Adgully Exclusive | Our expectations are modest and our services are quite specialized: MBAEase's Unnati Patel

MBAEase, a successful education venture was started by New York based Indian sisters ' Unnati and Uttama Patel, with their goal of clients into the business school of their choice. The venture which has helped hundreds of applicants to secure admission to a B-school of their choice has now entered the Indian market.

MBAEase helps students understand what American and European Universities are truly looking for. They can't emphasize enough that each University has its own individual values that they are seeking in their candidates and as a result, the essays need to reflect those particular values. For example, in a Harvard application it is important to emphasize leadership in a consistent manner, but this may not be the case for a Kellogg or Insead application.

Speaking exclusively with Adgully, Unnati Patel, Co-Owner, MBAEase.com, sheds some more light on the venture and her insights of the market.

Unnati Patel's personal life experiences have in a large way contributed to the birth of MBAEase. A graduate from the Harvard Business School, her family, friends and colleagues would request her to learn more about the application process and for help on their essays. Though she found it difficult to juggle between her work and the "help', she said, "I felt a special joy every time someone would call to express their appreciation after they got their acceptance letter from the great schools they had gotten in to. Over the time I realized that maybe I had decoded a framework that works for each school. This framework varied by school based on the types of candidates they were seeking but I think I had found a way to ensure that the right framework was used for the right school. This laid the seed for MBAEase."

"Our process starts with understanding the candidate, who they are and their experiences. Then collectively we decide how they should structure the essays to portray their story as a unique candidate. We use each essay as an opportunity to highlight a different aspect of the candidate's experience that makes them more interesting than the average", she added.

Elaborating further, she said, "We believe that this is the most critical part of the application process because often times candidates, in particular those with international backgrounds believe that a high GPA and GMAT scores are a sure way to get in. This definitely is not the case as most people applying to the particular schools have already met the minimum grade requirements and as a result our company's focus is to make sure that the candidate stands out through their essays. Thus under our process we recommend that our clients spend a lot of time brainstorming and working towards differentiating themselves."

Highlighting the core objective and working principle of the company, Patel added, "At MBAEase we understand the importance of a specialized service and our recommendations are detailed, personalized and can often be harsh. Unlike our competitors who tend to offer just grammatical checks we provide a full package with focus on the most important thing ' content. The aim is to get our clients into their top school, and if we have to be blunt, we will be!"

Speaking about the expectations from the market, she remarked that, "The Indian market is no doubt large and getting bigger every day, thanks to the strong economic growth. More importantly, however, there is a cultural belief that education can be a stepping stone to a better opportunity. In addition, the candidates we have come across have the raw analytical power as well as the drive to succeed. Given the rigor of the Indian education system, a student that has done well in India, can also expect to do very well in the USA MBA program."

"Our expectations are actually modest. Our services are quite specialized and we are not taking a mass market approach. We really get involved with each applicant we take on. We just want potential applicants to know that we exist and utilize our free 15 minute brain storming session. We are pretty confident they will learn something you may not have been aware of," she added.

Today most of their referrals come from past students, friends and family, and over the long term this is what, the sister duo believe, will make them successful.

The company is very excited to enter India and is confident of their success. They believe that each B school has different requirements and guiding principles and the candidates' essays need to show that they meet these special requirements. | By Aanchal Kohli [aanchal(at)adgully.com]