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The MBA Guided Quest

Our most comprehensive service.
Make your coach your full partner in every aspect of your MBA success from essays to interviews to scholarship negotiation and beyond.

Authentic character, inspiring true stories, and deep insight into your genuine values are what compel schools to grant you admission and scholarships.

That’s why the MBA Success Protocol encourages you to deepen your self-awareness and enhance your self-communication skills while you build your most authentic MBA application.

That takes work and dedication to yourself.

In this project, your coach is by your side every step of the journey.

Here’s how your amazing MBA journey will unfold:

step 1

Discover Your Values and Stories
  • How we’re different: We don’t try to fit your story in a prescriptive box. To help you showcase your best and most authentic self, we really get to know you first. Like really really. Then we help you choose your most inspiring unique merits to highlight across every aspect of the application.

  • Complete our simple yet profound You Discovery™ story exploration workbook to catalogue your most important experiences.

  • Your coach creates your Life Story PowerPoint, giving you clarity and insight into your character. Most clients say this is a revelation.

  • Then you have your Awesome Sauce call to review it all and kick off the storytelling process.
“Working with Angela on my MBA applications was a truly awe-inspiring adventure of self-discovery and affirmation. And a journey of advice, tough love and reflection that pushed me to do my best, and in turn find out and reaffirm what makes me, me, and more than good enough for the college admits: great at manning and captaining my own boat.”
Career Protocol Alum, Stanford GSB Class of 2023

step 1

Discover Your Values and Stories
  • How we’re different: We don’t try to fit your story in a prescriptive box. To help you showcase your best and most authentic self, we really get to know you first. Like really really. Then we help you choose your most inspiring unique merits to highlight across every aspect of the application.

  • Complete our simple yet profound You Discovery™ story exploration workbook to catalogue your most important experiences.

  • Your coach creates your Life Story PowerPoint, giving you clarity and insight into your character. Most clients say this is a revelation.

  • Then you have your Awesome Sauce call to review it all and kick off the storytelling process.

step 2

Choose the Right Schools

  • How we’re different: We don’t constrain your school choice. We encourage you to aim high. But we also make sure you understand your odds accurately and strategize accordingly.

  • Get your coach’s expert partnership to choose schools even if your profile evolves through updated test scores or work changes.

  • Ensure you’re aiming high while protecting your downside by choosing accurately calibrated reach, match, and safety schools.

  • Leverage our AI tool to get an accurate understanding of your profile strength against target schools and to research the best fit programs for your career needs

step 3

Design Your Career Game Plan 

  • How we’re different: Our DNA is in career coaching, so we take the time to help you formulate a comprehensive 4-part plan to build a career you genuinely love (and impresses the adcom in the process). No other firm has the skills or experience to do this.

  • Design your 4-Part Career Game Plan to ensure you can show schools you know where you’re headed and that you need an MBA.

  • Ensure your career goals are both credible and inspiring for your Personal Statement Essays.

  • Map your best fit career path with greater self-compassion and clarity with coach support and insight.

step 4

Conduct Thorough and Efficient Research

  • How we’re different: We expect you to do extensive research on schools and potential jobs because it leads to a competitive edge, and we support that process with guidance and time-saving tools.

  • Shave up to 10 hours per school off your research process with our AI hacks and tools.

  • Collect all the information you need to write powerful essays for each school with our easy-to-use template.

  • Leverage the collected wisdom of our team and clients over the years in our MBA Resource Library.

step 5

Network with School Communities

  • How we’re different: Schools are evaluating your networking skills in the application process because they know your post-MBA jobs hinge on them. So we teach you how to network gracefully and confidently.

  • Get guidance from your coach on the best way to approach students, where to find them, and what to talk about.

  • Leverage our informational interview scripts to make conversations effortless.

  • Connect via the Career Protocol Hub with CP alumni at your target schools.

step 6

Select and Coach Recommenders

  • How we’re different: Recommendations have an outsized impact on the outcome, so unlike other consultants, we actually review your recommendation letters in addition to helping you choose and coach recommenders.

  • Choose your best advocates with coach guidance and expertise based on what has worked in the past.

  • Leverage our done-for-you templates to craft a robust package to prep and support your recommenders.

  • Get gentle but direct coach input on what your recommenders write to ensure they are doing the very best they can on your behalf.

step 7

Perfect Your Resume

  • How we’re different: Our approach leverages Angela’s experience evaluating post-MBA resumes at BCG to help you learn how to construct a resume that stands out of the pile of Harvard grads applying to top post-MBA jobs. No MBA applicants have resumes as strong as CP clients do.

  • Drive your resume to the top of the pile with unlimited revisions in collaboration with your coach.

  • Leverage our Badass Resume Protocol to learn how to construct brilliant bullets (so you never need to pay for resume advice again.)

  • Use our done-for-you template to make MBA resume formatting a breeze.

step 8

Tell Epic Stories

  • How we’re different: We don’t tell you what to write, and we don’t line edit your essays for you. We partner with you to brainstorm your most epic stories, teach you how to tell them, and then work through unlimited revisions so your authentic voice can really shine through.

  • Brainstorm the essays for your core schools in multiple calls. (And get one bonus call to brainstorm essays for even more schools that you can then complete on your own).

  • Work through unlimited revisions of essay drafts with your coach, including experimenting with multiple approaches to core essays (Like What Matters Most and HBS’s essays).

  • Learn the invaluable skill of personal storytelling to carry forward into your MBA and career through this iterative process.

step 9

Show School Fit

  • How we’re different: School fit isn’t about pandering to what you think schools want. We help you build a concrete plan to maximize the value of each school’s offerings to your future and contribute while you’re there. Then we help you show that throughout the application.

  • Get coach guidance on integrating the Career Game Plan and School Research work you’ve already done into your Personal Statement essays and work through unlimited revisions.

  • Ensure your candidacy resonates with each school uniquely not based on stereotypes or manipulation, but on your authentic vision for your future and how that school plays into it.

  • Leverage our Personal Statement trainings to showcase a vivid and compelling vision for your future career that garners unsolicited scholarship offers.

step 10

Submit Your Online Application with Confidence

  • How we’re different: We actually help strategize and then review every corner of your application, including the online short answers to ensure you are fully leveraging every application component to stand out.

  • Strategize with your coach on which awards, extra-curricular activities, and career experiences to highlight in the supplemental application questions.

  • Work through revisions of your short answers and short essays with your coach to polish and perfect them.

  • Get our guidance on all the other app bells and whistles – video essays, recorded video interviews, and any extra components of the submission.

step 11

Ace Your Interviews

  • How we’re different: We don’t just do blind mock interviews. We teach you to build your best answers the 4 core question types that come up in all MBA interviews. Then we practice your answers with you to enhance them.

  • Complete our comprehensive Interview Hero Training Program, designed to help you excel in interviews much harder than MBA interviews (like post-MBA interviews with BCG or McKinsey).

  • Leverage our Interview Reports that delineate actual questions from past interviews at each school so you’re prepared for each individual school’s approach to interviews.

  • Practice your personal answers with your coach in two 1:1 interview prep calls to perfect all your answers and shore up your improvisational confidence.

step 12

Choose Your School and Negotiate Scholarships

  • How we’re different: On average, our Guided Quest clients get more than $90,000 in unsolicited scholarships each. Even still, we push you to ask for more and give you powerful tools to do it.

  • Get access to our scholarship negotiation process and scripts. Get coach guidance on how to approach schools to ask for more money.

  • If you’re choosing among multiple offers, chat with your coach to finalize your decision and choose the option that’s truly best for you.

  • Get coaching on your waitlist strategy (if you are waitlisted at a core school) or reapplication guidance (if you’re not successful at every school).

step 13

Prepare for MBA Recruiting

  • How we’re different: Our work doesn’t even end with admission, matriculation, and scholarships. For qualifying community members, you’ll join YOMO: You Only MBA Once; our pre-MBA Recruitment Prep program so you can get the job you really want post-MBA.

  • Complete the industry’s ONLY pre-MBA recruiting prep program in a community of your CP alum peers.

  • Build your network, revamp your resume, and recalibrate your goals with group coaching guidance from Angela and the team so you can enter post-MBA recruiting with confidence and clarity.

  • Targeting Management Consulting? Join our Case Interview Hero Program to prepare for your case interviews.

  • Guided Quest Students who qualify get these programs for free ($2,000 value each).

We designed this program to get maximum results, and that’s just what it does.

ALL YEARS 2023-24 2022-23 2021-22
Total Client Scholarships $29,469,556 $5,618,528 $7,401,021 $4,470,797
Per Successful Client $90,675 $106,009 $129,842 $75,776
Overall Client Success Rate 93.1% 89.8% 96.6% 86.8%
Guided Quest Success Rate* 99.1% 100% 98.3% 98.3%
ALL YEARS
Total Client Scholarships $29,469,556
Per Successful Client $90,675
Overall Client Success Rate 93.1%
Guided Quest Success Rate* 99.1%
2023-24
Total Client Scholarships $5,618,528
Per Successful Client $129,842
Overall Client Success Rate 89.8%
Guided Quest Success Rate* 100%
2022-23
Total Client Scholarships $7,401,021
Per Successful Client $129,842
Overall Client Success Rate 96.6%
Guided Quest Success Rate* 98.3%

We proudly track our student results religiously, cataloguing their outcomes at all the schools they apply to.

Schedule a call

ALL YEARS

2022-23

2021-22

2020-21

Total Client Scholarships

$ 0
$ 0
$ 0
$ 0

Per Successful Client 

$ 0
$ 0
$ 0
$ 0

Overall Client Success Rate

0 %
0 %
0 %
0 %

Guided Quest Success Rate*

0 %
0 %
0 %
0 %

*excluding unsuccessful clients who did not follow Career Protocol recommended guidelines of applying to a portfolio of schools, including minimum 1 safety

We’re especially proud of our scholarship numbers.

Not only because it’s a life-changing amount of money per person, but also because it reveals the effectiveness of our work more than any other stat. Schools want our clients so badly – thanks to the quality and authenticity of their applications – that they’re willing to pay them to convert. No other firm rivals these numbers.

TBH, we’re even more proud of how much our clients love the process of working with us.

In case you're wondering... have you worked with someone like me?

We’ve served people from 70 countries, from every conceivable industry and career background, and with every imaginable strength (founded a company that went public, former Olympic athlete, literal porn star, etc.) and “weakness” (GPAs below 2.8, test scores more than 100 points below the average, academic discipline, DUIs, years of career progress lost to addiction, college exam cheating, unemployment, you name it).

Whatever you’re bringing to this party, we can hang with it. We’ll encourage you to consider a portfolio of schools that includes safeties, and we’ll help you tackle the challenge of choosing your top choices with great zeal and an indefatigable commitment to your greatness.

What some of our successful students have to say

“Working with Angela on my MBA applications was a truly awe-inspiring adventure of self-discovery and affirmation. And a journey of advice, tough love and reflection that pushed me to do my best, and in turn find out and reaffirm what makes me, me, and more than good enough for the college admits: great at manning and captaining my own boat.”
Career Protocol Alum, Stanford GSB Class of 2023
“Their material really is top notch. I was VERY skeptical about the process, self-guided modules, and so forth. However, it was much more efficient and allowed me to come better educated and prepared for conversations… or to be able to make progress on my own.”
Career Protocol Alum, Wharton Class of 2025
“I’m thankful I’ve left this process with multiple M7 admissions, a high degree of self understanding and confidence, and a friend in my fantastic coach and cheerleader.”
Career Protocol Alum, Wharton Class of 2024 Admit
“The templates, especially the template for the recommenders, was probably one of the most useful things. …Just having that resource and be able to coach my recommenders through that process was invaluable.”
Career Protocol Alum, Booth Class of 2024
“So my MBA network was small, and the Catalyst program really helped me to expand and be able to access more resources in a realm that I had no idea how to navigate”
Andrea, MBA Catalyst, Oxford Said Class of 2026
“My resume has never looked better because of career protocols MBA Resume Protocol. I feel so confident with that one piece of paper. It's pretty awesome. And I can't wait to continue that.”
Brittany, Career Protocol Alum, Stanford Class of 2025

Have you already figured out what makes Career Protocol different from everyone else?

The creative process

This is where we really shine: helping you think through all the amazing dimensions of your life story, bringing them together in an artful and inspiring narrative, and then helping you take ownership of your greatness as you go through the process so that your core level of self-confidence is permanently upleveled.

Our approach to coaching

In order to do all the above, we approach the whole process from a position of love. We see all of our clients for the magnificent, capable, brilliant beings that they are and hold them in the highest light as we go through the process. That way, whenever their vision of themselves isn’t up to that level, they can catch up while we’re working together. No one else does this.

Our goal for you

We’re also the only firm committed to building your executive skill-set and laying the groundwork for long-term success, rather than gaining MBA admission alone. Our approach is pedagogical, exploratory, and focused on building capacity, not giving you the answers. (There are no right answers, by the way.) And our coaching resources and support continue well into the first year of your chosen MBA program, as you tackle internship recruiting.

If you work with us, you’ll be able to say two things when you submit those applications:

This application represents the very best of me and all I have to offer. If this school doesn’t want this person, I accept the outcome because this is who I am.

I wrote my whole application. Yeah, resume too! So if I get into X school, I know I deserve it. I earned the admission entirely on my own merit. (Imposter syndrome be gone!)

This is MBA admissions coaching without regrets, MBA admissions coaching that brings out your best self. And that’s why we get such great results: We don’t get our clients in, they do. And you can, too.

If our approach does sound like a fit, your next question is probably:
How does your process work?

Our attitude, philosophy, and loving coaching style aren’t the only things that make working with us a great experience.

We also know how to help you tackle ginormous challenges with grace. The key to doing so is through our signature Mindset-Framework-Process™ approach to personal growth.

We make it easy, to understand what matters, understand how to climb the learning curve, and easy to master all the skills you need to be successful – not just with admissions, but in your entire career.

The three big components of working with us include…

1:1 Coaching

Our Signature Curriculum

The Best Resources

Our Curriculum

Applying to business school only seems big and scary until you
break it down into its component parts.

These are the 12 steps you need to take to do it right:

We provide resources, learning opportunities, and direct 1:1 coaching every step of the way so you can bring out your best.
Let’s dig into each stage of the process.

Self-Awareness

By the end of this stage, you will have…

  • A catalog of all your most important life experiences and greater awareness of the subtle nuances of your character that differentiate you
  • A 15+-page Life Story PowerPoint, created by your coach, that showcases all the aspects of your best self
  • Higher baseline confidence in yourself and the value you bring to the table
  • Clarity that an MBA is the right next step for your career

Choosing Up

By the end of this stage, you will have…

  • A portfolio of schools that lets you aim high while protecting your downside with safer schools
  • A 4-part Career Game Plan that will inspire admissions committees with your vision and practicality
  • Increased knowledge and credibility regarding your chosen post-MBA field

Building Relationships

By the end of this stage, you will have…

  • Friends on the inside at your target schools
  • Deep knowledge about your target schools and the value they would add to your career
  • Awesome MBA recommendations

Communicating Brilliantly and Finding Your Voice

By the end of this stage, you will have…

  • Essays that deeply touch and inspire you
  • A resume that shows you are an unequivocal badass
  • An online application that rounds out and adds value to your profile
  • Confidence in your ability to crush any interview (MBA or beyond)
  • Satisfaction that you got as much scholarship money as you possibly could at the schools you are admitted to

Resources

We’re known for communicating things simply, clearly, and compellingly.

The exact thing we’re teaching you to do in this process! So you can be sure that our resources are the bomb. Here’s a selection of some of the awesome things you’ll have access to while working with us:

“I personally believed a coach like him could help me better extract the essence of my stories and ensure connections to my true self, instead of trying hard to fit me into a box that looks pretty to AdComs. And I was right.”
Career Protocol Alum, Booth Class of 2026 Admit
“Working with Angela at Career Protocol was an absolute game-changer for my MBA application journey. The step-by-step guides and application checklist provided a solid framework that boosted my confidence in time management and preparation. Angela’s live sessions and office hours were invaluable, offering crucial support whenever I felt stuck and enabling me to gain diverse perspectives.”
Mireya, MBA Catalyst, Texas McCombs Class of 2026
So one of the things that I'm the most thankful about having worked with Career Protocol is that throughout these nerve-wracking months of the application process, I really, truly felt that I always had someone in my corner. So that had great advice, great objectivity, and that would always support me to keep going. And that, for me, is invaluable.
Career Protocol Alum, GSB Class of 2022
“Choosing Career Protocol was the best decision ever for me. Jenn was able to make me very comfortable at my interview chair and helped me to be just true myself. Her ability to resurrect / pick and choose major points for improvement in various topics from my life story was so significantly helpful.”
Career Protocol Alum, Johns Hopkins Class of 2025
In total, I received $1.4M in scholarship offers and will be attending an M7 school on a full ride this fall. None of this would have been possible without Brian. Working with him changed the course of my life and I’ll always be grateful for that.”
Career Protocol Alum, Booth Class of 2026 (Wesley Wood)

1:1 Coaching

Don’t let the abundance of awesome resources trick you into thinking this is a self-study program. Oh no. Your coach will guide you step-by-step through each part of the process. And now you have come to a fork in the road. This is where you have a decision to make.

Most of our clients choose the…

Guided Quest Project

Guided Quest Project

It’s our favorite, because it allows us to give you our very best every step of the way.
It amounts to unlimited support on nearly all aspects of your application.

This is our flagship service.

The Guided Quest Project is for people who want full partnership in elevating their soft skills, self-awareness, and confidence while creating inspiring and authentic applications.

You can think of this like Martial Arts training. You don’t tell the Master what you’re going to work on today; the Master takes responsibility for your development and ensures you’re doing all the things you need to do to reach the goal (i.e., admission to at least one school that’s as good as possible, ideally more than one, and ideally with a pile of scholarships).

We can’t guarantee or control the outcome. We can only control effort and input. With the Guided Quest Project, you hand yourself over to your coach, and they guide your efforts all the way to the destination. Your job is just to do the work and bring your very best to every step of the process. That’s how we ensure that by the end you will have created an application that reflects the best of who you are. The work is all yours; the structure and processes are all ours.

This is also the project that leads our clients to report almost magical results in their personal development – permanent transformation of their self-confidence, upleveling of certain soft skills, and dramatically improved clarity in who they are and what they want in their career.

Sign up for your personal 

Guided MBA Quest

GET THE DELUXE ALL-IN SERVICE ​

MBA Guided Quest ​

  • Calls during the process for essay brainstorming and troubleshooting, school selection, Career Game Planning
  • High level strategic guidance on extra schools
  • Unlimited revision of essays, recommendations, resume, and short answers
  • Interview training + two coaching calls to prepare for your interviews
  • Email access to your coach
  • Two business day turnaround on all queries

100% Satisfaction Guarantee

Join the MBA Catalyst Program today. If you don’t love the curriculum, coaching, and community, just send an email to [email protected] within 7 days of enrollment and we’ll refund 100% of your purchase.

MBA Success Guarantee

If you complete all the work of the MBA Success Protocol, regardless of which program you signed up for (Catalyst, Story Partnership, or Guided Quest)—including applying to at least two “safer” MBA programs—and do not receive an offer of admission from any MBA program this application season, you are eligible to participate in the next MBA Catalyst program for free. You will also receive a complimentary reapplication strategy call with a Career Protocol coach to help you refine your approach.

Conditions to Qualify for This Guarantee:

  • Application Timing: Apply to MBA programs in either Round 1 or Round 2 of the year you take the program (applicants applying in Round 3, Round 4, or to deferred programs are not eligible).
  • School Selection: Submit complete applications to at least two “safer” schools, as determined by MBAmo based on your application statistics.
  • Proof of Work: Share all completed work from the program, along with application materials for all schools, with the Career Protocol team. (All materials will be kept confidential.)

Note: Any private, 1:1 coaching services (including Power Hours, Story Partnership, or Guided Quest sessions) are not included in the guarantee. If you choose to reapply with 1:1 support in the second season, these services are available for an additional fee. Only the MBA Catalyst Group Coaching Program is included in this guarantee, provided it is available.