Background Information: An entrepreneur musician shares the power of music in improving the mood of distressed children, her mentorship, and the agency she started to help upcoming artists.
Theme: Music, Education, Job Security
Background Information: The applicant notices one person in his team consistently underperforming. His humane intervention to address the personal challenges helped the teammate rise to a star performer.
Theme: Inclusion, Mentorship
Theme (Explained): Often, mentorship when a peer or a sub-ordinate underperforms need context-setting about the problem.
For the essay, the theme of the intervention is holistic mentorship where the person’s personal challenges are handled sensitively.
Background Information: The applicant – a white male applicant working with a diverse team from China, South Africa, and India for a technology giant, confronts a peer who makes unflattering comments about his international peers on a visit to the US.
Theme: Inclusion, Courage, Xenophobia
Background Information: The applicant proactively offered guidance and mentorship to a junior analyst who was struggling to interpret contracts in an M&A deal
Theme: Inclusion, Mentorship
Theme (Explained): Mentorship to make a peer or a subordinate feel included is the best way to demonstrate your sensitivity to the person’s struggles.
Background Information: In the applicant in charge of leading a team of 20+ associates for an insurance giant witnessed an error in judgment from one of the 5 team leads. Reversing a decision to let go of the person is the ‘risky’ sense of inclusion narrative.
Theme: Inclusion, Ethics, Courage
Background Information: A primary care physician who was shaken by a personal tragedy in rural Iowa starts a non-profit, leveraging connections from her alma mater to fund her venture.
Background Information: A leading YouTube creator in the ‘editing for educational video’ niche narrates a peer’s bout with depression after he faced a stagnation in viewership. The applicant’s encouraging mindset with video collaboration helped the peer feel a sense of inclusion among the creator community.
Theme: Inclusion
Background Information: A technologist narrates the leadership traits he acquired from his entrepreneur father.
We believe Columbia Business School is a special place with a collaborative learning environment in which students feel a sense of belonging, agency, and partnership--academically, culturally, and professionally.
How would you co-create your optimal MBA experience at CBS? Please be specific. (250 words) (Common for both January and August entering class)
Background Information: The Essay is of a Business development person working in Technology.