Profile Evaluation (thanks in advance)

[Satya]

Past:

I am an Indian, and I have done my B.Tech (equivalent to BS) from the best and the toughest institute to get into in the country, Indian Institute of Technology Madras. I worked for IBM - India for two years now.

Academics:
I am a B.tech 2006 pass-out (major in Biotechnology, and minor in Financial Management) from IIT Madras, with a CGPA equivalent to 3.0/4.0.
Extra-curricular activities: Went on to stand in the elections for Branch Councilor (u can say Representative for the whole Department)-Department of Biotechnology, IITM, won unanimously and succeeded in changing the completely biology-oriented curricula (due to which our batch faced lot of problems) into tech-oriented one for the incoming students. I represented the Department's student body in the SAC (Students Affairs Council) meetings. Being the first Branch Councilor of the newly formed Department, I started Department's festival - Biofest 2005, which was a huge success. My Department's HOD is ready to give me recommendation for any of the B-schools I would apply to, if needed.
Besides just contributing to the department, being the Transportation in-charge, I made many changes in the Transportation Department of IITM, which added lot of value to the Technical and Cultural festivals of IITM.

Professional Experience:
I joined IBM as an Application Developer. I never intended to leave Biotechnology field, but I believed IT field would definitely give me valuable experience to achieve my future goals.
I worked as Siebel CRM developer, client - AT&T. I was awarded (prestigious Bravo Award) twice by IBM for my contribution, in terms of both leadership and siebel development, to the deemed impossible projects. Less than 8 months from the time of joining the team (of nearly 200 developers), I was given the role of representing the team and helping the newly joined members to get accustomed to the environment. I led a team of 3 people when I had just 7 months of experience as a developer (the team I led consisted of employees with more than 2 years of IT experience). I was appreciated by both IBM and AT&T for one of the most critical projects, and was offered a role of Business Analyst (System Engineer), when I had just 8 months experience. From July 2007, I have been working as a Business Analyst for an application based on Java technology. I believed in having a holistic approach and so, instead of sticking to one application, I shifted to another one (database application) recently. I was awarded by IBM in February, for handling unusually large number of projects as a Business Analyst, in my very first release. (I have rejected an abroad (USA) offer, when I was working as a developer, as I was more interested in taking up the role of IT Business Analyst, which was possible only if I stayed back offshore.) My work involves complete interaction with the client, and the requirement analysis and FP counting, besides acting as SPOC for all the projects during all the phases of design, development, testing and deployment. I have worked as a Business Analyst for applications based on different technologies, as mentioned earlier.
By the time I apply to the B-schools, I will be having one year of work experience as an application developer (and also Team-lead), and one year of experience as an IT Business Analyst.
Extra-curricular activities: Mainly making arrangements for get-togethers, team outings.. taking responsibility and ownership for all such activities.

Future:

With this experience, I would like to turn towards the Biotech/Health care/pharmaceutical Industry, as a Business Analyst, who would work on that client side, and would work with the vendor IT business analysts and the biotech professionals (essentially the end-users). I would believe my valuable IT experience, my Biotechnology knowledge and an MBA from a prestigious institute would definitely help me achieve this short term goal, besides helping me achieve my long term goal of starting my own firm, back here in India, that would provide IT solutions to the Biotech/healthcare/pharmaceutical firms. I am looking for universities which would help me sharpen my leadership abilities and if possible, help me out with a Biotech/Health care MBA.

GMAT score: 700, Q-51, V-32, AWA-5.0

The universities I am applying to:
HBS, Fuqua, Darden, McDonough, Kelley, Olin, Carroll.

I have strong plans of applying for fall 2009 itself. Due to some personal reasons, I can't apply any later. Do you think I have fair chances? Or, do I need to work out in any area(s)?

[MBAApply]

In short, you should be competitive for all the schools you mentioned except for HBS. Your profile (Indian engineer) isn't a match for what they're looking for.

With HBS, consider it a lottery ticket -- the only thing you can realistically do is to put in your best effort on the applications, and hope for the best.

Also, keep in mind that if you're applying to US b-schools, you will have to Americanize your language and writing style (i.e. "graduate" instead of "pass-out" and so forth; the cadence and tone of your writing is very Indian, and unfortunately yes it matters whether adcoms admit it or not).

Alex Chu
alex@mbaapply.com
www.mbaapply.com
http://mbaapply.blogspot.com

[Satya]

Thanks Alex, I will definitely work in that aspect.
1. I was also wondering if the disparity between my Quant and Verbal scores is going to effect my application.
2. I also wanted to know if the short term goal I mentioned makes sense to the adcom. I mean, does this make them ask... "Why he needs an MBA for this??" kind of questions.

[MBAApply]

To answer your questions:

(1) No, it shouldn't be a huge issue given that both scores are strong enough.

(2) Your goals are hard to understand, but with a few weeks' work on the essays going through multiple drafts (and getting feedback on those essays from alums, colleagues, or even paid consultants), you should be able to craft a sincere and compelling story.

Alex Chu
alex@mbaapply.com
www.mbaapply.com
http://mbaapply.blogspot.com