1.

In one or two sentences, please describe your immediate career plans upon graduation
from Olin.
2. At Olin, we pride ourselves on our close-knit community and aim to know every
student by name and story. In an essay of no more than 500 words, please introduce
yourself as you would to your future Olin classmates.
Optional Essay
Please provide any additional information not previously addressed in other areas of the application
that you feel would be helpful to the Admissions Committee in its assessment of your candidacy.
(300 word maximum)

Question #1
My immediate career plans upon graduation is to work in consulting with the aim to
specialize in consumer goods industry. I am planning to apply for work in the US, but
if unsuccessful, return to the EU.
Question #2
If I compared MBA programme to a journey to a deserted island with my peers, I
would take with me a book, a large bottle of sunscreen, and a pair of running shoes.
I would take a book, because I always liked reading, studying, and intellectual
challenge. I have managed to obtain high GPA both in high school and in university,
always being in the top 5% of the class. Later I managed to display my intellectual
abilities at work. When I started as a Key Account Manager at the age of 22, many
people from LOreal and on the client side were surprised by my age, because
usually people start working as KAMs in their 30s. However, in a short period of
time, I managed to gain the trust of my client counterparts, and to show results
internally, growing the largest account in the region both in sales and profit. In the
future, I would like to challenge my intellectual abilities even more by switching my
career to consulting for few years and later coming back to consumer goods to a
much higher position in sales or marketing, and I am definitely ready to challenge
my intellectual abilities during the 2 year MBA at Olin.
Because there is a lot of sun on a deserted island, I would take a sunscreen with me.
Obviously, I know a lot about them after 3 years in LOreal. Why would I take a large
bottle? To share it with others. Collaboration with others and generosity have always
been my core values. After graduation from the university, I realized that my
debating experience contributed a lot to my learning, especially that I became
much more aware of political processes in the country. Me and some of my friends
established Latvian Debating Association QUO Tu Doma? to benefit the whole
country by popularizing debating, critical thinking, and public discourse. This
experience greatly helped me to develop my personality, but most importantly it

benefited others and the country as a whole. At Olin MBA I am looking forward to
sharing my experience with others and learning from the class.
Lastly, I would take running shoes with me, because I like to keep an active lifestyle.
Even though, because of my back problems, I was never able to run a full marathon,
I like running for leisure and some occasional 10km distances. I also go to the gym
regularly to keep fit. I am keen on alpine skiing, and I spend at least a week in the
mountains every winter. This summer I also started to kiteboard in the Baltic Sea.
The journey to an island will definitely be not an easy one, but I am sure it will be
rewarding. I am looking forward to the intellectual challenge it promises, and I am
ready to collaborate with others to complete this journey. I hope, however, that
even if the journey is difficult, it still will be a lot of fun.
Question #3
I would like to use this essay to highlight and expand on several points from my
resume.
Education
I have graduated from Stockholm School of Economics in Riga, which is considered
to be the best business school in the Baltics. I obtained GPA of 157.08 out of 200,
which was top 5% of the class and equivalent to A on ECTS scale. I had top score
in marketing report, and my Bachelor thesis International New Ventures`
Internationalisation Strategies: A Configuration Approach was chosen among top 5
student papers to be published in SSE Riga Student Research Papers yearly
compilation.
Work experience
I moved to LOreal after 1.5 years in consulting, because I wanted to work in
consumer goods, but was not able to specialize in this industry in my consulting
firm.
The greatest achievement as a Key Account Manager was to make business
development more analytical and fact-based. My major strength is the ability to
analyze and synthesize large pieces of complex data and draw conclusions from
them. I am able to use these conclusions to adjust the action plan and seek internal
support necessary for that. This approach to account planning generated consistent
growth in sales and profit year on year.
Latvian Debating Association
I am very proud of this NGO experience. As an organization we managed to
organize more than 15 public and online debates; we kicked off Radio Debating
Championship and organized Latvian Debating Championship; we taught debating

to students on numerous occasions and taught debating to teachers to facilitate the

establishment of debate clubs in schools and the inclusion of elements of debating
into curriculum. Personally, I participated in the branding of our organization, the
development of curriculum for trainings, led many trainings myself, worked with
high school teachers and members of Teach for Latvia.

We developed the organization from zero to a well-recognized NGO and

implemented many projects, including Radio Debating Championship, dozens of
public and online debates, dozens of workshops for teachers that later included
elements of debating into their curriculum.