December 07, 2008

A sample business-school application

Dear Sir/Madam,

I am interested in joining your esteemed business school this year. I have perused your website and I am sure that I am a good candidate for the MBA program. I attach my application form herewith, and I address some potential concerns below.

I do not see the need to tell you my university grades, for they are but fragments of opinion; each mark but a human (and therefore necessarily flawed) estimate of my ability. Moreover, a transcript is a miserably one-sided conclusion: it lacks the opinion I personally hold regarding these estimates, which is, to say the least, uncharitable.

I am also apparently required to submit the results of certain competitive examinations. I have not bothered to sit for them; I have discovered that they are meaningless evaluations of verbal and mathematical skill, pedantic quantifications of the intrinsically unquantifiable. I refuse to suffer the indignity of being assessed in these matters by individuals that I neither know nor respect.

I do not have the time or the inclination to write those four 1000-word essays you seem to expect me to give you. It appears that you wish to know personal things about me, to understand the inner workings of my mind, to "know what makes me tick", as you so abhorrently put it. I do not, however, wish to tell you personal things about me, or to tutor you in the inner workings of my mind; I have better things to do, like watching my new Star Wars DVDs. They’re digitally remastered and all. Well, not the prequel movies, which were already kind of remastered because they came out so recently; but the sequels, by virtue of having come out so long ago, did need some touching up, like the scene at Mos Eisley where those aliens .. but we digress. You want to know what I intend to do after finishing your wretched little course? What insufferable audacity. You should be thanking your stars that I even considered your school, dammit.

And what be this fee you speak of, vermin? What diabolic spirit hath possessed your feeble brain that you quote amounts so random, and yet so astronomic? Let me get this straight. I'm the one who is expected to drag self halfway across the planet, study diligently, do those obnoxious assignments, stay up late - and I have to pay you for it? Greedy little weasel, aren't we? The way I see it, you should be the one paying me. For flying over, for staying in your godforsaken little town, for doing all those little Powerpoint presentations and cost-benefit analyses and whatever else it is you folks pretend to do.

Thank you kindly for your time and consideration. I hope to hear from you at the soonest.

9 comments :

DSK said...

I applied to 18 institutions, I wrote 18 essays.

Yes, I may have only changed the names of the institutions in each essay, but I ended every one of them with a "Thanking you in advance." and a "Yours sincerely".

Not so sincere.

tangled said...

orly?

LAK said...

Dear Applicant-in-a-million, Thank you for showing us the light! What were we even thinking of when we made all those pernickety rules? We were impractical, we see that now. Without beating about the bush (or, er, shoo-ing)we offer you, not a student seat, but a faculty position!Yours etc., Dean, IWTM (Institute of Wishful Thinking Management)

Sheetal said...

heh, you're polite enough to begin with... :)

zigzackly said...

Is the One available for freelance assignments?

the One said...

DSK: You got away lightly - that would be just one essay per institution (if one's arithmetic is still in adequate shape :)). But it's never sincere, is it - and the institutions know it too.

T: Yes, really :)

LAK: What, a lowly lecturership? One demands the title of Professor Emeritus. And, Dean, when exactly are you due to retire?

Sheetal: Stream of consciousness, what :)

Zigzackly: Yes, sounds exciting - will get in touch. Thanks for letting me know about this.

Padma said...

The people in these esteemed business schools, do they really get down to reading all the essays?
This article probably has the requisite number of 5+ syllabled words to pass through their “advanced writing skill” software and of course, through the spell and grammar check.
All I’m really saying is that this is well-written :)

the One said...

Padma: One hates spelling-check and grammar-check software, and it forever seems to be pointing out errors that really don't look like errors. This letter might not pass after all :)

The Stone Angel said...

Daring you are.Did you really try this? BTW I liked your post in 55 word fiction..'he was....... posting anymore'.