Essay Question1: Describe the biggest commitment you have ever made. (500 words maximum)

This is such a broad and general question and it can be tricky to answer and elaborate on. It is critical to establish an organized structure to be able to follow here while answering this question. Maybe an applicant should focus on three things a human being can be committed to: An ideology, an organization or a person. 

When it comes to being committed to an ideology, this is the easiest way to answer and tackle this question. Applicants can use the broad nature of ideology to tackle both their personal and professional life together. For example, applicants can talk about their commitment to social issues such as civil rights, LGBT rights or women rights. Applicants can also talk about their commitment to the environment and climate change, and how they have tried to do their best through volunteer work and changes in their own personal day to day life to contribute less to climate change and pollution. 

Organizations can be of professional nature or community based and focused. Linking the question to an organization allows the applicant to showcase their leadership skills and ability to work within groups. Teamwork skills are extremely important in graduate level studies because most of the work is done through cases in which groups get to interact and compromise to find the best solutions. Applicants can also talk about community based organizing such as fundraising, charity and community events. The key here is to show to the admission committee that you engage with a group of people. 

Finally, when it comes to committing to a person, it is crucial to be careful not to look like someone that idolizes somebody too much. It is more safe to discuss committing to spouses or children. It is a fact, that most applicants would prefer to go the simple route of speaking about committing to bettering the life of their own families, which would make it harder for applicants to stand out. Second, it might be a little difficult to try to speak about your commitment to family or somebody and link that commitment to your professional goals post MBA graduation. Of course, if you can talk about how a commitment to a certain loved one has influenced your decision to seek an MBA education, then by all means, go for it! 

One thing applicants should remember while tackling this essay question, is to stick to one commitment and try to link it to the overall goal of getting admitted! It can be a little bit overwhelming to speak about many commitments with just 500 words. So, it is better to focus all the 500 words to elaborate on only one commitment.