Vulnerability: Secret Element Wielded by Winning MBA Candidates

Why did the Entire Generation of Millennials Love Harry Potter so Much?

Because at his core, he was vulnerable. He was dealing with the loss of his parents, questioning his place in the world, and facing the terrible unknown of eventually confronting Voldemort. Harry’s struggles were deeply human. More than a wizard, his vulnerability made him someone you and I could identify with. Remember when he confessed to his friends in Goblet of Fire that he didn’t feel ready to take on the Triwizard Tournament? Or when he struggled with his self-esteem in The Order of the Phoenix? Those moments when Harry didn’t hide his fears made him stronger and more human, and ultimately, someone we all could root for.

Vulnerability in MBA Applications: Why It’s Essential for Your Success

While you and I are not magical characters from a fantasy book, all of us have surely had our fair share of struggles and challenges. In business school applications, candidates are often confused, and some aren’t even aware that they could leverage vulnerability in MBA applications as a strong tool to gain favor from the admissions committee. The truth is, admissions officers most likely have built their entire careers in academic management. Rarely are they engineers, management consultants, or bankers. They mostly have backgrounds in philosophy, arts, psychology, creative marketing, and similar fields, with strong foundations in the understanding of human values—something they strongly seek in their MBA students.

Why Vulnerability is a Winning Strategy in MBA Admissions

Vulnerability, over the years, has become a rarely expressed quality as B-school admissions become cutthroat, and candidates continue to serve a laundry list of exceptional achievements. To adcoms, however, someone who is able to share remembrances from their weakest moments while showing a growth mindset is the truest reflection of bravery. This quality is exactly what top MBA programs are looking for—a candidate who can reflect on their challenges, overcome adversity, and grow through it.

INSEAD and the Power of the Failure Essay: Show Your Vulnerability

To illustrate the importance of vulnerability in MBA applications: INSEAD’s MBA application has altogether done away with the achievements question. The second motivational question is now entirely focused on telling a failure essay for MBA application. The failure essay for MBA application is one where most candidates struggle a lot. How hard it is to speak about your misdemeanors when you are vying for a seat at a globally top-ranked B-school! But that’s exactly what the admissions committee wants to hear. As we are surrounded by more and more uncertainty, lack of compassion for others, and disillusioned high-headedness, showing your vulnerable side can make you very likable and showcase your potential to lead within your capacity as a compassionate leader.

This has the desired effect that the admissions officers partake in your success and root for you. Selecting you from among all others makes them feel good about their choices.

Stanford’s ‘What Matters Most to You?’ Essay: A Test of Self-Reflection

In another example of why top B-schools value vulnerability in MBA applications so much, Stanford’s MBA essay, What Matters Most to You?, is among the hardest business school applications essays. This essay, which has been an integral part of the Stanford GSB application for some time now, isn’t about what you might think the adcom wants to know—your grand noble aspirations, lofty goals, or career plans. This is a thought-provoking question used by the GSB adcom to identify individuals with above-average reflective capacity and an equally strong ability to make honest and authentic statements in business school applications and in life, generally. It also reflects your ability to be candid or vulnerable about your experiences.

While less informed candidates continue to write about lofty goals and CXO aspirations, the winning ones have penned heartfelt essays about their own struggles with LGBTQ rights, fear of losing the only financial backing, failing to secure loans or capital for business, struggles with self-worth and family pressures, personal experiences with women’s safety and reproductive rights, among other topics that genuinely mattered to them, ultimately guiding their pre-MBA career or extraprofessional engagements.

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