With only Stern and Sloan left to submit, the most chaotic round in recent history* comes to a close.
(*not counting r3 2020, which was, I hope, a once-in-a-lifetime event)
I’m exhausted, and I know many applicants are as well.
Round 2 deadlines always smack us in the face right after the holidays. Many people have just gotten accustomed to the mellower end-of-year stress levels — the office is closed, no imminent project deadlines — and no sooner do you come back from putting the empty champagne bottles in the recycling and it’s January 4, and almost noon in Boston, and the gate to that elite school on the Charles is closing…fast.
Lots of people scrambling this year, more than usual. Revising essays until (literally) the last few minutes, desperately paging missing recommenders, dealing with system outages at target schools, sending me updates at 2, 3, and 4 am. (I’m fine with those middle-of-the-night updates, by the way, and try to review them as soon as I’m up, especially with imminent deadlines.)
Many of my clients seemed severely sleep-deprived. I felt for them. Fact is: you are not going to produce your best work when you’re not getting enough sleep. You know that, so I’m just belaboring the obvious. And if you don’t have enough time to sleep, you’re probably skipping out on exercise, friends, and just plain old staring-off-into-space time.
My best advice: pace yourself! (Also good practice for your MBA experience. You will be miserable if you try to complete all your projects at the last minute. You won’t be able to get off the treadmill and take full advantage of everything your program has to offer.) The application process is truly a marathon. And though I am here to help you get through it, you’ll get the most out of it — and have the best results — if you set aside enough time, probably more than you think you need, to pull together your essays, fill out the applications, and practice staring into a blank screen for the Kira videos.
Best of luck to all!
