaretStrother » Thu May 03, 2018 8:49 am
What interesting questions! In my opinion, they are actually targeting very different aspects of your profile.

The first question is obviously deeper: while you don't need to tie this directly to some kind of professional achievement, there are a lot of assets that you could bring into this story. Lately, for example, many schools have been asking about a time when your mind was changed by someone else's perspective, either in essay topics or in interviews, so sharing credit for your growth with others will show you as a team player.

Depth of content also matters: changing your mind about something trivial ("I used to think Game of Thrones was brilliant, but recently I changed my mind") would add less value than "I used to fully believe in supply-side economics, but after two years as a VP for a predatory lender, I've changed my mind. Here's why..."
See what I mean? A more meaty topic would give you the opportunity to showcase your professional credibility, how your perspective has evolved, the books you read or thinkers who have influenced you, your consciousness of public events, your "teachability" -- all desirable profile points for an applicant to a top MBA program.
Hope that gives you some guidance about how to make use of this interesting Ivey topic.

Now, for Berlin: the rather complicated hypothetical road trip is a variant of "If you could have dinner with anyone, present or past, living or dead...", which comes up a lot as well. This is a "What makes you interesting?" kind of question. In my opinion, you can get the most out of the topic by showing interests that transcend the usual, "Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi"-type answers. Because it's a road trip, you can bring your own experience of road trips into the story, but you don't have to. It could be "who's the best talker, to keep me awake?" or "who might know how to change a tire?" Either way, your companions should shed fresh light on you and your passions. For example, you might want to spend your road trip talking about aviation with Amelia Earhart, baseball with Babe Ruth, or alchemy with Paracelsus (and hope that they also know how to change a tire). In short, there is no wrong answer -- this is a place where you can be you!

Good luck,
Margaret Strother
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by RBBmba@2014 » Mon May 07, 2018 11:30 am
Thank you so much Margaret for your insights. That was helpful to start with...and it seems quite a job at hand - requires DEEP introspection!

Need to dive really deep...will get back to you after few days to share how it's shaping up. Thank you again!

P.S: Other experts -- Admissionado/ARINGO/Clear Admit/mbaMission/Personal MBA Coach/Veritas -- on the forum please feel free to chime in and share your insights. Would much appreciate your feedback !

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by Personal MBA Coach » Sat May 12, 2018 7:52 am
RBBmba@2014 wrote:Hi Admission Experts,
Do you provide any Analysis/assistance for the Essays for Ivey (Canada) and ESMT Berlin ?

It'd be great if you can get me any feedback on how to write the following two Essays from these two b-schools :

1. Ivey (Canada) : What is the most important issue that you've ever changed your mind about? (250 word limit)

2. ESMT Berlin : Imagine you have just finished your MBA. You have two months until your next career adventure is due to start and have decided to go on a cross-country automobile trip. You can afford to invite two fellow travelers. Who (can be people alive or historical figures) would you take with you and why? (1500 characters maximum)

BOTH the essays appear to be pretty unique.

P.S: Admissionado/ARINGO/Clear Admit/Stacy Blackman/mbaMission/Personal MBA Coach/Veritas -- Would much appreciate any feedback on them. Other experts on the forum also feel free to share your insights. Thanks in advance!
Thank you for requesting advice and for the post. I will give some initial thoughts here and if you want to explore further together, let me know!

1. Think about something that required you to think outside the box or think about a political or economic issue that would interest the reader. It would be great if this issue is important but not too controversial as you never know who will be reading the application. That said, the important thing is to think through the thought process you had. WHY did you change your mind? HOW did you change your mind? Did this surprise you? Did this surprise others?

2. This is very personal. To be honest the best advice comes once I know your story more as I usually like to tie these answers to the broader story we are presenting to admissions committees. There are a lot of options here, but make sure that your answer connects with your broader stories.

Best,
Scott

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by Michelle@ARINGO » Tue Nov 06, 2018 10:52 pm
RBBmba@2014 wrote:Hi Admission Experts,
Do you provide any Analysis/assistance for the Essays for Ivey (Canada) and ESMT Berlin ?

It'd be great if you can get me any feedback on how to write the following two Essays from these two b-schools :

1. Ivey (Canada) : What is the most important issue that you've ever changed your mind about? (250 word limit)

2. ESMT Berlin : Imagine you have just finished your MBA. You have two months until your next career adventure is due to start and have decided to go on a cross-country automobile trip. You can afford to invite two fellow travelers. Who (can be people alive or historical figures) would you take with you and why? (1500 characters maximum)

BOTH the essays appear to be pretty unique.

P.S: Admissionado/ARINGO/Clear Admit/Stacy Blackman/mbaMission/Personal MBA Coach/Veritas -- Would much appreciate any feedback on them. Other experts on the forum also feel free to share your insights. Thanks in advance!
Hi, and thanks for asking for our input on this!

In my opinion, the reason they are asking the first question is that they want to give you a chance to tell them about an achievement (that did not come easy perhaps?) as well as make sure you are not too stubborn and incapable of changing your mind about things when proven wrong. So formulate your essay based on those two aspects.

The second question gives you a chance to show off your personality and your passions, as already stated above. So choose something unique, and be prepared to explain your choices well. Of course, you could bring up some non-work related achievements here as well if you want (by choosing a sports star, for example and then explaining how you also used to do this sport and won some tournaments or similar) but I would not say that is a must here. You want to provide an unusual answer here, that tells them something about you as a person.
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