Education
How to write an acceptance-worthy essay for HBS [Show summary] Harsha Mulchandani, member of the Harvard Business School Class of 2021, offers her perspective on student life at HBS, as well as what her work on the Harbus Essay Guide has taught her about writing the perfect admissions essay. How can The Harbus Essay Guide help you craft your admissions essays? [Show notes] Is HBS on your list? Hear from this student about her experience so far at Harvard Business School (shut down and all) and about how the Harbus Essay Guide can help you get accepted. Our guest today, Harsha Mulchandani, lived most of her life in India. She earned an integrated MS in mathematics and computer science in 2015 from IIT Kanpur. She then launched her professional career at Boston Consulting Group and left BCG to become an investment analyst in 2017. She moved to Boston to attend Harvard Business School last summer and join the class of 2021. For her summer internship, she is an M&A and operations associate while also serving, separately, as a product manager for Harbus, HBS' student newspaper. For Harbus, she works primarily on the Harbus Essay Guide, which just came out, and its interview guide, which will come out shortly. Can you tell us a little bit about your background, where you grew up, and what you like to do for fun? [2:05] I grew up in India. For the largest part of my life, I was in a town in the northern part of India called Jaipur. You may have heard of it as the “Pink City” or a city famous for forts and palaces, or more recently for weddings. It's getting popular. I spent a large part of my time, until I was 18, there. And then I shifted to Kanpur to do my integrated master's in mathematics and scientific computing. I spent about five years there. After that, as you mentioned, I launched into management consulting with the Boston Consulting Group. A large part of my two and a half years there was focused on consumer goods, and I did a project with the government of Rajasthan, which is my home state as well. And then from there, I went on to a private equity fund called Westbridge Capital. I spent about a year and a half there, and I'm here now. That's what I did before joining HBS, other than of course getting married. And for fun, I've been into dance all my life. I used to do a lot of dance growing up, in college and now in HBS. And I like to go for short runs and listen to some of my favorite podcasts. Why did you decide to get an MBA? [3:46] I guess this is the question that people ask any MBA graduate often, or someone who is deciding to go into an MBA. I guess the most important question to answer is, why an MBA? And I guess for me, the answer was never just about only the hard skills or only the more tangible skills. It was a mix of a hard skills agenda and a more personal development agenda. And the answer for me somehow has always been a cross cut of those two. My exposure to working styles had only been focused on my own geography, which is India, so being able to develop a more global working style, interacting with some of my colleagues who have had experience working here or have grown up here. That was one of the things on my list. I wanted to interact with people and figure out what it is out there. A lot of people do it on investment calculations and take the salary of their next job and say, "Okay, in how many years can I make up for the salary?" But I guess for me, it was always that you have to add that personal development equation into that. It's a melting pot of so many different cultures, being able to listen to speakers from Brian Stevenson to Alan Horn. And also personally for me as an entrepreneur, I guess America is a much deeper market capital wise. Just to be exposed to the venture capital/private equity community here. I guess if I put all of that into the equation, it would seem favorable for me to come here and do an MBA.