Business School Recommendations

[dartmouth06]

I plan to apply to Business School in the next couple of years but I wanted to start requesting recommendations from my former Managers with whom I still have a good relationship. Does each Business school have a different requirement for what is included in the recommendation (i.e. specific questions) or do they just ask for a recommendation in general stating quailties, strengths, etc.?

Thanks for your help!

[Jay Allen]

Happy to keep up our conversation

Each school is very different and it's important, if at all possible, to have each recommendation tailored to your specific school. Schools look down on cut and paste recommendations just like they do cut and paste essays.

We work with our clients to build outlines and provide background materials that can help a recommender write a great contribution to your overall application. It's really important to know your strategic positioning plan before your approach a recommender so that you can help inform him or her of the areas you need them to focus upon. In the end, a recommender can write whatever he or she wants, but almost all appreciate some input into what areas of your application need addressing.

Feel free to call at anytime if you'd like to talk further. I'm happy to answer your questions here as well because it gives other people the chance to read the responses.

All the best,


Jay

[dan75]

What would be a good business school for a future CFO aspirant?

[Jay Allen]

Hey Dan,

While Wharton has a particularly good finance program and is probably the best regarded in this sense, all the top programs have the resources to prepare someone for a CFO position. With the large quantitative focus at all the top programs, there is always enough financial curricula to keep the finance people engaged.

HBS definitely focuses more on the CEO and Stanford more on the founder. Both of those and the others that round out the top 10 would suit you well.