The mbaMission Podcast

Ep 31 |Top MBA Admissions Trends for 2025

mbaMission Season 2 Episode 31

In our first podcast episode of 2025, mbaMission's Harold Simansky, Jeremy Shinewald, and Jessica Shklar share their takeaways from the 2024 MBA application season and make predictions for the 2025 application season. They discuss macro trends related to the economy, the impact of AI on business school admissions, trends in GMAT scoring, and more.

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what's happening next year? what we're

seeing is admissions officers trying to

figure out how to stay ahead of the

curve of applicants who are so used to

using AI we are seeing more video

questions more interviews if I've just

spent hours and hours on my application

what do I do with that Jessica I'm

scared as you should be and I think

International um applicants are going to

be struggling with is this country a

good place for them to be in will there

be jobs for them afterwards Business

School Pops a little bit more during

recessionary times people say this is a

great time to go hideout business school

and I'll come back just during hiring

those of you who are thinking of

applying now remember that maybe 100

seats in your class have been taken for

two years

already it's a new year and a new look

and feel for the NBA Mission podcast we

had so much success with a more

traditional podcast last year that we've

decided to up our game again delivering

a more polished video podcast with some

incredible guests ranging from test

experts to admissions directors to our

very own in-house admission experts

we'll be covering the topics you want so

be sure to leave your recommendations

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subscribe wherever you get your podcast

what else is new I have a co-host none

other than my very first podcast guest

and the founder of mbaMission Jeremy

Shinewald thanks for having me Harold of

course and on this episode our very

first one of 2025 we are joined by NBA

admissions executive director Jessica

Shklar Jessica has been with MBA missions

since 2009 and she's basically an

industry Legend she has the most

five-star reviews of any admissions

consultant on GMAR club and is a top

consultant from poets and quants she's a

storytelling expert and has helped

hundreds of applicants get into all the

top Business Schools in the US and

around the world including The Usual

Suspects like HBS Stamford Warton

Columbia Booth INSEAD and many many more

right now we're looking at potentially a

very mysterious year after 2023

2024 we get to 2025 2026 and there are

already some whisperings about what's

going to happen let's first off thinking

about macro Trends how are macro Trends

really impacting application volume

anything from the economy which

direction is it going people getting

laid off even AI which then of course

brings us to also the micro trends

what's happening with the applications

themselves what are your thoughts well

let's start with the macro Trends and

talk about that for a little bit and I

think there are a lot of different

issues going on one is clearly the

effect of the election the US election

um and there's trepidation around that

and I think International um applicants

are going to be struggling

with is this country a good place for

them to be in will there be jobs for

them afterwards how should they be

thinking about moving to the US and I'm

starting to hear that more and more from

my clients as I'm sure both of you are

as well yeah I mean I attended a

summit recently from from GMAC and

they showed data I wish I could remember

the precise amount but they showed

data among Internationals I think it was

about 15% they saw a decline in GMAT

test takers which is a leading indicator

for application volume exactly so um

this is during Trump's first term so in

you know I don't know if maybe people

have a different

understanding they're accustomed to this

at some level they think that the four

years will pass quickly but I would

imagine that some similar drop will

occur among Internationals now depending

on perspective if you're an

international committed to apply in the

states maybe that's a good thing for you

maybe you're looking around saying this

is my chance to stand out but I think

there is some there are some

apolitically speaking there are there is

some data that said that last time Trump

came in GMAT test takers declined GMAT

test and they bounced back up I was

going to say GMAT test takers declined

except do we know how many applicants

International applicants I don't know I

don't know if we if we knew exactly how

many International applicants um fell

off and again that's GMAT test

takers that's a that's a view at the

entire test taking population and the

entire applicant population it's

possible that at the top schools that we

tend to deal with more the top 15

schools maybe there's a little less

volatility right among those programs

but I know that some of the

international programs were delighted

like I know that uh some of the Canadian

and European schools saw application

volumes increase and that made some of

those schools U more competitive which

again depending on if you were thinking

about applying to INSEAD before maybe like

oh I'm actually going to have a more

competitive pool because of trump so

it's a it's complicated do you think

that that works from the flip direction

are we seeing more Americans thinking

about going to European schools as a way

getting away the one thing I will say

when Trump's during his first term it's

the first time I ever did applications

or helped folks with applications from

Rotman from um British Columbia a lot of

European applications so I think we saw

it in very real ways here at our firm

yeah then one of the other big trends

that I'm thinking about is that COVID is

really in the past now and COVID impacted

volumes tremendously for several years

but now when I think about the essays

I'm working on who graduated in during

COVID and so our next cycle on the cycle

after that will be people who yes they

were affected by COVID during college but

it didn't affect their working

experience quite as much and so how does

that change things I don't know if that

changes their career trajectory their

timing for business school remember when

we were doing applications right during

covid and after every essay was about

right thank goodness we're not seeing

that anymore during covid applications

went up

initially question initially

applications went up a Nick at some

schools keep in mind when it hit in you

know in March of 2020 um you know we

were kind of through rounds like

Harvard Business School only has two

rounds they were effectively done and

they didn't open up a late round some

other schools said we've got to be more

flexible we got to open up we got to

extend our year people haven't had a

chance to take tests that it took a

while to get the GMAT online ultimately

some schools saw a bit of a pop but I

think it's important to set the cont to

to create that context that basically

over the 20 plus years that I have been

doing this

full-time applications to Harvard

Business School as a bellwether have

been between roughly 9,200 and a little

under 10,000 applicants every year so it

fluctuates you know 2 3% a year

depending on where the economy is and in

the overhang of covid for 2 years the

only time in my 20 years I've seen the

number that didn't start with nine it

went down to about I think 8,700 and

then

8,200 and people were saying oh is the

business is an MBA gone are people

done and in fact it was just people were

very happy with their work from home

life their job security and as we'll

talk about a lot of that appears to be

gone and a lot of young people rush back

so last year it we actually reverted

to the mean and there are all these

articles written about oh you know the

MBA is back and it's surging but really

it just went back to a local

band where about I think HBS had about

9700 applicants last year again which is

right where it should be we can

certainly talk about where it's

going to be going you know in general

and not everyone applies to HBS there

are other schools that are maybe a

little bit more sensitive to macro

Trends but we're at least for now you

missed your great years to apply uh you

know 8700 8200 those are quiet years and

now we're back in a pretty normal cycle

couldn't we also say that there was a

bubble afterwards because there were a

lot of people who decided they didn't

want to go remote people who deferred if

they've been accepted to a school that

was then going to be remote and that

took up spaces from those future classes

so there was more constraint for a while

there and I feel like all that's passed

and so now the classes are back to being

you apply and then you go with one big

distinction which is deferred programs

which have really grown when I joined

the company and started this business

Harvard was pretty much the only one

with a deferred program and now I think

there are at least eight or 10 and so

those of you who are thinking of

applying now remember that maybe 100

seats in your class have been taken for

two years already right like Warton had

Warton had 60 direct admits from its

from its well 60 deferred admits from

its uh its molus program in its last

Core last uh last class you know Orton

has 850 spots like so 60 are gone you

know it's close to it's we're nearing

10% that are gone before current

applicants even have a chance to get

into the pool and then look at like

other specialized programs like at

Wharton they've got their Healthcare

Management program they got their

Wharton water program and as you start

to chip away you realize that some of

these classes are actually a lot smaller

you know object what is it objects in

the mirror maybe larger than

they're a lot smaller than they appear

we should price take a minute though and

Define what we mean by deferred programs

so deferred programs are when you apply

as a senior in college typically the

deadline is April I think HBS is still

January but don't quote me on that and

you don't work right you don't go to

business school right away you get

accepted for a class two or three years

down the road and you do have to work

and the Business School generally has to

approve you not all programs are

structured the same way for Yale you can

you join right away then take two years

off and then do another year but when we

talk about deferred programs and I think

all of us by Instinct default to calling

them two plus two simply because that

was Harvard which is the first one we

mean seniors in college who get in but

aren't going to start for two or three

or four more years and if you apply as a

deferred applicant

that's not a commitment like you

are not it's not binding so we're seeing

another Trend out there we're seeing a

lot of applicants say okay well I

better apply when I'm in college feeling

like a little bit of that fear of

missing out as their friends start

applying and then maybe they don't get

into the top school that they want to

but they've got they're pre- admitted to

another school and then they start

applying again in another round right so

there's it's a different kind of

pressure on that applicant pool and

admissions officers have said to me they

feel like almost part of their job is

become is become making sure their

deferred pool doesn't melt away that's

interesting and also we used to think of

it because of the Harvard program as the

2 plus two but actually it could be 2

plus three or four or even five years

out so there's some spillage over that

as well to what's happening next year

we're hearing a few different things

regression to the mean as far as the

number of applicants at the same point

the actual class is getting chipped away

whether it's at Warden with the louder

program these deferred admission

programs volume changing international

volume is changing that's right and then

so much can be driven also just by

the economy right like so again

trying to be AP political but like if

there is in fact a massive Terra War

what does that do I mean generally

speaking Business School Pops a little

bit more like we said during covid when

the during a uh you know during

recessionary times people say this is a

great time to go hide out in business

school and I'll come back just during

hiring so you know it's really hard

to know what happens with an economy you

know honestly a lot of things a lot of

different obviously um different factors

are playing a role here so Jessica

what's going to happen that is such a

great question and what's going to

happen with the entire economy entire

economy and all geopolitical impact

exactly and where should I invest my

money now right so obviously if I knew

that things would be different and I

think that actually brings me exactly to

the point I wanted to make to our

listeners which is our viewers which is

what does this mean for you and the

bottom line is not that much you don't

have control over any of the things we

just discussed the only thing you have

control over is your application and

your candidacy and so you can be aware

of the these factors and maybe they

would play into what schools you apply

to how safe you go whether you look at

International programs maybe into your

career discussion but fundamentally your

job is to make yourself the best

candidate you can and not worry about

these macro Trends which probably leads

not to step on your toes Harold to our

second point which is about micro trends

yes yes yes but I but I would say one

other thing which is that you're not

even going to know what that macro trend

is until well after you're admitted like

they like they so you can guess oh

my God this year is a really busy like I

thought that I thought that COVID was going

to go off the charts bananas I thought

we're going to see 11,000 applicants at

Harvard 12,000 or something like that

well Harvard was done but you know that

type of thing right it just it just

didn't materialize quite that way and we

didn't know that until you know small

pop at some schools or a bigger but it

wasn't it wasn't crazy we didn't know

that until well after that class was

admitted like the class was you apply

the class is admitted and then once

they've got all their final numbers

because literally they've got people

matriculating on the ground they can

then say this is our class and they

release data like a month or two after

that in October November of the of the

of the year after in which you've

applied and so you know you don't even

know what you're facing what we're also

seeing in the news is the fact that

there have been layoffs in a lot of

different parts of the economy

Jeremy how is that going to affect

things yeah like I think on a macro

level we think about like the general

economic health but what are the jobs

that young people are taking young

people are generally taking jobs in

finance in technology and Consulting

that's often 65 70% of the class at a

top MBA program and so I would say that

the you know that the application

volumes are actually more sensitive to

those three Industries than they are to

GL to Big global economic trans and um

and there was seemingly big over hiring

in Consulting for a period that's right

and applicant there are fewer offers to

stay there's less hiring going on um so

I think some applicants are starting to

you know look around and think about

their next move towards business school

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subscription okay Jeremy so just picking

up on what you said the reality is we

are seeing some macro Trends we're

seeing macro Trends in Consulting we're

thinking about macro Trends as far as

Tech goes some of it is driven from AI I

think this is a great segue to the

second half of our podcast to talk about

how is AI going to affect the actual

application Jessica what are your

thoughts it's a great question and we've

spoken with several admissions directors

um who are really struggling with this

because the generation that's applying

is very comfortable with AI sometimes

more comfortable than the admissions

officers are and so they're trying

rapidly to get up to speed I was at my

HBS reunion a couple of months ago and

it was you know two days of workshops

and sessions and I went to three

sessions solely on AI because my

generation we have to push ourselves

to use it and so this is a case where

admissions directors are running behind

the applicants on their knowledge and

are trying to figure out what does this

look like from an application standpoint

and so what we're seeing is applications

really changing to try to get around the

AI the risk that they are being written

by AI more video essays questions that

are multi-art and more complex than

we've seen shorter making them tougher

to write yeah and we'll probably have an

entire podcast on I say because I'm GNA

say this as a caution anytime I mention

AI be really really careful we always

can tell when something's been written

by AI and in fact Jeremy did this for

for us as a team of asking AI to

write essays and presenting it at staff

meeting and we all knew instantly AI is

a tool it is not a substitute for you so

we'll get to that on another I was going

to say we're going to talk a lot more

about AI at a different podcast what I

always tell people AI is great at

getting you to mediocre it doesn't get

you to it does get you to mediocre right

so what we're seeing is admissions

officers trying to figure out how to

stay ahead of the curve of applicants

who are so used to using AI for papers

and whatever else they're doing

so they are we are seeing more video

questions more interviews right

some scary video questions actually as

we as we think about the MIT application

towards of the end what pops up then is

a quick video on something to be

determined it varies from person to

person if I'm an applicant if I've just

spend hours and hours on my application

what do I do with that Jessica I'm

scared yeah absolutely uh as you should

be because so first think about why does

the admissions office do this they're

trying to put a name and a face together

they're trying to verify that you are

who you say you are you have this

beautiful polished essay that's got lots

of multi-lab words and commas and

phrases and sub Clauses and then you get

up and you can't articulate and speak

English at all there's going to be a

disconnect so for that some reason it's

that as an applicant you really also

should think about the fact that

Business Schools aren't looking for you

to be perfect they understand that in a

video where you have not had any

preparation you're not going to be

perfect and articulate but they're

trying to prepare you for or any

business situation that you might find

yourself in if you get into the elevator

and the CEO is the person next to you

you don't have time to prepare a speech

and edit it and analyze it you need to

be able to talk off the cuff if you're

at a recruiting event and they someone

walks by and asks a question you need to

be able to speak quickly and

articulately so Business Schools are

trying to prepare you and assess you on

key skills that you need for life and

one of them is the ability to think on

your feet and so it's scary for those of

you who spent lots of time preparing and

who are nervous about presenting

yourself as we all were when we went to

business school um it is designed for

the business schools to test a number of

different strengths one of the things I

was told before I started business

school from an Alum said that the

key thing to remember is that what the

purpose of the case method which is how

Harvard teaches is that you might be in

in a finance class and working on a

finance case and discover that the

problem is in HR what business school is

trying to do is teach you to think in a

multifaceted nonsiloed way and I think

if you take that idea for the

application itself and understand that

what business school is trying to do is

understand what skills you're going to

bring to the classroom and to the

business World it helps explain a lot of

the admissions process because in the

real world when you're giving a

presentation you don't have 900 words to

explain an essay you have 300 that's

right and so they're trying to model and

sense that you have those skills so

that's one key thing we're seeing in

business school admissions is more

variety in the types of questions one

way AI is affecting the applications as

admissions officers trying to get up to

speed on it themselves um and also um

trying to find ways in the application

to prevent you from using AI I would say

like but In fairness there probably are

a few a few use cases where AI can be a

little bit helpful to you you know if

you wanted to uh do a whole bunch of

interview prep you could type in you

know to chat GPT you know give me a long

list of MBA interview questions or

something like that that can help you

out I'll give you a great example um I

have a friend who's a Stanford Business

School grad and she was job hunting a

couple of years ago and so I sat down

with her and I talked to her about how

do you interview and how do you prepare

for interviews and so I went through

with her a lot of the techniques I use

with my clients in preparing where you

really go underneath your story and try

to understand the motivations behind the

bullet points on your resume and she

loved this technique and actually taught

it to her executive coach and ended up

putting together for herself 30 or 40

pages of stories from her life of

answers to her questions now she's

trying to write a board bio so that she

can be interviewed for different boards

so she put into chat GPT the 30 or 40

pages of self-reflection she had done

and her resume and said to chat GPT

write a board bio for me and identify

the kind of places that would um be a

good fit and it came out with some

amazing stuff but that's based on a

tremendous amount of work on her part

part first she couldn't just stick a

resume in there and yeah so input is what

and then that's really technology

excellent inputs no no and also honestly

it's really AI does a thousand Google

searches at once if you look at the

output of chat GPT it sources everything

so the reality is is you could get to

the same place if you start using Google

for everything if you use grammarly for

everything but this is beyond the

subject matter of this particular

podcast we are going to be going to talk

about AI specifically but at this point

Jeremy so tell me are Gat Norms becoming

clearer now that's a great question we

have another podcast with Stacy Koprince

coming out soon she is the head of

curriculum at Manhattan Prep the best

GMAT shop in the world so let's

talk to her about that but I think for

now you know first of all the GMAT

changed significantly uh but gear Oro yes

give or take and the reason why it

changed is because so many people were

maxing out on the Quant that basically

this is sort of short-handed a little

silly way to say it but kind of broke

the scale right and so um there wasn't

enough differentiation between top

scores anymore and they just they

basically just had to recalibrate the

entire thing and in doing so they kind

of made some other tests to make it more

user friendly to compete with the GRE

Etc we're talking about the GMAT Focus

yes the GMAT Focus so if you look at the

old GMAT at this point and you look at

the new GMAT there isn't enough data at

this point even having gone through one

full class as the schools announced

their class profiles that included the

GMAT focus and they've retired the name

the GMAT Focus making things more

complicated but we'll use that

distinction right and so what has what

has happened really at this point is

from an applicant point of view people

are still referencing the old GMAT

averages and looking at a GMAT

conversion table that's published by

GMAC that says an old 740 is a 685 on

the new GMAT right except then a 750 is

a 685 the imprecision of that

concordance table also adds to the it's

a little imprecise but one thing I would

say if you're looking to understand if

you're taking the new GMAT which you can

only do now it's really if it ends at a

five it's the new GMAT if it ends at a

zero it's the old GMAT I think the

admissions officers are still sort of in

the same world as us they've been so

used to one standard they're like still

trying to mentally calibrate and say

like what does this mean this person has

a

665 this person has a 63 I bet you

they've all got big big conord stes

right by their office that's especially

true because although Business Schools

started accepting the GMAT focus in

round two Harvard and Wharton didn't and

so they have never had applicants with

that Jessica let me just ask a question

here to pull us back to sort of what's

going to happen next year I always think

that GMAT gr is it going up every single

year this going up yeah has that been

our experience they've kind of at

the top schools they've kind of

plateaued 740 740 163 on each side on

the GRE continued to go up over

time as from the very beginning it used

to be kind of a workaround and now it's

getting pretty close to like maxing out

at 165 at some schools 164 163 but like

yeah I I think I think there's

still room for decline but I think

that's the point I think the point was

there was nowhere for the GMAT to go

anymore and I think they I don't think

they wanted it to go higher per se but I

think that actually

could be part of this I think when

people were saying before like I've got

a 760 like I if I retake this there's

there only two points that I can get

three points it's very rare for someone

to get an 800 um you know and so now I

think it's like okay I've got a 685

there's a there's a there's there a

couple there are many many different

rungs on that ladder that I can push you

this could actually maybe they know I'm

sure they consider this could drive some

applicant bananas because they be like

I'm so far from the top right but I

think the other thing is we're seeing

more tests right we're seeing G used to

be GMAT and some people took GRE then

the GRE increased so it's now roughly 30

to 40% of applicants then they launched

the executive assessment which is

primarily for EMBAs but there are more

and more um two-year programs that are

accepting the EA and then there are some

schools that are waving the GMAT if

you've taken HBS core so there's more

and more flexibility in tests I think

reflecting the fact that the tests are a

much bigger deal to applicants than to

um that has always been off we have

always had that had that conversation

with our clients we've always had a

conversation with ourselves so pecul

it's so peculiar that Business Schools

even require a test considering like if

if you have a degree in

economics Investment Banking you 30

years old yeah and you worked in

yeah you worked in Consulting and

then yeah then industry and you're yeah

and you've got you know you've got

all this analytical experience behind

you what information do they actually

need to say that you can manage

analytical work and I think that one of

the issues we talked about talk about

all the time with our clients I'm sure

you guys have this experience is another

10 points is not going to change your

your overall profile if you have a 3.7

GPA and a I don't know equivalent 730

GMAT 740 maybe it helps the schools

average but it's not fundamentally going

to change your profile they are looking

at your overall academic profile and

it's already really good let's move on

and focus on other parts of your

candidacy so Jessica that brings us back

to the original question the candidates

from year to year are they looking for

different people can we say in 2024 they

were looking for type A and 2025 they're

looking for type B can we ever get there

if we could ever get there it would be a

rear view look where we would look you

know a year down the road and say oh

this CL the school took fewer

Consultants possibly down the road we

will say oh back in 2025 they were

taking few fewer people from AI there's

absolutely no way like a 20-year view of

this industry would say that I which I

have I would say the changes are so

subtle it's like when I went in you know

people had two or three years of

investment banking well private equity

boomed and now it's two years of

investment making two or three years of

private Equity you know it's like

that wasn't driven by admissions that

was driven by a change in the way

Finance works you know you had you had

Tech hiring was much smaller at the

beginning and it was like a big deal to

have programming experience like

everyone had programming experience

that's it's just completely

it's not necessarily that appealing to

to a to a to a business school now it's

like okay I've got I've got Cutting Edge

AI experience well maybe that maybe

that's like a little if you really

credible it could be a little helpful to

you but like a lot of people have that

too you know so the compensation of the

class is just sort of overwhelmingly

Consulting Finance Tech but does that

mean that people who aren't in those

fields should run away from it you

brought up a trend when you talked about

Investment Banking and then private

Equity that are seeing which

is it used to be 2 years work experience

and then you apply to business school

and now sometimes we're even seeing four

years isn't enough I think the caveat

always is it has to be the quality of

your experience but when I joined here

and started working in this field two

years of really good experience could

still make you a credible applicant now

I look at two years no matter how good

the experience is and it's just not

enough it has to be something really

really spectacular that's almost like a

a proxy for five years EXA exactly yeah

I'll be honest with you just over the

last 3 four 5 years I just don't see

that many applicants with only 2 years

of experience yeah and I certainly don't

see successful ones that's very true too

that's very yeah it's almost like

the ones that you see who get in

like that have to have they sort of

have more it's like well yeah like I'm

two years out of school but I

started college yeah and so I kind of

have four years of experience I think

that's something really really and that

is how we end up positioning it on the

applications because we don't want them

to appear obviously we're position it

accurately but we will boost the impact

of those college Years yeah to try to

make a proxy for showing that they have

more experience yeah okay Jeremy to

summarize can you just take us through

some of the macro Trends you're seeing

big picture things I mean look the

things we've talked about I think that

overall we're kind of in this very

normal band and so there's a lot of

noise there's a lot of noise there's AI

and there's the concern about

you know about tariffs disrupting the

economy or some Internationals who may

fall off but like I would expect that

we're in a pretty stable area for MBA

admissions right now and that this this

year might grow or Shrink by a percent

or two but we'll probably be more of the

same okay great thank you and now in

summary what's going to happen with the

applications next year Jessica I predict

that we will see even more video

questions even more attempts at

spontaneity in the application and I

think we're going to continue to see uh

GMAT scores that are increasingly

trending towards the GMAT Focus

or the GRE and that's and probably

more interesting and shorter questions I

think the big takeaway that we all can

agree on is it's about the quality of

your application the reality is much of

this just doesn't matter right at the

end of the day for you as an individual

Kate it doesn't matter you have to do

the best possible application you can

right what I tell people when they come

onto consultations free consultations

with me and say does it matter that I'm

from EXC country or does it matter that

I went to ex didn't go to ex kind of

school I literally my first response is

what are you going to do about

it and they're like oh you're right I'm

like you could be aware of it we can

mitigate it or emphasize it but

fundamentally if you cannot change it

there's so much to worry about in the

application process don't worry about

what you can't change that's right

absolutely absolutely great then well

Jessica thank you very much for joining

us my new co-host Jeremy congrats

on a fantastic verse podcast well done

friend of course of course and we now

have more podcasts to come thank you

very much everyone it's Harold Simansky at

mbaMission.