Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to attend the QS Top MBA Connect 1-2-1 event, infiltrate the MBA admissions process at leading b-schools, find out what they are looking for in future students and report back to HQ with your findings.
Held at the Regent’s Park Holiday Inn, the hotel chain, b-schools from the crème de la crème of the business education world will be present, including Fuqua, IE and Cranfield.
In order to register, you must submit your CV to QS who puts it through their “personalized matching procedure” and will pass it on to their participating schools for further scrutiny. Selected candidates will be contacted and invited to attend the event.
Unfortunately for me, the organisers did not feel my CV cut it. So instead of returning to base empty-handed I did the next best thing: stalk those lucky enough to be “invited” to the QS Top MBA Connect 1-2-1 event.
Having been rebuffed by some MBAs - they probably had bad interviews - I found a few who were willing to talk to me.
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Patrick Okzi, a lawyer by training, was interviewed by Manchester Business School, ESCP Europe, Chicago Booth and RSM Erasmus for a place on their part-time EMBA programs. “The one I’m keen on is Rotterdam because of the location of the business school...Rotterdam is willing to waive my GMAT because I have two Masters,” says Okzi. RSM’s part-time EMBA takes place every weekend making that an additional benefit says Okzi, who works for a small management consultancy.
Talking to other attendees revealed that interviews lasted 20 minutes and the age of candidates ranged from 28 to 45 years. But there was a definite lack of oestrogen -80% of interviewees were male, according to one disappointed male attendee.
Candidates were not interviewed for a place but were asked what their motivations were for their chosen program, why they chose a particular school, what they were looking to achieve and whether the program suits their needs.
Most of the attendees I interviewed told me the experience was worthwhile.
Not everyone, however, was quick to praise the event.
Fui Amevor, a law graduate, slammed QS claiming that the organisation of the event was not that “great.” According to Amevor his interviewer, a business development manager at a top European school, was “stinking of alcohol” and “hadn’t read my CV.”
“He gave me general info that I could look up online,” says the disgruntled MBA applicant.
Amevor intends to apply to Chicago Booth and CEIBS, citing Professor Michael Gibbs at Booth and CEIBS’s focus on sustainable development central to his choice.
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