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Introduction
Writing a compelling and well-crafted MBA Letter of Recommendation (LOR) is crucial when applying to the Indian School of Business (ISB) or any other top business school.
An effective LOR not only showcases your professional accomplishments and personal qualities but also highlights your fit for the program. In this blog, we will provide you with valuable tips and insights on how to write an outstanding ISB LOR that captures the attention of admissions committees and boosts your chances of acceptance.
Understanding the Importance of the ISB LOR: Before diving into the tips, let's understand the significance of an MBA Letter of Recommendation and how it can influence your application. The ISB LOR is a testament to your character, work ethic, leadership potential, and interpersonal skills, providing an external perspective on your abilities. Admissions committees often rely on LORs to gain insights into your personal and professional qualities, which can be a deciding factor in the competitive admissions process.
Familiarize Yourself with ISB's Expectations: To write an effective ISB LOR, it's crucial to understand what the admissions committee is looking for. Research ISB's official website, admission guidelines, and other relevant resources to gain insight into their values, mission, and evaluation criteria. Understanding ISB's expectations will help you align your LOR with their desired qualities and demonstrate a strong fit for their program.
Choose the Right Recommender: Selecting the right person to write your LOR is essential. Ideally, your recommender should be someone who knows you well, has worked closely with you, and can provide specific examples of your achievements and strengths. Consider a supervisor, client, or colleague who can effectively highlight your professional accomplishments and personal qualities. Moreover, ensure that your recommender has the time and willingness to invest in crafting a thoughtful and compelling LOR. ISB does not accept recommendations from college professors if you're applying to programs other than ISB YLP.
Provide Relevant Information to Your Recommender: To assist your recommender in writing a strong LOR, provide them with necessary information about your career goals, achievements, skills, and experiences. Share your resume, academic transcripts, and any other relevant documents that will help them gain a comprehensive understanding of your background. It's crucial to discuss your aspirations and key attributes you want your recommender to emphasize in the letter.
Focus on Concrete Examples: The strength of an LOR lies in specific and compelling examples. Encourage your recommender to illustrate your qualities and achievements with anecdotes, real-life instances, and quantifiable results. Whether it's your leadership skills, teamwork, or problem-solving abilities, concrete examples provide credibility to your claims and help the admissions committee visualize your potential impact as a future MBA candidate.
Highlight Your Unique Contributions: One of the goals of an ISB LOR is to differentiate you from other applicants. Encourage your recommender to highlight your unique contributions, experiences, and perspectives that set you apart. Discuss any initiatives, projects, or challenges you have undertaken, demonstrating your ability to go beyond expectations and make a lasting impact. This will show the admissions committee how you can bring a distinct perspective to the ISB community.
Emphasize Personal Attributes: While professional achievements are essential, it's equally important to highlight your personal attributes in the LOR. Traits like integrity, adaptability, resilience, and communication skills are highly valued by business schools. Share with your recommender instances where these qualities were demonstrated and how they positively influenced your work environment or team dynamics. Such insights provide a holistic view of your potential as an MBA candidate.
Keep the LOR Concise and Well-Structured: Admissions committees review numerous applications, so it's important to keep your LOR concise, well-organized, and easy to read. Ensure that the letter is structured with a clear introduction, body, and conclusion. It should flow logically, showcasing a coherent narrative that reinforces your strengths and suitability for the MBA program. A well-structured LOR also reflects positively on your recommender's ability to communicate effectively.
Proofread and Edit: Before submitting the LOR, make sure it goes through a thorough proofreading and editing process. Check for grammatical errors, clarity of language, and coherence of ideas. Ask your recommender to review the letter with you and provide any necessary revisions. A polished and error-free LOR indicates your attention to detail and professionalism.
Signup for Career Adhyaapak's Review Program: We offer an end-to-end MBA essays and LORs review program where our consultants who're ISB alums will go through your application and help you ensure you've a stellar candidature. Book a slot for review here by filling the MBA Application Assist form. We charge 3000Rs for your complete application review.
Conclusion
Writing an impactful ISB LOR requires thoughtful planning, collaboration with your recommender, and a deep understanding of ISB's expectations. By following these tips and incorporating them into your application process, you can enhance your chances of crafting an exceptional LOR that truly captures your strengths, potential, and fit for ISB's MBA program. Good luck with your application!
An Example ISB LOR from an actual applicant:
1. Please provide a brief description of your interaction with the applicant.
Candidate joined Company 1 in 2017 after completing his Engineering from NIT Trichy; I came to know him a couple of months after he joined and since then,I’ve been his Manager. He is an excellent team member to work with. Candidate primarily works on Business Intelligence systems. I am responsible for overseeing his work and evaluating his performance. I’ve found him to be a hardworking and sincere worker who always gives his 100%. Also, he shares a great rapport not only with me but with everyone else in the team.
2. How does the applicant’s performance compare to that of other well-qualified individuals in similar roles?
Candidate’s performance has always been top-notch and he sits comfortably in the top 5% of the folks that I have managed throughout my career.
In the last six months, in particular, I have seen a tremendous increase in his ownership. He makes sure that he gets to the bottom of any issue by either resolving it himself or taking help from various people. I have seen him staying back more than required to resolve an issue.
A most recent example would be owning up the handovers of the system to stakeholders, shadowing, and reverse shadowing parts of the transition. It has been quite frustrating dealing with one of the external teams, but Candidate has handled everything very efficiently and not let anything come to me. He has shown tremendous maturity for his age and been a real role model for those around him.
Also, Candidate has an excellent understanding of BI systems. A couple of months back, he, along with one other team member, came up with the design and implementation of a system improvement on their own. They just walked through the basic model with me.
Everything else, from development, testing, getting it deployed, and making sure it is working was handled by them entirely. With very little guidance from me about regression testing, they ensured that their changes were working optimally and integrated well with the existing system.
Lastly, one of the best things about Candidate is that he is always ready to help other team members. Even if he is busy with his deliverables, he makes time to understand what issues other team members are facing and how he could help them. He has stepped up to take more responsibility (leveraging new members of the team) and has met challenges head-on. His planning and organization have been commendable, keeping on top of tasks assigned to him, following up with others on tasks that need to be completed and helping them when they do not know how to do something. He is unwilling to let things happen in a less than acceptable manner, showing commitment to standards.
3. Describe a piece of the most constructive feedback you have given to the applicant?
Candidate is an excellent consultant, but he gets bored too quickly. There are some aspects of consulting, such as documentation, which are quite mundane but equally important. I have noticed that he generally does a good job but takes more time than average in such things. I think that this is because he gets bored and thus spends more time. I had communicated this to him in our last formal review, and he took the suggestion positively. He has been working on this feedback, and I can see him putting in more effort to overcome this problem.
4. Is there anything else we should know?
Although Candidate has only a couple of years of experience, he has shown remarkable maturity in dealing with stressful situations. One example that comes to my mind when he demonstrated this trait involved a project in which we had to make a significant change to the system to rectify an issue which caused multiple users to lose access and raise resolution requests. Without being overwhelmed by so many resolution requests, Candidate quickly identified the root cause and set to work on a remedy that would resolve the issues. He ensured that this got completed within a week, and within two weeks, users got their access back. This piece of work won the trust of our clients and subject matter experts, which led them to the conclusion that our team can quickly resolve issues.
Additionally, Candidate's communication skills have improved significantly since the time he joined us. He conveys what needs to be expressed in a proper sense, from explaining basic logic to users about the system to sending out strongly-worded emails when required. He quickly jumps on calls with users instead of waiting days, exchanging emails with users to resolve issues. This approach ensures that the problems are resolved rapidly. He has an excellent rapport with clients and subject matter experts. This rapport helps us when we need to get something done quickly and need their approvals.
He is always very reliable and does not shy away from making unpopular decisions. I want to call out, in particular, his involvement in meetings. He is always invested and makes his opinion very clear. He is willing to listen to reason while standing his ground if he believes in something. Since so much of our work happens in our weekly meetings, these qualities of his are instrumental in ensuring that it is not an 'instruction and update giving' session.
Lastly, I want to compliment his ability to run company events with excellent attention to detail. So many aspects of the company dinner were completely his responsibility, and there were almost zero glitches. Even when he was faced with a potential problem, he only came to me when he wanted assurance on his conclusion.
In summary, I think he has a very bright future ahead of him, and I believe an MBA from a prestigious school such as ISB will set him up to achieve big things in life and realize his true potential.
*Please use the above as a reference on structure only. Utilising actual text from the above will result in your disqualification from ISB candidature since they perform plagiarism check.