Profile evaluation PhD OB / Behavioral Science / Management

[cilantrophy]

After 2-3 years of lurking, I'm finally applying to PhD programs and I'm super excited! First off, I want to thank this community and especially its active members. Honestly, I had no idea where to start when I first decided I wanted to apply to PhD programs in the US, and thanks to this forum, I feel I was really able to improve my profile over the past years.

 

Test Scores

GRE: 333/340. Q167 (92%), V166(97%), AW 5.5 (98%)

TOEFL: 120/120

Undergrad GPA

Two bachelor degrees in unrelated fields (Law/Public Administration) from a European University, GPA 7/10 and 8/10 ~ 3.0/4.0 and 4.0/4.0 (according to Stanford's converter)

Graduate GPA

Master of Science in HRM from a top European business school, GPA 9/10 ~ 4.0/4.0 (graduated summa cum laude), including a semester exchange at a top 10 US business school

Research experience

1) Part-time RA in behavioral health economics in a social/behavioral science dept in Europe, resulted in a paper that's now under review

2) Part-time RA at an economic research organization, resulted in a published research report (non peer-reviewed)

3) Part-time RA at an economics dept in Europe, resulted in an honor's thesis that was nominated for an award in organizational psych (supervisor is one of my letter writers)

4) RA at a top 10 US business school - one of the schools I'm applying to - with a very well-known prof in decision-making (one of my letter writers), 10h/week for one semester

5) RA at a top 10 US psychology department - one of the schools I'm applying to - with a very well-known prof in decision-making (also one of my letter writers), full-time for one summer

6) Currently a full-time RA at a marketing dept in a top European business school for this academic year, has so far resulted in a conference submission that's under review

Teaching Experience

Full-time TA for a year, tutored courses in social/behavioral science (including Psych) and qualitative research methods

Applying to: 9 schools, 12 programs.

Organizational Behavior @ HBS & Stanford GSB

Decision-making / Behavioral Science @ UCLA Anderson, UChicago Booth, Wharton, Carnegie Mellon

Management @ Berkeley Haas & UCSD Rady

Psych & Marketing @ Penn

Social Psych @ Harvard, Stanford & Cornell

Dream schools: All of the above! I'm specifically targeting faculty members that I really admire for their work.

 

I'm mostly worried about my undergrad degrees being too unrelated to the disciplines I'm applying to (especially for the Psych programs, although I know that that's not the main expertise of the people in this forum), my undergrad GPA, and lack of quant/stats courses. As I'm only applying to dream schools, I'm still wondering whether I should add two schools as a back-up where I feel I have a stronger chance of getting in. These two European schools are also very strong, but I feel slightly less affinity with the faculty members.

 

Hope everyone's had a great Thanksgiving and is back on track with their research! :)

[Granps]

As someone applying now to mostly OB programs (though from a Sociological perspective), I can say that you have a very strong profile. You might have already applied, so it doesn't really matter :)

At any rate, education is a journey of personal development - it led you to a related masters. If you showed this you're good.

You're GRE is great - as a non-native speaker myself, a 5.5 AW is amazing (I got a 4.5). You're research experience is awesome as well. But I'm sure you know this ;)

 

I'll tell you what I was told by a professor from a top program - they get about 200 applicants for OB and can accept 3. Out of these 50 are great. Maybe 15 are amazing. There are a bunch of factors that you can control (e.g., faculty fit, SOP strength) and some you can't (e.g., luck, they want to give students to younger faculty). So we need to do what we can, apply to enough schools, and hope for the best. Xanthus said that top10 schools are always a crap-shoot.

 

Regarding adding schools - the consensus here on the forums is that you should only add schools that if accepted to them and only them, you still will be excited to go. That should be your consideration. The effort and expense it takes to apply to two more schools if marginal.

 

Good luck! Maybe we will see each other in the end :)

[cilantrophy]

As someone applying now to mostly OB programs (though from a Sociological perspective), I can say that you have a very strong profile. You might have already applied, so it doesn't really matter :)

At any rate, education is a journey of personal development - it led you to a related masters. If you showed this you're good.

You're GRE is great - as a non-native speaker myself, a 5.5 AW is amazing (I got a 4.5). You're research experience is awesome as well. But I'm sure you know this ;)

 

I'll tell you what I was told by a professor from a top program - they get about 200 applicants for OB and can accept 3. Out of these 50 are great. Maybe 15 are amazing. There are a bunch of factors that you can control (e.g., faculty fit, SOP strength) and some you can't (e.g., luck, they want to give students to younger faculty). So we need to do what we can, apply to enough schools, and hope for the best. Xanthus said that top10 schools are always a crap-shoot.

 

Regarding adding schools - the consensus here on the forums is that you should only add schools that if accepted to them and only them, you still will be excited to go. That should be your consideration. The effort and expense it takes to apply to two more schools if marginal.

 

Good luck! Maybe we will see each other in the end :)

 

Thanks for the helpful feedback Granps! I definitely agree with it being a crap-shoot. After some reflecting, I decided to stick with my initial 12 programs because (the faculty members at) my "back-up" schools just didn't excite me enough. If I don't get into any of these 12, I'll spend one more year improving my profile and try again next fall... Looking forward to sweating together :)

[Mingming]

Hi, a newcomer here. I think your profile is competitive enough. I am not a native English speaker. Ahh, you got 120 on TOEFL? Or your TOEFL is waived? I also wonder if you have any pubs. I will apply a 19 fall OB phd program. Good luck for you.

[cilantrophy]

Yes, I got 120 on the TOEFL. I took it once a couple of years ago and prepped for about 4 days with all the resources on the ETS website. I scored 119 then. I had to retake it this year because some schools required the TOEFL to be less than 2 years old at the time of admission into the program (so for me, September 2018) rather than the time of application. So I retook it, and I guess the practice of already having taken the GRE twice and the TOEFL once paid off.

 

I do not have any peer-reviewed publications. At the time of application, I have one report published by the research institute I interned at, two papers under review, and one manuscript in preparation. Thanks Mingming and good luck to you too!

[Mingming]

Thanks for your reply. You are awesome. My research interests are leadership and teamwork. I have been doing RA job since my sophomore year. I do not have any English peer-reviewed publications either, but I have finished a cross-sectional moderated mediation study. Currently, I am doing a five-wave team level longitudinal study as the research team leader. I will submit this paper to JAP. I really appreciate what you have done. Can I have a personal connection with you? I am looking forward to learning the way you tackle the tests and, if possible, cooperating to do some studies. My email address: tarro1993@foxmail.com . You will do phd from 18 fall, so I think I will benefit a lot from your experiences for quite a while. I also want to help you if I have the information or knowledge that you need, like the phd job market, salary and methodology. I am looking forward to your reply. Good luck! Edited January 8, 2018 by Mingming

[cilantrophy]

That's awesome-- I'll shoot you an e-mail.