{"id":7367,"date":"2014-06-25T11:09:32","date_gmt":"2014-06-25T15:09:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.manhattangmat.com\/blog\/?p=7367"},"modified":"2019-09-05T16:03:40","modified_gmt":"2019-09-05T16:03:40","slug":"mbamission-stanford-graduate-school-of-business-essay-analysis-2014-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/blog\/mbamission-stanford-graduate-school-of-business-essay-analysis-2014-2015\/","title":{"rendered":"mbaMission: Stanford Graduate School of Business Essay Analysis, 2014\u20132015"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve invited\u00a0mbaMission<\/a>\u00a0to share their Business School Essays Analyses as they\u2019re released for the 2014-2015 application season. Here is their analysis for Stanford Graduate School of Business.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) became the second top MBA program to release its essay questions this year, and the school follows a trend in application essays\u2014\u201cless is more.\u201d Stanford has dropped its third essay question this season and stuck with two standbys, which we can summarize as \u201cWhat matters most to you?\u201d and \u201cWhy us?\u201d The GSB\u2019s choice to maintain its\u00a0\u201cWhy us?\u201d question is an interesting one, considering how selective the program is (the Princeton Review ranks it number one for Toughest to Get Into). Maybe one reason the school is so strong is that it still focuses on fit and does not take its desirability for granted (?).<\/p>\n

Another big change in the Stanford application this year is that the number of recommendations required has dropped from three to two, leaving the candidate to make the vexing choice between a professional recommender or a peer for that second recommendation. Our guess is that most people will choose the far more straightforward professional recommendation option, because candidates who do so can be more confident that they have made the \u201cright\u201d choice of recommenders.<\/p>\n

\"Stanford<\/a>Essay 1: \u201cWhat matters most to you and why?\u201d (750 words)<\/strong>
\n
\nWhen candidates ask us, \u201cWhat should I write for what matters most to me?,\u201d we offer a pretty simple tip: start brainstorming for this essay by asking yourself that very question: \u201cWhat matters most to me?\u201d This might seem like obvious advice, of course, but many applicants get flustered by the question\u2014often believing that an actual \u201cright\u201d answer exists that they must identify\u2014and never pause to actually consider their sincere responses, which are typically the most compelling.<\/p>\n

So, we advise that you brainstorm in depth and push yourself to explore the psychological and philosophical motivations behind your goals and achievements\u2014behind who you are today. We cannot emphasize this enough: do not make a snap decision about the content of this essay. Once you have identified what you believe is an appropriate theme, discuss your idea(s) with those with whom you are closest and whose input you respect. Doing so can help validate deeply personal and authentic themes, leading to an essay that truly stands out.<\/p>\n

Once you have fully examined your options and identified your main themes, do not simply provide a handful of supporting anecdotes\u2014or worse, recycle the stories you used in a similar essay for another school. A strong essay response to this question will involve a true exploration of the themes you have chosen and reveal a thorough analysis of decisions, motives and successes\/failures, with a constant emphasis on\u00a0how<\/em>\u00a0you conduct yourself. If you are merely telling stories and trying to tie in your preconceived conclusions, you are most likely forcing a theme on your reader rather than analyzing your experiences, and this will be transparent to any experienced admissions reader. In short, be sure to fully consider and develop your most sincere answer(s), outline your essay accordingly and then infuse your writing with your personality, thoughts, feelings and experiences.<\/p>\n

Essay 2:\u201cWhy Stanford?\u201d (350 words)<\/strong><\/p>\n

One of our favorite admissions quotes is from Stanford\u2019s assistant dean for MBA admissions, Derrick Bolton: \u201cResist the urge to \u2018package\u2019 yourself in order to come across in a way\u00a0you think<\/em>\u00a0Stanford wants\u201d (emphasis added). What the admissions committee\u00a0really<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0wants is to know what and\/or who you want to be. The school does not have a preferred job or industry in mind and expect to hear that you plan to fill that space\u2014the admissions committee wants to understand your true vision and understand why you feel Stanford is necessary in facilitating this vision. If you try to present yourself as someone or something you are not, you will ultimately undermine your candidacy. Trust the admissions committee on this one!<\/p>\n

Because Personal Statements are similar from one application to the next, we have produced the\u00a0mbaMission Personal Statement Guide<\/a><\/strong>,<\/em>\u00a0which helps applicants write this style of essay for any school. We offer this guide to candidates\u00a0free of charge<\/em>. Please feel free to\u00a0download<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0your copy today.<\/p>\n

And for a thorough exploration of the Stanford GSB\u2019s academic program\/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment and more, please check out the\u00a0mbaMission Insider\u2019s Guide to the Stanford Graduate School of Business<\/a><\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve invited\u00a0mbaMission\u00a0to share their Business School Essays Analyses as they\u2019re released for the 2014-2015 application season. Here is their analysis for Stanford Graduate School of Business.\u00a0 The Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) became the second top MBA program to release its essay questions this year, and the school follows a trend in application essays\u2014\u201cless […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,17,4,6],"tags":[56,101,52744,179,52742,694],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-7367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-admissions-tips","category-essay-analysis","category-mba-b-school","category-mbamission","tag-admissions-essay","tag-business-school","tag-essay","tag-essay-analysis-2","tag-mbamission","tag-stanford"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7367"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17423,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7367\/revisions\/17423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7367"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.manhattanprep.com\/gmat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=7367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}