“Thank you for completing the Stanford MBA Recommendation letter before the Round 1 deadlines. Greatly appreciate your time.”
“Now let us start with the MIT Sloan MBA program”
“Can you just rephrase the recommendation letter and use it for MIT Sloan”
Meeting Round 1 deadlines is a challenge even for the well-intended applicants. Schools are on a race to set the record for the earliest deadlines. From Early Bird to the Earliest Bird, it is not far away in the future when August will become the standard for Round 1 Deadlines. Right now, preponing of deadlines have gone as early as September from the standard October Deadlines. January First Week Round 2 deadlines have remained unchanged.
Pick your Favorite
Even if you appreciate MIT Sloan and Stanford in equal measure, you have a favorite. By putting all your energy on one school for the Round 1 deadline, you are likely to go through the deliberation that is required to complete the essays. Even if two schools target an Entrepreneurial minded MBA aspirant, the culture is starkly different. Without recognizing the culture, and creating a one-fit essay for all schools, you are jeopardizing your chances. You might have attended the MBA info sessions of your favorite schools, and the interactions with the Alumni have revealed inside information about both the programs. You might have done your own research by reading our Comprehensive MBA Research Guide. What factors attracted you to one school over the other? After shortlisting your favorite MBA program, it is time to put your energy on one MBA application.
MBA Recommendation Letter
When recommenders ask you to rephrase the letter for other schools, you know that you have picked the wrong recommender. Unless, the supervisor mentored you to who you are, it becomes impossible to fight the argument that “they don’t have the time to complete 5 different recommendation letters.” Recommendation letter verifies the spin that you have put to your story. If there is no connection between what you have highlighted in essays, and the recommendation letter, even the best-crafted essays will not find any buyers. Let us assume that you don’t have a mentor, but you can follow some of the best practice to make the 2-part strategy work for the recommender.
Informal Meeting
Start with an informal meeting. Take the recommender to his favorite pub, and talk about life in general, and your plans for the future. Get a buy-in for your plan and express how grateful it would be if the recommender invests time for the letters. Discuss how schools evaluate candidates and the importance of customizing recommendation letter according to the school’s culture.
Formal Meeting
Follow up the informal meeting with a formal meeting. Come prepared with the recommendation letter prompts for each school. If you are applying to NYU Stern, the focus should be on your learning ability, and if it is MIT Sloan, you resourcefulness should be the focus of the letter. Reiterate the importance of customizing the recommendation letter.
Plan
Without a concrete plan, getting recommendation letter can be a nightmare. Sit with the recommender, and plan for the next six months. Explain your 2-part strategy where you would apply to two schools in Round 1 and three Schools in Round 2. Your top-2 MBA programs should be part of the Round 1 and Round 2 deadline. Set dates as to when you would like the recommender to complete a draft copy, the final copy and do the review together. Once the dates have been planned, set a clear layout on the themes you would be covering in the essays, and the support you are expecting from the recommendation letter. The recommendation letter should supplement the information offered in the essays. If the focus of your essay is on leadership, emotional intelligence and communication, your recommender should supplement your narrative with his narrative about at least two of the three traits covered in the essay. Communication will be evident with how you translate thoughts in essays. It is rare that someone who can express thoughts fluently in written word fumble during face-to-face communication.
Reminders
Call the recommender and remind him about each deadline with first reminder 2-week before and a second reminder 1-week before each deadline (draft copy, final copy, & Review). Set the final review date, two week before the actual deadline, so that you have enough time to fine-tune your essays according to the recommendation letter. Even though, you have planned extensively for the recommendation letter; the recommender can spring a few surprises by quoting events that you had not intended. If you ask the recommender to rewrite the letter several times, he will lose interest in the 6-month process. Ask him to rewrite the letter only if it does not meet the quality guidelines of a standard recommendation letter, or the event the recommender had quoted undermines your candidacy; otherwise it is better to customize your essays, according to the recommendation letter.
On completing the recommendation letter, buy your recommender a Gift - tickets for the concert, home games, or dinner for the family. You don’t have to wait till the recommendation letter is uploaded.
MBA Admissions