MBA Essays

I guess the most useful thing I can do here is post up my essays for people to look at. My basic thoughts when I was writing them were

• Explain why I wanted to do an MBA
• Explain why I wanted to do an MBA at Oxford
• Highlight my strengths / achievements / etc.
• Provide fodder for my interview – this is worth noting, if you write a whole essay about chicken farming in Turkmenistan they will ask you about it.

I did a history degree, I’ve written a lot of essays, and I kind of assumed I’d be able to knock these out in no time. They took ages. So whatever you do don’t leave this stuff till the last-minute.

So without further ado

• Download Essay 1 (31KB .doc)
  Which recent development, world event or book has most influenced your thinking and why?
• Download Essay 2 (30KB .doc)
  Explain why you chose your current job. How do you see your career developing over the next five years. How will an MBA assist you in the development of these ambitions?

I should point out that I’ve anonymised a couple of client names just to be on the safe side. However the remarks about Sage stand, and as for the remarks about Tiny Computers well, that’s what it looked like at the time… As for the vainglorious ‘in five years time’ stuff I just figured that’s what they wanted to hear.

Subsequent to writing my application I’ve found a number of sites offering sample essays which they claim were accepted by various MBA schools. Most of these sites also offer an ‘essay editing’ or ‘essay writing’ service. Now maybe I’m going out on a limb here, but that’s cheating isn’t it?

About the author: Martin Llyod. Before attending business school I spent nearly five years at Domino Sytems, where I was a key member of projects including brand development and e-commerce for EPSON, intranet design and strategy for BP, and cultural change within Jaguar Cars.