Business-Minded Essay: Please reflect on how your experiences have influenced your career choices and aspirations and the impact you will have on the businesses, organizations, and communities you plan to serve. (300 words max)
Harvard Business School application sees a major change this year. After many years of having one single open-ended question, the school comes up with three specific questions!
While on the face of it, this question can look like a simple career goal question talking about your past experience and what you want to do in the future but this is not a simple question. Harvard MBA admissions team wants to understand your motivation, your values - that have driven your career choices in the past, and why you have taken up a particular field of work, a certain set of companies. All of these will help them understand your true motivations, passions, and what all you bring to the Harvard MBA class.
In the second part of the answer you are expected not only to talk about what you want to do professionally after MBA, but more importantly what kind of impact you want to have in the world going forward. Harvard MBA is an extremely privileged platform for anyone and HBS wants to ensure that they offer this exclusive opportunity only to students who are really committed and determined to make a positive impact on their organizations and communities - basically, leaders who are going to change the world for the better! So your answer should incorporate a strong vision and specific plans for making a powerful impact on the world after Harvard MBA.
Leadership-Focused Essay: What experiences have shaped who you are, how you invest in others, and what kind of leader you want to become? (250 words max)
Visionaries are leaders who change the world. In continuation to the first question about future impact Harvard admission team wants to understand what kind of a leader you are and what, based on your experiences, are your values, and your actions. This answer requires deep introspection in terms of evaluating what life experiences, what role models, and what thoughts and perspectives have had strong influences on who you have become as a person and as a leader.
Through the wording of the question, it also becomes clear that Harvard emphasizes leadership - as investing in others - so you ideally show through example and action how you develop and invest in others, how you enhance their abilities, and how you help them grow. Giving details about your actions taken in this regard must be thematically summarised to answer how you invest in others.
The second part of the question can be tied to your values and role models or you could discuss the gaps in your understanding or skill sets or perspectives leading to the kind of leader you want to be.
Growth-Oriented Essay: Curiosity can be seen in many ways. Please share an example of how you have demonstrated curiosity and how that has influenced your growth. (250 words max)
Strong intellectual curiosity is at the core of what drives every human progress. A strong curiosity is also a hallmark of an intelligent mind who seeds to develop, who is ambitious, who will question the status quo. So find an example where driven by your curiosity, you explore the unknown, go out of your comfort zone, and enable your growth and transformation. Find specific and strong examples that challenged you, and have left a lasting impact on you and then also discuss how that experience has affected your growth.
If you think - the entire MBA experience is going to be very similar to this experience! You enter a new student seeking new knowledge, wanting to make new friends, learning about the industry, finding the right career opportunities, and at the end of 2 years you will come out a transformed person - driven mainly by your curiosity, courage, and your commitment to your growth self-growth.
Harvard MBA application requires you to submit a one-page resume along with details about your employment and academics. The typical MBA resume format consists of employment, education, and extracurricular details. MBA resume tips
You will need to have two recommendations submitted online by the application deadlines.
It is the applicant's responsibility to ensure that all recommendations are submitted online by the deadline date for the round in which the applicant is applying.
As per the HBS admissions team, you are suggested to find people who know you well enough to answer them. This can be a former supervisor, a colleague, someone you collaborate on an activity outside of work. How well a person knows you should take priority over level of seniority or HBS alumni status.
Like many top business schools in the US, Harvard MBA application constitutes of letter of recommendation questions modified from the GMAC MBA letter of recommendation template. MBA LOR tips
As is the policy with most top business schools, Harvard MBA interviews are conducted only by invitation. Students typically would receive an invite 4-6 weeks after submitting their MBA applications.
MBA interviews may be scheduled on campus, in domestic or international hub cities, or via Skype.
Harvard MBA Interviews are 30 minutes and are conducted by an MBA Admissions Board member who has reviewed your application. Your interview will be tailored to you and is designed for us to learn more about you in the context of a conversation.
Within 24 hours of the interview, MBA candidates are required to submit a written reflection through our online application system. Detailed instructions will be provided to those applicants who are invited to the interview process. MBA interview tips
