Research MBA Programs

Hello,

I am writing this post because my gmat score is consistently around 620-640. I am planning for US B-school. I am working so I am not getting any time for further preparation. Because of few reasons I have to apply for MBA at the earliest. Please evaluate my profile and suggest which colleges I can target. I feel my profile is strong point but I am not correct person to comment on this.

Which all US b=colleges will give me admit ? Probability. So that I can start Application process.

Few people suggested --> Boston College, Purdue, U of Illinois - Urbana Champagne, University of Santa Clara, SMU Cox, and Arizona State University

Age 25 - Indian

Work Experience :

Business intelligence Delivery offshore lead and Senior application Specialist. Leading a team of 10 member. Handling US clients from last 3 years. 1 years with European client.
Current total Experience of 4 years and it is with Accenture.
Handled clients from various sector--> Finance, telecommunication and media.
Have expertise in more than 10 technical skills.

Responsibilities

As Offshore Application delivery lead handled technical, people and management work.
People Management : This includes staffing, coaching, mentoring, employee assessment and effort hours tracking.
Technical and Delivery lead : Business analysis, client requirement gathering, Application development and support, Escalation handling, etc. Managerial reporting. Handled more than 10 technical skills and Applications.

Achievements in Work experience
So far received 15 awards in 4 years. Received 3 most Organization's most prestigious awards at Nation level.
Accenture Promoted twice in just three years. Organization Leadership recognized my career as one of the fastest career growth till date.
One of best trainer for Business Intelligence Application.
IBM DataStage (Business intelligence tool) certified.
Business Intelligence Application SME (Subject matter expert) in Accenture.
Recognized by Accenture India managing director.


Undergrad Info:
B.E in Computer Engineering with 58 % from Thadomal Shahani Engineering college, Mumbai (Bombay) University. This is one of the top engineering colleges in India.
GPA 3.2/4
Extra-Curricular
Chief Event organizer for people events in Organization. Formed and lead team to organize events. So far organized 50 events. Audience size from 100-500 people.
In education time --> Hostel student representative for 2 years.
International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) event initiated and organized events for 2 years in Mumbai, Bandra area. This was done on non-profit basis. Event audience about 200 people.
I have been part of State government's social awareness events for from last 3 years. In which have given numerous speeches in communities on Consumer rights and Consumer Laws. State chief officer of consumer department recognized my efforts.

Hi

Your profile has fair bit of differentiation. Exposure to customer facing role and ability to manage teams is something B-Schools look for in any candidate.
Considering that you academics have been average, we would still advise you to better your GMAT score. If you are scoring 620-620; then crossing 650 should not be a challenge. It is worth taking some time off from job and prepare thouroughly.
In terms of choice of Schools, you are pretty modest. You should apply to atlest 3 US schools which are among top 30 in FT rankings.

It would be helpful to advise you on colleges if you share your career goals.

Hi

Your profile has fair bit of differentiation. Exposure to customer facing role and ability to manage teams is something B-Schools look for in any candidate.
Considering that you academics have been average, we would still advise you to better your GMAT score. If you are scoring 620-620; then crossing 650 should not be a challenge. It is worth taking some time off from job and prepare thouroughly.
In terms of choice of Schools, you are pretty modest. You should apply to atlest 3 US schools which are among top 30 in FT rankings.

It would be helpful to advise you on colleges if you share your career goals.

Thank you so much. I truly appreciate your response. I am planning to get some time off from work. I will try to 650+, but because of some reasons I need get admission at the earliest.

I am looking for Information management, Consulting, Management & Business Strategy.

Check if below information helps you.
I have extensive experience of handling client leadership & End users. One of the key person in driving Million dollar Project delivery.

Kindly suggest business schools.

Hi,

Kindly suggest.

Hi

If I understand correctly, you are looking for leadership roles in tech centric organization wherein you would prefer to lead the effort for client engagement, delivery etc; below schools you can consider
Cornell, Berkeley-Haas, CMU-Tepper, UCLA, NTU, Indiana-Kelly,Maryland-Smith, UT Austin, Mccombs, Tamu maze.
This list is a good mix of fairly competitive to extremely competitive school.

Hi Yogirb8801,

Before commenting on anything, what I am interested is in your 3 years of association with the State Governemnt - what role you played - and any initiatives there!

the b-schools would like to slice and dice there.

second, while you may have lot of work accolades - but what are your learnings? did you work in multi-cultural - multi-lingual teams?

What was the impact you had on the bottom-line?

Thinking about such might help you evalutae the quality of your work-ex.

Hope it helps !

Thanks ivyctor2010 for your reply.

Hi abhi0syal,

As I mentioned in my first post, I handled clients from US and Europe, telecom and finance business domain. I got a chance to work with people from various cultural back ground.

My team has people from different parts of India. As Lead, I got chance to learn how to interact with people from different background, understanding their culture, priority, etc. In my work experience, I worked on more than 10 applications such as, Business intelligence, ERP application, Reporting, Different Data warehouse tools. I have experience of working with more 8 stakeholders at a time.
My organization is quite huge in terms of every aspect (90000+ employees in India). However I was able to create my strong network in organization irrespective of level, project, and department. This is one of the key learning and achievement I feel.

As people event lead, I created team and started with people events in delivery group (~100 people). Addressed people issues and guided, mentored people regarding career in organization.

Because of wide range of technical knowledge, leadership skill, strong hold on work policies and good interpersonal relation, Accenture higher management recognized me many times.

Recommendation letters - My US manager (who is MBA) and my offshore senior manager (20+ years exp) are happy to give recommendation letter.

Here, I have provided very detailed info so you guys can suggest me better options.

Just took one gmat practice test - My score is 610 (Q47 V27). I am trying to improve, However, I am not keeping much hopes to improve. Could you please evaluate and suggest realistic school list. I said realistic because targeting school such as Harvard might not be realist target for my current profile.

ivyctor2010 , Since I have provided detailed profile description now. Please feel free to comment back.

Dear Yogirb,

I would strongly recommend that you retake GMAT and score somewhere in the range of 650 to 720. With a 620 i don't see much hope as the average score of Asian MBA candidates applying to good to top American business schools is above 700. You will fall way below the average. As you would definitely know that finding a job internationally is becoming increasingly difficult so it is advisable that you try to crack a good school or it won't be worth the effort & the cost.

Hope it helps.

Thank you everyone for reply...! Took GMAT today.. Scored 650.

Could you please suggest which colleges I should target?

Waiting for reply... !

Hello,

Here's my blunt assessment :

GMAT is average.
B.E. - school ( Thodomal -good) / percentages - very average ( no first class from Mumbai - is not good) - that'll throw out the better schools.

Extra-cirricular: Nothing special - school stuff no-one cares.
Work experience - Looks like you are in Accenture - very run of the mill. Nothing special. You'll have to prove leadership -- that'll be useful.

Age/Experience: A bit young, but maybe OK


Smart and very apt choices of schools. For the universities that you are targeting, you should be OK. UIUC, Boston maybe, but rest should be OK.


"Few people suggested --> Boston College, Purdue, U of Illinois - Urbana Champagne, University of Santa Clara, SMU Cox, and Arizona State University"


Best luck! Hope you make it.