Description

This is my Comprehensive package pointed at the two schools people most often apply to together, and most often get wrong in the same way. Stanford and Harvard reward opposite instincts. The GSB gives you 1,000 words across two essays and asks you to go inward — "What matters most to you, and why?" is a values question, and the essays that work get uncomfortably specific about why you are the way you are. HBS gives you three tight essays, 300 and 250 and 250 words, and asks for evidence: how your choices shaped your path, how you invest in others, what curiosity has actually done for you. Applicants who run one story through both applications end up vague at Stanford and thin at Harvard. What we work on, specifically: • Stanford — Essay A, "What matters most to you, and why?" (650 words), and Essay B, "Why Stanford for you?" (350 words), plus the optional Impact examples, Background Context, and Additional Information short answers. • HBS — Essay 1, Business-Minded (300 words): how your choices influenced your career path and aspirations. Essay 2, Leadership-Focused (250): the experiences that shaped how you invest in others and how you lead. Essay 3, Growth-Oriented (250): a real example of curiosity and what it did for your growth. Plus the 500-character career-goals short answer. • The overlap problem. We'll deliberately map which material goes where, so the two applications reinforce each other instead of reading like the same essay twice. • Both interviews. Stanford's is behavioral and alumni-led. HBS is a 30-minute conversation with someone who has read your entire file — and it's followed by the post-interview reflection, due within 24 hours, which is read closely and which most applicants treat as an afterthought. We'll prep both, including a timed rehearsal of that reflection. Here's everything that's included, since packages can be a little vague: Tangible work products / sessions • A 90-minute personalized 1:1 essay workshop: a 50-slide class I built for Leland that got a lot of positive feedback in my 10-12 person group sessions, so I turned it into a 1:1 offering. It gets you off the ground and shows you example essays that surface best practices for MBA writing. • Unlimited essay drafts and revisions: I don't like limiting people on this — we work on them until they're great. Essays have become the most significant part of the application, and short-changing them isn't an option in my book. As a former speechwriter, I also don't know how to leave a piece of writing unfinished. • Mock interviews: I'll challenge you the exact way real interviewers will, for as many reps as it takes until you feel comfortable. I got through these interviews myself, so I can tell you what they feel like as well as what to prepare. • Recommendation letter help: no one can write recs for you, but I'll give you a process for assembling a slate of information and a draft so your recommenders have what they need to write compelling letters. Same as the essays — we work them until they're finished. • Resume review: a full revamp if you need it, design upgrades and individual line edits included. Not "done" until it's right. • Additional application questions: two reviews per school of every written piece in the application — short answers, optional essays, all of it. I always want to look at the entire app before we start, to get the full picture. * GMAT note: I handle GMAT prep completely separately, though I did manage a 99th-percentile score myself. If you want targeted help there, I offer discounted hourly blocks. I'm good at distilling clear rationales for the hardest question types and building concrete strategies for the areas you're actually losing points on. System-level / project management • Timeline tracking & deadlines: we'll set deadlines for each item on this list and I'll put together a project tracker so we can see how we're mapping against our goals and check items off as we go. • Bi-weekly calls: I typically suggest we meet for 30 minutes every other week to talk through where things are. Sometimes we don't need them because we've already touched base or been messaging in the interim. Sometimes we need to hop on the phone a few weeks in a row, especially if we're moving quickly. Consider it a suggested cadence rather than a cap. • MBA folder / organization: to keep things in one place, I suggest all documents live in a shared MBA folder, with a sub-folder for each application piece (essays, recs, additional questions). I prefer Word docs for essays so we can keep tabs on old drafts in case we want to recycle material; everything else can be Google Docs to avoid version-control headaches. Turnaround time: 48-hour turnaround is my general M.O. for any document you send through, and plenty of them come back faster. If I need more time because of a particularly busy work week or travel, I'll tell you up front — but 48 hours I can guarantee 90-95% of the time. Keeping the lines of communication open is the whole trick. Feedback / iterating as we go: if at any point you have thoughts on how to make working together faster, easier, or simpler, just say so. There are a million individual pieces to this process, and it can get overwhelming once you realize there's more work than meets the eye. Every single person I've worked with has found it psychologically taxing at some point — handling that is probably the most important part of being your coach. I'll check in proactively, but please don't sit on something if you're feeling it. If there's anything you want to adjust or incorporate here, we can shape the process around you. Drop me a line whenever you're ready for an initial conversation.