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Hi,

Could anyone please tell me what the impact of job promotion is? I have worked for three years and will get promoted only at the end of 3.5 years of total work experience (after I am done applying to the schools). I switched to the second company after first 9 months. Then I was supposed to get promoted this year, but didn't get so because my group had performed very badly, and was shut down this year, and I had to join another group in the same company (and lots of other politics going on too). Do you think this severely weakens my chances of getting into the Top few B-Schools? How do I tackle this? The good thing is my manager (the earlier manager didn't care to promote any of us in the group; he was leaving the group anyway) has changed.

Thanks a lot. I appreciate your help. This thing is killing me.

The real answer to your question is "it depends." Obviously, if you kept getting promoted based on strong merits, then that would be a positive to your candidacy. However, the fact that you have not been promoted yet is not necessarily a negative. If the quality of your work experience is strong and if you have been able to excel at a high level while taking on extra responsibilities, then you are still a strong candidate.

Make sure to make your work experience sound as strong as possible. There's no need to pre-emptively apologize for a lack of promotions, but if it comes up in your interview be sure to provide a good explanation for your progression.

Jaffar,

Thank you so much for your reply. Actually I have trained two new guys in my team, and I did pretty well. Demonstrated leadership qualities for sure. Does that count? Can this defend my position?