IESE MBA Essay Topic Analysis 2024-2025

The following essay topic analysis examines the IESE MBA admissions essays for the 2024-2025 admissions season. You can also review essay topic analyses for other leading MBA programs as well as general Essay Tips to further aid you in developing your admissions essays. 

IESE MBA Essay Topic Analysis 2024-2025

Let’s take a closer look at each question.

Essay Question 1

What are your immediate career goal after graduation and your mid-term career goal 5-10 years after graduation? How will the IESE MBA program help you achieve them?” (word limit 300 max)
While this question is a version of the standard career goals essay required by many business schools, IESE’s 300-word limit is a bit tighter than that of some programs. Applicants will need to clearly and concisely state what their future plans are for both immediately after business school and in the medium term (five or so years out of school), being sure to illustrate how their goals relate to their work thus far and the skills they would gain from an MBA. Then, connect to your interest in IESE’s MBA program, perhaps naming some key courses and clubs, to support why you want to earn your degree at IESE specifically.

Optional Essay

What would you like to highlight about yourself or your journey which may have not been captured in your application? (word limit 300 max)
This question provides candidates a chance to briefly explore an important aspect of their candidacy not mentioned in their data forms, résumé, or other essay responses. It makes sense to complete this essay in order to round out your application or explain any issues such as a low GPA or test score, work experience or choice of recommenders. For applicants from oversubscribed groups in the applicant pool, this essay could offer a great opportunity to truly stand out from the crowd by sharing an unusual hobby or an interesting anecdote. Potential topics could be a time you demonstrated leadership, ethical behavior, entrepreneurial spirit, or persuasion skills, as these are all topics that are often of interest to admissions committees. In the case of explaining a worrisome issue about your candidacy, be brief and to the point. Avoid making excuses and simply explain the situation. For example, perhaps you’ve taken coursework to mitigate a weak academic record, or you chose a recommender who was not your direct supervisor, but could still attest to your leadership skills. Whatever topic you select, it would be ideal to link this quality or fact to some element of your intended experience in the MBA program and/or future career.

Video Essay

This year you will also complete a Video Essay as part of the application. Once you submit the written application and pay the application fees, you will receive a Kira Video Essay link (within 24-hours) to be completed by the Application Round Deadline. The link will expire in 48-hours after receipt, hence to provide yourself with adequate time we recommend submitting the written section a few days ahead of the deadline. There will be two video essay questions that you will be required to complete. We will consider your application as complete and ready to be reviewed only once we have received your answers to the video questions. All instructions for this section will be shared with you along with the link.
Before pressing the “record” button, it would be worth reviewing our advice on video essays to understand the broader goals of a video prompt. As this is a visual presentation that will be recorded live, ensure you are dressed in appropriate professional attire. In terms of a background, clean and steady may work best—you do not want to make the adcom dizzy by taking them on an unsteady walking tour with your laptop. While many applicants will be tempted to introduce props into their video, such as signs, souvenirs, or any prized possessions, we would like to urge caution in this domain. A focused response to the question (while looking your audience in the eye) may be far more effective than a distracting string of props, signs, charts—each requiring valuable time to make transitions—not to mention careful attention to readability/visibility on screen.

Clear Admit Resources

Thanks for reading our analysis of this year’s IESE MBA essay topics. As you work on your IESE MBA essays and application, we encourage you to consider all of Clear Admit’s IESE Business School offerings:

• IESE Profile on the Clear Admit website: up-to-date advice and admissions information
• Clear Admit LiveWire: admissions updates submitted in real time by applicants to IESE
• Clear Admit DecisionWire: school selections in real-time by admits to IESE