Preparing Your Resume/CV For Bschool Admissions

With the multitude of attributes that MBA Admissions committees consider in applicants, perhaps one of the most basic and important element is your resume. Your resume communicates your educational background and relevant work experience that admissions committees will use to judge whether you have the kind of diverse background that would add to the school environment.

We’ll get to the details of the resume, but for now let’s focus in on how you will name your resume when you submit it into the MBA application online for your school of choice.

What should the filename of my resume be?

Good question. This is sometimes overlooked, but it does make a difference! Most candidates will give the following filenames to their resume:

“John Doe – 091009.doc” “Resume – bschool.doc” “resume for harvard Fall 2010.doc” This is NOT what you should do. Sure, having the “091009″ system is beneficial to your own personal tracking system to monitor which dated version you put by on-091009 -September 10, 2009. However, business schools do NOT want to see this.

Let’s observe what is good from the above. The John Doe part is good. Why? Putting name in the filename immediately brands you as a unique candidate. Only ever use you should are aware of the entire MBA application process is that branding is everything. If you don’t brand yourself, you will be in the same way as the 1,000’s of other generic guys who give their resume the name: “resume091009.doc”

Brand yourself! Put your name there and attach the name of the company you worked at for 4 years. You can also place the name of the school you are employing to-it gives a slight impression that this specific resume was specially customized for the school- rather than just being your generic resume that you hand out all over.

For instance, use the next formats: “John Doe Resume – Goldman IB – Harvard R1 2010.doc” or if the online system does not allow [spaces] in the title, then use underscores like this:

“John_Doe_Resume_Goldman_IB_Harvard_R1_2010.pdf” Notice the name “John Doe” is at the outset. You can likewise place the word resume to begin with like this: “Resume – John Doe – Goldman IB – Harvard R1 2010.doc” Notice “Goldman IB” utilizes the recognized brand name in the title. Notice “Harvard R1 2010″; indicates this resume was tailor-made for Harvard. And R1 signifies that the resume was put forward as step in Round 1 in the coating process ( rather than Round 2 or Round 3). Without even opening your document, the admissions director will already know your position and what your general trajectory is. They know name. They know the name of the firm that you probably spent a good portion of your career at and they also know which application round you fit in with.

This article was authored by GMAT tutor and guru, Zeke Lee. Zeke is the creator of The GMAT Pill Study Method and has helped numerous students ace the GMAT exam in as little time as possible. Although his secret techniques were limited to privileged students who could afford $200/hour a few years ago, Zeke has now opened the door to his unique strategies to the general public. Online GMAT Preparation