Harvard Business School - 12-10-2021

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December 9, 2021 6:00pm ET

Applying: Harvard Business School, INSEAD, London Business School

Intake Year: 2022

Pre-MBA Career: Non-profits, tertiary education, and startups

Post-MBA Target Industry: Technology, Venture Capital Companies: Google , Tesla , Other , Other

GMAT: 730

Years of Work Experience: 5

Location: Australia

Notes:

Hi guys! Listener since I started my journey, thank you for keeping me inspired. There’s a lot of hinky stuff in my profile and many days I wonder if I’m being too ambitious. Expelled from university in Manila (19 yo) I have a learning disability I didn’t know about at the time. I don’t have an undergraduate but have a Master of Marketing from Sydney University (QS Ranking #42 uni worldwide) and graduated with distinction (75 average).

I built my career via work experience. I was already in a managerial role working for a university’s startup program when I decided to get a degree again.

When I applied for a bachelor's, there were concerns about my record and I was evaluated by a professor via a series of coursework over a whole semester. The professor ended up endorsing me for a master's degree. I still went through more assessments before I could get the master's: vice-dean interview & high-performance minimums in my early subjects. It seems illogical to get faulted for exceeding expectations? But at the end of the day I’m missing a “minimum requirement” or it looks as I skipped entering info (bachelor’s) and I’d get filtered out before they even get to see any written explanation in the responses.
WORK XP
- “First hire” in a top-ranking university’s startup accelerator back when it was a new concept. I led its operations and it grew from a two-person team to a team of 12 in 2+ yrs. Our alumni startups have now raised over $35m.
- Directly mentored/worked with 100+ startups
- Have also been employed in a startup as head of operations (

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Show Comments (8) Last: December 21, 2021

crispy Likes Earned: 1 Oh would add another red flag: career gap! I quit my job and have been unemployed since Aug to help my family. My dad got sick from covid-19 and was in a critical state, followed by secondary complications. When he started to stabilise, I had already decided on doing an MBA and thought to not apply for a new full-time role in bad faith knowing I might leave in less than a year. I've been doing did a bit of self-learning especially in investing. I also got accepted into a competitive investor traineeship program by one of Australia’s largest VCs + secured a teaching assistant position for another top Aussie uni for the course “Creative entrepreneurship” which are all for the first half of 2022. (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1675 Your profile is going to be very unorthodox, but I seem to remember a case, several years ago, of someone gaining admission at a top program without an undergrad degree. I don’t remember their circumstances. You’d need to use the optional essays to provide your explanations. I think there’s no doubt you’re smart, and have had strong impact. You’ll want to show you have a good plan, goal focus, for the MBA. Applying only to 3 programs might be risky, where do you want to be, post MBA? (1)

grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1232 I agree that you have a highly unorthodox path here...but that a path to admission does exist (and there have been other instances of this sort). Of course, as Alex points out, you will need a great (and concise) explanation for your lack of a proper ugrad degree. I'd also argue that stellar marks in the master's AND a very high GMAT would be the optimal case to present...and it's unclear that that's the case at this point. And finally, with HBS, INSEAD, and LBS, you seem to solely be fishing at the very top end, which could be misaligned with your profile. I suspect their may be some other programs that could help you achieve your goals (and really bolster your academic profile) while also allowing you a bit more of a margin of error.
(1)

crispy Likes Earned: 1 Hi Alex and Graham, thank you for responding so quickly! My short-term goal is to transition into private sector, preferably in a global tech firm. (From non-profit and education background) I feel like I have this big gap in commercial experience. Long-term would ideally be VC. Or did you mean physically "where"? Long-term back in Australia but fresh post MBA is flexible globally :) I forgot to also mention other profile bits! Female, Nationality - Philippines (+ Australian Permanent Resident) Re: the short list - I have an extended list but don't feel like I can do them all well in the short period of time :( I'm focussing on putting my best foot forward for my top three, is that the wrong way to go? I also mainly looking at global programmes & not in the US but HBS holds a special place. I toured the region a few yrs ago to research entrepreneurship programs. A lot of learnings from Harvard fed directly into the some of the new things I co-designed at Sydney Uni (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1675 Just to address a point you raise, you won’t get filtered out. Your app will get read. And while your candidacy is unorthodox, your work experience does sound very interesting, shows impact and progression. So if you plan to return to Australia in the long run, which Euro-based programs have the best networks to support that, beyond LBS and INSEAD? I’d pick 2-3 more, and target those 6 programs? (1)

crispy Likes Earned: 1 Thank you! After some reflection and readings on the weekend, I've concluded to do max 4 in this round (Judge is my 4th), and then 2-3 more for the Mar/Apr round. I initially excluded that season due to limited access to scholarships so I was banking everything in one round. (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1675 Just be aware, the admit rates in those later rounds will be tougher, Round 2 / January rounds are your best shot. (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1675 More details on this candidacy in this episode of Wire Taps: https://www.clearadmit.com/2021/12/episode-205-wire-taps/ (0)