1. The Admissions Committee is interested in learning more about you on both a personal and professional level. Please answer the following (maximum of 300 words for each section):
a. Why are you pursuing a full-time MBA at this point in your life?
b. Define your short and long term career goals post MBA.
c. What is it about Chicago Booth that is going to help you reach your goals?
Because Personal Statements are similar from one application to the next, we have produced the “mbaMission Personal Statement Guide.” We offer this guide to candidates free of charge, via our online store. Please feel free to download your copy today.
For a thorough exploration of Chicago Booth’s academic program/merits, defining characteristics, crucial statistics, social life, academic environment and more, please check out the mbaMission Insider’s Guide to Chicago Booth.
2. Chicago Booth is a place that challenges its students to stretch and take risks that they might not take elsewhere. Tell us about a time when you took a risk and what you learned from that experience (maximum of 750 words).
The first sentence of this essay question is a “red herring.” Chicago Booth need not play in your response. In fact, we would actually advise against tying the school in. Instead, focus on the second sentence – discussing a time when you took a risk and the learning that occurred thereafter.
For those of you who are conservative and risk averse, you should not worry if you have not taken a significant entrepreneurial/financial risk to date. You might have taken a risk in choosing one career track over another or in championing a professional project that stretched your team/managerial skills/capabilities. Maybe you stepped out of your traditional role/leadership style by initiating a new project via your community endeavors. Of course, an entrepreneurial endeavor is fair game, but few will have such stories. So, you should not feel disadvantaged if the risk you have taken will not send chills down the spine of the AdCom. The AdCom really just wants to know that you have pushed yourself.
You might want to start your essay by placing the reader in the middle of the situation that arose due to the risk taken or you might start by showing how the situation evolved and how you made your decision to pursue one of two competing paths. Regardless of how you approach your essay, you should not just focus on the risk itself but how you weighed your options and what you learned – whether you succeeded or failed. Your ability to reflect and discuss takeaways from the experience will be crucial.
3. At Chicago Booth, we teach you HOW to think rather than what to think. With this in mind, we have provided you with “blank pages” in our application. Knowing that there is not a right or even a preferred answer allows you to demonstrate to the committee your ability to navigate ambiguity and provide information that you believe will support your candidacy for Chicago Booth.
Most AdComs will give you little flexibility and so you will be constrained by their questions – what if a great story does not fit the questions asked? Chicago Booth does away with one question altogether and gives you a blank slate. This flexibility may seem daunting, but it is actually a phenomenal opportunity to give the AdCom a complete/optimal picture of yourself.
Before you even consider your approach to the blank space, you should take a step back, brainstorm and create a “life inventory” of sorts. By cataloguing your most profound experiences, accomplishments and relationships, you will hopefully have a rich trove from which to draw as you start to write. While this essay need not be a catchall — you can focus quite narrowly on a single experience if appropriate — most candidates will benefit by developing a broad image of themselves, revealing a unique set of experiences/accomplishments. Once you have determined which information you want to provide, you can then focus on how you want to present it. (As the Chicago admissions committee notes, this is not an exercise in graphic design. So, you should not fret or hire a creative to work on your presentation if you do not have design skills. You can show creativity and thought, even through a basic approach!)
As you contemplate your structure, you should maintain an open mind. You might look around your room or office and see what jumps out at you. That travel guide to Turkey may inspire you to create a few pages of a travel guide to your apartment (which is in itself an inventory of your life) or a faux country based on you – your banged up briefcase may inspire you to tell the story of how, where and why each scratch occurred. (Don’t use either of these approaches!) Your approach need not be “off the wall” — it just needs to be an expression of you. That written, your only limitation is your imagination (and ability to execute).
Read the full article: University of Chicago (Booth) Essay Analysis 2010-2011