MBA Admissions Tip: Essay Polishing
The deadline is looming and you’re making one final pass through your application before hitting submit. This isn’t the time for drastic changes – but there might still be an opportunity for small improvements.
Read on for three big picture, “crunch time” tips!
Keep It Professional
It’s true that many schools ask “fun” questions and most urge applicants to be themselves rather than submitting “overly polished” material. But it’s important to remember that this is a graduate school application, and you should approach your essays with a degree of formality.
You do want your unique narrative voice to come through, but even professional writers know to vary their tone based on their audience. Before you submit, scan your materials for slang or overly conversational speech patterns in your writing.
Emphasize Action
Lapsing into the passive voice is a common essay-writing pitfall. This means constructing sentences about how some unseen force or agent acted upon something or someone else (e.g. “we were required to” or “the project was completed”).
Instead, make sure that you’re putting your own thoughts and actions at the fore. By making a conscious effort to write “I/he/she did x” rather than “x was done to y” you can make your comments more informative, dynamic and, often, more concise.
Avoid Repetition
It’s often a good idea to give the reader a sense of an essay’s direction through an introduction, and to sum up the key ideas through a conclusion. Ideally, though, each sentence of an essay will add some new information to the document or build the reader’s understanding of what you’ve already written. And for shorter essays (e.g. 250-300 words), you can probably dive right into the content rather than giving the reader a detailed road map at the outset of your response.
So if a sentence isn’t saying anything new, it’s probably safe to cut it. This rule can be particularly helpful with last-minute edits if your responses are running over the word limit. It also helps to ensure that you’re including as much relevant information about your candidacy as you can within the allotted length.
Good luck with those finishing touches!
MBA Admissions Academy
In addition to the MBA essay tips above, learn more from Clear Admit’s Admissions Academy below.
Episode 12: Essays I: The Basics
MBA Applywire
I do not have a strong academic background, but I believe I have a strong professional background to offset. I have over 10 years of progressive finance experience starting as an analyst moving all the way into a Director level role with line of sight into a VP role within the next 2 years. My background consists of financial acumen and cross department engagement resulting in tangible business outcomes and deliverables. I have experience managing upwards, managing downwards with my direct reports, and managing sideways with various department directors and VPs.
- Engineer at a top Aerospace & Defense company (Blue Chip / Fortune 100 company)
- 3 years of FT experience, have had 1 promotion so far, expecting 1 more before matriculation in Fall 2028
- Will have 4.7 Yrs FT experience (+2 undergrad internships) at matriculation
- Applying R1 2027 for Fall 2028 Full Time Entry
- Mechanical Engineering BS with Aerospace Engineering Minor, GPA 3.53
- Undergraduate volunteering included leadership role for a Pediatric Cancer philanthropy that raised $XX,XXX / yr.
- Also had an undergrad internship with a Blue Chip / Fortune 100 automotive company
- Hold a Masters in Engineering Management from Washington University in St. Louis, GPA 3.94
- Masters Capstone was a consulting project sponsored by a boutique firm in NYC
- Currently in MIT Sloan's Pre-LGO Pipeline Program
- Currently prepping for GMAT Focus, I am a strong test taker and expect 95th Percentile+. First attempt will be in early Q1 2027.
- Post-MBA goal: MBB Consulting in the Aerospace & Defense or broader industrials sector. Also considering a pivot to A&D/Industrials Investment Banking. (Any/all advice on how either of these map better to my profile is appreciated!)
29, applying R1 2027 for Fall 2028 entry. GMAT Focus not yet taken; targeting ~670. 3.49 GPA, B.B.A. Finance (magna cum laude, full-tuition scholarship) from a state school.
~3 years at GS (margin lending ops to internal audit), now an Audit Manager in internal audit at TD covering Global Markets (fixed income, munis, prime services, counterparty credit risk). Lead audits as Auditor-in-Charge, manage small teams, support regulator exams. Use SQL/Alteryx in audit work. CIA in progress. Fluent in Spanish. Starting Big Brothers Big Sisters volunteering.
Goal: move from risk/controls into strategy or product roles at an established fintech (lending, brokerage, payments). Long term: run a fintech business line.
Schools: Wharton, Columbia, Yale SOM, Tuck, Stern, Fuqua, Ross/Johnson, Georgetown. Planning to use the Consortium for several. Also considering Stern part-time.
MBA LiveWire
$25k fellowship