, originally uploaded by kengelbr.

Theodore Roosevelt

I recently finished my off-campus interview for Kellogg application. Although it is not supposed to be ‘matched’, I was lucky to get an alumnus in exact same field of my interest. So, it was much easier to talk and there was lot to discuss given the common field. On the content portion, really nothing out of the blue (refer to the standard questions on forums, clear admit wiki etc) and my interviewer was very nice and made me feel comfortable. I hope I didn’t bore him too much since its hard to make me stop talking once I start off.

Secondly, it was first ‘blind’ interview for me and so I had to repeat a lot of stuff from my application and do the talking while putting everything in perspective. Overall, if you are clear about your groundwork and goals, such interviews become easier to handle.

Oh and Kellogg interviews everyone, so the interview invite itself does not mean much. In the end, its anybody’s guess and from past experience, I can say only one thing – speculation doesn’t help. I’ll know when I’ll know but it was the last interview for me and I am glad that I can focus on more fun things now: my canvas is unattended since ages and I need to experiment with my SLR a lot more. Plus, some internship hunting. And, hoping that weather pacifies a bit and Wednesday isn’t as dreadful as they are predicting.

Peace.

src: www.wordle.net

I just ran this cool online tool provided by Wordle on my MBA essays and got this word cloud. And the three boldest words summarize my focus – Media, Technology and Business.

I have so far refrained from blogging my MBA application experiences on a public portal but now that it is ensured that I am heading back to school in the fall, I will probably publish from few private posts. I had found significant help on some blogs and hopefully someone else will benefit from my experiences.

P.S. I took the Wordle idea from Dino’s blog.

Red alert from one of the MBA program advisors-

I’m an experienced editor, so it’s easy for me to spot writing habits. I can usually tell when a set of essays and an accompanying letter of recommendation have been written by the same person. The voice, the diction, and especially the errors of grammar and style are all unique identifiers. I have seen people use the exact same phrasing in recommendations that they used in their essays. That’s why it’s a bad idea to write your own rec’s.

While the admissions people may not be professional editors, I know from first-hand experience that they too catch applicants by noting their unique phraseologies. Most of you will have to work with your recommenders in crafting your letters, but don’t write them wholesale. At the very least craft your recommendations as a joint project. Even if your recommender would prefer that you write them alone, encourage him to do some of the work so the language will assure the reader that someone other than the applicant wrote the recommendation.

Forbes List

Damn, I need to study!

P.S. Mo, you are not helping- Stop procrastinating dude..
and Roux, you stop finding excuses from work.