Applying to the ISB - How we went about it

Looking at the profiles of some of our regular contributors and some who aren’t, their rationale in deciding to do their MBA and why they chose ISB to do it in seemed like a good way to help prospective applicants in their decision making process.

Dhar suggested this and so I sent out the questionnaire and got responses from the following people:

Ranjit Babu (RB), Manoj Ramaswamy (MR), Sumit Dhar (SD), Kanan Nabar (KN), Mamta Goyal (MG), Rangararajan Govindan (RG), Damandeep Soni (DS), Manu Dhir (MD) and Girish Nanappa (GN).

1. Your age, years of experience, last job and educational background

RB: 25, 2.5 years, Market and Media research software, BE Electronics and Telecomm.

MR: 26, 4 years, Planning & Budgeting, Corporate Finance (Dr.Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd) Chartered Accountant

SD: 27, 4+ years, Information Security, BTech

MG: 31, 8 years+, Team Lead(software dev. in telecom), B.Tech. in Computer Engineering

KN: 25 years, 4 yrs 5 mths in Marketing communications. Last job was as an Account Manager in the Rural Mktg Division of Ogilvy & Mather, Mumbai. B.Sc. (Hons.), M.A.

RG: 26, 5.5 years, Research Analyst with Deloitte Consulting, B.Com, CA

DS: 27, 4 years+, IT Consulting , BE Elec. Engineering

MD: 26, 3.5 yrs, Team Lead(software dev. in telecom), B.E (Information Science & Engg.)

GN: 32, 7 years+, ASIC design/verification, BE and MS in Elec. Engineering

2. When did you start thinking of doing an MBA?

RB: Working 1.5 years down the line, I realized I needed a career shift. I talked to a few friends and colleagues and an MBA at that juncture seemed 'wise'.

MR: About 2-3 years into my job when I started to get the feeling that MBAs may be preferred over non-MBAs as one goes up the corporate ladder.

SD: Around 2002. But finalized it only around Mar 2003.

MG: Immediately after completing engg. but seriously considered it around 2 years back.

KN: Started thinking about it in mid-2002 - was the best way to help me steer my career in mainstream marketing.

RG: Was clear about it from the time I qualified as a CA in May 2001. I planned to get three years of work-ex after CA on the CV and start the MBA in 2004 – which is what I did.

DS: I started thinking about an MBA right out of college. Waited for 3 -4 yrs to get decent work experience and apply to colleges.

MD: During the final year of my engineering course. Seriously considered it about a year back.

GN: My final decision was the result of discussing it casually with friends and acquaintances for about 2-3 years prior and then visiting other b-schools in 2003.

3. When did you take your GMAT? How long did you prepare for it? What was your primary preparation material?

Everyone responded that the resources they used were the Kaplan GMAT Book, Kaplan Test Prep software, the GMAT Official Guide, Princeton Review books and PowerPrep software from www.mba.com

RB: January 2004. I prepared for about two or three months- seriously began reading the Official Guide and worked on the Powerprep in the last month.

MR: January 2003. Prepared for abt 2 months @ ~2 hours per day. I didnt find Barron’s very useful.

SD: September 2003. Prepared seriously for 3 months. Around 10 hrs a week. Also used quite a few online sources, which while not directly related to GMAT helped me a lot nevertheless. One example is: http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html

MG: July 2003. Prepared seriously for two months prior to taking the exam.

KN: Took the GMAT in Oct 2002. Prepared for about a month while I was working - took a 10 day break prior to the test.

RG: Jan 2001 – At that time I had taken the CAT and felt it would be good to place the GMAT close to that date. In my opinion, the prep for CAT and GMAT overlap significantly.

DS: June 2000. Standard prep, nothing special

MD: Dec 2003. Prepared for 1 month.

GN: May 2003. Prepared quite seriously for a month prior to taking exam.

4. Schools considered/applied to other than ISB

RB: None! I was considering INSEAD when I received an offer letter from ISB.

MR: Nanyang Business School – Singapore, LBS.

SD: Wharton, Stanford, HBS, Kellogg and Tuck

MG: Kellogg, Columbia, MIT and Duke

KN: Considered National University of Singapore & Asian Institute of Mgmt, Manila - applied only to AIM.

RG: None

DS: Cornell, Duke, CMU, Indiana, Emory, Kenan Flagler

MD: None.

GN: INSEAD, Simon - University of Rochester, Yale - SOM, Nanyang Business School – Singapore

5. Sources of information about the ISB, prior to joining

RB: ISB website, Yahoo groups, BW Forums, ISB Blogs, emailing alums.

MR: Mani Iyer (Batch of 2002)

SD: Primarily Nikhil Gehrotra, founding batch, ISB Website, various online Forums. Obviously blogs like this were not in vogue that time. :)

MG: Friends, ISB website and ISB session at Bangalore

KN: Alumni (Class of 2003 & 04) - Had 2-3 good friends who studied here & had shared their experiences through out - 95% of my decision was based on their experiences during the course and after. Other sources were the ISB website (for faculty, details), brochure, media articles (largely around placements).

RG: Followed school right from inception. Have had a friend in every batch that has passed out so far, so information has been available all along.

DS: ISB website (for faculty details), Business India, ET articles ,friends from Infy

MD: Alumni, ISB website and ISB road show at Bangalore

GN: Arjun Chittoor – from the ISB batch of 2004, ISB website (for faculty details), Business India, ET articles.

6. What are your top two reasons to join ISB?

RB: Located in India. The Faculty.

MR: Importance given to workex, affiliations (Wharton, LBS, Kellogs).

MG: The faculty and the fee.

KN: The duration of the course and convenient funding options (9 yr loan)
RG: Wanted a quality one-year program. Wanted that to be in India if possible.

DS: The Faculty.

MD: Faculty, exposure and unique one-year program suited for working professionals.

GN: The Faculty. The location (close to Bangalore - hometown) and fee structure.

7. Round of application when applying to ISB – 1st round (Dec 2003), 2nd round (Feb 2004). Did you visit ISB prior to applying and was it helpful in making decision?

RB: Second round (Feb 2004). I couldn't visit ISB because I was based abroad.

MR: 1st round. Visited many times before applying since I was working at Hyderabad. A visit certainly impresses you.

SD: Second Round. Didn't visit prior to applying

MG: 2nd round in Feb 2004, didn't visit ISB prior to applying.

KN: Applied in the 1st round. Visited ISB in Oct. 2003 - meeting alumni & getting a feel of the environment on campus both helped consolidate my decision and motivated me during the application process.

RG: First round. I visited ISB about a year before I applied. I already had favourable inputs on the school, so the visit really just helped reinforce the positive image.

DS: Applied in the 1st round. I didn't visit ISB as I was abroad at the time of applying.

MD: 2nd round. No – did not visit.

GN: Applied in the 2nd round Visited ISB in Oct. 2003, very helpful in making my decision.

8. Who were your referees and why did you choose them?

RB: A senior manager in the firm I worked for and my undergrad professor. I was closely associated with the manager during my tenure; I chose to ask a professor for reference because it hadn't been too long since I graduated. I was sure that both of them would not hesitate to provide me with stellar recommendations :)

MR: First referee - CFO of the organization where I worked. Reasons- he had constantly encouraged me to take up further studies. And I hv worked under him for a few projects. Hence the right person to assess me on my core area of finance. Second referee- Sr VP- Marketing. Reasons – I felt it was important to highlight that I hv worked in cross functional teams and had a holistic perspective of an organization. Hence the choice of the marketing person to underline this.

SD: My referees were both people I had worked closely with over an year. I felt they had guided me quite a bit in my career as well as my MBA application process. One of them was an external consultant who had worked with us on various Information Security initiatives and the second was my immediate boss.

A small note: Someone I know had called me up earlier this week asking if the professors from college days were OK as referees. Ideally I would suggest that you get your recos from your workplace/professional lives. If there is some genuine reason why you cant do that, only then go for recos from college professors etc.

MG: People who I had worked with very closely - one of them was my manager in previous organization for almost 2.5 years and the other was my peer with almost the same experience as I had. They knew me well and were in a position to write a fair assessment.

KN: One of my referees was my immediate superior at O&M who had later moved for another assignment - a lot of my essays revolved around my experiences while working as part of his team. I was quite confident that he would present a balanced view about me. The other was from a Professor who was my guide in the Honours Programme at the undergraduate level. He brought a different perspective (from an academic p.o.v) added added to the to the other referral (that was purely professional).

RG: My immediate boss at Deloitte and the boss one level above that.
My immediate boss – because it’s almost mandatory! J Well, I had worked with this person for the last three years at two organizations – as colleague and as sub-ordinate. I knew he would give me strong, well-rounded reco. My boss’ boss – Expat (Irish) – felt it would add a nice “international” touch to the app! I worked with an offshore team based in Hyderabad for Deloitte Consulting US. All my work was with consultants from the US firm and I felt this reco would kind of help support that position. I had of course worked very closely with this person.

DS: My roomies and a close friend were my referees. One of them was in Stern and the other is extremely profound. Good help in finalizing my essays

MD: Previous bosses. I chose the bosses I was currently working with, because I was doing well at my organization and felt they were the best persons to write a recommendation.

GN: Both of my referees were people who I had worked with fairly extensively. One was from a client company and quite senior and the other was from my own company and a year my senior. I could trust them to provide an objective reference while being reasonably enthusiastic about me.

9. Had you decided on an area of interest prior to joining ISB? Which area?

RB: I worked on Technology for some time, and was in close contact with Market research systems at work. I came in looking for some extra gyaan on Technology and sound fundamentals in Marketing.

MR: I had not decided at that time. In the course of the first couple of terms, I hv firmed up on specializing in Finance.

SD: Vaguely yes. Knew it would probably be related to IT and Marketing.

MG: Yes - Entrepreneurship

KN: Yes. Marketing - that has largely been my area of work and interest. The objective of the MBA is to help me further my career in this field.

RG: Clear again from the start (2001) - Analytical Finance and LCM.

DS: I wanted to dabble with Product Management. Consulting as usual was a backup.

MD: Yes - Marketing.

GN: Based on my knowledge/work-ex outside of ISB, I had decided Technology and was also keen on International Business (not at ISB).