One Application Per Applicant

As one of my last acts in 2007, I submitted my Harvard and Wharton applications yesterday. And then promptly ended up at what turned out to be an awesome party in DC.

The day after, as I re-hydrate my system with detoxifying fluids (whatever that means), I feel an overwhelming sense of relief at having finally submitted. I also feel like penning a thought I had since the past few days as I spent re-positioning essays.

Why can't we have a unified system of applications? Here's how: there would be one set of essays across schools; applicants must pick which ones to write depending on the schools they target, and the message they want to position. There could be a set of 10 essays, and applicants can choose say 5 of those. Applicant picks what schools to apply to, and dispatches the same essays to all those schools (perhaps with an additional essay describing why that school).

Clearly the applicant stands to gain. Countless hours spent re-positioning the same content for different schools could be utilized to introspect. This would make for more focused essays, more/better reflection on career goals and hence (hopefully) a better business school experience. By forcing the applicant to choose one message, schools get a true picture of what a candidate really is, taking the guesswork out of the entire 'fit' question. And that is precisely what schools stand to gain.

Also, this might likely reduce the number of applicants applying to each school. Enforcing the one message policy would reduce simultaneous applications to schools with very different cultures (Eg Wharton and Tuck. Sorry, but I fail to understand how an applicant could be a perfect fit for both Wharton and Tuck). A lower, more focused application volume would make the selection process easier for Admissions Officers.

Now lets do some math. Take the average MBA applicant, Mr Joe Hopeful.

• Mr Hopeful applies to 4 schools, lets say he's a first timer, and applies in R2.
  
• 16 essays total (Mr Hopeful does not have extenuating circumstances). Let's say 7 of those are similar which means they almost count as one. That makes 10 unique, non-reusable essays.
• Each essay takes Mr Hopeful 10 hours to think about, write and review.
• His reviewers spend an additional 10 hours in total.
• Plus another 10 hours that he takes to write the online details for 4 schools.
• Plus 5 hours that he spends creating content for his two recommenders, who in turn each spend five hours on Mr Hopeful's recommendation.
• Add it all up: 100+10+10+5+10 = 135 manhours spent on Mr Hopeful's MBA application.

Now lets take our system.

• Mr Hopeful must write a set of 5 essays.
• Even if he spends 12 hours on each, thats 60 hours.
• Plus 5 (reviewers)
• Plus 2 (online application details)
• Plus 3 (creating content for recommenders)
• Plus 10 hours spent by the recommenders themselves.
• That adds up to 80 hours.

Hence:

• Time saved: 55 manhours per Mr Hopeful.
• There are 175,000 Mr Hopefuls that apply each year. (Source: GMAC Annual Report)
• Total time saved: 9625000 manhours.
• Which is roughly the work that an 1100 person team can get done working 24 hours a day for a year. And this is just for full-time programs MBA programs.

My numbers may be off, but you get the point.

I'm sure that this has been discussed by schools before - so what holds back a unified admission system?

Closure

After quite a long break, I return to my blog again. It's been almost 2 months, I'm knee deep in the application process. While I'm writing essays at full tilt, I also am perplexed by a question which is the topic of my post today.

I shall present two arguments, and invite comments from fellow bloggers (to whom I promise, that I shall write more often).

Writing essays is an iterative process. It's like sculpting - you start with a flat slab, and then shape it, chiselling away until what remains is what you want and only what you want. Write a draft, and then leave it. The next day, hack it, turn it upside down, and add new content. Come back to the third day, and add a fitting opening and conclusion, make some more changes, and so on. By extension, the quality of essays becomes directly proportional to the number of revisions it goes through. It is therefore a no-brainer that the best time to submit an essay is after the most revisions you can make to it (assuming you do not lose steam or burnout and all that). Which would be right before the deadline (or a day before the deadline, if you are scared of server malfunction). To this end, there is no closure.

On the other hand, I also feel that closure comes when you know you cannot do any better. Closure is not a defined, clearly visible destination that you can say you are at a certain distance from. Closure is a state of mind - you know it when you are at it. Closure is when you (or your reviwers) are truly satisfied with your work - what you say represents what you are and what you want to be. It may come within a few revisions, it may come right before the deadline, or it may be elusive, and you could continue to feel something's amiss despite having submitted. In short, closure is when you know it. Conversely, when you know it, you know it's time to click submit. That the deadline is 3 weeks away notwithstanding.

Closure is relative. What is your closure?

Of acceptance rates and yields

I happened to look at acceptance rates and yields for top schools today, and thought I'd share some thoughts about these 2 parameters.

Its well-known that acceptance rate is a measure of the selectivity of the school (#admitted/#applied), while yield is a measure of 'relative desirability' of schools to students (#accepted/#admitted). Schools publish both numbers - and taken together, these numbers offer some pretty interesting insights.

I've compared the schools I'm applying to by normalizing the two ratios. The number in parenthesis give the two ratios (Yield, Acceptance Rate in %) for each school.

School	Applied	Admitted	Accepted
HBS(89,14)	720	100	89
Wharton(69,17)	800	100	69
Columbia(77,16)	800	100	77

After thoughts

1. These numbers mean nothing to me. Fit cannot be quantified - it is a function of each combination of applicant and school. School X may simply be a lot 'nicer' because its alumni were more responsive, or a visit to its campus was much more pleasant.

2. This comparison is a digression during essay-writing. If you hate digressions, use Dark-Room.

Errata

Anonymous correctly pointed out that these numbers are not updated - I used the figures from Bouknight's "MBA Game Plan", 2003 edition. Apologize for this oversight, which makes the numbers obsolete by 4 years. I've since corrected the numbers (I did not find these stats for Chicago GSB or Stern).

This also renders my conclusions invalid - I've taken these out since. Thanks, Anonymous.

Autumn heralds R1 deadlines

It's been a full 2 months that this blog has sprung back to life. With the GMAT done, I thought the hardest was over. How wrong, and how vain.

The last 2 months were grueling - there have been times I've thought my essay drafts were absolutely awesome - and then thought they should be gutted the very next day. It's hard, this writing game, since there are no benchmarks, no comparisons, no percentiles that serve as a crutch to your dreams. It's like shooting at flying targets in the dark - take aim, take your best shot and fire. It's a hit or miss.

B-schools make the field even more level - by encouraging almost anyone from 1-10 years out of school to apply, regardless of industry, education or nationality.

I've been caught up in this write-introspect-edit cycle for weeks now. I know not if I possess the much-talked about wow factor, I don't even know if there is any such thing. I'm visiting Chicago on October 12, and really would like to talk to folks there, since I've heard so much about this school.

My first recommender has already agreed to write what it takes, I talk to the second one tomorrow.

Sorry if this blog seems in bits-n-pieces and scattered all over, but I also promised myself that I'd blog more often - I feel it is cathartic. I also hope the now-defunct blogging community kickstarts back to life, and becomes alive with comments/posts.

GMAT ... [OK]

Registration: $250
Manhattan Tests: $40
GMATClub Tests: $40
Red Bull: $2
Ghirardelli Chocolate: $10

760 (99)
Q51 (99)
V41 (93)

Irish Car Bomb at local bar: Priceless.

The Telltale Test

I am positively tired of studying for the GMAT - its wrecking havoc in my daily (or everyday?) life.

I am haunted by the passive voice - nay, the passive voice haunts me. I not only strive for parallelism, but also aim at precision. I incessantly cut down wordiness and constantly reduce redundancy.

I routinely critique my manager's emails for underlying assumptions, and am constantly engaged in rewording my own to make them (the emails, if you still haven't caught on) more persuasive. Even as I write email, I pause after my lines...thoughts swirl in my mind: "I will follow up on this" (..shouldn't this be a would?). "...it is something I'd love to do" (ambiguous 'it'...is this awkward and redundant?). I pick on my manager's emails (in my mind) for misplaced modifiers or ambiguous pronouns.

Just today, I sent an email that started with : "While it is true that specifying XYZ would serve to our advantage, I believe that deferring this until next quarter would prove even more beneficial". I've been using words like evident, notion, belief, assumption, hypothesis, redundant, ... so often that I suspect everyone around me knows I'm taking the GMAT.

These days, I always number my reasons - and leave an empty line between 2 paragraphs. I even have started using a 0.7 mm pencil instead of my favorite pen, and prefer taking notes on letter-sized sheets instead of the notebook. What's more, I must conserve my paper, for I have only 6 sheets of paper a day. Oh, and I sit at my work-desk in slots of 75 minutes, breaking for exactly 5 minutes in between. I have timed myself - I take 30 seconds in the loo, another 30 to wash my face with cold water (the holy books say it's gotta be cold), 2 minutes to down a can of coke, and another minute to walk back to my desk. I have another minute as buffer, to regain my breath, and dive back in.

While driving to work, I try not to look at other cars and their license plates. Numbers like 43, 37 and 101 are devious and prime. They make me cringe, for I cannot cross-out common factors. On the other hand, I am very nice to drivers with plates that have numbers like 4096 and 8649 - they are perfect squares, and all perfect squares have an odd number of prime factors. At the lights, I know I have an average of just 2 minutes until it turns green - so, my mind races to find possible values for A and B, since the plates I see in front of me read: AXB(=)1101. I hate driving on interstates - I start thinking of the number of different ways I could choose a lane if 2 of the 5 lanes are occupied. It gets convoluted on a circle (Dupont Circle, if you are in DC) - clockwise and anti-clockwise are the same.

I can hear the voices you know - they are so close! It's just a matter of time now - I am nervous, for I must not fail, yet excited in a strange way.

I'm also ready to buy a drink to anyone who (or that?!) can (could? god!) help me get over this.

(Crudely adapted and force-fitted from Edgar Allan Poe's The Telltale Heart)

The Identity Crisis of the MBA Blogger

I am going to write about a completely divergent topic today. I cannot do more GMAT questions, and just need my mind to wander just so it is away from the CRs and the RCs and the DSs.

I was wondering over the last day or so over this - as an MBA blogger, should you keep you identity secret? Those of us who work would appreciate this question - most employers are not very kind when it becomes known that you intend on leaving them in a year from now. So it is in the best interest of the blogger not to divulge any information that may lead to a possible exposure. You are the mole, that double, not what he/she pretends to be!

On the other hand, putting in some context sensitive info about yourself on these blogs can be a huge plus. You can accumulate comments that are more specific to you, your profile/blog is oft-visited by like-minded MBA bloggers, and this forms a community within a community that is focussed, and much stronger than the sum of its parts.

Personally, I believe that keeping it under wraps has advantages. This could be significant if you are due for promotion sometime towards the end of the year. Why would an employer promote you if you intend to leave within 5-6 months anyway?

I know, I know...it's a matter of drawing that fine line, of not letting anyone know AND getting that elusive promotion AND the admittance letter from X (insert your stretch school here). I just wanted to elicit responses from fellow mates.