Have you ever wanted something so badly that you promised yourself that you would do whatever it took to make it happen? I had a dream like that. I wanted to get an MBA from a top-notch school. I studied for months for my GMAT, and eventually reached my perfect score, but then I got stuck.
How do you tell your story to make admissions like you? Maybe, you ask your friends to read your story, and maybe they give you a stamp of approval or some constructive feedback, but you are applying to 5 schools, with 2-3 essays each, with 4-5 revisions per essay. How soon will your friends get bored with all your novels? I realized that I needed professional help, but with so many options, choosing a consultant was a project on its own. I read hundreds of reviews and testimonials, and Angela stood out from all of them. Her past clients’ reviews deeply resonated with me. Her intro video on MBA Mission page made me like her even more. I tried to schedule an intro call, but there was no availability for her on the website. I became Angela’s stalker. I found her personal email, and reached out to her directly. Luckily, she did have some availability and agreed to work with me.
My profile is far from perfect. I did not go to an Ivy League undergrad, and I do not work for McKinsey. I immigrated to America, so half of my life needed a lot of explanation. I have gaps in my resume. I had little volunteer experience. My recommenders did not have MBAs, nor had they ever written MBA recommendations before. Yet Angela did not seem to notice any of the negatives, she made me focus on the positives. She made me see my own story in a different light. I thought about my current position, where she made me think about the length of my journey.
Before I submitted my first application, I knew that purchasing this service was one of the best investments I had made in my life. I got more than I bargained for - a new sense of pride and confidence.
Yesterday I attended an admitted students event at an M7 school. I still cannot believe that I was accepted. There is no doubt in my mind that I wouldn’t be able to achieve such a great result without Angela.

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Krista Nannery is a great admissions consultant and truly provided me the support to get into my dream school! I don’t think I could have put together such a high quality application or would have handled it the way I did without her. I can’t recommend her enough.

First, Krista is extremely competent. She’s thorough in her comments on my material, and always gives me such high quality feedback; I’m also so amazed how she always manages to do it within mbamission’s two day turnover timeline (sometimes earlier). She also writes extremely well – she has an amazing way of cutting down your words without letting go of any substantive content (and in fact making your material tighter and cleaer), and has this way of bringing out your personality in your writing. Importantly, Krista is creative – I love how she can magically transform my boring essay outlines into such colourful stories to capture the AdCom’s attention.

Second, Krista is experienced with the MBA Admissions process, and could provide me with such great, wise advice (not to mention emotional support) to handle situations I encountered in the admissions process. She gave me great feedback for my interviews (e.g. how to structure my answers, the tone to maintain in my interviews, the length of my answers etc.) – I definitely wouldn’t have performed as well on my interviews without her feedback. I also encountered distressing situations during the process, including when my interviewer didn’t respond to me and took a while to submit his feedback, but Krista provided me wise advice on how to coolly handle this situation, and even emotional support.

Third, Krista is just such a wonderful person to work with, and truly made this painful MBA admissions process more pleasant for me. She’s funny, personable and passionate about her job, and I felt that she genuinely cared about her clients. I found it easy to talk to her on a whole range of issues I was concerned about over the phone, and she would always patiently address them. She was also enjoyable to speak to because of her bubbly personality, and would have interesting stories to share about her own MBA experience and previous jobs.

If you’re thinking of engaging an admissions consultant, I would confidently endorse and recommend Krista. I genuinely think she has all the skills and qualities that make a great admissions consultant, plus also great experience to help you navigate the admissions process.

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After working with Debbie on my applications, I was admitted to a top 10 MBA program! Debbie helped me with applying to 10 schools in only 1.5 months! I realized late in the game that I wanted to apply in Round 1, and I approached mbaMission to be paired with a consultant who could help me with my applications. I was very fortunate to have been paired with Debbie!

For my first school, I had already prepared drafts by myself. I gave these to Debbie for review and confidently told her that these drafts were “near final” and only needed a quick read before submission. To my surprise, Debbie told me that my drafts needed a complete rewrite. I was shocked but appreciated her candidness and honesty.

In the next week, I heavily relied on Debbie to provide feedback on my drafts. What I like about Debbie's style is that she didn’t sugarcoat anything, always pushed me to reflect deeper on my experiences, and provided good advice to help me be more succinct in my writing. In my essays, I sometimes found myself getting lost in the details that the writing lacked the "so what?" factor. Debbie would redirect my attention to focus on the big picture and tell me to cut content if necessary. Further, her flexibility and positive attitude helped calm me down in times of stress and focus on the execution of the applications.

After finishing my first application with Debbie, we had developed a great working relationship, and the rest of my 10 applications went rather smoothly. As a demanding client, I sent her at least 3 essays to review every day (Each school had 2-3 essays, so in total it was about 30 essays that I had sent her way). She always provided prompt, detailed and high-quality feedback. I even wondered how she was able to do all of this in so little time!

Debbie is great at all aspects of the application, from helping me brainstorm ideas to outlining the actual essay and providing feedback. She was available through phone, skype, and email. I even did a mock interview with her over Skype two days before my actual interview and it made a tremendous difference. Before the interview, I was stuttering on the basic questions such as "Walk me through your resume". But she gave me helpful feedback that allowed me to structure my answers and practice effectively, which made me feel confident going into my interview.

In conclusion, Debbie is a stellar, seasoned, and top-notch consultant. Completing applications for 10 schools in 1.5 months was a daunting task, but Debbie maximized the limited time we had to help me craft stellar essays. If you work with Debbie, she will make sure that you are always submitting your best work! There were times when I submitted drafts that were weak, and Debbie held me accountable by asking me to rewrite the entire essay or think of new experiences to write about. I greatly enjoyed working with Debbie and definitely recommend with flying colors!

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John Sisk was instrumental in helping me get into business school. I applied the year before and did not receive acceptances to any of my top schools. The following year I started to work with John, and he was able to help me refine my story and build a compelling case for admission teams. I went from receiving denials at all of my top schools to getting 3 out of 5 with John. I highly recommend John to anyone looking for help with their applications. He was professional and incredibly responsive throughout the entire process; from the brainstorming sessions to the interview preparation.

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I worked with Jen from MBAMission during my MBA application process and it was a seamless and wonderful experience. I got in to Ross and INSEAD and finally decided to go to INSEAD. I used MBAMIssion's services as I did not have time to go through the application process with my full time job. Jen did an incredible job in helping me to articulate my story and tie up the loose ends. She always responded to my queries and her comments were never late. We had a brain storming session in the beginning and then most of the communication was through email and it was very efficient. I really thank Jen for her wonderful support during the intense application period.

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Harshad is your best bet to putting together the best application possible to get you into your most desired program. Here is why:

+ It was a success story for me. With his help, I got into Columbia Business School, my top choice of choice.
+ He gave realistic evaluation as to what your candidacy's strengths and weaknesses are so that you know exactly where you should spend effort on.
+ He is great at writing, and he will help you write great essays.
+ In every step of the way, Harshad was able to provide me helpful tips and insider insights. From "how should I approach my recommenders?" to "Should I wear a black suit?", Harshad was there for me.
+ He responded to my emails very promptly - well within MBAMission's guideline.

Perhaps most importantly, in order to help me build the most compelling case for admission, Harshad guided me in reflecting on my past life experience as well as exploring my motivation for my future goals. This process was crucial for my application, and Harshad dug deep into some of the most impactful and sensitive moments of my life, moments that I was afraid to revisit. Not only was my application more personal and powerful as a result, I came out of the process with a deeper understanding of myself and a stronger conviction to pursuing this career path. This was truly unexpected, and I only have Harshad to thank.

Harshad is your guy!!

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At first, I chose to utilize the 30-minute free consultation with mbamission to get some pointers on application prep, and I quickly found their feedback to be incredibly helpful in the short amount of time that we had. mbamission wasn’t pushy like some of the other groups I had spoken to. Though the woman I spoke to was booked for consulting services, she strongly recommended Dan Richards (based on our backgrounds, my school choice, etc.) and I am SO happy that she did. I used hourly consulting services with Dan to receive guidance and feedback on my essays and resume for my top choice school in Round 1. I had about 2 months to improve my test score and write compelling essays. Dan exceeded my expectations. His feedback was always honest, direct and quick (usually within 1 day). If you decide to work with a consultant, I highly recommend that you first spend 20-30 minutes with Dan brainstorming your essay themes before diving into the writing- his feedback on my outline was valuable as it helped me to develop a structured set of essays. He worked with me to pull out important themes in my essays and helped me to tell a story about my short and long term goals. With Dan’s help, I was accepted to the one business school I applied to (top 10)! I couldn’t have done it without his guidance and support. I strongly recommend Dan’s services- he is a trusted professional with years of experience helping candidates get into their dream schools. It was 100% worth the investment- I strongly recommend him!

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Kate was instrumental in helping me craft my story for my MBA applications. I did not have a business background and she helped me make my experience marketable and relevant for an MBA admissions committee. Having a professional available for feedback on all aspects of the application really streamlined the process, and Kate was always quick to respond with quality insights. I avoided countless hours of research and essay tinkering with Kate’s knowledge and unbiased input.
Kate was always provided objective feedback in a friendly manner, making the introspection and reflection and enjoyable process. I would highly recommend Kate for admissions consulting services.

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I totally recommend Jen Kedrowski to you to brush up your candidacy and create the best application packages.

I am a non-English native as well as a re-applicant aiming at British business schools. Before starting the collaboration with Jen, I took several free consulting sections offered several consulting service providers. Then, I found that Jen would be the best to revise my applications, and decided to choose the Hourly Services at mbaMission.

There are 2 main reasons why I recommend Jen to you as your partner.

First, she has splendid analytical and editorial skills to cover your weaknesses and stand out your strengths. It is hard for most applicants to differentiate your candidacy from others. Additionally, almost all of the candidates who attempt to enroll in business schools have piled up similar careers. So, her analytical skills will help you in finding your uniqueness, and editorial ones will strongly contribute to brushing up your applications sentence by sentence, along with each school culture. In my case, she always identified points that I had to deepen or reconsider clearly. She gave me a hand to construct stories of applications as total packages accompanying consistency in the last applications. In some cases, she asked me to reconstruct whole sentences along the latest career progress, but in other cases, she simply improved part of the essays I’d hand in the last term in order to consolidate my candidacy.

Second, you will gain experience about how cultural differences should be expressed on your essays. I live in a more high-context society than the UK and the USA. In my country, people require reading between the lines, which prevented me from writing suitable sentences or showing connections of each sentence clearly. But, through the communication with Jen, I found these were signs not only to fit my sentences to each school, but also to improve sentences to best reveal my experiences with cultural differences (I did not notice this when I asked a consultant in my country last year).

If you feel you might be the lack of confidence to create best sentences for admission committees, Jen's skills to enhance your candidacies and edit your applications will become the best to bridge the gaps.

Finally, this book will help in understanding cultural differences between countries (you and admission staff), or in improving your sentences along experiences in diverse cultures (international exposures are a key for every candidate).
"The Culture Map: Decoding How People Think, Lead, and Get Things Done Across Cultures"
http://amzn.to/2xKoZMs

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Monika was recommended to me by one of my closest friends who told me “if I hadn’t worked with Monika, I wouldn’t have gotten into HBS.” I trust my friend, so I decided to work with Monika, and I feel very fortunate to have done so.

I was a reapplicant (interviewed at my top schools but ultimately rejected). I really didn’t think there was any way to improve my application as I thought I’d crafted my apps to reveal everything there was to know about me. With that said, I sent my applications to Monika to get her thoughts, and she said that while she was impressed with what I submitted the year before, my apps left her wanting more. Monika sold me when she told me that the bullet points underneath the employment section of my resume were confusing. This was a direct feedback I’d actually gotten in my HBS interview, so I knew that Monika was the real deal. To keep the review somewhat brief, I’ll highlight three areas of the application where I found Monika’s help to be truly invaluable.

Essays:
When I first applied to school, I wrote what I thought were the best essays I’d ever written. Monika, however, described the essays as “good, but predictable.” She was right. She sent me a worksheet and asked that I fill it out. The worksheet essentially was a way for me to highlight key moments in my life. She spent time digesting the information and then scheduled a phone call with me to discuss. What I really appreciated about this experience was that she didn’t take my answers at face value. She really tried to peel back the layers to get a better sense of who I was. We brainstormed potential essay topics based on our conversation and the document that I’d already filled out. We talked about our vision for each of the potential essay topics, and from there narrowed it down to one (we did this for each school to which I applied)—the one we thought would reveal more of who I was. We worked on the essays for about 2-3 months, and over the course of those months, the essays completely evolved—my first draft looked completely differ than the final draft. I sent the final draft of the essays to two friends, and the feedback was extremely positive. One of my friends, who had critiqued my HBS essay the year before (she wasn’t a fan of that essay!), simply said “wow, this is great.”

Resume:
My resume was not well crafted last year, so Monika wanted to make sure that we spent a good amount of time here so that each bullet point under my employment section was not only easily understood by a layperson, but also highlighted the impact I had at the organizations of which I’ve been a part. I think Monika was excellent in helping me to put together a very solid resume. Although she graduated from HBS herself and fully understood what I’d done at my job, she asked many probing questions to see how we could better phrase each bullet to highlight impact.

Monika also found a way to make my “interests” section quite interesting. I won’t reveal her secrets in this review, but the way we structured it made it memorable for readers. In one of the admit weekends I attended, the person who interviewed me brought up one of my interests I'd listed on my resume to a group of current students,

Short Responses:
The section is probably the first part of the application that is seen by the reader, so it’s crucial that it’s done well. Last year, I failed to give this section of the application the proper attention. Monika made sure that we changed that. We spent a few weeks drafting and refining our answers.

MBAadmissions has a timeline for turning around comments; it’s usually two days for essays and one day for the resume. Monika never missed a deadline. In fact, she was often early. She also stayed on top of me to make sure that I was putting in the time and the effort to incorporate her comments and feedback and improve whatever part of the application we were working on. Even though she was always staying on top of me, I must say that Monika was also patient. For one of my applications, we felt that the essay wasn’t quite where it needed to be. We were aiming for a Round 1 submission, but opted for Round 2, and I’m glad we did. The final output was excellent.

I feel that I could go on forever writing a glowing review for Monika, but I won’t. If you’ve continued to read up until this point, I’ll leave you with this: the service is expensive, but it’s absolutely worth it! I can say that because with Monika’s help, I was able to not only get into my top schools, but I also secures a merit based fellowship that covers my tuition and fees—that’s over $150,000!

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