Growth-Oriented Essay: Curiosity can be seen in many ways. Please share an example of how you have demonstrated curiosity and how that has influenced your growth. (up to 250 words)
Background Information: The applicant, an Entrepreneur from India narrates his first entrepreneurial experience – facilitating exchange of stamps in the late 1990s.
Curiosity: Culture
Curiosity (Explained): Sometimes the challenge faced by an entrepreneur are cultural. From Silicon Valley investors who have a bias in favor of SaaS companies to investors in certain countries prioritizing models of scaling that worked before, the lack of curiosity is a malaise across cultures. For the applicant, the pitch to an Indian and an American investor is cited to reiterate the value of curiosity.
MBA Essay Strategy: Instead of addressing the biases in the investor community that could turn preachy, I wanted to focus on the applicant and his entrepreneurial journey by citing two entrepreneurial experiences – a platform(club) for stamp collection and his Grocery delivery App.
Theme: Culture
Theme (Explained): A culture can be criticized without turning the tone acerbic. The weakness in a culture can be narrated from a historical perspective or you could contrast with two experiences, which I have done for the fund-raising example.
Profile: Entrepreneur
Industry: Technology
Opener: The opener takes the reader to the late 1990s where the applicant learned the first lesson of entrepreneurship – middlemen-model/platform has its limitations.
Sample Harvard MBA Curiosity and Growth Essay – The American Dream (248 Words)
In late-90s India, stamp collection was bigger than TV. I started a club with one condition—a rare stamp of my choosing from both participants. In just a week, I had accumulated stamps from over 70 countries. It was a win-win-win deal for all three players, but the limitation of the middleman was evident as a seven-year-old when the top collectors facilitated meetings outside the club.
When I started a Grocery Delivery ..
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