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Your Application Essays For MBA Admission

Attack the essays over time, and on a schedule to which you strictly adhere.

Remember, most essays are written over one weekend with no prior brainstorming. No wonder they’re superficial and thin – that is, worthless.

Don’t write what you think the schools want to hear. Write what’s true, and in your own voice. Later on you can assess whether everything you’ve written is appropriate.

Afraid of the readers’ reactions and misunderstanding the purpose of the essays, many readers consciously edit out all personality and all honesty from their early drafts. The result is tedium.

Business schools don’t want tedium. They don’t want you to sound like an annual report. They want to hear your voice and your opinions. Let them come through. Take some risks. You can always cut Back in the final drafts, if you think your writing is too controversial or edgy. But if your early drafts are bland and impersonal, the final drafts will be even worse.

Be aware of length limits, but don’t be hamstrung by them in the early drafts.

If the school wants 500 words, then you’ll give them 500 (or, better, 475). But to get to those 500 words you might, at first, come up with 1,500. Don’t stifle your own creativity. The time for strict adherence to length limits is the final draft, not the first one.