With each passing year, more and more universities start welcoming applicants who didn’t have a chance to gain any job experience after college.
Still, the overwhelming majority of top business schools continue giving an advantage to students who have several years of working experience under their belts. In their opinion, people who have had a taste of a real job will gain more from their MBA program and will be able to share better ideas with classmates.
Which parts of a job experience is considered to be deal-breaking and ultimately crucial? According to Accepted, there are several of them:
1. Leadership
For most business schools, proof of your leadership is the most meaningful thing in your overall job experience – even more than your previous company or your position in it. Hence, your resume has to contain some solid proof of your leadership abilities – teams where you were leader, people who worked under you, finances that were your responsibility, results of your work gained due to your leadership talent. You can’t just state that you are a skilful leader and thus fit to enter a business program; it has to be proven using evidence like real results and/or numbers.
2. Career Advancement
The second most significant part of your working experience is proof of your constant development as a professional: your promotions up the career ladder in one company or as a result of gaining a new position in another organization. It’s not enough to just write about changes in your position – you have to give evidence that your new jobs meant more responsibility, dynamic growth and overall development. It won’t hurt to share some solid facts here, either.
3. Stable development
Usually, admissions committees don’t mind your changing companies, but only if it’s done to gain a superior position, not because you just wanted change or lost your job. To show professional stability, you can’t just find a new job whenever you like it: every new position should be better and with more responsibility than the previous one. If you haven’t ever worked for a company for more than a year, it tells the adcom members that you are not a stable professional. They may even think that you are unable to hold a position for a long time, so recruiters who search for candidates at business universities won’t even touch your resume. Of course, you can’t always avoid change and stay in one place for decades, but don’t skip from company to company too often – and try not to stay jobless for long spells, as every lapse in your career will require explanation in your application package.
All in all, not only has your resume to reflect your career advancement, but it also should back it up with concrete facts, like details, results and numerical data. Your resume shouldn’t look like a list full of jobs, it has to show what kind of a person and professional you are.
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