GMAT Club
January 27, 2015
Anonymous

Posts: 0

Kudos: 5

Self-reported Score:
730 Q50 V38

I first heard about mbaMission through MGMAT and given that i had a very positive experience with MGMAT i felt comfortable in choosing them. I did, however, talk to consultants from at least 3 other consulting firms since i knew that getting help on 4 schools was going to be a significant short term investment. Of all the consultants i had researched, i felt that no one other than Angela had such positive reviews and client feedback history on various online forums, including GMATClub, spanning several years.

Once i signed up and had Angela as my consultant, she sent over a very thorough brainstorming document which took me more than one entire day to fill out. It forced me to think about EVERYTHING that has happened in my life so far, which was great because it helped me build a clear and concise picture of why i want to really pursue an MBA and several schools' essay questions themselves were answered through stories narrated within the document. We scheduled our first call and discussed the strategy for which 4 schools i would work with her on. We chose Stanford, MIT, Wharton & Booth.

Before we started on a school, i tried restructuring my resume from a coding/technical-jargon filled page to a more business school resume and sent it to her for review. She came back with several important highlights and indicators as to where i need to put more content or expand on a bullet more to show impact/result. In the meantime, we also discussed our strategy for the first school and i got to work on the essays as well so that i wasn't idle while she was reviewing the resume. I really liked this tandem work ethic because we were both then working on a document without wasting any time in between and it carried on till we were done with all the schools.

Six reviews of the resume later, after we couldn't identify any bullet/heading/formatting to improve on, my resume looked completely different than what it was to start off with. It presented my achievements and the results/impact that i've had in a very succinct and meaningful manner and in which i definitely could see how it was much better for business schools than what i had been able to do on my own. We went through a similar number of reviews for each essay and also reviewed the short answer questions within the schools' online application forms.

For each of the schools that we worked on we would schedule a call to discuss what the general strategy should be for me to answer the question properly and what stories about me i should definitely mention in the essay. Angela also answered any questions i had regarding any parts of the application from the schools we were not working together on. There was no doubt that she was definitely concerned about my outcome; apart from answering all my questions she highly recommended applying to a safety school myself as a back up several times since i was applying to only M7 schools. When the deadlines got closer she would even reply to any questions and even send back essays over the weekend even though she didn't have to as per the contract.

When i got an interview invite from MIT she coached me through the interview process, conducting a mock interview, giving me suggestions on structuring my thoughts and what to ask at the end. She also shared with me a list of questions other mbaMission clients had been asked so far in the interview process this season.

When i finally got an admit to MIT i couldn't have been more thankful and relieved. All of a sudden my initial hesitation to spend so much money on a consultant seemed totally worth it. Without Angela's expert opinions, suggestions and coaching i don't think i would have had as good a chance to get into my dream school. Even though i didn't make it to the other 3 schools i worked with Angela on, looking back i now realize the importance of 'fit'. While i was researching the application process, i had heard of how important 'fit' is and how each school had a distinct culture but i didn't think much of it until i actually interviewed at MIT and met people there and saw how much i can relate to them. I feel i got into MIT because of my personal story and how much more it identifies with MIT's culture as compared to other schools and Angela was instrumental in bringing that out in me.

I would highly recommend Angela Guido if you're looking to apply to business school and hire a consultant. Its great to have someone with several years of experience reviewing your work and guiding you during such a crucial stage of your career.

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