More chapter reviews on Montauk

I have finished several more chapters in "How to Get into the Top MBA Programs", so I'll post a review of these chapters while it's still fresh.

Chapter 12 (Interviews) presents a lot of information about interviews. This chapter is packed full of useful information. There are several different lists of questions in this chapter that provide excellent practice material. The format for the questions is with a topical heading such as 'University Education', then a list of anywhere from ten to twenty five questions depending on the section. Following the questions are several key points that that should be emphasized with these questions, there are also statements and areas to avoid. The following sections are covered:
- University Education
- Work Experience
- Managerial Orientation
- Goals
- Personal

After the questions there is some very good interviewing information about practice and preparation. There is also some very useful information on how to read the interviewer as well as general tips on how to make it a good interview. Montauk points out that nearly everyone thinks they interview well, but the vast majority of people do not. So it stands to reason that some practice is in order for nearly everyone.

Chapter 13 (Application Timetable) is primarily and organizational chapter. The goal with this chapter is to get you proactively working through the process without waiting until the deadline. This chapter is useful material, but if you find that you are already a decently organized person it may not be as useful as some of the other chapters.

Chapter 14 (Responding to Wait-Listing, Rejections, and Other Disappointments) begins Part III (On the Road to Business School). I suppose applicants ought to consider it telling that this section begins with a chapter on rejection. This process is tough and many of us aren't trying to get into just a good school, instead we are trying to get into the best schools possible. Even the strongest of all candidates don't typically get into all of the schools they apply to. This chapter is kind of a pep talk to keep your spirits up. The lesson here is that you can learn from a rejection, and improve by it. He also strongly cautions that if you are going to re-apply make sure you give it your full effort and do a better job than you did last time. This is something I've seen re-affirmed by several schools, that a lot of re-apps do a very poor job the second time around. This chapter is pretty short, hopefully you won't need to read it. :)

Chapter 15 (What to do once you are accepted) starts off with a discussion of accepting the offer and resigning from your job (ie, when and how). It then provides good information about the type of academic work you will face when you start the program. The chapter contains suggestions on the subjects you should get exposure to if you aren't a b-school undergrad. There are eight core areas that are covered in the first year, in order of importance they are: Accounting, Economics, Finance, Information Systems, Marketing, Operations Management, Organizational Development/Human Resources, Quantitative Methods. He suggests several good books for each topic, and for some of them he highly recommends taking a course from a local school because they are difficult to learn from a textbook. He also highly suggests taking a Business Calculus course and statistics, as these topics are used extensively in other courses. If you aren't familiar with a word processing package and how to use spreadsheet, he suggests becoming familiar with Office. Some of the material in this chapter seemed a bit dated to me, but I am reading the 1997 version of this book, so it could be updated in the new edition.

The final paragraph of Chapter 15 is worth repeating here: "The last point is the same as the first. If you reach business school without having prepared properly you will regret it. Anything that is difficult two months before the program starts will get much more so when you have to learn it along with all the other concepts and techniques that are being piled on you each day."

That is how far I have read currently, I plan to finish Chapter 16 today and start working through the sample essays. After that I'll head back to Appendix for Chapter 10 and start working through the personal organizer. Time to connect back into work and get that taken care of so I can get back to playing Warcraft. :)

Quick review of Montauks excellent book

I still haven't received my official GMAT scores. Even though I have the un-official scores, I would like to know what my AWA score is. I'm sure it's not that important with a 99th percentile on verbal, but I'd still like to know what I got. Hella keeps telling me not to stress about it, to which I say "I'm not stressing, just curious". I don't think he believes me. :)

I have also been devouring the Montauk book. I cannot adequately stress how much I appreciate this book. Even though I haven't applied yet, it has helped immeasureably with my confidence. Something I learned from my father a long time ago was to listen for the ring of truth in something. Generally you can tell when someone or something is giving you great, solid, and useful advice. I have also learned to listen to that small nagging voice in the back of my mind. If I have that nagging voice while listening to a salesman, or during an interview, or reading a post on the BW forums ;), I've learned to ignore it at my own peril. That little voice was pretty loud when buying my timeshare, but I ignored it and bought anyway. Ugh! That was a huge mistake.

While reading this book I find myself saying "of course! why didn't I think of that." while I'm reading through his suggestions. The ideas he presents are very self evident once they are explained. That is the mark of something that is truly great. Several of the sections are invaluable even if you don't read the rest of the book. To me those sections start with Chapter 8 (Marketing Yourself) and continue through chapter 12 (Interviews). I would also read through the Application Essay Examples in the back of the boook.

Chapter 8 (Marketing Yourself: General Principles) goes through the process of using themes and general positioning during your application. He spends a lot of time discussing how you want to present a totally unified message throughout your application essays. This chapter also includes statements from the admissions directors at many of the top schools. Universally they say that most applicants do a very poor job of marketing themselves. In fact if you can effectively market yourself through your essays and your interview, that will be the single greatest thing you can do to advance your candidacy.

Chapter 9 (Understanding the Key Essay Topics) covers twenty one different generic essays questions. While these essay questions are not exactly the same as those asked by the schools, the gist of the information requested is highly relevent. In this chapter he breaks down what the purpose of asking the question is, what the typical applicant does on this question, and then gives you a better approach to the question. Again there are a lot of quotes from admission directores attesting to this better approach.

Chapter 10 (How to Write Persuasive Essays) covers the nuts and bolts of organizing yourself and writing your essays. There is some really great advice in here on how to make the essays effective, how to tie them together, and how to extract the best information to use in each.

If you can only read a few chapters from this book, I would highly suggest that you read these three chapters.

Chapter 11 (Recommendations) covers the best way to choose recommenders, and how to guide and prepare them through this process so that you will get the most effective recommendations possible. He also discusses how to use the recommendations in the context of your overall marketing effort. Again, great information here.

Chapter 12 (Interviews), I have to admit this the chapter that I am currently reading so I can't give a complete review of this chapter yet. However so far I have been greatly impressed with the depth of questions presented in this chapter. Some of those questions might have given me pause if they were asked of me in an interview. So far excellent information though.

Posts are migrated to blogger

Ok, my posts are finally migrated over from http://beowulf.opencoder.org. I'm not going to migrate the comments over though, I think that will be more pain than I want to feel today. Migrating posts is kind of a pain in the but IMO.

I really like the new setup that blogger has now. It is much easier to use, although it still lacks a few features that I would like. I would like a recent comments, similar to recent posts on the sidebar. I would also like better built in traffic analysis. Currently I'm testing two different traffic analysers on the site, so I suspect that is making the site load a bit a slower.

Overall, I'm quite please with the changes. I *really* like the ability to save something in a draft status. The other bonus is that the site is really fast.

Buyers Remorse

So I bought an IPOD last week, brought it home and it sat there for a full week, undisturbed. I came to the realization today that I simply don't have much music to put on it, and in general I don't listen to music that frequently. Typically I listen to talk radio or NPR. So I took the IPOD back to Best Buy today. They were really good about taking it back, even though they are going to have to mail the check to me. The final kicker on the IPOD was when I realized that it's cost would nearly cover the airfare for another trip back east to check out the schools this september. So once again I'm IPODless, although I still have my Mac. :)

United Way

I have really missed donating to the United Way at work during this past year, so today I decided it was time for me to take some action. I called the local United Way, and scheduled an appointment with the president. He is going to come out to my work and bring me an informational packet so I can make the presentation to my boss. Hopefully my company will go for it, United Way is a good charity.

I also decided that I would get more personally involved with the organization, so he is bringing me some information on helping out with some of their committees. I happened to mention that I'm a programmer, and surprise surprise, they need some help with their web site. Oh well, as long as I can get on some non-technology related committees as well. :) I have to admit, they definitely make it easy to jump in and help.

Golf frenzy

As I tend to do everything I do, I've thrown myself into Golf this past week. With another trip on last sunday, a trip to the driving range yesterday and another early round of golf this morning.

It's been very nice to get back into a hobby that isn't computer related. It has helped to restore some balance back to my life.

Wife had surgery today

My wife went in for a Laproscopy today. Everything went well, and they didn't find any evidence of problems. Surgery is a very exhausting experience, both for the patient and for the person taking care of the patient. I took today off work, and I will be working from home tomorrow in order to take care of her. She's a bit drugged up at the moment, but in good spirits.

Reassessing schools

This last weekend was interesting for me. After reading the write up by MBA Traveler on the s2s forum, I thought I would take another look at Harvard as a potential school. Aspects of the Case Study method really appeal to me, so I actually began to lean strongly towards Harvard as a potential school choice.

In addition to leaning this direction, I have been reading the Business Week forums.
I posted a question for an essay consultant about my chances of getting into Harvard, Wharton and Stanford. He instantly dismissed my chances at Harvard, but said he thought I might have a shot at Wharton or Stanford. I was pretty bummed out after that experience. I talked to Hella about it over ICQ for an hour or so. He gave me some incredibly good information, and some very insightful comments. To all of you going through this process, I would highly recommend you find someone to mentor you along in this process, because it can be immensely helpful to get their encouragment when you are down, and their overall perspective into this process in general. Thanks Hella, you rock! :)

Let me state for the record that I don't recommend the Business Week forums. Negativity is very pervasive on them. Another good point that Hella made is that the job of an Essay Consultant is to sell doubt. If they can't make you doubt you have the ability to get into a good school without them, they won't make any money. I know Wharton for instance seriously frowns on using an Essay Consultant, particularly if they write your essays for you.

I've decided instead of using an Essay Consultant to focus on the Montauk book. I have to say I'm really impressed at this point. There is some very good information in there, and I feel my confidence climbing already.

New IPOD

I bought a shiny new IPOD today. I opted for the 15 Gig version rather than the 20 or 40 Gig version. The 20 Gig was $100 more than the 15 Gig, and the 40 Gig was $200 more. It's charging up right now, I can't wait for it to finish charging so I can start loading some of my audio books onto it.

Early morning golf

I went golfing with the guys here at work this morning. It was a great trip, despite the 6:32 am tee time. I shot a 55 on a par 37, which I consider quite good for my first time out. Surprisingly I was able to get a few solid shots with my driver, although my 3 wood had bad mojo today. I felt pretty good about the round, and I look forward to golfing again on Sunday.

Shrek 2

I took my wife to see Shrek 2 last night. I found the show to be entertaining, although I didn't find it quite as funny as the last Shrek. There was good comedic interplay between the characters, Donkey wasn't as funny to me though. One of the new characters was quite good, and the antagonism between this new character and Donkey was thoroughly enjoyable.

I doubt you are supposed to critique kids movies on plot and character development, but I'm going to do it anyway. :)

The plot was pretty good, although not as solid as Shrek 1. There were a few times during the early parts of the movie that I felt my eyes getting heavy. Later however the action picked up a bit, and the interplay between the characters was better.

Shrek 2 was very character development oriented, as was the original Shrek. A lot of the story focused on the relationship between Shrek and Fiona. There were quite a few adult overtones mixed into the movie, and a lot of kissing between Ogres. Overall it was an enertaining movie.

I give this movie a 7 out of 10.

Excellent school visit journal

On the s2s wharton boards, MBA Traveler posted an excellent diary of his visits to several different schools. The thread really tries to capture the spirit of the school and other salient aspects. Wharton is not the only school covered, and it is well worth a read. It got me considering other schools that I might like if I didn't get into Wharton. After reading through it, Harvard actually sounds like a very interesting choice as well.

Here is the link:
http://s2s.wharton.upenn.edu/wh-wharton/messages?msg=4478.1

Relaxing on the Golf course

I went to the golf course and hit a bucket of balls today. That was good for my soul. I have been so filled with different anxieties lately that I've had a difficult time relaxing. I realized today that golfing is exactly what I needed. The guys have been trying to get me to golf with them before work, but I've been resisting because the tee time is at 6:30 am. After going out today, I caved and decided I'm going to go with them tomorrow. I also called another buddy of mine to set up a tee time for sunday morning. Now if I can just get my slice straightened out. :)

Troy

I went on friday and saw the new movie Troy. I greatly enjoyed this movie and its excellent character development. One of my major pet peeves is when a story tells me that a hero is a badass but largely fails to show it. For good character development to take place, you can't tell something like that, you must show it. Hero development is handled excellently in this movie. The battle between Hector and Achilles was perhaps the best, most intense fight scene I've ever seen and the events leading up to it are an excellent escalation of the tension.

While the movie doesn't follow closely the storyline the Illiad, it instead sticks close to the spirit of the book. The gods are not active participants in the events of men as they are in the Illiad, rather they are deities to be consulted and prayed too, however they remain silent. Instead of the gods, they focus on the interaction and conflict between Agammemnon and Achilles, between Paris and Menelaus, and between Hector and Achilles.

The movie can be a bit bloody at times, which you might expect from a war movie. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed it, enough that I will go see it again in the theater, something that is rare for me these days. I also went and bought a copy of the Illiad, and started reading it again. If you like war movies, I highly recommend Troy.

Wharton essays posted

I've been fighting some type of cold for the last couple of days. It's really been making me feel run down. It's odd too, because I'm not usually sickly, however the last while I've been pretty run down. Hella keeps telling me I need to eat some more calories.

Wharton has the new essays up for the 2005 application year. Time to start working through those now.

GMAT Perspective

After completing the GMAT on Saturday, I never would've guessed that I would spend the rest of the day and most of Sunday sweating whether or not my score was good enough.

When I started this process of studying for the GMAT (after that initial Kaplan score [shudder]) I had set my sites on 690 for a decent score. After a bit more study, and some more serious thought though, I realized that if 713 was the average GMAT score of the schools I'm looking at, a score of 690 would put me towards the bottom side of that average. At that point I started thinking 700+ is what I ought to shoot for. That lasted for a while, until I realized that I just didn't want to be underneath the average all, so I was hoping for 713+. Of course, I didn't want to settle for just being average, so then I decided that 720+ would be ideal. I never really consciously changed my desired score higher than that, but I realized when I saw my 740, that I had been hoping for higher. Perhaps it was also that I realized I could do better than I had. The 82nd percentile in math didn't help either.

I posted on the s2s wharton boards though and asked if 82nd percentile with a 740 overall would be considered low. Alex Brown responded with "the quant score is greater than 80% so no worries there. cheers, alex".

I also sent an e-mail to Hella, and IM'd with him today about it. He's been very helpful in talking me down from taking the GMAT again. He had the same feelings that I did, for the same reasons. He knew he could do much better than he did on the GMAT. It also helped that we had the exact same overall score (740), so I feel like I'm in good company if nothing else. :)

So at this point, I don't think I'll take the GMAT again. I've got a lot of work to do on essays, and I need to pull in some extra cash this year to get rid of some debt. So it's time for me to buckle down and start writing out some essays. :)

Why and MBA?
Why now?
Why Wharton?

Took the GMAT today

Ok, I finally got through the GMAT today. Wow, what a long day!! I got up this morning at 6:00 am, so I could walk on the treadmill and still have some extra time to review some questions and do some last minute cramming. I left my house at about 8:10 and got to the testing center at 8:30 am, 30 minutes before exam time. There was some paperwork to fill out, which included copying a paragraph verbatim saying that I won't disclose any questions. They are pretty serious about not letting you have anything in the testing center, no food, no water, none of your own pencils or paper etc. The only thing you can have is your ID, everything else they give you.

I worked my way through the analysis of an issue and the analysis of an argument, I think I had pretty compelling arguments. :) When I hit the math section I started getting some pretty tough questions, which I took as a sign that I was doing pretty well. I got a combination question at question 11, and at question 23 or 24 I got a probability question that stumped the crap out of me. When that question came up, the power went out!! wtf?!?!? I thought everything I had done was lost, but it turns out that they keep a very accurate running record of what you have done, pretty much up to the second. I had to wait around for 5 and half hours for the power to come back on!! For two of those hours I ran home and got a quick bite to eat and a 10 minute nap. Then I hurried back and waited for two more hours. I think the break in the middle of the math section really hurt me, because when I finally got back in there I felt the difficulty of the questions plummet. I never did figure out that stupid probability problem, it was much more difficult than anything I'd studied. I looked at my pre-calculus book and it didn't cover the material it asked at all.

I felt pretty good going through the verbal section although I was worn out at that point. I kept watching the clock hoping the stupid test would be over at this point. I had the thought of randomly clicking through the test just to get done a few times. I resisted my testicidal temptation though and slogged my way through.

I was a bit hesitant to see my scores, and thought for a minute about not getting them. In the end I clicked 'report scores'. My score break down is as follows:

Math Section:
Scaled Score - 47
Percentile Rank - 82

Verbal Section:
Scaled Score - 46
Percentile Rank - 99

Overal:
Scaled Score - 740
Percentile Rank - 98

So I'm not in love with my math score, but I guess that's a decent score overall. I'm a little worried though because on the s2s Wharton boards they have said they like to see 80th percentile or above on math. While 82 is above that, it's not above it by much. I really don't know if that 82nd percentile will hurt my chances, and I'm thinking about re-taking it, because I don't think it accurately reflects my abilities. I'll have to think about it for a while, for now I'm exhausted. Time to go get some grub.

Why Blog, Why Now, Why Moveable Type?

In the spirit of the MBA essays, I thought I would answer these three questions to get the blog started.

Why blog?
The MBA process is a rigorous and time consuming process. It requires serious amounts of personal introspection, a deep understanding of where you have been, and a good idea of where you are going.
So why should I write about my experience? Part hubris, part sincere generosity, part desire to have a record. I believe that keeping a record of your life changing experiences can have a profoundly positive impact on your life. It gives you something too look back on and reflect upon. A journal could have just as easily filled the role of keeping a record.
The desire to help. When I started this process, it was difficult to find any good information about it. There are a lot of posts on bulletin boards, newsweek and businessweek, but many of the posts are incoherent, rude or incomplete. What I wanted was a more complete picture of the application process. What is it like, what should I know about it, what would you do differently if you had to do it again. I really have liked the blogs I've found. They provide many of these answers, and have been a great source of both information and inspiration to me.
Hubris. I believe I can get into a good school if I work hard enough. If I were just planning to attend some rinky dink local university, I don't believe I would find this blog inspiring. It's the desire to be the best, to compete with the best, and to ultimately prevail in convincing a top school that I would be a suitable MBA student. Even should I fail in this endeaver, I believe the value of this record lies in the attempt.

Why Now?
Because it has begun. I am now in the process, and if I want to have any kind of a record, I believe it is better to keep the record while you are in the thick of things, rather than recording it later. Personally my recollection of events tends to change in order to suit my interpretation. By recording my experience along the way, I hope to convey an accurate sense of the ups and downs of this process.

Why Moveable Type?
Initially Hella set me up with a blog using WordPress. I really like the interface of word press, it has some really nifty features. There are some problems with the beta implementation though, and it turned out not to be suitable for the arrangement between Hella and myself. The nice thing about Moveable Type is the migration to Word Press is easy, so the site will stay in Moveable Type until Word Press is good enough to meet our needs.
(edit 5/28/2004: I'm clearly not using Moveable Type any more)

Taking the GMAT

I have registered for the GMAT this upcoming saturday. I have been studying for the last month or two getting ready for it. I have used Kaplan, Princeton Review and the Official Guide during this process. When I have more time, and I have a score from the GMAT, I'll go back through and discuss what strategies I used to study for the test. Saturday we'll find out how effective my studying has been.

Welcome to my site

I am planning to get into an MBA program starting in 2005. This site is my blog about the process in general. I'm writing it under a nom de plume in order to allow me to be as truthful and honest about this process as I can, without jeopardizing my chances at a given school should someone happen to read this blog.

(edit 5/28/2004 - Previously this site was hosted by Hella on opencoder.org, you can check out his blog at http://hella.opencoder.org. Thanks for the hosting Hella!)