If the MBA Decoder team was to think of consistency in essay topics, we would first rate Stanford and INSEAD and then ISB at number 3. Many, many years ago, ISB used to ask guesstimate kind of hypothetical questions, but over the years, those evolved into the “uniqueness” questions and this has consistently been asked for a while now. With some changes in the essay question last year that also asked applicants how they would contribute to ISB, the b-school is now back to asking the basic question- What makes you unique and worth admitting?
ISB’s goals essay also remains on the essay question list, with some variations here and there. This year, they have specifically asked about a long term goal and also increased the word limit by a 100 words – this is another first for the career goals essay.
Over to the essay questions:
There will be 900 students in the class of 2021. Why should you be one of them? (400 words max)
ISB’s first essay question has remained unchanged, although its delivered in a different wording this year.
Before we start off with our essay analysis, we’d like you to understand what is the composition of this 900 strong student class. Here’s a look at their class profile. The students’ age ranges from 22 to 46 years (Average- 26.6 years) while work experience ranges from 2 to 20 years (average 4.3 years). There are both men (61%) and women (39%), engineers (68%) and non-engineers (32%). There’s a wide range of industries representation including IT, consulting, financial services, pharma, manufacturing, FMCG, energy, entertainment, PSUs, armed services, and more. This is tremendous diversity! In effect, there is room for every applicant.
Wait! We will say that again.
In effect, there is room for every applicant, so long as they make a strong case for themselves.
Every well-ranked business school in the world tries to compose a well qualified and diverse class, with students bringing insightful experiences that will be invaluable during class discussions and group studies. With this in mind, what unique skills, personality traits or experiences do you bring to ISB, such that the admissions team feels compelled to admit you?
From the application perspective, uniqueness could be of several kinds:
- Academic: You could have excellent academic grades and GMAT score, which will definitely make you more desirable to ISB. However, this will be visible via reporting your standardized test scores and your academic transcripts. Unless you have some other academic uniqueness which would be relevant to a business school, this point may not be worth talking about here in the essay.
- Professional uniqueness: What kind of skills have you acquired served with an extra overloaded helping, that others around you lack? What kind of unique experiences have you garnered at work? Has your career progression been better than your peers’? Have you got some leadership experiences, not just of leading people formally, but driving initiatives informally? Lastly, what kind of impact have you created at your workplace? Have you added value to your client or to your organization? Brainstorming along these ideas could lead you to important experiences in your career that are worth telling in the essay.
- Noteworthy extra-curricular activities: These are another good way to differentiate yourself from other applicants. Have you had unique experiences where you made a positive impact on other people’s lives? Are you passionate about a sport or a hobby and actively participate in it? Have you become an entrepreneur and are running a successful business alongside your day job?
- Unique experiences such as international travels or difficult experiences that taught you life’s most important lessons and helped you better your personality.
These are some areas where you can data mine information for essay fodder. We believe a 400-word essay gives you a chance to tell 2-3 impressive stories about yourself. These could represent any of the ideas above, or more ideas of your own.
Eventually do bear in mind that you are telling the adcom any of the above with a purpose in mind: You wish them to see that your experiences are worthy and that you will be able to add value to the class. While selecting stories for your essay, ask yourself – is this relevant? What will this tell the admissions team about me? Will it be valuable for someone’s learning?
End the essay by summarizing how you will use your unique skills, traits, and experiences to contribute to the ISB class. About 5-6 lines should be good here. You could also tie in your personal values with the values of ISB, thus pitching a strong case for why you are a good fit for each other.
Career Goals Essay
What will you be doing in 2025 and 2030? How will the ISB PGP programme help you to achieve these goals? (400 words max)
ISB has put a twist to the classic career goals question- they have put time frames to your career goals! As you are applying for the class graduating in 2021, this questions ask you what you will be doing four years after graduation and nine years after graduation. For simplicity, we suggest you break your goals to two parts:
1. What will you be doing upto 5 years after PGP?
2. What will you be doing around 10 years after PGP?
Your career goals make most sense to the essay reader when she is able to correlate your past experiences with them. Therefore start the goals essay talking about your past professional experiences. You could either trace a career summary, focusing upon any inflexion points, motivations for job changes, and notable achievements.
Alternately, you could tell a strong professional story where you made some impact and that experience influenced you to form your career goals.
Now that the stage is set and the reader understands where you are coming from, tell them what is the way forward, A.K.A. your career goals. We advise applicants to go into some details here, specifically for the short term goals. Specific questions to answer are:
1. Which company would you like to work with (in 2025)?
2. What will you do/ learn there?
3. How will this role prepare you for your long term goal (2030)?
4. What will you be doing in 2030? Which kind of company will you work with? What large scale impact will you make on the world?
The future plan being grand requires a skill upgrade, via an MBA. Therefore, mention what skills will you require in order to achieve these career goals?
How will the ISB PGP help you build these skills? You should come up with a mix of reasons. These could be related to academics, experiential learning opportunities, Clubs, centres of excellence, career access etc. The best reasons are always those which help you address a need for knowledge or skills specific to your career goals. We often read very, very generic reasons in this section, and our response to them is a resounding NOOOOOOOO…!
Do some research by talking to current students and alumni and crack the code for why ISB.
The Reapplicant Essay:
Please use this space to explain significant improvements in your profile since your last application to the ISB PGP. (200 words max). Note: It is mandatory for you to write this essay.
We are glad that ISB has brought back this reapplicant essay. If you have already been dinged by ISB in past years, you definitely want to tell them how have become a better version of yourself now, and therefore they should evaluate you within this context.
ISB doesn’t give reject feedback, so it may be difficult for you to understand where you should show improvement. Here are some areas that you could cover via this essay:
1. Better profile at work. A promotion, client-facing role, a change in job. How any of these have helped our profile grow.
2. Noteworthy achievements at work and outside.
3. A new extra-curricular activity (this should be relevant for business schools)
4. Starting a venture
5. Revisited career goals that align better with your past experiences and future career vision.
6. A new GMAT/GRE score or new courses that support a low GPA.
We recommend that you don’t just drably list the above. Show the adcom that you went through a process of self-reflection, analyzed what your shortcomings were and then worked upon them to emerge as a stronger applicant.