Gatehouse Admissions

Having worked with business school applicants for nearly two decades, Liza has seen the bar to admission at the very top schools continually rise. Driving this phenomenon are several factors: First, the typical MBA candidate is savvier, making use of the considerable information and resources readily available on the Internet. As a result, more can... didates are submitting noticeably stronger applications, thereby requiring that all business school applicants up their games to remain competitive. Second, the MBA applicant pools are getting deeper. The business schools themselves, maniacally focused on recruiting and building robust, diverse classes full of future leaders, have increased their marketing outreach, encouraging new potential business school students to apply. Complicating matters, the well-known (and well-respected) pipeline industries to business school, such as private equity, investment banking, and management consulting, continue to grow in size, creating more "traditional" applicants. Both these dynamics are exacerbated by the fact that business school class sizes have remained largely unchanged. This puts considerable pressure on MBA applicants from these traditional industries to stand out in very crowded fields. Third, MBA applications are also getting harder. The MBA admissions teams are constantly tweaking their admissions process-introducing new questions and application components. In recent years, the Stanford GSB launched four new optional questions, each approximately 180 words in length-effectively almost doubling the size of the GSB's written application! In the 2021-2022 business school application season, HBS and Wharton both added new background questions; Wharton also modified its letter of recommendation form-already an anomaly in business school applications. Each of these changes adds to a business school application's complexity, which in turn makes an applicant's journey more challenging. The bottom line: The commitment, energy, and expertise required to develop a winning ...Read More