Long Term Goals

How much of clarity is needed about the long term goals? I was discussiong this with Chaos the other day and we though we need to be as clear as it can be. So I have to think what it has to be. I am not completely confused about it and my short term goals are pretty clear in my mind. Long term goals have not taken a definite shape maybe because I am still working to realize my short term goals.

So I sat down to explore what should a long term goal be like. When I am confused, the first thing I do is to type it in google and hit search (sometimes I am feeling lucky). And good gracious there are so many guys out there to help me on this. Well let me go through some of these texts and then I'll sit down thinking what next to do. I am targeting to write the first Kellogg essays draft over the weekend. I am thinking of taking a leave today for the same. Over the weekend if all goes well, I am planning to go and visit my cousin. The school where I go to teach is celebrating its annual foundation day so we don't have the computer classes this week.

For the sake of publicity (PR cell would become happy with me on this), I work for Pankhudi, which works specifically for upliftment of unpreviledged kids. Would write a post on pankhudi sometime (in my other blog).

Ah!! By the way. I clicked a submit on ISB application last night. They made me download a pdf of my whole application and I was done.

Next target: Kellogg Part 1

Exploring Kellogg

This MBA application is becoming fun. Whenever I delve deeper into a school, I tend to think that I want to be at that school. It started with Tuck. I loved Tuck when I went through the blogs and their website. Then it was MIT, and now Kellogg.

Kellogg offers a great deal of flexibility in terms of courses and a lot of activities to keep one busy through a wide variety of student clubs. I was taken aback when I saw the long list on their website.

Want to know what is it like to be at Kellogg? Just go through the pages on student life.

The information on the website is pretty connected and written from the point of view of applicants. Would defininitely leave you thinking that you are missing something.

ISB Done Kellogg Next

ISB Over!!! After so many drafts I finally finalized my ISB essays and now have a much better idea of what to write in essays.

Kellogg essays are much better in terms of word limit. Writing an influential Prizes would have been much easier for Eric Segal than an influential Love Story. The more we get to talk of, the better we paint ourselves. And Kellogg essays give doubly spaced 2 pages. Almost double of ISB. Sigh!! That indeed is a relief. Today I was in mood of writing a draft but am feeling very sleepy now. Read a nice article on Kellogg website about the induction of fresher batch.

Meanwhile I also have to write TOEFL. Any pointers on TOEFL preparation? I bought a book which has 6 practice sets and I guess it should be sufficient.After TOEFL I plan to take up the prized MIT essays.

A lot of action is in pipeline and slowly slowly surfacing. An introduction in form of ISB was a good warm up (well actually more than just warm up).

As I step into the US b-school process, I hope to gain more seriousness. Thankfull workload is super mild.

Need to scan a couple of douments and get one photo done and ISB application would be complete :)

Essays started

Bad that I was out of blogging for so long but it was for a cause. I was drowned into first set of my essays. Did first, second and third drafts and got them reviewed iteratively by some friends. A mix of closest friends to aquiantance one of whom had converted ISB call last year.

And you know what... its important to understand the suggestions but impossible to implement them all... cause they can be poles apart.

Anyways I read somewhere that the essays for first school take the longest and by the time we are into third school, it becomes a lot easier to do the essays. But the first essays take real long time. At times when I got frustrated, I just stepped outside and thought why didn't I join IIM Indore, only to regain the confidence back and get back to applications.

Few days back a friend asked me that in my school selection criteria, I have not selected Kellogg but in my page my R1 schools have Kellogg too. Actually a month back when I talked to my recommender, he asked me why am I not applying to top five. He told me that I must try atleast one or two of them. Well given a choice between HBS/Stanford GSB/ Wharton/ Kellogg/ Chicago, I chose Kellogg as Wharton/Stanford ask for exceptional acads, HBS kinda looks out of reach for a general profile like mine, Kellogg's emphasis on teamwork attracted me. A bit of more research, a glance at essays and I knew that I like Kelloggs. Not so huge class size, emphasis on teamwork, good placement percentage for consulting etc attracted me. Though Kellogg is more known for Marketing, I loved the number of electives they have to offer. I can customize the course in whatever way I want. So I knew that Kellogg was going to be the addition.

Few days back I got an anonymous comment by Holden on one of my previous posts. The reply in itself would be a post. Will write on it when I get to it. As of now I have Kellogg lined up. Will officially start on Kellogg essays tomorrow.

Will be a lot more frequent in next one to two weeks as I have a lot to discuss.