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Statement of Purpose Applied Program: Organizational Studies
Being a major of economics, I would like to ascend onto higher intellectual horizons by undertaking advanced studies in your Ph.D. program in Organization Studies, which will enable me to fulfill my ambition of being an outstanding expert in such a field. I hope I can contribute my knowledge and lifelong enthusiasm to the ongoing economic and management development of my homeland.
I love economics, because I do care about this changing world. The past twenty years during which I was brought up has been the most sensational and significant age of China's reform. This period witnessed the emergence of a prosperous new China, which I experienced personally and kept a close eye on, during which the occurrence and maturation of many new things in economy and management have stimulated my strong interest towards this area of study. I realized that the most challenging obstacle that China faces is the transformation of its various organizations.
After I entered university, I have been exposed systematically to abundant courses in many fields, which established a solid foundation for my major and helped me to become the top student in my school for four consecutive years. With strong academic knowledge gained gradually through the rigorous training from my department, I began to think profoundly about many newly engendered problems in my field of study, using a broad perspective. Never content with simply performing well in course work, I have been keen on hands-on experience. I completed four field trips, covering various social phenomena ranging from the most primitive production mode to the most advanced modern business, from agriculture to industry and from individual companies to large-scale national projects. Last summer, invited by the Hong Kong American Chamber, I took part in the Business Orientation Program 2000, enjoying the rare opportunity of communicating with college students from all over the world, from whom I gained constant inspiration and mutual stimulation. Especially, the internship in Xerox HK provided me a precious chance to have a close scrutiny on the complete human resources system of a transnational corporation. Moreover, my detailed evaluation, my suggestions for improvement on its Digital Training Program, and my potency in analyzing and solving practical problems were highly praised by the Training Manager. On the last day of our visit, at the top of the American Club Building, surveying the beautiful scenery of the Victoria Harbor under golden sunset, I felt the pulse of my beloved motherland not far away. However, in the bottom of my heart I understood clearly that the economic distance between Mainland China and the developed countries is not that short. Being a young man caring about the rise and fall of my home country, I know how heavy the responsibility is and how much we have to undertake.
With the knowledge I have acquired in my college studies and the practical experience I have derived from all my social investigations, my critical eye towards Chinese Economy has sharpened. Apparently, the reform campaign in China will be carried out with gathering momentum for an extended period and on a more expansive dimension in the future. When greater degree of liberty and reform as the macro orientation of the country's development become incontrovertible, the integration on the micro level that corresponds to the macro orientation should become our primary concern. Inspired by the research and investigations that I have undertaken so far, I have grown increasingly convinced that the success or the failure of the transformation of various organizations, whether the enterprise or the government, the private sector or the public sector, would become the primary challenge for China's economy in the decades to come. Take the reform of Chinese enterprises for example. Undoubtedly, this process of reform virtually has no frame of reference in international economic history. It can be inferred from this perspective that mere imitation of the organizational mode of Euro-American enterprises would render difficult and ineffective the organizational transformation of Chinese enterprises during the operational and the control stages. As a matter of fact, Chinese enterprises as a whole are going in the direction of recession as compared with the relatively vigorous economic growth. The management system in Chinese enterprises has remained ineffectual since the implementation of all existing approaches ranging from the contracting operation to modernized enterprise administration. Such mechanisms as merging and recombination that can otherwise revitalize foreign enterprises have proved to be more of a curse than a blessing for Chinese enterprises in the actual process of enterprise reform practice. I firmly believe that, on a broader and more objective academic level, China's enterprise reform is a subject of tremendous research value throughout the economic history of mankind. Organization Studies, particularly Organization Transformation, become the optimum tool for putting this issue into proper perspective.
My sense of mission to contribute to the future of my motherland and the tremendous potential academic value of Organization Transformation Study in China make Organization Study the inevitable choice for my prospective research. To be finally engaged in the study of this subject, I have already undertaken some tentative investigations in this field. My first academic paper entitled Study of the Entrepreneurial Human Resource Capital in China's State-Owned Enterprises was published in Socialism Study, a very authoritative and avant-garde academic journal especially devoted to the crucial issues of China's reform. In this paper, I conducted an in-depth compassion regarding the enterprise's human resource capital between the past and the most recent macro economic context. I proposed my criticisms with respect to the government's prevailing policy of "distribution according to labor" and presented relevant models for implementation. The publication of this paper produced its important academic effect. It was reprinted and much quoted by many other academic journals and received a very important academic award of first-class prize as Outstanding Academic Paper at the Symposium on the Economic and Cultural Development Strategy in China's Western Region. More valuably, the models of implementation that I proposed became opportune frame of reference for many enterprises when they conducted their reform in the field. The success of this academic paper gave me substantial encouragement and reinforced my determination to pursue further in the study of Organization Transformation. In the wake of the first academic paper, I published another two research findings in Business Study. In one of those two academic papers, I probed into the determining factors affecting the success and failure of an enterprise's fundamental transformation. I embarked on a case study concerning the transformation of Xerox Hong Kong. In this study, I proposed that the transformation of the mentality and the knowledge structure of both the enterprise's management and the employees is the most powerful force facilitating the enterprise's transformation as well as the most important guarantee for the stable process of transformation. I further elaborated that an enterprise bent on constant and conscientious acquisition of new knowledge is the most flexible and cost-effective enterprise to face a rapidly-changing external environment and to launch transformation in order to answer its internal need for development. Those serial achievements on my part helped me secure high evaluations from my teachers and advisor and aroused the attention of the China Academy of Social Sciences. At its invitation, I attended an academic conference in Hanoi, the capital of Viet Nam. As far as I am concerned, all those academic honors and awards are only of secondary importance. Some of my research findings might be proved by future researches to be flawed or even incorrect due to the insufficiency of currently available information and the limitations of research methodologies. For me, the most valuable thing is that those research activities have provided me with precious opportunities to come into contact with and develop an increasingly profound understanding of the discipline that has so deeply fascinated me. I feel as excited as Alibaba who has just finished speaking the magic words to the door of the treasure cave.
Finally, I would like to say that my four-year college study and practice have molded a strongly ambitious young man. Looking back on these hard-working days, I am so confident of myself. With anticipation and excitement, I am now applying for admission into your Ph.D. program in Organization Studies. I firmly believe that this specially designed program in your strict and inspirational graduate school will fulfill my academic ambitions. As Galileo once said " Give me a pivot, then I will pry up the Earth," I sincerely request you to endow me with that "pivot".
Essay 1
Describe your two most valued accomplishments and the process by which you achieved them. What challenges or obstacles did you encounter along the way? How did you overcome them?
Objectively speaking, my undergraduate life was spent in sustained progress and the honors brought by my achievements. I have always congratulated myself on my modesty and my relentless perseverance which empowered me to strive for higher objectives. In retrospection, I feel that I deserve all the honors and awards that were conferred on me, be it the first scholarship upon entering the university or the undisputable award of the Most Outstanding Graduate of the Department with which I graduated from my beloved university. I am also delighted with my clear-minded understanding of myself, remembering the two important turning points in my life that happened during my most precious youth. The two achievements that I am going to describe may not be so spectacular in appearance as compared with my other honors, nevertheless they are significant in that they have charted the course of my future career.
I. The Publication of My First Academic Paper
My first academic achievement is an academic paper entitled Study of the Entrepreneurial Human Resource Capital in China's State-Owned Enterprises, which was published in The Socialism Study (No. 2, 2000, please refer to Appendix I). As an undergraduate, I felt really excited for being able to have an opportunity to present my true and unorthodox opinions in so influential a domestic academic journal. As the first major achievement, this event and its subsequent influence not only enabled me to deviate from mere coursework and embark on academic research, it also reinforced my determination to pursue scientific research as my career objective.
Essentially, my insatiable thirst for new knowledge constituted for me the fundamental starting point for conducting this research. Being a second-year undergraduate, I felt that my basic knowledge in economics and management had already equipped me to reflect on and to comprehend some of China's economic problems. As I was more interested in the field of management, the reform of China's state-owned enterprises naturally became the major concern of my analysis and contemplations. At that time, Chinese scholars were almost all devoted to heated controversies over the issue of the enterprise's share-holding reforms and the establishment of modern framework embodied in corporate management.
These controversies, which are still raging on, are primarily focused on the production domain. My belief was that the reform in the production sector would necessitate corresponding reforms in the system of distribution. Any society or enterprise that confines itself to the reform in the production sphere is incomplete or flawed. With the discovery of this problem, I commenced the difficult process of substantiating my arguments based on those research findings of mine.
Without exaggeration, only when I had started my academic research did I begin to experience the real challenges from myself, those challenges caused not only by the imperfections of my existing knowledge but also, more seriously, by the lack of effective methodology. I underwent a long period of painful meditation and constantly consulted my teachers in diverse disciplines for their perceptive comments on problems whose solutions were difficult for me to discover. In half a year, the number of books, journals, and academic papers that I consulted for undertaking my own research exceeded the total number of books that I read in two previous years. That was the most difficult and painstaking period for me. But this painstaking exploration was also very rewarding in that my perspective concerning China's economic problems was greatly sharpened and my training in academic thinking was all the more profound. A remark by a philosopher that "Without the spasm, history would never advance, not even a step" seemed quite aptly applicable to my case.
The valuable support from my Department, the instructions from my respectable teachers, and my own indefatigable persistence helped me surmount all the obstacles and contributed to make my research a rewarding success. Many facts proved the significance of my research. While feeling proud of my success, I had the profound feeling that, when it is so challenging for a student like me to switch from his coursework to formal research, it would be much more difficult for an enterprise or a nation to undertake its reform. The growth and the maturation of generations of young scholars will enable China's overall academic research to promote and to guide successful social reform. I would like to be one of such scholars under the conviction that the real joy of my life inhabits in what I believe to be my noble objectives.
II. Participating in an International Exchange Program as Representative of Our Country
At the beginning of 2000, Hong Kong American Chamber of Commerce invited and sponsored 12 college students from Mainland China (selected by Chinese Ministry of Education) to participate in the Business Orientation Program that it held in Hong Kong. I was one of the 12 representatives, and the only representative from my province where there are several hundred thousands of college students.
Perhaps in the eyes of American professors, participation in an international exchange program cannot be counted as an "achievement" in itself. However, in China, it is both an honor and a challenge to be singled out from millions of your counterparts to become a member of the program. It represents the highest confirmation by the nation of the value of a student majoring in economics or management
The exchange program was characterized by friendly atmosphere and tight agenda. All the visits to international companies and the seminars were very formal, with presidents of those companies receiving us in person. All the participants were organized into 8 teams and it was sometimes necessary for a particular team to be stationed in a particular company to investigate a specific project. Even now, I can recall a remark by Mr. Jim Harvey, chairman of this exchange program: "There is no competition here, but competition exists anywhere and anytime." Even though that was the first time I came into a totally English environment, I adapted to it immediately and fully displayed my talents in those activities. "Actions speaks louder" was my primary principle. My team was assigned to survey the results of the Digital Training of Xerox HK. By applying the knowledge and the wisdom that I had acquired, I formulated the framework, the specific procedures and the plan for conducting our internship. My proposals were highly evaluated by the manager of its Training Department. As a matter of fact, the entire program was completed according to my framework and I was the virtual leader of my team. In the English seminar at Black Aisle Company, my excellence performance that combined eloquent English expression, listening comprehension and unusual memory astonished American students. I am willing to exchange knowledge and culture with college students all over the world under the atmosphere of mutual encouragement and learning. By the time the program was concluded, I received a card from an American friend on which was written " It is a pleasure to become your friend."
The fruits of this visit were not merely confined to what I have mentioned. This activity gave me the first opportunity to have a close experience of Hong Kong where I could come into contact with a different economy, society and culture. With major international companies as a frame of reference, I realized that China still had a long way to go in its enterprise reform. With Hong Kong as a frame of reference, I realized what my beloved country has and what she does not have. At the same time, I could perceive that the future generation of Chinese social scientists have a historical mission to perform, which can be executed only through determined efforts. With so many major international companies, Hong Kong occupies a uniquely important position in international economy. Hong Kong's achievements are the result of the sustained and strenuous efforts by Hong Kong people. A vibrant and prosperous society requires its citizens to have the courage to strive for what they consider to be their genuine ideals and fight for those ideals with dedication and sacrifice in order to maintain its vibrant prosperity. My journey to Hong Kong made me all the more acutely aware that China is really in urgent need for the cutting-edge knowledge and the most advanced experience and approaches in economics and management for its future development and reform. This recognition has now become increasingly well-defined for me, prompting me to seek an advanced degree as the ultimate objective of my student life.
Essay 2
Why have you selected our Ph.D. Program at the Carroll School of Management at Boston College? How do you think our academic program is related to your scholarly and academic career objectives?
The Organization Studies offered by the Carroll School of Management at Boston College is my ideal choice in pursuing my further academic studies. I believe my studies there will constitute an essential step in my fulfillment of scholarly ambitions.
My aspiration is to promote and direct the successful changes of the Chinese society in the field of organization transformations through my academic research. In this field which is vital to the future development of China and even the world, only the solid and rigorous theoretical research and richly flexible practical guidance can create enterprising, innovative and highly capable academic leaders in the future. Undoubtedly, this is the paramount reason for my career objective and for my academic objective in selecting your college as a place to undertake my advanced studies.
It was with great excitement that I ferreted out that the academic program at the Carroll School of Management is the only institute among numerous top U.S. business schools that specifically and particularly concentrates on the research of organization transformation. Essentially, this unique pedagogical focus agrees perfectly with my long-range research plan. Such an agreement will definitely make my study plans and scholarly objectives well-defined and purpose-oriented. In the prospective 4-year program, I will dedicated myself to this program with lasting passion and infuse it with all my wisdom and energy.
On the other hand, the individual research interests of the reputed instructors working in this academic field are remarkably extensively, covering all the central and cutting-edge areas of knowledge that Organizational Studies involve, such as organization changes, transformation, conflict, pluralistic culture and organization ethics. I believe that their diversified academic backgrounds from the world's top academic institutions will make the Carroll School a locus of unusually active academic ideas. This is testified by as many as 44 differently-styled academic papers published by the instructors from 2000 to 2001, those that are presented in the OS NewsFlash of your college. In this highly liberal and open academic atmosphere, students can come into contact with different schools of thought and different systems of research approaches. They can profoundly benefit from this program on three levels: the mode of thinking, knowledge, and methodology. Moreover, an education that features the intimate marriage between theory and practice is also bound to train students to develop acute academic vision and enlighten on their imaginative creativity. All those factors are the prerequisite conditions for the achievement of remarkable academic progress in the field of management.
It is self-evident that the Carroll School's program in Organizational Studies is highly competitive and selective. This will pose a major challenge for any applicant. Nevertheless, once the applicant is admitted, the small-scale classes will become an immediate asset to the participant. Students will have ample opportunity to collaborate with their instructors in teaching and research, in joint analysis and solution of problems, and in the exchange of academic ideas. In addition, the compact and rationally-organized 4-year curriculum makes the Ph.D. Program in Organization studies highly valuable.
To recapitulate, I must say that, honestly, the Organization Studies at the Carroll School of Management at Boston College is virtually the only program that I am interested in pursuing for my graduate education. To develop the determination to devote my most precious youth in my entire lifetime to this program is by far my most proud decision. While applying for this program with great expectations, I also maintain the most sincere wish that I could have the honor and the luck to become a member of this program.
