Dual Degree MBA Applicants: How to Improve Climate Change Essay Narrative
If you are a Dual Degree MBA applicant with career aspirations in Consulting, the Environment, or Policy, there are five ways in which you can add scope to your MBA Essay Narrative.
1) Pick a Climate Change Specialization
Broadly, climate change is caused by non-renewable energy usage, unsustainable agricultural practices (land, water, and fertilizers), wastage in production, incentives that facilitate consumption rather than reuse, culture, outdated production practices (processes, energy, and incentives), and migration to cities (impact on infrastructure and the secondary impact from constructions).
These seven factors permeate through multiple industries and daily behaviors.
Editor’s Note
Memorable narratives all presented behavioral changes and incentives in MBA Essays. Such narratives separate the applicants with generic view of the problem to specialist with plans to implement the change.
How Technical can you get?
Depending on your background, you can introduce industry and functional metrics. But avoid jargon when you can, or expand the abbreviations at least once before mentioning it later in the essay.
2) Cite Failures – Incentives, Demographic and Politics
One of the lines I eagerly scan through in MBA Essays from Dual Degree applicants is failures in implementing a change.
Those who have worked in the Environment or Policy or in Energy space have several examples where a technology prototype didn’t scale or an incentive or power structure in a government prevented a change from mass adoption.
Several of the failures are driven by the fear that disruption could impact a large population who cannot be trained on short notice. While presenting the roadblocks, the tone must be neutral, and the proposed solution should be related to an incentive that changes the behavior of those influencing policies. Such narratives are the most believable than a top-down technology or policy intervention.
One of the applicants proposed a retraining program in a large US city that was flexible and involved a steady income as an intern over specialized training that require gaps in employment. Although Federal loans existed to manage the expenses, the high interest rate – 6% and above in educational loans, discouraged a large percentage of Manufacturing workers from upskilling. In addition to the solution, the applicant cited her experience in an emerging economy where such an incentive worked.
Writer’s Tip
Any essay narrative driven by the ethos of ‘applying what I have learned’ has the most persuasive power.
3) Short-Term Goals - Leverage the School’s Network and Infrastructure
Most choose a Dual Degree program to leverage the network of the school.
Many in influential roles can assist with the applicant’s ambitious and often unconventional solution. Here, connecting short-term goals with a professor’s mentorship or working with cross-functional experts in Finance, Technology and Consulting is the best way to make the essay narrative impactful.
School’s Functional Centers
Schools with dedicated Environment, Climate Change, or Energy centers are anticipating an intermingling of ideas from participants in multiple academic disciplines. Such engagements are central to many innovations. They will also be in the school’s news cycle with new initiatives and the participation of expert speakers from the industry.
The best way to understand the impact of such centers is by monitoring the news releases and events page of the school for 1-3 months. If, after a big bang PR around the inaugural week, you see little activity (speaker series, research paper, news release on investments/donation, or competitions), you can be certain that the school has limited value to offer.
Admissions Consultant’s Note
From how I will get into a top school, think about how you will get and add value. This switch in perspective can dramatically improve your MBA Essay narrative.
Meet the Current Student
If you get the opportunity to visit the campus, don’t waste time attending the general information sessions or class experience. As in most dual degree MBA programs, the cohort is close-knit and often separate from the full-time MBA cohorts. Even the schedules and electives have large divergences. You will get several unique perspectives by meeting current Dual Degree participants from your target program.
Ask them about three values:
1) Value from the Curriculum
2) Value from networking
3) Value from professors
Note down all the specific examples that helped the participant come closer to a solution or drastically improved their understanding of the problem they are planning to solve in the near term.
An applicant shared how just by being in a university known for patenting renewable energy solutions, she was able to find a solution that had never crossed her mind while offering policy consultation for a government in the middle east.
Now that you have learned 3 ways to add scope to your Climate MBA Essay narrative, let us cover three cliches but effective narratives.
4) Funding – Cliché but A Good Motivation
In the 2010s, this was the most common essay I edited.
At that time, none of the governments were moving with such determination to change the law or production practices. Even the general populace was debating the risks of climate change. Now that extreme weather has become common, the challenge is different.
If you are from the US, Europe, or cities in Asia, a general ‘funding doesn’t exist’ to offer a solution has the lowest believability.
Editor’s Note
The lion's share of the funding has been sourced through the public sector and through government-affiliated organizations. The gaps in funding are mostly from individuals and private companies.
Education and Branding
A cliched but effective narrative is around educating about climate change to ‘highly’ educated professionals.
One of the essays I read was about this gap in understanding climate change among city dwellers. When the applicant put a risk to real estate in the outreach, the reception to funding initiatives improved.
While policy, technology, and funding are the common narratives I have read, marketing and branding also have a huge influence on raising funds.
Schools with Marketing specialization are non-existent, but there are a few with strong marketing cohorts in the incoming class. A peer-to-peer learning narrative in such schools would help improve the believability of the MBA Essay. See the MBA placement trends to check if your target school has a strong marketing cohort.
Admission Consultant’s Note
When an accounting applicant shared her interest to join a dual degree MBA program, her primary concern was how to make her pre-MBA experience relevant for the narrative. A smaller engagement with a UN-affiliated organization, auditing the expenses and budgeting for renewable energy adoption in a large hybrid plant was sufficient experience to demonstrate her motivation.
Her perspective on changing auditing rules to incorporate the long-term impact of climate change and its costs on the cities was unique. Such perspectives need to be part of the Essays.
For help structuring the motivation for your Essays, Subscribe to our Editing Service.
5) Interpersonal Influence – Cliché but A Good Motivation
Another cliché but non-existent narrative now is improving influence in Climate Leadership through tailored leadership development experiences. I understand why applicants hesitate to mention leadership development.
One, schools might assume that you don’t have sufficient leadership skills.
Two, the narrative will be non-technical in a job market where General Management roles are diminishing.
For schools with strong General Management placements, use the leadership or interpersonal influence narrative.
There is a good reason for this.
The latest IPCC report on Climate change has cited lack of engagement in private citizens, insufficient marketing, low literacy and lack of leadership, especially political leadership as reasons for the slow pace in adopting solutions to mitigate climate change.
Building awareness through policies, marketing, branding, and educational initiatives requires leadership skills.
If the school has a history of building awareness around climate science, such initiatives could be used as a template for building awareness in other parts of the world. This is just one example on quoting school’s resources.
Research and leadership
Research is another key aspect of bringing change. Many times, research initiatives exist in siloes in large universities. With leadership, applicants can bring experts and research into one platform through a niche speaker series catering to one of the seven factors we have highlighted that caused Climate Change.
1) Non-renewable energy usage
2) Unsustainable agricultural practices (land, water and fertilizers)
3) Wastage in production
4) Incentives that facilitate consumption rather than reuse
5) Culture
6) Outdated production practices (processes, energy, and incentives)
7) Migration to cities (impact on infrastructure and the secondary impact from construction)
1 and 2 are the niches where the government and public consciousness are focused the most.
By highlighting one of the 3 to 7 initiatives in your MBA Essay, you can bring interesting angles to a large societal problem.
6) Hands-On Experience - Cliché but A Good Motivation
The Global Experiential learning initiatives quoted from the MBA Curriculum might be the most cliched part of the goals essay, but to demonstrate motivation, you must cite such experiences.
A reason for this is the disparity in awareness, technology, and processes around climate change technologies and policies in different parts of the world.
A consultant from a top firm with experience in an emerging economy is extremely valuable for a school.
To find unique ways to connect the hands-on experience in the school with your motivation, Subscribe to F1GMAT’s Essay Editing Service. I would be happy to brainstorm and help you perfect the essay with our editing services.
