Congratulations! You are on the final leg of going from the military to your MBA.
If you’ve made it this far in the process of going from the military to pursuing an MBA at a top program, the world is seemingly your oyster.
After you submit your application and complete an interview, you have to go through the waiting game. The good news is that schools publish the dates that they will release acceptance notifications. Even if they get to you late in the day, they will get back to you on that day. So there’s no need to anxiously check your email or your phone before that day.
Presumably, you applied to schools that you would actually like to go to. So if you have a few acceptance letters, now comes the time to choose. Look at each program to which you’ve been accepted and think about how each would benefit you differently. Which is the best for your needs based on your evaluation criteria?
Waitlisted
I got waitlisted at my top choice and I can attest that this is super annoying. When will you find out? Seriously—no one knows. I’ve heard of people getting invited to a school off the waitlist a week before class starts. It can happen that late.
The first thing I would suggest should you get waitlisted is figure out a timeline. If you have acceptance offers elsewhere, you may want to figure out a date and say, “Ok, if I don’t hear back from the school by then, I’m just going to cut my losses and go to my top choice from the offers I already have.”
It may be possible for you wait another year for admissions, but considering that most veterans are probably looking to go to an MBA program right from the military this may not work out with your timeline.
Once you have a timeline and a decision point identified, there’s still a few things you can do to boost your profile and increase your odds of acceptance off the waitlist.
First, check out whatever guidelines the university publishes for people on the waitlist. Read those first to make sure you don’t screw up any of their rules — a surefire way to stay on the waitlist.
Next, I would reach out to a student (the veterans’ club can be a good place to start) to try and connect with one of their members who was admitted off the waitlist. There is no guarantee that their experience will be like yours, but it can be a good place to start for advice and to get an idea of the process.
After that, you can send an email to the admissions department simply expressing your continued interest in attending their program. If it is true, you may also say that their school remains your top choice. There is nothing wrong with a little verbal commitment — just keep the message short (an email of three to five lines).
Second, you can update your profile with anything that happened since you submitted your application. As an example, when I submitted my applications I was only in the first month of my DoD Skillbridge internship, so at that time I didn’t have much to say about the experience. By the time I was waitlisted, however, I had completed the internship and had some experience and lessons I’d learned from it.
You may also need to look into beefing up your profile. Especially if you had a lower GPA or quant score on the GMAT or GRE, you may want to consider taking some additional coursework. Two of the more popular options are MBA Math and Harvard Business School’s Credential of Readiness (CORe).
MBA Math is run by a Tuck professor and is very focused on using spreadsheets. Speaking with a Tuck student, MBA Math is very close to what they learn in “math camp” before school starts.
CORe is a highly polished program with lots of great videos and exercises. It’s also a lot more expensive. Even with a military discount, it runs at $700, compared to MBA Math for $149.
I did both courses (I’m an English major and numbers make my brain hurt so I know I needed the help). Value-wise, I found MBA Math to be a lot more beneficial than CORe. The Harvard nametag definitely appeals to a lot of people, but as far as increasing your skills, MBA Math is a better value.
If you don’t mind spending the money, doing both is not a bad idea. While I felt a lot more proficient with hard skills after MBA Math, CORe was far better at teaching me business concepts such as price elasticity, regressive analysis, and relative cost analysis (all terms I had no idea even existed before the course, let alone what they meant).
Remember, the goal with either of these is to score well on the tests and display to the admissions committee that you are capable of doing well academically to get you off the waitlist. Don’t do both just to do both. If you only do one well to get a good grade, then just do one.
Scholarships
Here’s another factor you now have to seriously consider: money.
I did a whole post on this, which you can find here. But keep reading to learn how you can negotiate with your money.
Veterans tend to overlook this factor, mostly because the Post-9/11 GI Bill coupled with a match via the Yellow Ribbon Program covers a lot already. But your acceptance offer may come with additional scholarship money.
And here’s the thing: you can use that money to negotiate. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. This is business school, after all.
Here’s an example of what this might look like:
You got into School A and School B. School A is your choice over School B, but School B offered you some scholarship money.
Take your acceptance letter from School B (with the scholarship amount shown) and send it to the admissions office at School A and say “Your school remains one of my top choices, but I have received a significant financial offer from School B. Would you be able to contribute scholarship funds so that my attendance at your university would be more possible?”
I’ve never heard of a school rescinding an offer because of that. Again, this is business school. They want you to negotiate.
Ok, but if you have the Post-9/11 GI Bill and a Yellow Ribbon Program match, why do you still need scholarship money?
Here’s the hidden secret most people don’t know, whatever scholarship money you get beyond your qualified educational expenses with the university, comes back to you.
Yes, you read that right. It all comes back to you.
So you should absolutely apply for as many scholarships as possible. Because as great as the Post-9/11 GI Bill is, there are still gaps. For one, the housing stipend does not cover 12 months a year. It also gets prorated based on the number of days spent in class in a month. So you may have some out-of-pocket expenses. Even after the military, an MBA is expensive.
MBA students are also known for traveling. A lot. There’s career treks, global studies, ski weekends, and everything in between, both personal and professional. A recent article I saw stated that MBA students spent an average of $18k on travel throughout their MBA experience.
Point being— you will have expenses. So apply for scholarships.
Quick note: Whatever you get beyond “qualified educational expenses” is considered taxable income.
Pre-MBA recruiting
One you have the tag of “admitted MBA student,” you can start recruiting. A consistent comment I’ve heard from people who’ve started an MBA is their surprise at how soon recruiting starts. Schools each have a different policy on when they allow on-campus recruiting, but within the first month is normal.
But you can go ahead and start the process. Once you’ve decided your school, you can go ahead and update your Linkedin profile and anything else with “XYZ School MBA Candidate Class 20XX.” And when you do, expect that people start reaching out.
There are also specific recruiting events just for admitted MBA candidates. Some are even just for military MBA candidates.
Consulting
Deloitte Consulting Immersion Program
Bain Consulting ExperienceBain Veterans
Banking
Wells Fargo Corporate & Investment Banking MBA Diversity Summit (open to veterans)
Global Banking & Markets — MBA Diversity Fellowship
JP Morgan Early Advantage-MBA (Note: JP Morgan has had a similar program in the past for veterans, but it currently looks to be discontinued.)
William Blair Early Insight Program (LIFT)
Tech
Google Student Veteran Summit (only open to veterans)
Besides all these, don’t forget about doing a DoD Skillsbridge internship, or even taking off some time for yourself.
This post wraps up everything you should need to do and think about before you get to campus.
Once you get admitted, there’s still a lot to do. The good news is these are all problems you want to be having. I’d rather be struggling to find the time to write out scholarship essays than not be, and I’d rather decide between a lot of pre-MBA opportunities than not.
Related:
The Yellow Ribbon Program and Top MBA Schools.
How Veterans Can Finance Their MBA