B-Schooled Podcast Episode #167: The 5 Paragraph MBA Essay
Today on B-Schooled, we’re going back to basics on essay writing. While there are countless ways to approach an MBA essay, we know a few things are true for virtually any business school essay prompt:
• You need to convey a lot of complex information succinctly,
• These prompts are often purposely broad/vague—which means that it is essential for you to structure your essay in a way that is captivating and easy to understand, and,
• Admissions officers, who have to read hundreds or thousands of applications a year, read these essays VERY quickly.
For all of these reasons, it is ESSENTIAL your essay is well structured, compelling, and that you make every word count. Of course, you can write a well-structured essay in all kinds of ways, but one tried-and-true approach is probably the same format that your middle-school English school teacher taught you—the five-paragraph essay:
• One introductory paragraph,
• Three paragraphs in the body that support and develop your argument, and
• One concluding paragraph at the end
But the magic of what we share here ISN’T this format. Virtually every 14-year-old in the country is familiar with this format; the critical thing is how you LEVERAGE this format to integrate interesting and relevant stories about yourself in a way that is consistent and cohesive with your larger application narrative.
In this episode, your host Chandler will:
1. Walk listeners through each paragraph of this essay structure,
2. Suggest specific tips and suggestions to think about for each part of the essay,
3. Share things to watch out for/avoid, and
4. Showcase essay examples from successful applicants who earned admission to their first-choice programs
This B-Schooled episode can be found here, or take a listen on any of the major podcast platforms below.
B-Schooled is available on most major podcast apps, including:
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Stitcher
TuneIn
Please be sure to subscribe to B-Schooled so that you don’t miss a thing. Also, if there’s something you’d like for us to cover in a future episode, please email podcast@stacyblackman.com. We’d love to hear from you!
