So I got put on the summer waitlist at Kellogg. Since I am an international applicant and it's taking 2-3 months to get a student visa, I was expecting a firm yes/no from Kellogg this week. So my 1st reaction was WTF! But then I found out that since I already live in the US I just have to wait for the receipt of the visa application to arrive in order to start school. So it made sense - from an immigration viewpoint.
But summer waitlist is as close you can get to a ding without actually getting dinged. So I am moving on. If only I could have gotten some closure on this. It has been 6 months! And I thought I was the indecisive one.
This has not been a pretty week so far. Got denied after an onsite interview at my dream company. Good thing is atleast now I know which company I would be joining. So that somewhat reduces this terrible uncertainity I have been living under for the past several months. But I am 90% certain that I am going to reapply. So there is no end in sight to the overall uncertainity yet.
Last week I had my feedback session with Wharton. I was surprised that I was not fed the usual platitudes and got some real feedback. Going in I knew what the major weakness of my application was. And that got pointed out to me ofcourse. But then I was completely surprised by another weakness that got pointed out. I don't know yet if I am going to reapply to Wharton but I this feedback will definitely help my overall (re)application
Finally, welcome to all the new '09 bloggers. I was away from blogs for a while and when I got back - boy has there been an explosion! Good luck everyone.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
[MBA] Tuck
Got dinged by Tuck today. Was kind of expecting it when I didn't get the call on Thursday. But anyway. So it's Kellogg or nothing now.
Thursday, May 11, 2006
[General] To assimilate or not
Now that all the marches and strikes are over it might be a bit dated to talk about immigration. But there is a certain aspect of this immigration debate which I find especially intriguing. One charge that's often thrown against illegal immigrants is that they don't assimilate. Language is often cited as the prime example of this. I don't want to talk about the reasons why they don't pick up the English language (hint : it's not simply because they don't want to). I am more intrigued by the question. Why is it so important that people assimilate?
I do understand the practical benefits of everyone speaking the same language. Hell, I am from India. You have to grow up and live in different regions of India to really know how inconvenient it is to have people speak in a bewildering range of languages. But then is practicality a good enough reason? Can the same practicality argument not be made to push for uniformity in other fields as well? Won't the world be a better place if we just had one religion? Just as English is the predominant language of US isn't Christianity the predominant religion? Why isn't there a push for everyone to change to that predominant religion? Is it because of the degree of predominance? After all only 76.5% Americans identify themselves are Christians. While pretty much every (statistically speaking) American speaks English. In that case is it ok for countries like Saudi Arabia to outlaw the practice of any religion other than Islam because 99.5% of their population are Muslims? Or is it that religion and language are just not comparable. Religion is one of the intensely personal human right and people should have the right to practice any religion they want. But language is just a practical utility so the same rights argument cannot apply to it.
The bleeding heart liberal in me keeps urging me to take a stand against this push for uniformity. But then the pragmatist in me can clearly see the benefits of a uniform language. I just can't make up mind. Not that there's anything new about it :)
I do understand the practical benefits of everyone speaking the same language. Hell, I am from India. You have to grow up and live in different regions of India to really know how inconvenient it is to have people speak in a bewildering range of languages. But then is practicality a good enough reason? Can the same practicality argument not be made to push for uniformity in other fields as well? Won't the world be a better place if we just had one religion? Just as English is the predominant language of US isn't Christianity the predominant religion? Why isn't there a push for everyone to change to that predominant religion? Is it because of the degree of predominance? After all only 76.5% Americans identify themselves are Christians. While pretty much every (statistically speaking) American speaks English. In that case is it ok for countries like Saudi Arabia to outlaw the practice of any religion other than Islam because 99.5% of their population are Muslims? Or is it that religion and language are just not comparable. Religion is one of the intensely personal human right and people should have the right to practice any religion they want. But language is just a practical utility so the same rights argument cannot apply to it.
The bleeding heart liberal in me keeps urging me to take a stand against this push for uniformity. But then the pragmatist in me can clearly see the benefits of a uniform language. I just can't make up mind. Not that there's anything new about it :)
Saturday, May 06, 2006
[MBA] Still hanging in there
When your own blog falls off your browser's history, you know that you haven't blogged in a while.
Well, the last several weeks have been quite hectic. I set my plan B in motion - basically get a job in a fast growing company where I could get a chance to try out new things and then decide between 1) Reapplying 2) Doing part-time 3) Going back to India
If you have 5-6 years experience and are not looking for a job which is exactly same as what you are currently doing, you have loads of studying in front of you. So back I went to my software engineering roots. At first it made me feel so miserable. Wasn't I supposed to be reading books from that cool list I had prepared at the start of the application season? You know books like 'Against the Gods' or 'Witch Doctors'. But instead, there I was dusting off old textbooks to re-learn the finer points of paging and thrashing. But then figuring out how to prevent deadlocks is way easier than writing down what you really really want to do with your life. So I slowly eased back into familiar territory. I have to admit, to be back in a market where people actually dig your skills and background was a nice break for my poor little battered ego. I could almost close my eyes and pretend that all was finally well. But my powers of rationalization are not that strong. There were reasons why I wanted to do an MBA and those reasons haven't gone away.
It required a superhuman effort, but I managed to pull myself out of the comfortable world of design patterns and effective C++ to write and send my final update letters to Kellogg and Tuck. Of course after that I spent 2 says like a lovesick teenager trying to read between the lines of each school's responses. To those who are wondering one was enthusiastic, the other was ho-hum. And interestingly it was a neat reversal of the response my 1st update letter had received from the two schools. Unless something drastic happens this should be the end of my contribution to this year's app season. But then something always happens. The day I submitted my MIT application I had proclaimed that it would be the last weekend I would spend writing essays. Look how that worked out!
Well, the last several weeks have been quite hectic. I set my plan B in motion - basically get a job in a fast growing company where I could get a chance to try out new things and then decide between 1) Reapplying 2) Doing part-time 3) Going back to India
If you have 5-6 years experience and are not looking for a job which is exactly same as what you are currently doing, you have loads of studying in front of you. So back I went to my software engineering roots. At first it made me feel so miserable. Wasn't I supposed to be reading books from that cool list I had prepared at the start of the application season? You know books like 'Against the Gods' or 'Witch Doctors'. But instead, there I was dusting off old textbooks to re-learn the finer points of paging and thrashing. But then figuring out how to prevent deadlocks is way easier than writing down what you really really want to do with your life. So I slowly eased back into familiar territory. I have to admit, to be back in a market where people actually dig your skills and background was a nice break for my poor little battered ego. I could almost close my eyes and pretend that all was finally well. But my powers of rationalization are not that strong. There were reasons why I wanted to do an MBA and those reasons haven't gone away.
It required a superhuman effort, but I managed to pull myself out of the comfortable world of design patterns and effective C++ to write and send my final update letters to Kellogg and Tuck. Of course after that I spent 2 says like a lovesick teenager trying to read between the lines of each school's responses. To those who are wondering one was enthusiastic, the other was ho-hum. And interestingly it was a neat reversal of the response my 1st update letter had received from the two schools. Unless something drastic happens this should be the end of my contribution to this year's app season. But then something always happens. The day I submitted my MIT application I had proclaimed that it would be the last weekend I would spend writing essays. Look how that worked out!
Saturday, April 08, 2006
[India] There we go again
The Govt. of India has decided to increase the % of reserved seats in institutions which are controlled by the central govt. This will include among many others the IITs. Currently 22.5% seats are reserved for people who fall in the Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe (SC/ST) category. A few seats are reserved for foreign nationals (usually non-resident Indians) who pay higher tuition and so are a source of extra income for the IITs. According to the new proposal 27% of the seats will be reserved for people who fall under the Other Backward Caste (OBC) category. So less than 50.5% seats will be open to people who fall under the general category. The competition to get into IITs was brutal to start with. Now if you are a general category candidate you will be in the 'Male Indian Engineer trying to get into Stanford in the 3rd round' zone.
Many people have condemned this move saying that it will dilute the brandname of IITs. Well yes it would. As would the government's plan to nearly double the number of IITs. But I am not one of those who considers the IIT brandname to be an end in itself. If diluting the brand is good for the country - especially for its poorer sections then I am all for it. But the people who have decided to implement this policy haven't bothered to argue how reserving seats in IITs would lift OBCs out of poverty. In order to even appear for the IIT entrance exams, you need to have completed 12 years of schooling. How many poor OBCs will get that far? If the Govt had real interest in doing good for OBCs it would have created conditions (through incentives) to allow poor OBCs to get educated till the high school level. And then introduced this reservation to give them a leg up into elite institutions. This is what will happen now. Poor OBCs will continue to drop out of school because they have to work to support their families or their schools just don't function because the teachers don't show up. Middle class and upper middle class OBCs who have all the opportunities that every other middle class person in India has will get a back door entry into elite institutions. Since they won't have to go through the rigorous competition that everyone else has to go through, the quality of these elite institutions will suffer.
During the time that I attended IIT 22.5% seats were reserved for SC/ST candidates. None of the people I knew who fell in that category came from poor backgrounds. Most of them were middle class people (like me) and some were quite rich. I never understood how making it easy for them to enter IITs helped the poor SC/ST people in any way. And I am not even talking about fairness here. SC/STs and OBCs have been screwed by mainstream Indian society for so long that I don't even care if a policy is unfair to mainstream society. But it has to be effective, something this policy is definitely not. Of course anecdotal evidence can't stand in for raw data. If anyone has pointers to studies which have investigated the effectiveness of reservations in India, please do let me know.
This reservation policy was first proposed to be implemented in 1989. Back then all hell had broken loose. India in 2006 is very different from India in 1989. So I don't think anything similar is going to happen this time. But if even some discussion happens in the mainstream media then it will be good. Not because this policy has any chance of getting reversed. No political party wants to antagonize vote banks. In fact a few years back this policy was approved in principle by a overwhelming majority in the Parliament. No, I think there is another reason why any discussion on development or poverty will be useful. I often feel that in the euphoria generated by the soaring economy, middle class India has forgotten that most Indians are still quite poor. I am as guilty as anyone else of this ostrich like attitude. If this discussion wakes some people up to the fact that a lot still remains to be done about poverty in India, atleast some good will come out of a policy which is destined to fail.
(For a good research article on poverty in India go here.)
Many people have condemned this move saying that it will dilute the brandname of IITs. Well yes it would. As would the government's plan to nearly double the number of IITs. But I am not one of those who considers the IIT brandname to be an end in itself. If diluting the brand is good for the country - especially for its poorer sections then I am all for it. But the people who have decided to implement this policy haven't bothered to argue how reserving seats in IITs would lift OBCs out of poverty. In order to even appear for the IIT entrance exams, you need to have completed 12 years of schooling. How many poor OBCs will get that far? If the Govt had real interest in doing good for OBCs it would have created conditions (through incentives) to allow poor OBCs to get educated till the high school level. And then introduced this reservation to give them a leg up into elite institutions. This is what will happen now. Poor OBCs will continue to drop out of school because they have to work to support their families or their schools just don't function because the teachers don't show up. Middle class and upper middle class OBCs who have all the opportunities that every other middle class person in India has will get a back door entry into elite institutions. Since they won't have to go through the rigorous competition that everyone else has to go through, the quality of these elite institutions will suffer.
During the time that I attended IIT 22.5% seats were reserved for SC/ST candidates. None of the people I knew who fell in that category came from poor backgrounds. Most of them were middle class people (like me) and some were quite rich. I never understood how making it easy for them to enter IITs helped the poor SC/ST people in any way. And I am not even talking about fairness here. SC/STs and OBCs have been screwed by mainstream Indian society for so long that I don't even care if a policy is unfair to mainstream society. But it has to be effective, something this policy is definitely not. Of course anecdotal evidence can't stand in for raw data. If anyone has pointers to studies which have investigated the effectiveness of reservations in India, please do let me know.
This reservation policy was first proposed to be implemented in 1989. Back then all hell had broken loose. India in 2006 is very different from India in 1989. So I don't think anything similar is going to happen this time. But if even some discussion happens in the mainstream media then it will be good. Not because this policy has any chance of getting reversed. No political party wants to antagonize vote banks. In fact a few years back this policy was approved in principle by a overwhelming majority in the Parliament. No, I think there is another reason why any discussion on development or poverty will be useful. I often feel that in the euphoria generated by the soaring economy, middle class India has forgotten that most Indians are still quite poor. I am as guilty as anyone else of this ostrich like attitude. If this discussion wakes some people up to the fact that a lot still remains to be done about poverty in India, atleast some good will come out of a policy which is destined to fail.
(For a good research article on poverty in India go here.)
Saturday, March 18, 2006
[MBA] Expected updates
Got my official ding from Haas. This was very much on the cards ofcourse, but it still hurts. To think of it I could very well have stopped my application process on Dec 1st after I submitted Tuck. Not a single school after that even graced me with an interview. What a colossal waste of time this whole process turned out to be.
Like everyone else in this world I also got a mail from Tuck informing me about the continuation of my waitlist status. I realistically didn't expect any movement on their waitlist till their April end deposit deadline. But it was nice of them to keep us informed.
I am doing my bit to further my case during this waitlist wait, but it feels like just going through the motions. If 4 top schools don't even think you are worthy of an interview, is it realistic to expect admits from 2 other top schools? I don't know and since hope springs eternal I will keep trying to get off the right side of the waitlist. But whatever. Btw Kellogg has already seen some movement off the R1 waitlist (both admits and dings). According to Kristen on bweek next week they will see even more of that.
I just realized that I have started sounding like a broken record on this blog. No admit waaah, no interview more waaah and so on. I guess that prevents me from over whining in real life. I would be left without any friends if I were to whine half as much as here.
Like everyone else in this world I also got a mail from Tuck informing me about the continuation of my waitlist status. I realistically didn't expect any movement on their waitlist till their April end deposit deadline. But it was nice of them to keep us informed.
I am doing my bit to further my case during this waitlist wait, but it feels like just going through the motions. If 4 top schools don't even think you are worthy of an interview, is it realistic to expect admits from 2 other top schools? I don't know and since hope springs eternal I will keep trying to get off the right side of the waitlist. But whatever. Btw Kellogg has already seen some movement off the R1 waitlist (both admits and dings). According to Kristen on bweek next week they will see even more of that.
I just realized that I have started sounding like a broken record on this blog. No admit waaah, no interview more waaah and so on. I guess that prevents me from over whining in real life. I would be left without any friends if I were to whine half as much as here.
Sunday, March 12, 2006
[Cricket] WTF
My routine every morning includes a quick browse through cricinfo. This morning I got the surprise of a lifetime. Australia had scored 434 in the last one-dayer between them and South Africa. And that was not the surprising part. The way the one-day game has become stacked in favor of the batsmen, the 400 run barrier was bound to be broken sooner than later. What was surprising was that South Africa was actually in the hunt for an improbable victory. Now, on this same ground 3 years ago Australia had run up an equally impressive score against India and India had lost without a fight. So ofcourse I got behind the South Africans in this heroic run chase. AND THEY WON! Those of you who don't follow cricket and have been diligent enough to read this far this is equivalent to a team scoring 30 runs in a baseball game and still losing!
Man, wish I could have watched this game on TV!
Man, wish I could have watched this game on TV!
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
[MBA] Plan B?
No love yet from any of the still in play schools. Stanford is a no hoper at this point. There is no evidence in cyberspace yet that Sloan has released invitations for my hub (Chicago). But this being my most hurried application it's difficult to be optimistic. I had high hopes from Haas. Both the school and location would have been perfect for me and my wife. But just 10 days to Super Saturday and no invite yet. I have sent waitlist update letters to Kellogg and Tuck, but the sense I got from talking to the waitlist officers is that unless I can come up with some miracle, I will be in only if enough people with my profile drop out. Nothing much I can do about that.
I guess it's time to start seriously thinking about Plan B. Yes, I could wait till the bitter end but my visa status doesn't allow me that luxury. So back to 'what do I really want to do with my life' mode.
I guess it's time to start seriously thinking about Plan B. Yes, I could wait till the bitter end but my visa status doesn't allow me that luxury. So back to 'what do I really want to do with my life' mode.
Monday, February 20, 2006
[General] What is your clan spread?
Thanks to Sepia Mutiny I came across this site http://www.gens-us.net/ If you type in your last name, it will give you a map showing the distribution of your clan (clan <=> last name) across the various American states.
The pic on the left is my clan spread. As expected we are pretty under-represented. I think they only use citizens and/or permanent residents to generate this map. So I don't show up on this.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
[MBA] Wharton says - so long sucker
So Wharton has snagged the privilege of delivering me my 1st ding. Wharton was a stretch school for me, so am not surprised. But ding without interview - Ouch!
I have always maintained that Wharton has the most humane applying process. All decisions on one day instead of the drip, drip chinese water torture of some schools. All interview invites within one month instead of the marathons of some schools. So no hard feelings. Just a punctured ego.
I have always maintained that Wharton has the most humane applying process. All decisions on one day instead of the drip, drip chinese water torture of some schools. All interview invites within one month instead of the marathons of some schools. So no hard feelings. Just a punctured ego.
[MBA] Wharton offers a peek into the future
The one day you are not obsessive about your MBA app status something actually does happen. Apparently due to a technical glitch, many people were able to see their dinged status on their Wharton account last night. Using the s2s boards as the sole indicator, this window lasted from about 7pm ET to about 9am ET. The problem has since been fixed. Every night before going to bed I religiously check all the discussion boards. Last night was not one of them. So there goes my chance to put the Wharton thingie to rest before schedule. My application went complete a gazillion years ago. So my chances of getting an interview invite now are pretty minimal. But early closure would have been good.
Monday, February 06, 2006
[MBA] Differentiate this
If you want to explicitly hear an admissions officer say how strong your application is, get yourself put on a waitlist. Had my Tuck waitlist review. Even here the stumbling block seems to be 'differentiation'. Surprisingly no direct mention was made of Tuck love or lack thereof in my application. In a way it's good. Both the schools who have waitlisted me encourage additional materials and both want me to differentiate myself. So less effort for me.
We went through the various aspects of my application (essays, work exp, recommendation etc.) Most of my application components, including - surprise - the interview, fell into the 'good/great/strong' category. I don't read too much into adjectives like these as they are thrown around with such abandon. I did however, learn a thing or two about my application during this review. Apparently my academics are 'extremely strong'. And I was worrying myself silly about my undergrad gpa. My work experience at X is 'interesting'. Well, thats an interesting choice of words. Had the lady not been so friendly I would have thought she was being sarcastic.
I haven't talked about recommendations too much here. Doesn't mean that I have not worried myself sick about them. Both my recommenders are engineers, not given to hyperbole and I didn't do any recommender management whatsoever. When I went to ask for recommendations, this is how the conversation went
Me - I am applying to business schools. Can you give a recommendation?
Recommender - Sure, why not.
Me - I hope it'll be strong. (self-deprecating laugh)
Recommender - Yeah sure.
Me - (awkward silence followed by hasty exit)
So it was a relief to know that the recommendations fell in the 'great' category.
We went through the various aspects of my application (essays, work exp, recommendation etc.) Most of my application components, including - surprise - the interview, fell into the 'good/great/strong' category. I don't read too much into adjectives like these as they are thrown around with such abandon. I did however, learn a thing or two about my application during this review. Apparently my academics are 'extremely strong'. And I was worrying myself silly about my undergrad gpa. My work experience at X is 'interesting'. Well, thats an interesting choice of words. Had the lady not been so friendly I would have thought she was being sarcastic.
I haven't talked about recommendations too much here. Doesn't mean that I have not worried myself sick about them. Both my recommenders are engineers, not given to hyperbole and I didn't do any recommender management whatsoever. When I went to ask for recommendations, this is how the conversation went
Me - I am applying to business schools. Can you give a recommendation?
Recommender - Sure, why not.
Me - I hope it'll be strong. (self-deprecating laugh)
Recommender - Yeah sure.
Me - (awkward silence followed by hasty exit)
So it was a relief to know that the recommendations fell in the 'great' category.
Friday, February 03, 2006
[General] Me too
When I started reading Bschool blogs around mid 2005 something called tagging was going on. I never quite understood the concept. Was it an online version of something which happens in the real world? It was interesting anyway to read people's choices of books. This year the tagging includes a much longer list, so it's even more interesting to read. But Ash had to interrupt my lurking and push me out onto the stage :)
So here goes.
Four jobs I've had in my life:
Teaching Assistant
Instructor
Personal Tutor
Engineer
Everything related to software/programming/computer science - yawn
Four movies I can watch over and over:
O Brother, Where Art Thou? - I still don't understand why I like this movie so much
Sholay - No self-respecting Indian should leave this off the list :)
Padosan - More for nostalgic reasons than anything else
Matrix (II, III) with subtitles on - So that I can finally get it!
Four places I have lived:
Boulder, CO
Madison, WI
Kanpur, India
Rourkela, India
Four TV shows I love to watch:
Raymond - An example of acquired taste
Seinfield - Appeals to the inner stoner in me
Colbert Report - Bill O'Reilly pisses me off so much that Colbert's take is more fun that it should be
No I didn't flunk elementary school math, I am more of a channel flipper than a faithful tv watcher.
Four places I have been on vacation:
Redstone, CO
Rapid City, SD
Yellowstone
Chandipur, India
Four of my favourite dishes:
No name - baked potato, fish and a killer sauce (wife's concoctation)
Don't know english name - some sort of spinach and mashed fish
Mutton curry
Fried chicken at an obscure joint near Rapid City, SD
Four websites I visit daily:
Businessweek - someone please save me from this addiction
Sepia Mutiny - a blog for Indians not in India
Unstrung - for wireless geeks
Hella - fellow bloggers
Four places I would rather be right now:
Anyplace with a sea and without net connection
Four bloggers I am tagging:
All the bloggers I 'know' have already been tagged. So I'll pass on this.
So here goes.
Four jobs I've had in my life:
Teaching Assistant
Instructor
Personal Tutor
Engineer
Everything related to software/programming/computer science - yawn
Four movies I can watch over and over:
O Brother, Where Art Thou? - I still don't understand why I like this movie so much
Sholay - No self-respecting Indian should leave this off the list :)
Padosan - More for nostalgic reasons than anything else
Matrix (II, III) with subtitles on - So that I can finally get it!
Four places I have lived:
Boulder, CO
Madison, WI
Kanpur, India
Rourkela, India
Four TV shows I love to watch:
Raymond - An example of acquired taste
Seinfield - Appeals to the inner stoner in me
Colbert Report - Bill O'Reilly pisses me off so much that Colbert's take is more fun that it should be
No I didn't flunk elementary school math, I am more of a channel flipper than a faithful tv watcher.
Four places I have been on vacation:
Redstone, CO
Rapid City, SD
Yellowstone
Chandipur, India
Four of my favourite dishes:
No name - baked potato, fish and a killer sauce (wife's concoctation)
Don't know english name - some sort of spinach and mashed fish
Mutton curry
Fried chicken at an obscure joint near Rapid City, SD
Four websites I visit daily:
Businessweek - someone please save me from this addiction
Sepia Mutiny - a blog for Indians not in India
Unstrung - for wireless geeks
Hella - fellow bloggers
Four places I would rather be right now:
Anyplace with a sea and without net connection
Four bloggers I am tagging:
All the bloggers I 'know' have already been tagged. So I'll pass on this.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
[MBA] King Kong ain't got - whatever
It seems I am the king of waitlists. Tuck placed me on the waitlist today. I haven't talked to the waitlist coordinator yet, so I have only the general waitlist mail to go by for now. But it looks like the ability 'to demonstrate a clear desire to attend Tuck' is what will matter most now. I can't help going back to my interview and the absolute disaster I made of the 'Why Tuck' question. Hell, it was not even a 'Why Tuck' question. It was more like 'If you get into X and Tuck which would you prefer' question.
Anyhow, it's funny how expectations can affect your perception of the present. Getting put on the K waitlist was a big downer for me as I was looking forward to an admit. However, since on Tuesday I had assumed that I was getting dinged at Tuck, the waitlist news today has made me happy. Ah, the beauty of lowered expectations.
Congrats to fellow bloggers sghama and vatsa for making it to Tuck.
Anyhow, it's funny how expectations can affect your perception of the present. Getting put on the K waitlist was a big downer for me as I was looking forward to an admit. However, since on Tuesday I had assumed that I was getting dinged at Tuck, the waitlist news today has made me happy. Ah, the beauty of lowered expectations.
Congrats to fellow bloggers sghama and vatsa for making it to Tuck.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
[MBA] More essays?
Every waitlisted candidate in Kellogg is assigned a waitlist officer. I talked to mine last week. I tried my best to cut through the usual platitudes - strong application, too many good applicants - to get to why exactly was I waitlisted. It seems I couldn't differentiate myself enough from my 'applicant pool'.
Phew! Given my 'applicant pool' I knew right at the start of this process that differentiation was going to be the albatross around my neck. And I had paid a lot of importance to it while preparing all my applications. Hell, Kellogg had a 1000 words uniqueness essay. But obviously it was not enough. Wish, I had asked a few more questions about what kind of differentiation they are looking for exactly. Now, I don't know how I can differentiate myself further without resorting to outrageous lies. I do have something in mind - non-fiction btw. But I don't know how much it would differentiate me from my 'applicant pool'.
Right around the time I was starting off on the full-time MBA quest, I had a conversation with a friend who is a 2nd year student at UCLA. He said for Indian male engineers, the MBA app process is a bitch. Back then I was surprised by this negativity. When I got off the phone the other day with my very nice waitlist officer, his statement was all I could think of. No point in whining about this too much though. The rules of this game were always known to me. I had the option of not playing it.
Tuck decisions will probably start going out from tomorrow. The official decision date is Feb 1st. Well lets see, I got invited for the Tuck interview on the very last day that they sent out such invitations. I got my Kellogg decision on the very last day that those decisions were released. So what are my chances of hearing from Tuck early next week? Given the way I answered the why Tuck qs. and my Kellogg decision I am not even sure I want to hear the decision any more.
Finally, in response to my last post, Linda Abraham of accepted.com had left a couple of very informative links in my comments. I am posting them here.
http://blog.accepted.com/acceptedcom_blog/2006/1/17/
Phew! Given my 'applicant pool' I knew right at the start of this process that differentiation was going to be the albatross around my neck. And I had paid a lot of importance to it while preparing all my applications. Hell, Kellogg had a 1000 words uniqueness essay. But obviously it was not enough. Wish, I had asked a few more questions about what kind of differentiation they are looking for exactly. Now, I don't know how I can differentiate myself further without resorting to outrageous lies. I do have something in mind - non-fiction btw. But I don't know how much it would differentiate me from my 'applicant pool'.
Right around the time I was starting off on the full-time MBA quest, I had a conversation with a friend who is a 2nd year student at UCLA. He said for Indian male engineers, the MBA app process is a bitch. Back then I was surprised by this negativity. When I got off the phone the other day with my very nice waitlist officer, his statement was all I could think of. No point in whining about this too much though. The rules of this game were always known to me. I had the option of not playing it.
Tuck decisions will probably start going out from tomorrow. The official decision date is Feb 1st. Well lets see, I got invited for the Tuck interview on the very last day that they sent out such invitations. I got my Kellogg decision on the very last day that those decisions were released. So what are my chances of hearing from Tuck early next week? Given the way I answered the why Tuck qs. and my Kellogg decision I am not even sure I want to hear the decision any more.
Finally, in response to my last post, Linda Abraham of accepted.com had left a couple of very informative links in my comments. I am posting them here.
http://blog.accepted.com/acceptedcom_blog/2006/1/17/
admissions-tip-waitlist-letters.html
http://accepted.typepad.com/admissions_almanac/2005/01/
http://accepted.typepad.com/admissions_almanac/2005/01/
mba_waitlist_ti.html
Thursday, January 19, 2006
[MBA] Kellogg pulls me back in
Now, there I was shifting apartments, ruining my back, trying to make sense of the jibberish that passes as customer requirements - you know fun stuff. Then K comes along, on the very last day I may add and delivers this message.
"Dear XXX - or was it YYY - whatever, though I sort of like you, it just ain't enough for me to make a commitment right now. You know, I'd much rather wait for someone better to come along. But just in case no one shows up you'll still be there for me right? Right?"
I got waitlisted at K. I guess it's better than getting dinged but now for another long wait (March-June) wrt K. I can almost hear a booming voice from the heavens saying, "Thy who complainst the most, shall get shafted the longest."
So now I am back in the MBA game, trying to figure out how best to get myself off the good side of the waitlist train. I don't know what to think of this waitlist though. It scares me a bit because I always thought that K was my most complete application. I am all paranoid now about all the interview invitations and the Tuck decision.
Yeah, I am definitely back in the MBA game.
"Dear XXX - or was it YYY - whatever, though I sort of like you, it just ain't enough for me to make a commitment right now. You know, I'd much rather wait for someone better to come along. But just in case no one shows up you'll still be there for me right? Right?"
I got waitlisted at K. I guess it's better than getting dinged but now for another long wait (March-June) wrt K. I can almost hear a booming voice from the heavens saying, "Thy who complainst the most, shall get shafted the longest."
So now I am back in the MBA game, trying to figure out how best to get myself off the good side of the waitlist train. I don't know what to think of this waitlist though. It scares me a bit because I always thought that K was my most complete application. I am all paranoid now about all the interview invitations and the Tuck decision.
Yeah, I am definitely back in the MBA game.
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
[MBA] I'm outta here
Submitted my Sloan app today. One of my recommenders is still working on his stuff. But I'll ignore that and declare this phase of my application process over.
Now, here's my plan. For the remainder of January I'm going to be MBA free. Now that won't be completely true as Kellogg and Tuck results will come out in that period. But from my side I'll be MBA free - no bweek, no s2s, no blogs. I have some killer deadlines at work, we are shifting apartments and some travel might be in store. So this would be difficult but not impossible to do. I really really need a break from this crap.
So everyone, I'll see you in February. Pray that I come back with atleast one piece of good news.
Now, here's my plan. For the remainder of January I'm going to be MBA free. Now that won't be completely true as Kellogg and Tuck results will come out in that period. But from my side I'll be MBA free - no bweek, no s2s, no blogs. I have some killer deadlines at work, we are shifting apartments and some travel might be in store. So this would be difficult but not impossible to do. I really really need a break from this crap.
So everyone, I'll see you in February. Pray that I come back with atleast one piece of good news.
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
[MBA] Now to the final stretch
Submitted Stanford and Wharton over the last couple of days. Wharton essays are quite standard and I have been sitting on them for a while now. So am pleased with the way they have turned out. The 2nd Stanford essay looked good to me when I last saw it. Hopefully I managed to tie together my interests and goals into what I can get from and contribute to Stanford. The 1st essay is so out of whack that even if I had 1 full year to work on it, I would still be whining about it. And I had just 4 weeks of which, 1.5 was lost to Kellogg decision anxiety + Tuck interview decision anxiety + Some old fashioned illness. Now if I were Marina I could have finished this essay and thrown in a couple of extra apps in 2.5 weeks :) But I am a very slow writer. That's just a polite way of saying that I am a champion procrastinator. So that essay went out without my 100% satisfaction. I wanted to make it completely from the heart but ended up writing it strategically. Anyway, it's over now.
Now on to my last application - MIT. Sloan is my biggest strategic mistake this app season, well until the decisions reveal something else. I knew that I was applyingt to Sloan right from the beginning and this is the only school where there is an advantage to applying in the 1st round. Yet, I postponed it to the very end. Now I have to tackle it with my energy, enthusiasm and ability to stay sane at extremely low levels. Don't know how it will turn out. Couldn't they just have a standard why mba/why sloan/career progress essay. Now thanks to the Cover Letter I'll have to write that from scratch.
I hope, no I swear that this coming weekend will be the last weekend I'll spend telling adcoms how I have repeatedly saved my company from ruin, while working for the poor and downtrodden of the world and maintaining a moral stature which would put Jesus himself to shame. I can't put up with this !@#$ any longer.
Now on to my last application - MIT. Sloan is my biggest strategic mistake this app season, well until the decisions reveal something else. I knew that I was applyingt to Sloan right from the beginning and this is the only school where there is an advantage to applying in the 1st round. Yet, I postponed it to the very end. Now I have to tackle it with my energy, enthusiasm and ability to stay sane at extremely low levels. Don't know how it will turn out. Couldn't they just have a standard why mba/why sloan/career progress essay. Now thanks to the Cover Letter I'll have to write that from scratch.
I hope, no I swear that this coming weekend will be the last weekend I'll spend telling adcoms how I have repeatedly saved my company from ruin, while working for the poor and downtrodden of the world and maintaining a moral stature which would put Jesus himself to shame. I can't put up with this !@#$ any longer.
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