Find out who you are really competing against!
One of the most popular questions that I get from MBA applicants is “How do admissions committees create a class?” The answer to this question is most easily explained through one of my favorite hobbies, cooking, and one of my favorite meals, jambalaya. For those of you who don’t know, jambalaya is a delicious Cajun and Creole spicy rice dish originating from New Orleans with influences from French and Spanish cooking. So, in honor of Mardi Gras, let’s get started!
To make a great jambalaya, you need quality ingredients. There isn’t only ONE recipe for making a great jambalaya, but the ingredients for any jambalaya are generally the same: rice, andouille sausage, shrimp, chicken, green peppers, onions, celery, and a variety of creole spices. Each ingredient’s flavors play off each other to create a mouthwatering meal that takes you on a journey with each bite. If you leave out one of the ingredients or spices, your jambalaya might be bland or off balance. You get the point.
An MBA class can’t be composed of all of one type of candidate, such as ALL American males who went to Ivy League schools and work in investment banking or consulting. You need a mix of geographies, industries, business functions, and life experiences to maximize peer learning. If there’s too much rice, the mixture just isn’t right.
Additionally, you can’t trade out a measure of under-represented candidates for more IT professionals, for example; the mix won’t be right, and the MBA experience for all students will be less compelling. There is great potential for all when sitting in a class or working on a team with peers who each bring a different perspective to the discussion. For example, having a CPA on your team for financial statement analysis is a HUGE win, and the creative advertising person can help the finance guy understand the importance of positioning a brand.
Let’s pretend each admissions committee is an incredibly picky chef going to the local market to purchase ingredients for their jambalaya. All ingredients need to be fresh—the MBA equivalent being that candidates need to be pretty close to the 80% range for GMAT score, GPA, and work experience for the program. So, what ARE the ingredients that make up a diverse MBA class?
- Rice: Bear with me here. The chef is going to pick out EACH GRAIN OF RICE. These are the mainstays of an MBA program—American males—but each is unique in their own way. There is incredible diversity within this group, but if you are an American male, these are the candidates you will be compared to as the admissions committee decides which will be best for their program. Some are engineers, others majored in humanities, some are doctors, others are lawyers, and there’s even some military folks. Some of these American men are first-generation college goers or come from low-income backgrounds. If this is your group, craft a compelling narrative in your application to stand out.
- Andouille sausage: This is possibly the MOST complex part of the jambalaya. Rather than buying premade sausage, the chef will handpick the ingredients and create the sausage. These are the international students—an extremely complex collection who add a multiplicity of ethnicity, geography, and global experience. Within the non-US student population, each program needs a balance of students from different regions, industries, and academic backgrounds. These cannot ALL be sponsored applicants from Asian conglomerates or engineers from India. If you are among this group of applicants, you will be compared against other candidates from your country or region. Keep in mind that some areas of the world are over-represented in the MBA applicant pools. If you are from one of these regions, your stats will likely need to be above the class average, and you will need to tell an especially compelling story of why YOU are the right applicant for this particular program. If the overall admit rate for a program is 15%, there will be some countries for which the admit rate is only half of that. Do the math. Differentiate. Conversely, being the ONLY candidate from a country doesn’t make you a slam dunk.
- Other protein (chicken and shrimp): The chef’s choice of protein beyond the sausage will determine the overall substance of the jambalaya. These are the American women. Again, there is a lot of variety within this group. Whether you are a poet or a quant, if you are in this group, you need to distinguish yourself. What is your unique perspective? What legacy will you leave? Virtually ALL programs are looking to increase the percentage of women, so qualified women are likely to be admitted at a higher rate than men with similar stats.
- Veggies, aka the “Holy Trinity” (green peppers, onions, celery): Under-represented minorities—African American, Hispanic, Native American, and LGBTQIA+ people—make up this group. All the chefs are clamoring for these ingredients because they are not readily available in local markets, and MBA programs will be competing to get these applicants. However, if you are in this group, it doesn’t mean you are an easy admit. Admissions committees care about yield, so they prefer to admit the applicants who will actually enroll. Do your research. Reach out to current students and alumni to understand what their experience has been. Find your fit. Connect the dots between where you are now and how a specific program can get you to where you want to go post-MBA. (See our resources for Black applicants, Hispanic/Latinx applicants, and applicants from the LGBTQIA+ community.)
- Spices: This group is composed of nontraditional candidates who stand out in a unique way and add incredible flavor to the class. In this group, you will find professional athletes, astronauts, Nobel Prize winners, and children of alumni who have made substantial contributions to the school. If you are one of the few in this category, you STILL must tell a powerful story about why you need an MBA from a particular program and share what contribution you will make. If you do so successfully, you could be like the applicant who had a 510 GMAT but still got into Harvard Business School (clearly, their unique perspective is what helped them stand out, rather than their test score).
As the famous New Orleans chef Emeril Lagassé once said, “If you don’t follow your dream, who will?” Our counseling team at Stratus Admissions can work with you to help you differentiate yourself and craft a compelling narrative as you pursue your dreams. Bon appétit!