Admitted To CBS, Yaron Is awesome!!

Attending an M7 school was an uphill battle from the start. While I had a great undergraduate GPA and good work experience, my GMAT was lower than the median and I came from an overrepresented group. I also did not have a lot of time to be on top of multiple applications, as my intention was to apply to five schools, all on the East Coast. Three of the schools I applied to were in the M7, and two were in the T10, meaning every single application was going to be very competitive (all had a 30% acceptance rate). I did a ton of research on consultants to maximize my chances of getting into at least one school. After narrowing it down to three and getting an initial consultation from all, it was clear that the Menlo Coaching program, and more specifically Yaron, were the right choice. Yaron has tons of experience with candidates with a similar finance background as I have and frequently gets admitted with less-than-ideal stats into top-tier schools. I also really admired his pragmatism as he told me where I could really get into what would be a real stretch (such as Wharton). Menlo’s resources kept me on track through the entire process, and I ended up crafting five great applications all in time for Round 1, despite starting in the middle of the year. All of this happened during a challenging work schedule where I could only devote a handful of hours a week to applications. Yaron made it a priority to make sure each of my applications was tailored to the school I was applying to. He and Menlo provided resources to contact current students and alumni of the programs. The Basecamp project management software that Menlo broke down the apps into bite-sized deliverables, gamifying the process and ensuring I was on track for every single deadline. He meticulously reviewed the dozen or so essays that I put together for the five schools. We worked on some essays for weeks, going through multiple drafts until I finally nailed down the story I wanted to tell, making sure my true self was being expressed in 500 words or less. Of Wharton, the two other M7 schools, and the two T10 schools, I received interviews at all except one of the M7s! This result is nothing short of remarkable given my GMAT, which I was told elsewhere would have to be above 740 to be competitive. There is no way I would have gotten an interview at Wharton without Yaron, and while I ultimately wasn’t admitted (perhaps due to the school’s unique TBD interview process), I have no complaints about where I will be attending. Columbia has been my dream school since I was a high schooler, and I am extremely elated to be attending it this year. If you are worried about your GPA, GMAT, or any other aspect of your profile, Yaron will help you craft the qualitative aspects of your application, which will more than make up for any quantitative shortfall. I cannot recommend Yaron enough and look forward to staying in contact with him as I enter B-School and beyond. Menlo is the most expensive consultancy out there, and the price initially gave me some hesitation. Just how much value add could a consultant provide for a seemingly standardized process? Well, the phrase ” you get what you pay for” was almost made for a situation like this. Nowhere else will you have access to the consultancy and your individual coach for such a long period after your applications are sent. No one else would allow you to schedule as many meetings as you need, even at times inconvenient to your consultant. And most importantly, the attention to detail each application received made me confident that I would be admitted to one of my five programs, which would otherwise have been extremely challenging. Thank you, Yaron!!!