Best North Dakota MBA Schools and Programs

When you register and prepare for the GMAT exam, you should give yourself a minimum of 3 to 6 months to prepare for and study everything you’ll need to know for the exam. If possible, try to begin preparing 9 to 12 months in advance. If you kept your undergraduate textbooks, use these as a base from which to study.

Decide what score you want to achieve. A good way to decide is to add 20 to the highest scores above those GMAT averages at the first school of your choice. Take a diagnostic exam so you know what areas you need to focus on most strongly. A private tutor or mentor will be a useful addition to your preparations. Choose a tutor with a Real GMAT score of 760 or higher. They should also have at least two years of experience. If you can’t find anyone in your community, a virtual tutor may help you out.

Three or four days before exam day, decrease the intensity of your studying so you don’t exhaust yourself mentally. You want to be well-rested and able to remember all the material you just learned.

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Think about those people from whom you will request recommendation letters. Again, complete this well before the application deadlines of the schools to which you’re applying.

Think of people who have had an impact on your professional career or your years in college. Perhaps a mentor who guided you in your early professional years would be a good selection. If you became close to a particular adviser in your school years, this person might also be a good choice, especially if they know what your goals are.

After you have made your recommender selections, give them 6 to 8 weeks, at a minimum, to complete online or printed recommendation forms for each school. Be sure to let each recommender know that the essay questions won’t be the same from school to school, so they should go back over several of their memories of you.

Choose recommenders who know you very well - what they say about you may “make or break” a decision as schools decide whether to extend an invitation for you to apply for admission. Statements and answers to questions should be strong and certain, not wishy-washy or unsure.

It’s time to explore yourself and who you are so you can share yourself with the admissions offices of the schools to which you’re planning to apply. You also need to know yourself academically and professionally. Your goal is to convince them that you are one of the best applicants to invite to apply.

Take some time to think about who you are in several spheres of your life. Admission committees want to know who you are personally, so they can establish that you’ll fit in well with other students in their MBA programs.

What makes you different from other applicants who have similar career goals and academic profiles? While it may seem like a step you can omit, it’s one of the most important for your eventual admission to the program of your choice.

Some of the questions you should ask yourself are: What makes you stand out from the crowd of applicants, especially when their applications are similar to yours? How have you affected the world, especially in your community or region? How do you plan to continue making an impact? Regarding leadership skills, what makes you so effective as a leader? Communicate why you need an MBA right now.

Narrow your list of schools down and note down the deadlines of each program. Create a list of a minimum of four schools and a maximum of eight. Some schools will be safe bets for admission; others are targets, where you’re almost sure of admission, but not quite. The stretches are those schools that are very selective about MBA student selection.

In choosing schools, your GMAT score shouldn’t be the only consideration. It’s important, but not the be-all and end-all.

After making your own final program choices, create a spreadsheet and highlight approaching deadlines. Once you finish this, it’s time to start jotting down ideas for essay questions. About these essays—don’t do a “copy-and-paste” job, thinking this will save time and still impress admission committees. Customize each essay you write. It’s obvious when applicants have taken the time and trouble to write their essay answers for each school. Make sure to have your application essays submitted on time to each school.

Keep track of deadlines every week—applications, application packets, and GMAT exam score. You want to be able to meet every deadline, perhaps even sending in required documents a little early.

Look at your resume and look for any gaps in either volunteer experience, leadership skills or work experience. Keeping these gaps in mind, begin to fill them in. If you’ve taken the GMAT one time already, but your score wasn’t as high as you wanted it to be, schedule a new testing date if you still have some time before application deadlines roll around. If you can, take a summer course that allows you to obtain the knowledge you need so that, when you re-take the GMAT, your score will be higher.

Spend a few hours each week, working as a volunteer with an organization whose work you like. Explain to the director that you would like to improve your leadership experience or non-work activities. They will help you to find something that needs to be done—such as assuming control of staff members; working with management of the organization or non-profit.

At work, talk to your immediate supervisor. Let them know that you’re seeking to improve your resume in several areas. Explain that you have a gap in x area and you want to correct this. They may have you begin working in a leadership position - add this to your resume prior to applying to your preferred programs.