Profile Evaluation Please

[ACNAndy]

Hello,

I plan on applying to the following schools and hope to start Fall of 2010. I would love it if someone could give me the chances at each of these individual schools, or as a whole.

Notre Dame (1 year MBA)
Kellog
University of Minnesota
University of Wisconsin
U Chicago
Duke
HBS (sort of a pipe dream)

My Profile is as follows:

3.4 GPA, graduating with a BBA in Management and Human Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (Top 10 public)

Very heavily involved in several social clubs while in school, including prominent roles on some governing boards as well as VP Finance for my fraternity

2 years of work experience at Accenture, up for early promotion to Consultant, receive great reviews.

Plan on getting my recommendations from a Senior Exec that I worked closely with (Notre Dame undergrad alumni), a former family friend that was a Vice President of Vodaphone, and possibly a board member at the University of Notre Dame that is also a family friend. Is it unwise to have family friends write letters of recommendation?

I'm taking the GMAT in April '09 but have been receiving around 680-720 scores on the practice tests (wide variety but getting closer to around 710 now with little variation).

In terms of goals and aspirations for wanting to obtain an MBA: I'm currently working in an IT Consulting role, implemting large scale systems at high profile clients. I'd prefer to make the move to Management/Strategy Consulting and the move to a McKinsey, Bain or Boston Consulting Group, however I plan on leaving options open for a more "industry" position if one were to interest me.

My concern is that my volunteering history isn't very developed and any attempts to correct that now would be interpretted as simply "padding" my application. With all of that said, what are my chances at the schools listed above.

Thanks again!

[Cindy Tokumitsu]

Hello,

You’ve got quite a range of schools.

First, a recommendation from the family friend may be okay, but only if it adds something substantive and meaningful to your profile.

Without continuous, strong extracurricular leadership and lacking any other clear “standout” accomplishment or quality, I’d say HBS is a pipe dream. In fact, Duke, Kellogg, and Chicago will want to see recent community or extracurricular involvement, and not having it will be a weakness to these adcoms. Regarding starting more volunteering now, better late than never. There’s nothing wrong with taking concrete steps to enhance your candidacy. They want to see the activity, and are less concerned with the purity of your motivation. Moreover, you can address it forthrightly: say you’ve recognized the weakness, taken steps to address it, and how understand why it’s important for a business leader also to be actively engaged in the community (and give a concrete reason).

It’s hard to assess your chances on the information given. I’d say, roughly, for the three schools mentioned above, you should present a GMAT of at least 700. They’re definitely reaches, but whether reasonable reaches or not I can’t yet tell. I believe Notre Dame would likely be a solid on-par, with the other two somewhere between on-par and safety. All the above assumes excellent applications that both differentiate you and demonstrate your fit for the program in question.

Best regards,
Cindy Tokumitsu
Senior Editor, Accepted.com
www.Accepted.com