10 Steps to Getting Great Recommendations
1. Select recommenders that know you well. Nothing is more important – certainly not titles or alma matters – than selecting recommenders that know you well. If the recommender doesn’t know you well, you’ll end up with a letter that reads like a laundry list of generic virtues and ambiguous platitudes. Instead, you need someone that can provide first-hand accounts of how you have grown in your professional, academic, or volunteer capacity.
2. Select recommenders that will be honest. Having a recommender who is overly complimentary can be nearly as bad as having one who doesn’t think terribly highly of you. It can come across as disingenuous or lazy, neither of which are good. The former may raise the admissions committee’s suspicion, and the latter may demonstrate to the admissions committee that you don’t have recommenders who are eager to invest in and support your future. Instead, if you pick someone that knows you well, they’ll be honest about your strengths and weaknesses, and that’s precisely what the admissions committee wants to read.
3. Pick people that support your decision to pursue an MBA. If your recommenders express concern to you about your decision to head to business school, or if they tell you that you might be aiming too high with your choice of schools, think twice about whether that person is the right one for the job.
4. Prepare a few talking points. The best recommendations come with specific stories that demonstrate your leadership capabilities. If you can provide your recommenders with a few prompts or anecdotes that they can write about, it’ll help ensure your recommendation is more than just a boring list of commonplace attributes.
5. But don’t write it for them. Admissions committees are extremely good at what they do, and they will be able to see right through it if you write the letters for your recommenders. You want the letters to come across as genuine. If one of your recommenders asks you to write a draft for them, consider whether it’s a person you really want as an ambassador of your brand.
6. Make sure your recommenders understand the big picture. Give them an idea about the qualities you are trying to demonstrate and the narrative you are trying to tell. Make sure they know what you’re writing about in your essays. That will help ensure that they don’t repeat a story you’ve already told and that they are reinforcing the ideas you are trying to convey to the admissions committee.
7. Select people from different aspects of your life. As with any part of your application, you want to present yourself as a multifaceted candidate who can add value in a number of different ways. Presenting recommenders from different parts of your professional, community, and academic life will ensure you’re demonstrating just that to the admissions committee.
8. Help recommenders understand what business schools want. The one big advantage to having alumni write your recommendations is that they understand the qualities and attributes business schools are looking for in their applicants. If your recommenders aren’t too familiar with business schools or their admissions processes, make sure you take the time to convey to them the salient details.
9. Check in periodically. Writing letters of recommendation takes work, and it’s helpful to have a little reminder now and then. Make sure to check in with your recommenders periodically – every week or two – to ensure they are staying on task, understand when the deadlines are, and don’t need anything new from you.
10. Give them plenty of time. Ask your recommenders early in the process to ensure that they have some time to think about what they want to say and aren’t jammed with the request at the last minute during what could be an otherwise busy time for them.