NYU Stern MBA Essay 1: Change: _________ it (350 word maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font)
In today’s global business environment, the only constant is change. Using NYU Stern’s brand call to action, we want to know how you view change. Change: _____ it. Fill in the blank with a word of your choice. Why does this word resonate with you? How will you embrace your own personal tagline while at Stern? Examples:
Change: Dare it.
Change: Dream it.
Change: Drive it.
Change: Empower it.
Change: Manifest it.
Change: [Any word of your choice.]
**************
Before you get into any random tangent about change, let me give you some background information on when Stern began the “Change” call to action. It began in fall 2019 as a way to navigate the rapid change in business, finance, technology, and marketing ecosystem. The covid-19 shutdown just made the call to action extremely relevant.
Overnight, Businesses, communities, and people had to change business models, behavior, and technology stacks.
It doesn’t matter whether it would be a pandemic or climate-change-driven change that will force businesses and governments to pivot aggressively. MBAs must develop the skills to be agile and swiftly recommend and adopt solutions that help them and their customers thrive.
The Change slogan is Stern’s way of rebranding the existing experiential learning into three broad buckets
1) Dare it = Leadership Experiential learning
2) Dream it = Consulting Solutions
3) Drive it = Entrepreneurial Solutions
Now the question is indirectly asking you – which path represents your career or would give you the most value post-MBA.
Read Sample Change Essays - Preview of Sample Essays (Included in F1GMAT's NYU Stern MBA Essay Guide)
- Sample Stern MBA Manifest It Change Essay - Teenage Homelessness
- Sample Stern MBA Change Essay - Manifest It (Junior Bankers' Health)
- Sample NYU Stern MBA Change Essay - Empower It (Healthy Eating)
Dare It = Leadership
As we have articulated in the leadership lessons series in the book, not all leadership qualities are explicit. However, a pattern of taking the initiative and communicating with all stakeholders without any nudging is a classic leadership trait.
Another trait of a leader is a deep awareness of their strengths and weaknesses. They work actively to improve skills in framing a problem & motivating a team.
In addition to verbal communication, the leaders work hard on their non-verbal cues. This can lead to strange posing in front of the mirror moment before a presentation and acting out a few pivotal ‘key’ moments in a pitch.
Other traits that you should incorporate in the narrative if the word limit permits are fast decision/action and inclusiveness.
A few questions that will help you shortlist relevant achievements and events are:
1. When was the last time you had the opportunity to work on the strengths and weaknesses of your leadership?
2. Which experience has demonstrated your leadership skills?
3. Which experience has tested your leadership skills?
or
Read Sample Essays with Dare It Theme
- Sample NYU Stern Change Essay: Dare It (Finance Candidate)
- NYU Stern MBA Sample Change Essay - Dare It (Investment Banker)
Dream it = Consulting Solutions
Regardless of your industry or function, rarely is any service offered without a consultative framework. It involves defining the client’s problem, understanding the market and competitor dynamics, setting expectations on the opportunities and limitations of the solutions, and finally offering a solution driven by a strong data framework.
The biggest learning curve while offering a consultative solution is interviewing stakeholders. In large consulting companies, there is a framework for interviewing and capturing relevant information. If you are not in the industry, share a process you mastered that helped you reach all stakeholders.
A few questions that will help you shortlist relevant achievements and events are:
1. What were the challenges of interviewing stakeholders?
2. Did you had a chance to correct the biases in the data (sample) or the flaws in framing the question?
3. How did you accurately interpret the competitor and market dynamics?
4. How did your solution help the organization (non-profit) or company?
or
Read Sample Essays with Dream It Theme
- Sample NYU Stern Change Essay: Dream It (Consultant Candidate)
- Sample NYU Stern MBA Change Essay - Dream It (Education Non-Profit)
In your essay, you have to mention how experiential learning will broaden your perspective. If you had traveled previously but have missed a few countries in the DBi list, express your eagerness to be part of the program and offer the reasons for your interest in the country.
How will that experience help your post-MBA goal?
If you were to work in Finance, how will experiential learning programs help you introduce a new financial product to the market?
What can the culture teach you about facing challenges? This question is an important one. Don’t just make it all about post-MBA goals. Bring personal development into the mix.
Drive it = Entrepreneurial Solutions
Ideally, an entrepreneurial solution should be related to starting or scaling a venture, either through funding, operations consulting, technology development, or strategy. If you don’t have such experience, introducing novel solutions, processes, thinking, or approach to the problem within the company is a good example.
Experiential Learning that is offered under the Drive it change slogan:
Endless Frontier Labs
Students venturing into deep tech, life science, and digital tech would get support from Google Ventures, New Enterprise Associates intra-cellular therapies, Rendered AI, Material IMPACT, Sigma Ventures, Hearst Ventures, Syndax Pharmaceuticals, and New Enterprise Associate through a goal-based 9-month mentorship program.
Through the program, students will learn to scale and finance their ventures.
Business Startup Practicum
A primer for starting a new venture, the startup practicum teaches how to create a business plan and incorporate the strategies that help turn ideas into feasible businesses. Students will perform a thorough risk-reward analysis at all levels – strategic, market, operational and financial before finalizing the business plan.
Venture Building for Entrepreneurs and Intrapreneurs
By incorporating design thinking principles, students will learn to manage the uncertainty of validating an idea, segmenting customers, and creating services and products that the market love. Both through the prism of a startup ecosystem and within large organizations, the course will help candidates incorporate quantitative and qualitative research, stakeholder interviewing techniques, and on-field observation to create a sustainable venture.
Entrepreneurs Challenge
The Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship hosted more than 21 schools through a rigorous nine-month competition that included New Venture Competition, Social Venture Competition, and Technology Venture Competition, grouped together as the Entrepreneurs Challenge. More than $350,000 was awarded to 5 teams after filtering out 117 teams with 305+ students competing in the sustainability, AI and data science, technology, healthcare, cleantech, and automation industries.
Sample NYU Stern Change Essay: Drive It (Entrepreneurial Thinking)
Read Sample Change Essays - Preview of Sample Essays (Included in F1GMAT's NYU Stern MBA Essay Guide)
- Sample NYU Stern Change Essay - Sports Injury to Media Startup
- Sample NYU Stern MBA Change Essay - Dream It (Education Non-Profit)
- Sample NYU Stern Change Essay: Dream It (Consultant Candidate)
Get F1GMAT’s NYU Stern MBA Essay Guide (Sample Essays + 300 Pages of Essay Writing & Editing Tips)
