Another Profile Evaluation PhD in Management Information Systems

[kyrhee]

Hi.

I am planning to apply for the business school doctoral programs, specifically for the (management) information systems major. I have to finish my applications until this December and I would appreciate any type of advice or commentary regarding my admission possibilities.

 

 

 

 

Basic Info

Type of Undergrad: Business Administration major (Top 5 university in my country)

Undergrad GPA: 3.64/4.0

Type of Grad: Business School, Management Information Systems major (Top university in my country)

Grad GPA: 3.58/4.0 (I still have my last semester left, but this is my latest GPA)

 

 

Research Experience: Research in Progress Paper submitted to an international conference (First Author)

Teaching Experience: Only worked several times as a teaching assistant, but none as a lecturer

Work Experience: None (I don't have any work experience, and started my bachelor program directly after my graduation. I am not sure if this works as an advantage or a disadvantage.)

 

 

Requirements

Test Scores GMAT: Verbal 34 / Quant 50 / Total 700 / AWA 4.5 / IR 7

Test Scores TOEFL: Total 116 (All subjects are 29)

Research Interest: Data Mining and Big data analysis. My research interests are mainly in the intersection between social and technical aspects of information technology, especially extracting managerial insights from big, unstructured data.

 

 

Courses

Information Systems (Major): IS Seminar (4/4), IS Methodology (3.72/4), Electronic Commerce (3.72/4), IS Development (3.72/4), IS Research(3.44/4)

Statistics: Quant (3.72/4), Statistics (Planning to take in next semester)

Programming: Social Data Mining (4/4), Social Computing (3.44/4)

 

 

Applying to

Dream schools: University of Arizona, Carnegie Mellon University, University of Texas-Austin, University of Maryland at College Park, University of Georgia, Indiana University at Bloomington (These are the schools that I am interested in. I would like to hear realistic comments about whether to search for more schools.)

 

 

 

 

+) I am worried about my overall profile, but my time is limited and I am not sure where to focus on more. (Should I take GMAT again and raise my scores or should I focus on my research and start on a research paper?) Again, any type of advice would be appreciated. Thank you in advance :)

[BrazilianPhD]

As you said, your time is limited.

 

I think that taking the GMAT again only would make sense if you really expect a big improvement. 700 is good. If you think you can improve to something really outstanding, ok. Otherwise, I don't think you should retake.

 

If you start a new research now, you probably will not have anything really relevant in just a few months. So, I don'tt think this is going to help that much, you already have a paper.

 

It seems you are applying to a small number of schools. I don't know the reason for that, and I'm not in MIS to really give much advice about admission possibilities. But with this small number, you will need to get lucky, I guess.

 

Your research interests also seem so vague that it's not really helpful. "Extracting managerial insights from big, unstructured data" really doesn't tell us much, as there are tons of types of managerial insights. I would work to improve on that, with a good match for an expanded list of universities to apply.

[Mandalorian]

You sound like a competitive candidate, but you should apply to a much wider range of schools. Like 20-30.

[kyrhee]

Thank you for your reply. I will later elaborate on my research interests and my SOP.. and definitely apply to more schools. I am not so sure how many schools people apply to. All schools require recommendation letters, and I feel quite frustrating to ask my professors to write multiple recommendation letters. If I apply to 20 schools (and if each school requires 3 letters), should I have to ask each professor to write a letter for me multiple times? Or are the letters uniform?

[BrazilianPhD]

I guess that, for business PhD, the average would be around 15 schools.

 

I think 10 would be on the low side, and I usually see that when the applicant's goals are more restricted. For example, the research interests are very specific and not something that many schools do research on. Or they want to focus on a geographical area, avoiding places that are too cold.

 

And I think 20 would be a high number. I applied to 20, but I was really unsure about a lot of things. Being from Brazil, I barely knew many schools even after spending a lot of time trying to find information about them. Also, my grades are not that bad, but they look very low when they are converted to a US GPA system. Among other issues. So, I thought I would need some luck. And I decided to apply to more schools than I should, not only the ones that looked like a good match, but also a few that I didn't know.

 

About letters of recommendations, I think professors are quite used to this. One of them even complimented me for having a long list, because it showed him I was really trying to get an offer somewhere. I think they usually write a standard letter, that they copy and paste for every school. But I didn't have access to the letters to be sure. The exception might be when the professor has some special connection to one or a few of the schools (e.g., has a friend over there).