Ep 93 | What Makes a Great MBA Admissions Consultant? Experience, Strategy, and Expertise

How do you choose the right MBA admissions consultant, and what separates experienced advisors from newcomers to the industry?

In this episode of The mbaMission Podcast, host Harold Simansky is joined by mbaMission founder Jeremy Shinewald and Senior MBA Admissions Consultant Nisha Trivedi to discuss what truly defines expertise in MBA admissions consulting.

They explore why experience, collaboration, and rigorous training matter when helping applicants build compelling business school applications. The conversation also pulls back the curtain on mbaMission’s hiring process and explains why admissions consulting involves far more than editing essays.

From profile evaluation and school selection to storytelling and strategic positioning, the team explains how seasoned consultants help applicants present their strongest candidacy.

0:00 Introduction: Why Experience Matters in Admissions Consulting

1:47 Jeremy Shinewald on “Overnight Consultants”

4:29 Inside mbaMission’s Hiring and Screening Process

6:43 The Value of Consultant Collaboration

7:58 Institutional Knowledge and Applicant Resources

9:59 Why Admissions Consulting Is More Than Essay Editing

11:31 Profile Evaluation and School Selection Strategy

13:23 Track Record, Reviews, and Proven Expertise

14:30 Admissions Officers vs Admissions Consultants

15:25 The “Chef vs Food Critic” Analogy

16:31 Avoiding the Formulaic MBA Application

17:05 Red Flags When Choosing a Consultant

18:03 Final Advice for MBA Applicants

Book your FREE 30-minute MBA admissions consultation with Harold or another one of our experienced MBA admissions consultants by filling out this form.

Learn more about onTrack by mbaMission, our innovative, on-demand MBA application platform, and take our two-minute questionnaire to receive your customized learning path.
 
‼️Use code MBAMPOD for 30% off any onTrack subscription‼️

Contact Us:
info@mbamission.com

Follow Us:
YouTube
LinkedIn
Instagram

Transcript

Introduction: Why Experience Matters in Admissions Consulting

Jeremy Shinewald 0:00

We have put our collective wisdom into creating resources.

Harold Simansky 0:03

This is a huge curriculum that supports our clients. This is a profession that benefits from experience, not just your own experience, but experience of the people who you rely on.

Nisha Trivedi 0:12

We're a group of full-time consultants, so you know sometimes if I feel like I need another opinion, I've bounced ideas off of you or one of our other colleagues, and that just gives me all the more conviction in the advice that I'm giving to my clients.

Harold Simansky 0:23

You want the person who knows how to create the great product, not the person who knows how to critique the great product. But what makes a really great consultant who you can trust to help you achieve your dream of attending a top business school? On today's episode of the MBA Mission Podcast, we're telling it to you straight. You absolutely cannot become an admissions consultant overnight. Just because you went through the process and attended a top business school, that does not qualify you to guide others. But what does? MBA Mission Senior Consultant Nisha has been helping MBA applicants for almost a decade, and together we really know what separates a great consultant from a good one. Nisha will share what applicants should look for, what questions to ask, and how to make sure you're getting the guidance that will actually move the needle. We'll talk about why experience matters, how a consultant's approach can impact your application, and how to find someone who will help you tell your story most authentically and effectively. If you're considering working with an admissions consultant, or just want to make sure you're choosing wisely, this episode will give you the clarity you need to make a confident decision.

Jeremy Shinewald on “Overnight Consultants”

Jeremy Shinewald 1:46

I'm so thrilled to be here with my co-host and friend Harold Samansky and my non-co-host, but also friend, our guest, Nisha Trevetti, uh veteran consultant, uh longtime uh member of the team here. Certainly one, I would say seriously, at the risk of flattering Nisha, one of those conscientious people, someone who just takes her clients so seriously and her own practice seriously. Anyone who's worked with Nisha would be extremely lucky uh to be working with her. So thanks for joining us today. We're here to talk about uh something that really uh sticks in my craw as uh as someone who has uh built a firm in this space, which is the relative differences. We're gonna focus on us. We don't want to talk too much about others, but I I find that there are there's a there's a growing industry of overnight consultants. Yeah, absolutely. Who graduate from Wharton and declare themselves to be a Wharton consultant or or go on a platform and claim that they're an expert now because they're at Harvard or something like that. And it's just so different. You know, you look at someone, Harold has been a decade in this field, you're almost a decade. I mean, 22 years. The institutional knowledge at our firm and across all of our consultants is just so significant. And it's like the same thing. It's like, you know, if you there's so many examples I've given over the years. You know, if you are uh, you know, it's like, well, I cooked a really good meal, I'm a chef now. It's like, no, I'm I'm not. I'm not prepared. I did really well. I followed the instructions. I am not prepared to make your family a very important dinner. And so um, you know, there are all sorts of reasons why people get into business school. It doesn't necessarily make them qualified to be a consultant, even if they got into a top school. If you want to be one of our success stories, sign up for a free consultation with a member of our full-time MBA admissions team. Since we've worked with tens of thousands of applicants over the past two decades, we can give you our honest opinion on your chances and help you put together your very best application. That is not a sales call, but rather your first session with one of us for free. We can give you a profile evaluation, answer specific questions about the process, review your resume, talk about your school choices, and so much more. Sign up at nba mission.com slash consult. We look forward to working with you. Um, so I think it's really, really important to talk about again, trying to focus on what separates us out in a positive way. Um, you know, I I think it's really, really important to talk about that, the commitment we've all made to this field. So at the highest level, can you just talk about how rigorous, just not even our hiring processes, like our our most basic screening process?

Nisha Trivedi 4:29

Yeah, absolutely. So let's say when we are hiring a consultant, you know, the company, as I understand, gets many, many, many resumes.

Jeremy Shinewald 4:36

And uh, Kate who leads Kate who leads our our uh Kate Richardson, who leads our hiring committee, is inundated with requests uh all the time from from other firms, from students, from any just just inbound before we're even doing outbound.

Nisha Trivedi 4:51

Yeah, absolutely. And so we're you know constantly getting resumes and cover letters and you know, expressed interest in you know working with MBA Mission. And so, first of all, there's just getting through that screening process and being selected for interview, which, you know, in and of itself is incredibly selective. And then I remember going through the interview process, you know, I had to um critique essays, I had to do a mock free consultation, um, the 30-minute meeting that we offer um, you know, candidates who are applying to business school with um somebody listening in, um, I think a mock interview. And really, there were at least a few rounds of this. You know, I talked to at least a few members of the staff to get a sense of their day-to-day experiences, and they asked me questions about um parts of my previous work experience, even outside of admissions consulting, that would be applicable to this role. And in the end, I believe it's like what a 1 to 2% acceptance rate for consulting.

Jeremy Shinewald 5:45

One of the things I love about our process, first of all, is as I'm not even involved in it. It's it's like it's it's pure run, uh, which is great. I at the very end, I I I get to I get to meet someone at the very end of that process. But one thing that I love about it is everyone has to agree every step of the way. So it you you can't get through our our recruiting process unless every person who's who's part of that um part of that process, the the four to five consultants who are doing the evaluation, yeah, um, you know, they all need to agree that you're of that you are sort of of our quality uh before you can get that offer. And uh, you know, and we've had amazing people, like we've had so many admissions officers apply and just haven't had the skills that we're looking for, haven't had the demeanor we're looking for, haven't had the writing skills. So we're we're testing for everything. It's so rigorous. It is not, hey, join our platform. If you can get five clients, we're happy. It's hey, we want this, this is a calling for you. We want you to be committed.

The Value of Consultant Collaboration

Harold Simansky 6:42

Um and Jeremy, let me just pause here. And it also speaks to the infrastructure that we have as a firm. And what I really mean by that, all of us are going to be interviewed by I forgot how many people, many, many people interviewed me, and I spent time with many people. But when I was finally hired, suddenly I had a network of people, a group of people who I can just start bouncing ideas off of. And it's not just, okay, you it's not just can you become a consultant overnight and be admissions consultant overnight? The reality is do you have an infrastructure around you? And if you've just become an overnight, it's like the answer is no, you don't, you simply do not.

Jeremy Shinewald 7:13

Yeah. Like, I mean, at Amiation, we have we have OnTrack, for example, which is which is just like a free resource. Well, it's it's a you can sign up for a free version of it. You can you can upgrade to a paid version. It's like we have put our collective wisdom into creating resources. This is a huge curriculum that supports our clients that you can use as a self-study curriculum. We have, you know, our own you know, insider's guides. We have our own, like these are things that just we have our our career guides. I mean, I can go on and on. There's so many resources free or paid on our on our website that you can access. You just don't have those things as a, hey, today I'm a consultant. You don't have you know resume templates, you don't, you don't, you don't have all the things that that allow us to help people. You don't have you don't have reference points for their colleagues.

Institutional Knowledge and Applicant Resources

Harold Simansky 7:57

Yeah, I mean that's the thing. The funny thing to me is Nisha is my colleague. When I have a question or an issue, I send her an essay to take a look at. I ask her questions because they at the end of the day, this is an ex this is a profession that benefits from experience, right? Not just your own experience, but experience of the people who you rely on.

Jeremy Shinewald 8:16

I have a client right now who I'm working with. I love the guy. He's such a great, great applicant. I I'm I'm too biased now. I need to step away from him in the interviews because I just I love what he does. I asked another consultant on our team, I asked a few, and two people stepped up to give him a mock interview. You you can't do that if you're like, today I'm a consultant. Yes. You don't have the colleagues to call on to do the great work. That's right. For sure. I think um, just in general, also, before you're actually an official consultant at NBA Mission, um, you do a self-study program that's that's very vast. We don't hire you until you've completed a self-study program, until you've actually, again, as part of that process, there's a capstone process where you have to prove yourself. Like it's rigorous. There's mentorship before you become before you become a consultant. There's mentorship, there is reading, there are exercises before we can even say you you meet the level um that we need. I feel like everyone is is obsessed with the bear. That's like the the rigor of like, I don't know, placing spoons or something like that. Maybe we're not quite that level, but uh but you have to do a lot of work before we'll even consider you to be to be part of our team. And if you don't like that high threshold, like I remember years ago, this is so funny. I haven't thought about this. Years ago, someone called us and said, you know, I really would like to join your firm, but you know, I I've got another firm out there that's willing to hire me now, and they they don't have all these requirements. And I was like, so you want to join the firm that is is less strenuous so you can get to work now and and deliver less than your best? Like, great, go work for that firm. Absolutely. That's pretty awesome. Uh so I'm glad that person didn't didn't sign up with us.

Harold Simansky 9:48

Right, right, right.

Jeremy Shinewald 9:48

Um sorry, I'm gonna I get carried away with this because I'm pretty passionate about it. But let's um, yeah, let's let's let's talk about kind of the yeah, the intensity of the of the work that we that we do.

Why Admissions Consulting Is More Than Essay Editing

Harold Simansky 9:58

Yeah. I mean, listen, I think our work really covers everything. Frequently, particularly for folks who are just trying to do it, you know, on the shoestring or overnight, they think that it's just about essays. And at the end of the day, so much work has to happen before the essays. I frequently tell my clients that writing the essays is the easy part if you've done everything well. And again, you sort of have to know something, and experience really shows this to you.

Jeremy Shinewald 10:24

And if you don't have that experience, if you're gonna assess the profile of a candidate, it's like, so I'm I'm I'm uh I just started yesterday and I'm ready to go. It's like, or I'm I'm Nisha, I've done hundreds of thousands of free consultations, I've worked with hundreds of clients. I know what the ins and outs of your profile are.

Nisha Trivedi 10:44

Absolutely. Because that's the thing, exactly what Harold said. A lot of times people think of, oh, I need an admissions consultant because I need help with my essays and my resume and a mock interview later on. In sure, we work on that, but it's so much more than that, right? I um, you know, when I first meet a candidate, I help them assess their profile. Like what are their strengths? What are some watch out points? And based on their goals and some other preferences, you know, what is a good list of target schools? And there have been times where a candidate has told me, oh, I hadn't thought about those schools. Let me look into it. They end up applying and, you know, sometimes they end up going there. And it's because of that institutional knowledge that my colleagues and I have built up that we're able to see, you know, certain patterns or make judgment calls in terms of a person's profile or or what direction that you know they should go in. Um, and so you know, again, there's just it's it's very, very holistic.

Jeremy Shinewald 11:31

Like assessing your profile or guiding school selection, something you just you just need the reps to do it properly. And then on top of that, like just what about all the all the I mean, the whole point of hiring a consultant is is that we is we understand nuance, right? Like that there isn't some sort of like easily understood path to getting there. Absolutely. I am I was just laid off. What do I do? Uh my recommender is being difficult. Uh you know, I'm not sure he's gonna make his deadline. Uh I mean, just it goes, I mean it goes on and wrong.

Harold Simansky 11:57

Right, right. I mean, so so frequently it's not just about what you should, what you the client should end up writing about. Frequently, it's also what the client should end up not writing about. Exactly. And that is really reflected in the experience we have. We've seen other people like them. We've actually had the opportunity to talk to other colleagues to honestly, we do a lot of ding reviews as a firm. We do a lot of ding reviews, and sometimes I'll look at a ding review, look at their application, look at everything, and I think to myself, you know what? The consultant just went wrong. The applicant would did a great job. They did everything we're supposed to do, but there was something, the nuance was missing there. Exactly. And frequently, I hate to say it. Sometimes the reason for that, there's no escaping it, is they simply got wrong information because the seasoning wasn't there.

Jeremy Shinewald 12:41

Right. There's an amateur consultant out there who's just taking a few clients to pay off their ski trip or something like that. That's right. And it just doesn't work. It's got to be something like is there any other industry out there that I'm trying to think of where uh a lack of experience is is rewarded? It's like you wouldn't want the you wouldn't want the the the the the part-time doctor, uh, the the part-time attorney. Like, I gotta go to court. I'm gonna go find someone who takes one client every two years. Right. Exactly. I'm gonna go to I gotta go to court. You know, it's it's making me anxious. I'm gonna go find someone who's on a platform who's relatively inexpensive, and I'm gonna have this person represent me, or I'm gonna go find an expert who has a lot of seasoning and nuance, and and that person is gonna do a great job.

Track Record, Reviews, and Proven Expertise

Harold Simansky 13:23

Right. In commercial, I hate to uh uh necessarily put it this way, but go to poets and quants, go to GMAC Club. I think at the end of the day, sort of the proof is in the pudding. Nisha, I believe you at this point you have over 100 five-star reviews. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Jeremy Shinewald 13:38

I mean, and more than several firms. Like, seriously. That's right. More than several firms that are listed. More than most firms that are listed there, actually, because most firms are small, like what I call zombie firms, that give if they get a client great. And they've got, you know, the majority of the firms listed there have a very small number of reviews. Uh they don't have the kind of enduring success. No, that's right. Experience matters. As with everything, experience matters.

Nisha Trivedi 14:00

Yeah, I feel like I build up almost this, you know, Rolodex T is a very vintage word, of in, you know, of experience, of you know, having seen certain types of client profiles. And that's what gives me the confidence to you know advise the those I work with in terms of their application elements. And of course, as you mentioned uh earlier, Harold, you know, we have uh, you know, we're a group of full-time consultants. So, you know, sometimes if I feel like I need another opinion, I've bounced ideas off of you or one of our other colleagues, and that just gives me all the more conviction in the advice that I'm giving to my clients.

Admissions Officers vs Admissions Consultants

Jeremy Shinewald 14:29

Yeah, another another format that we've sort of shied away from is the the like we're admissions officers um type type of format. Yeah. And and and it's and and we have several people on our team who have been admissions officers. It's not necessarily a bad thing, but I can't tell you how many admissions officers have not made it at our firm, have not made it through that kind of like screening or that pre that that sort of pre-training period and mentorship period. Um and uh and it's it's because it's a totally different skill. Like like like like helping someone be creative is not necessarily inherent. There are some admissions officers who can do it, but it it's not the same as having a creative side where you're uh an extremely strong writer, you have a very high EQ. The evaluation, the ability to evaluate applicants is great for an admissions officer. It's just it's just not terribly helpful uh as an admissions consultant.

The “Chef vs Food Critic” Analogy

Harold Simansky 15:24

Listen, I'm gonna get to the punchline that invariably invariably all of us get to. Would you rather have Steven Spielberg making your movie, or do you want to have the top movie critic for the New York Times making your movie? And at the end of the day, it's sort of obvious at that point. But the reality is that you want the person who knows how to create the great product, not the person who knows how to critique the great product. Yeah.

Nisha Trivedi 15:46

Exactly. And it's also, you know, we actually have a blog blog post about this. Uh, you know, what's the difference between a food critic? So kind of like what you just said, a food critic and the chef, right? It's one thing to critique an application, to recognize a good application, but to work with somebody on actually constructing the elements, that's what we do as admissions consultants. And that is a different skill set from being an admissions officer.

Jeremy Shinewald 16:06

And as I said before, what's the difference between a chef and someone who just pulled off a really good meal? That's true too. It's just like just because you got into a program, there's so many different ways. That's absolutely true. Or your brother got into a good program.

Harold Simansky 16:17

That's even more. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeremy Shinewald 16:20

My boss went to Harvard in in uh 2001. And he's gonna read my essays. Yeah, right. Yeah, it's a great boss. Okay, you know, that's fine. Or in 1965. Right. Um, I've heard of that. That's absolutely true.

Avoiding the Formulaic MBA Application

Harold Simansky 16:30

Yeah. And again, the just to be clear here, the issue with that is they're trying to take you and make you sound like somebody else. Right. And I think that that's the biggest problem with inexperienced consultants, right? Is this notion here of there's only one formula, there's only one type of person who gets into these programs, and I'm gonna make you look like that as opposed to figuring out what you look like and what about you is gonna be most important.

Nisha Trivedi 16:53

Exactly. And so that's the thing. I help I get to know my clients deeply so that I can make sure their voice, not mine, not anyone else's, comes through in their application elements, and it's really recognizing the unique strengths that they bring to the program.

Red Flags When Choosing a Consultant

Jeremy Shinewald 17:05

Anyone, anyone who says to you, um, I'm gonna help you discover your personal brand, or I I went there, I know the way, like I understand how to do it. Absolutely. This run, run for the hills, run for the hills. It's like it is so much more nuanced and complicated. It requires judgment.

Final Advice for MBA Applicants

Harold Simansky 17:23

Yeah, listen, I personally see it every day. And what I mean by that is I look at essays that were written by some of Nisha's clients, and the beautiful thing about them, and I don't want to embarrass Nisha, is this notion here of one essay does not seem to be like another essay. This idea here of Nisha takes the time, and all of us do, to get to know that person and help that person communicate most effectively that's right for them, that is not right for somebody else. And a commercial here for Nisha. If you want to, by all means, sign up for a free 30-minute consultation with Nisha. She'll help you think through some of those things. Sign up for a 30-minute conversation with me, with Jeremy, or um, we've all had the reps.

Jeremy Shinewald 18:03

Because we've all the reps, we all know what we're doing. And we're we're we're ready to help you from the moment you're on that free consultation call. And we always say this is your first half an hour of paid time, only it's free. The point is we're not holding anything back. You're gonna experience what it's like to talk to an expert like Nisha um when you call for that free consultation. I don't want to belabor the point. I think I think we've made our point. I think uh I and I think this is this has been a really great. I hope that I hope that every applicant will watch this one and will sort of do the homework necessary to find the right consultant for them. Because, you know, admittedly, we're in an unregulated industry, and people can just pop up and say, okay, I'm a consultant, and it's super important to actually know what you're getting and to really, really do that homework. So um, thanks for having this discussion with me, guys. Of course, thank you. Thanks for being here, Isha.

Harold Simansky 18:52

Thank you, Jeremy.

Jeremy Shinewald 18:53

Thanks for coming on to my podcast tonight. I always love being on your podcast, Harold. Uh we'll see you next time.

Harold Simansky 18:57

Absolutely.

Jeremy Shinewald 18:58

Exciting news! You can now access OnTrack by MBA Mission for free. Take our two-minute onboarding questionnaire to personalize your learning path. Choose the free plan, and you'll have unlimited access to our complete modules on MBA application timelines, standardized testing, your professional background, community leadership, school selection, and more. You'll also get access to select lessons from our brainstorming, personal statement, essay, resume, and recommendation modules. It's a great introduction to the on track platform and will help you jumpstart the MBA application process. Get started today at ontrack.mba mission.com.