33
Finance
Banking-Inv.
Sponsored
Duke-Fuqua
MBA
I am pleased to share that I have been admitted to my first-choice program, the Duke University MBA, and also received offers of admission from several other schools. To be honest, neither my TOEFL nor my GMAT scores were particularly strong, but Ms. Round’s meticulous essay guidance more than compensated for my lower scores and led to outstanding results. In addition, just before my on-campus interviews—despite the fact that interview preparation had become quite last-minute—I was truly saved by the dedicated interview training provided by both Mr. Round and Ms. Round, who supported me enthusiastically until the very end.
I was a company-sponsored applicant, but due to company policy, I was required to continue my regular work while preparing for applications outside of working hours. In particular, the department I belonged to was notorious for its demanding workload, and until early fall I was forced to work from shortly after 7 a.m. until late at night. Moreover, I was not especially strong in English to begin with, and after the TOEFL transitioned to the iBT format—making it even more demanding—my scores were slow to improve. My GMAT scores also failed to rise as I had hoped. Under these circumstances, the reasons why R1 became such a crucial source of support for me are as follows.
Being able to secure an excellent essay counselor early on brings tremendous peace of mind. I had heard that at some prep schools, unless you already have strong test scores, you may not be assigned a good counselor—or that if you wait too long, the best counselors will already be fully booked. In this respect, R1 allows you to secure a high-quality counselor as early as April or May.
At the same time, having someone who helps pace your preparation from an early stage is another major advantage. Mr. Round’s detailed guidance—such as asking whether I was attending a prep school or had scheduled my tests—served as an excellent set of guidelines. Furthermore, from a typically Japanese perspective, once autumn arrives and scores are still lacking, it is easy to become overly fixated on improving test scores alone. However, essay counseling begins in September and provides an appropriate preparation period. Mr. Round consistently emphasized that essays and interviews carry significant weight in MBA admissions and must sometimes be pursued in parallel with test preparation. This proved to be absolutely true. Had I relied solely on my own judgment, I would likely have focused exclusively on test scores, postponed essay work, and ultimately stumbled with shallow essays. You simply cannot produce strong essays in one or two weeks. I truly realized that only after spending a sufficient amount of time reflecting deeply on my past experiences and what I hoped to learn through an MBA could I produce essays I was satisfied with.
Being able to receive appropriate guidance from a strong counselor from an early stage is, in my view, one of R1’s greatest strengths.
My essay counselor was Ms. Emma Round, Mr. Round’s sister. An INSEAD MBA graduate who has also served as an alumni interviewer, Ms. Round provided precise guidance down to what felt like the smallest details. She carefully reviewed my application forms each time, which was an enormous help for someone like me who was unfamiliar with overseas application formats. Even during the hectic period from late December to early January—when many other applicants were scrambling—she continued to provide counseling time right up until the deadline. Furthermore, even while I was traveling in the U.S. for campus visits in February, she managed to carve out time within a single week to fully support an entire school application. To date, my email exchanges with Ms. Round alone total 187 messages.
R1 explains that it limits class size in order to dedicate sufficient time to each client, but beyond that, the proactive support and fine-grained attention they provided were an enormous help to me while I was in such a demanding situation.
Because R1 is a fully online service, it not only eliminates the time required to commute to a physical location, but also allows access regardless of time or place. While appointment times are scheduled, they are willing to provide support outside those times when possible, and as mentioned above, even while traveling. At Mr. Round’s suggestion, I brought a headset with me during my campus visits so that I could immediately consult or undergo additional interview training if questions or concerns arose on the spot. This level of accessibility—and the services built around it—is clearly one of R1’s key advantages.
Interview training is optional, but for me it became the most important component of my MBA application process after essays. In particular, the Type A interview includes a 30-minute mock interview followed by a highly detailed feedback report that takes over an hour to prepare. The feedback is exceptionally precise, making it immediately clear what worked and what did not. By systematically addressing each issue raised, my interview performance improved dramatically in a short period of time. Both Mr. Round and Ms. Round were surprised by the degree of improvement—though, honestly, after reading those reports, it would have been strange *not* to improve.
In Type B training, conducted just before campus visits, I was repeatedly drilled on distinctive questions that had been asked at the schools I was visiting, which was extremely helpful. This preparation enabled me to handle unexpected questions with confidence. In addition, Type C training—focused on so-called “killer questions”—taught me how to ask sharp, well-targeted questions of interviewers. In my experience, the quality of questions asked can influence the tone of an interview far more than one might expect. R1’s interview preparation supports applicants all the way through the final ten minutes of the interview.
Mr. Round has prior experience teaching at Japanese prep schools and has a deep understanding of the challenges Japanese applicants face in MBA admissions. For example, he is well connected with leading instructors at TOEFL and GMAT prep schools. If I mentioned attending a particular prep school, he would say things like, “That instructor has a good reputation, so you’re in good hands,” or if my scores were not improving, “There’s someone I know connected to that instructor—try asking them.” He provided extremely detailed, practical advice. On a more personal note, I was surprised by how well he knew people from my company. He would say things like, “For that school, try asking Mr. ○○,” or “Why don’t you ask △△ to write your recommendation?” The first time he said this, I was genuinely astonished. As it turns out, my company sends several employees to MBA programs every year, and in the past, many of them attended the prep school where Mr. Round once worked. During that time, he served as counselor to many of them, which explains his familiarity. This kind of unexpected connection highlights just how long and deep Mr. Round’s experience in Japan has been. His advice, grounded in a strong understanding of Japanese MBA study-abroad realities, was incredibly reassuring.
Finally, I would like to reiterate that the success of my MBA application would not have been possible without my encounter with R1. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to Mr. Round and Ms. Round for their warm and unwavering support.
