mbaMission and Krista Nannery - applicant review

I first spoke to Krista Nannery in the summer of 2015 when I was interviewing b-school admission consultants for help during 2015-2016 admission cycle (matriculation in Fall of 2016). Right off the bat, in our first call, I found Krista to be extremely warm and pleasant to talk to. She had so many rich perspectives to offer on the admissions process and quickly honed in on the interesting aspects about my life and started giving me thoughts on how to market myself effectively. Given that I had gone through the admissions process unsuccessfully in the previous year, she even went through my prior applications and pointed out what I did wrong in those applications. After interviewing numerous different firms, I ultimately hired mbaMission and Krista for help with four school applications using the “start-to-finish” package.

Having successfully gone through the process now, I can easily say that hiring Krista is one of the best investments I’ve ever made. While she helped in a variety of ways – the following areas really stood out:

1) She was intimately familiar with the process

Having been part of admissions committees, Krista was intimately familiar with how most admissions committees think and what they like and dislike in applications. This allowed her to astutely point out the flaws in my application that could cause concern for admissions committees, and the strengths of my application that I should make sure to highlight. For the potential gaps in my application, she even gave me advice on steps I could take to remediate those gaps and strengthen my application. Her perspectives here really helped us come up with a strong application strategy and story for the four schools that I ended up applying to

2) She came up with really creative ways for me to tell my story

Through the brainstorming process, Krista took the time to really understand me as a person and get a feel for what my passions are and what makes me tick. She reviewed my 20 page brainstorming document (one of the essential steps of the mbaMission process is a brainstorming process that they make applicants go through) and came back to me with several really detailed questions about my background.
Once I had answered all of her questions, she started coming up with a variety of neat ideas for me to showcase certain aspects of my story. I’m generally not a big fan of writing, but the way Krista helped me showcase my stories actually made the entire process A LOT of fun for me. Thanks to her, I was able to write some of the strongest essays I’ve ever written and ended up truly enjoying the entire application process.

3) She was a true thought partner

Throughout the application process, Krista was a thought partner for me in every sense. Whenever I was spinning on an essay, she would get on the phone with me immediately to give me ideas and quickly get me back on track. I’m not sure whether she was doing a lot of prep before each one of these calls, or if this just comes naturally to her, but on every phone conversation we were having about a certain essay – she had at least 3 – 4 good ideas on what I could mention in that essay to make it impactful and leave a good impression. I was so impressed at the end of each conversation, and so happy with the ideas and the direction I got from her. This kept me from spinning and allowed me to end up with strong essays quickly. The previous year, when I had applied unsuccessfully to schools, I was averaging between 17 to 20 iterations on each essay before getting it to final. Working with Krista this time around, I had a strong essay completely finalized by the 4th iteration at the latest. I have a tendency to overthink things and get in my own way at times, Krista prevented me from doing any of that and kept me efficient and on track at all times.

4) She was timely

I can’t stress this one enough. I was initially a little worried about the fact that Krista was based in London (I’m based in New York), but the time difference here ended up being a true blessing. MbaMission promises a 2-day turnaround on all essays, but most of the time Krista responded ahead of schedule. Generally, I would send her an essay in the evening, and because of the time difference, I would have it back in my inbox with rich feedback by the time I woke up the next morning. I have a really demanding job and it’s hard for me to get away from work during the day sometimes to have personal calls. Because of this time difference, I was able to wake up earlier in the morning some days and have a call with Krista before going into work. This was just yet another benefit that kept me on track and on schedule.

Throughout the process, I felt as though I was Krista’s only client. I consider her to be not only a consultant that I hired, but a mentor and a friend that I will continue to reach out to in the future for advice. I’m happy to say that with her help, I got into several Top 10 schools and will be attending Berkeley-Haas this fall. I highly recommend mbaMission and Krista Nannery for anyone going through the application process.