ISB Essay Analysis

Following is our analysis of how essays for admission to ISB 2010-11 batch should be approached.

Essay 1: Give 3 reasons as to why you should be selected to the class of 2011. These reasons should ideally
differentiate you from the applicant pool and should be backed with some data. (300 words max).

This is probably the most significant essay. With just 300 words of leisure space, the canvas is all yours to
paint the town red!! Ok, more realistically, a thorough self-introspection is warranted. Start with a pen
and paper; jot down all the traits you consider your strengths (a laundry list, in the first attempt). Now,
pick up those for which you have real-life incidents to substantiate. Once you have done this, see if you
can ‘group’ those traits into categories so you can cover and convey most of what you want the Admissions
Committee to know.

An alternative way is to jot down the incidents in your life that you think convey something about you.
Don’t be stingy in your first attempt; anything that you did or happened to you, extraneous to your normal
routine, will be a candidate. Now, figure if you can ‘qualify’ each incident against a trait. For example, that
simple “Thank you” note that your colleague sent you for helping him out actually says something about
your skills about working in and as a team. Lastly, again, see if you can ‘group’ these events into buckets
of traits, that have a common thread running.

The idea is to create an imposing essay that deftly conveys all you want to convey of your personality and
simultaneously differentiates you from the applicant pool.

Essay 2: Describe a challenging assignment you have handled (at work or outside) to date. What were the
challenges and how did you handle them. What were the personal learnings you derived from this assignment.
(300 words max).

While the essay asks for “challenging assignment”, the thrust should more be on the challenge than the
assignment. While challenging assignments at work are easy to come by your memory, we would suggest
you thoroughly think through, to see if you handled some challenging assignment outside of work. For one
thing, this would provide variety (since we believe that most of the applicants would narrate an
assignment from work) to the person who evaluates your essay and has the potential to capture the
evaluator’s attention, if articulated well.

The essay should culminate with meaningful learnings that you derived from your challenging
assignment. Your learnings should be logically inferable from your experience (pretty much like GMAT
inference questions).

Unfortunately, people tend to go overboard with the learnings and list out dozens of learnings from one
incident (and how they are now perfect human beings, solely attributed to that incident); the risk you
carry is that the logical relationship between your experience and the learnings is lost and the entire
essay becomes fickle.

Essay 3: Briefly assess your career progression till date along with your assessment of your future career goals.
Discuss how your career goals will be met by the ISB’s one year program. (300 words max).

This essay clearly requires applicants to write their Statement of Purpose. Your career should show
progression that is at least commensurate with your experience and should ideally be interspersed with
good performances, promotions, recognitions and clever career moves. Most importantly, the essay should
show that you know what you want from your career. Your past (career progression), your present (the
decision to apply to ISB) and your future (post ISB career) should fit in well with the larger goal that you
have set for yourself.

Again, a caveat: Many people join ISB with a view to switching careers. While it is a perfectly valid reason
(in fact, ISB regales in publishing data about how many students were successfully able to switch careers
post ISB), for this essay, we would discourage applicants to mention career switch as the reason for
joining ISB, unless your current competencies and the competencies you would acquire at ISB can
convince the evaluator that you are currently in a career that was never meant for you to start with!!

Essay 4 (OPTIONAL): Please provide additional information, if any, that will significantly affect the consideration
of your application to the ISB. Please do not repeat information which has already been stated elsewhere in the
application. You may use this to clarify any breaks in education/work, inform about any other item which you
think has not been covered elsewhere etc. (300 words max).

Do not consider this optional!! Frankly, we think there is no way you can afford to not attempt this essay.
Just think about it…if all others are submitting this essay and you are not, your application is lacking
something in comparison to others; if you are the only one submitting this essay, you have a competitive
advantage. So, in either case you are better off, attempting this essay.

Now, if you think there is no reason for you to attempt this essay since you don’t have any gaps in
experience or education to explain and no meager academic performance to defend, think again!! There
are umpteen aspects of your personality that you have still not told the admissions committee…for
instance, why you specifically think ISB is the best fit for you; why not a regular 2 year MBA and so on.