Minimizing MBA Application Essay Agony
News flash: for most of you, writing MBA admissions essays really isn't much fun. I'm not going to give you another one of those "how to write a good MBA application essay" lectures. There are hundreds of (often very good) blogs and books and articles that cover that ground, and your life won’t be any better if I add to the cacophony.
Instead, I just want to give you some advice on how to minimize the pain involved in writing the essays. Every year, I watch several dozen applicants descend into writer's hell, and it’s never fun to see deserving MBA applicants suffer from a hideous case of writer’s block right before their deadlines.
So here are few tips to help you avoid MBA essay paralysis:
TIP #1: DON’T “BINGE-WRITE” YOUR MBA ESSAYS
So you’re trying to write inspired MBA application essays, huh? The type with some nice, creative flourishes that will help the adcom realize how brilliant and fun you are, right?
If so, don’t even think about trying to write your MBA essays in one sitting. Or in two or three sittings. The best essays are the result of small amounts of writing and revision, completed over the course of several weeks or months.
I discussed this in a crusty old blog post a few years ago, but the idea is that you’re likely to come up with your best ideas when you least expect it: at work, at the gym, in the shower, or on your commute to work. If you spend, say, a few minutes a day on each of your MBA application essays over the course of several weeks, you’ll give your subconscious mind plenty of time to come up with brilliant phrases, ideas, and flourishes for your essays.
The only way this can happen is if you stretch out your preparations for each MBA application. Plan to spend at least a month – and ideally quite a bit more – on each application, working for a few minutes each day, letting your subconscious and semiconscious mind do at least some of the heavy lifting.
Trust me: the slow, five-minutes-at-a-time approach beats the heck out of staring at a computer for 12 hours on the day before the application deadline, while your hairline quickly recedes.
TIP #2: SIMPLIFY THE LANGUAGE THROUGHOUT YOUR MBA ESSAYS
Far too often, MBA applicants write ridiculously dense essays that are almost impossible to read. They feature pretentious vocabulary and long sentences, and they sound like overwrought academic discourses on philosophy.
There are two problems with this. First of all, if you decide to write in the most “sophisticated” style you can muster, you’re probably torturing yourself in the process. It takes a lot of time and brainpower to cram your essays with GRE vocabulary words. Why punish yourself by trying to write in such an unnatural style?
Secondly, very few people actually enjoy reading dense, academic text. Simple, clear language is an infinitely more effective way to communicate with suffering MBA admissions committee members who read literally thousands of essays each year.
So don’t overdo it. Keep the language clear and unpretentious, and don’t make your essay sound like a GMAT reading comprehension passage. Try to write as if you’re having a chat with your best friend. You’ll be able to write faster, and your essays will be far more appealing to the poor MBA admissions officers who are forced to read them.
TIP #3: GET HELP ON YOUR MBA ESSAYS (FROM LITERALLY ANYONE)
This is a simple—and probably obvious—piece of advice: don’t try to write your MBA essays in complete isolation. If your budget and preferences allow you to hire an MBA admissions consultant, that’s great. If not, call a friend or a family member, even if they know nothing about the MBA admissions process.
Here’s the thing: sometimes, you get brain-locked when you try to write about how awesome you are. And sometimes, even a relatively clueless advisor can help you get unstuck; simply babbling to a good friend can help to relieve your essay-writing paralysis. Most of the time, they don’t even need to offer much advice. You’ll come to new conclusions yourself by ranting about your essays.
This might seem like a ridiculously uninteresting piece of advice, but you might be surprised by the number of inquiries we receive from miserable, frustrated writers… who have literally never told a soul about their MBA essays. Please don’t make that mistake.
TIP #4: DON'T WORRY ABOUT THE WORD COUNT IN YOUR MBA ESSAYS... YET
Another refrain that I hear constantly from MBA applicants: “Writing this crap is so hard with the word count and everything!”
That’s completely true. Writing your first draft is hard, and the word count is a pain in the ass. But your first objective is to get your ideas onto the page, and then you can worry about the word count later. If you worry about the word count prematurely, you’ll be paralyzed and miserable. So when you start writing, ignore the word count completely.
If your goal is to write MBA application essays that fit perfectly into the word count, then you’ll inevitably spend hours editing and rewriting. If you want to avoid unnecessary pain, spew your ideas onto the page as quickly as you can on the first draft—and worry about trimming the essay later. Don’t let the word count disrupt the flow of your writing, or else you may never finish the first draft.
TIP #5: BE HONEST: WRITING AN MBA APPLICATION ESSAY IS HARD, AND YOUR FIRST DRAFT WILL SUCK
Whenever I take on a challenging writing project (and in case you don’t know me personally: I’m nearly finished with my third full-length book, and I used to do lots of strange freelance writing work), my first step is to write the words SH**TY FIRST DRAFT at the top of the page.
Why do I do that? Well, because I like to swear at myself. And also because I need to remind myself that writing is hard and that I’ll never finish my first draft if I try to make it perfect. My first draft will mostly suck. Pieces of it will hopefully be brilliant. I’ll spend tons of time revising it, and that’s OK. It’s much easier to polish a crappy draft than to create a brand new one from scratch.
Writing in general is hard. Writing your MBA essays is even harder. So accept your imperfections as a writer and just get the words onto the page. Don’t edit while you’re writing—again, you’ll have plenty of time to edit later.
Let’s face it: it takes a lot of time to write great essays for MBA applications. But if you let go of some of your inhibitions and “analness” on the first draft—and if you work slowly and steadily on your application—you won’t suffer nearly as much as the last-minute binge-writers. You’ll be happier, and your odds of admission will hopefully be a little bit better.