How I Won The Chevening Scholarship [PDF]

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How I won the Chevening Scholarship (and How you can, too), Part 2: Writing your Essays Tips to write your essays for the Chevening scholarship application

Chi Ngo Follow Aug 24, 2019 · 11 min read

Vietnamese Chevening Scholars 2019/2020 at our Pre-departure briefing in Hanoi

This is Part 2 of my series on tips to apply for the Chevening Scholarship sponsored by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. If you haven’t read Part 1: Building a Profile, you can find it here. During the initial application process, you’ll have to write a few essays about Leadership, Networking, study plan, and future career plan. This is where you show the Chevening committee that you are a candidate worth considering.

General writing tips Before getting into the nitty-gritty, here are a few writing tips I learned from my 8 years working as a writer:

Tip #1: Be self-aware. Be humble. Be insightful. Ideally, by this point, you’ve already done the self-awareness exercises that I mentioned in Part 1. Knowing who you are, what you believe in, and where you want to go in life, is one of the most important steps in this whole process. The worst mistake you can make in your essays is bragging about all your successes or name-dropping the celebrities that you

know. These things say nothing about your skills, or what you value, or who you are as a leader. The second worst mistake you can make in your essays is telling the scholarship committee about the academic definitions of leadership, networking, or what a person should do to become a leader or to expand his/her network. There are millions of books about that. These essays are about You. The difficulties you faced, the lessons you learned, the impacts you’ve created. Get very personal in your essays. That’s how you stand out. Of course, you should highlight some of your biggest achievements that can showcase your leadership and networking abilities, or that are relevant to your course and your career goals. But other than that, skip the list and move on. Instead, think about the biggest challenge you’ve ever had. We often show our true selves in the face of adversity. Think about what you did in that situation, why you did it, and what you learned from it. Now, we have a story that tells who you are as a person.

Tip #2: Tell stories. If being a content marketer has taught me anything, it’s that stories can move mountains.

The Rabbit and The Tortoise. David and Goliath. The early bird gets the worm. There’s a reason that all the fables and pearls of wisdom are told in the form of stories. They are memorable. They are straightforward and easy to understand. Stories have a protagonist (you), an antagonist (challenges), and a clear goal (defeat the antagonist). Stories have a narrative that portrays character development. Harry and Voldemort. David and Goliath. Hamlet and Claudius (or, Simba and Scar for my fellow millennials). These are stories we know and love, and you know what they have in common? Everybody loves the protagonists and root for them to win. Tell your story in a narrative. You are the protagonist in your own story. Tell them your greatest challenge, and how you struggled to overcome it. This is the simplest (and most authentic) way to show them who you are.

Tip #3: Use S.T.A.R.

This format is used in every corporate performance reviews, but I found that it helped me be specific in my essays. S.T.A.R. stands for Situation (what was the status quo), Task (what needed to be done), Action (what you did), and Result (the impact of what you did). Keep in mind that you don’t have to follow this exactly while you’re writing because every supposed “format” can make you sound like a robot and less authentic. I used S.T.A.R. to outline the instances I wanted to talk about in my essay, and it helped me retain what was relevant and eliminate what wasn’t (because you can only tell your story in 500 words or less).

Tip #4: Be honest. The best story is always the ones that you experienced. The best lessons are the ones that life taught you, that your failures taught you. Tell that story, in the most honest, detailed way that you can. It will be a breath of fresh air to the scholarship committee, and you’ll stand out among the lists of achievements. Now that we know the general rules, let’s get into the details.

The Leadership Essay

Chevening is looking for individuals who will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer. “Leadership” is used in the broad sense of the word. You can be a manager in your company, a youth leader in an organization, a key opinion leader (blogger, activist, etc.), someone who has had an impact in an organization, or someone who leads by example. Don’t be intimidated if you don’t have an official “title”. What Chevening is looking for is leadership potential, which is best showcased through examples of your actions, your attitude, your influence, and your positive impact in your organization/community. Think of the last time something you did had a positive influence on your community or organization. Did you start a club? Are you writing a blog about climate change? Are you leading a youth group? Did you ask for better policies in your company? (*If you can’t think of an example, it’s time to get started). No matter your position, in your essay, you should highlight a few instances where your leadership skills have helped improve the outcome of your community or organization. Be as specific as possible, especially about your impact (which I’ve highlighted in Part 1) and how you got there.

In my leadership essay, I wrote about how I struggled when I first became a team manager at the age of 23. During my first year, the position was incredibly challenging and I was intimidated by the older, more experienced people that I was supposed to be “managing”. I started taking actions to become a better leader, and in the process, I gained an incredible amount of empathy and learned a lot, especially about creating a healthy, supportive team culture. It laid a strong foundation for all the impactful works I did for my company later on. If you don’t know where to start, these are a few books that taught me a lot about leadership in the past few years:  Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek  What You Really Need to Lead: The Power of Thinking and Acting Like an Owner by Robert Steven Kaplan  Radical Candor: Be a kick-ass boss without losing your humanity by Kim Scott

The networking Essay Chevening is looking for individuals with strong professional relationship building skills, who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Please

explain how you build and maintain relationships in a professional capacity, using clear examples of how you currently do this, and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future. Most Chevening candidates struggle with this essay because it is difficult to define and practice networking as if it has a concrete how-to formula. I never thought of anything I did as “networking”, I was just making friends, finding mentors, and making introductions when I saw suitable opportunities. It was difficult to find examples of “good networking” in my personal experience. Only until I read Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi that I finally understood the profound impact that networking can have, and found the words to tell my personal networking stories. In my networking essay, I wrote about the English book club that I created (on a whim) when I first joined the company, and how that helped me meet people in HR, Finance, Tech in every Traveloka country, those whom I’ll never talk to in my work. The discussions we had during book club were interesting and insightful, and it leads to incredible growth in my leadership, and some cool changes in the community around me as well. In your networking essay, you should share some examples of how you find and expand your network, as well as how you strengthen those relationships. This doesn’t have to be interpersonal

relationships, per se. I know a blogger who used her influence online to find funding for her education program, and I think that’s a great example of using your “network” for good. But, I must stress this again, don’t just talk about networking for the sake of showing off that you know how to network. You need to talk about the impacts that those relationships have on you and your community. Otherwise, it’s all talk and no walk.

Your course choice Outline why you have selected your chosen three university courses, and explain how this relates to your previous academic or professional experience and your plans for the future. Before writing this essay, I assume that you have already chosen the 3 university and the courses that you would like to study when you are in the UK. Ideally, the three courses should be essentially the same, because it’s better to be coherent and it paints a picture of knowing what you want and how you want to get there. If you haven’t chosen the courses, I suggest you do that first, since the Chevening application requires you to list the three courses & universities of your choice. The three universities I applied to were (1) a prestigious, reputable university, (2) a target choice (a course that I really like) and (3) a safe choice where it’s very likely you’ll

get admitted. I ended up getting into all the schools but chose (2) since it was the most suitable for my career goals. Once you’ve chosen the courses, the next step would be to look into the course catalog and understand what you’ll be studying and how that will relate to your future goals. I even looked up all the professors who teach the classes and found their prominent projects, researches, and books. The more you understand the courses, the better you’ll be able to link them to your career goals in this essay. In the essay, don’t go too far into describing the course or the university reputation and ranking. This information is unnecessary because it says nothing about you. Instead, try to draw a link between the school, the course or the professors to your passion, career goals, how you can apply what you learn here in your future career, and how this education can help you achieve your goals and make an impact in your field of choice. In my case, I found some personal projects from the professors at the University of Brighton that were inspiring. They were also things I hope to do in my future, so drawing the between the course and myself was quite easy. The University of Brighton also hosts an amazing month-long Digital Festival every year, and it has an extensive network with Digital Media professionals and creatives in the UK, those are also reasons that I believe the course would fit into my future goals.

Your career goals Chevening is looking for individuals who have a clear post-study career plan. Please outline your immediate plans upon returning home and your longer term career goals. You may wish to consider how these relate to what the UK government is doing in your country. Before writing this essay, you may want to research your field and its current position in our country’s landscape, such as what’s the current status, what are some current problems, what is the projection in 5–10 years, and how it is related to the areas of cooperation between the UK and your country. Understanding this thoroughly will help you draw the link between what you’re studying, and how you can impact your field in the future. Then, you should outline your plans in the future to achieve those goals. In my essay, I outline a timeline: immediately after I return, in the next 3–5 years, in the next 10 years, and the next 20 years. Don’t be afraid to be too ambitious in this essay, Chevening is looking for people with big dreams. However, make sure that you know how to get there, and outline the specific steps in this essay. It’s especially

important to highlight how your leadership, networking skills, and your UK education will help you get there. In other words, you should draw a link from all your previous three essays to this final essay.

I’ve tried to be as specific as possible in this post, but please understand that this is my personal experience. Chevening scholars come from diverse backgrounds and professions, some of them are studying topics I’ve never heard of, so I encourage you to get to know your field first and craft a roadmap that is authentic to you and write what feels true to you. I should also mention that a big reason why I succeeded was that during my application process, I was constantly bothering one of my friends who is a Vietnamese Chevening scholar 2018/2019, and he was patient enough to answer all of them (and more). Chevening scholars are also some of the kindest, most openminded people I’ve ever met, so don’t be afraid to reach out to one of us if you have any questions, we’d be happy to answer them. Stay tuned for Part 3: Interview Tips.

Update (September 5, 2020):

Since writing this story last year, I have received so many kind words from prospective Chevening scholars who were going through the application process. Some wanted to connect with me just to expand their networks, but most wanted to ask questions about my Chevening application, and many wanted my help coaching them through the essay-writing and interviewing process. Although I am glad that my Chevening series were able to help guide you through this process and I am flattered that many of you think that I am an authority on this subject, I must reiterate some points here:  The Chevening application is a very personal thing. It’s about you, your stories, your challenges, and your future goals. There is no formula to this. This is a good thing, because your story is unique to you. My Medium articles are about how to share your story in an engaging way. I cannot come up with your story for you (nobody can).  Along the same line, my Medium articles are about my personal application journey. It doesn’t mean that this is the correct and only way to create your Chevening application. Like I said in my article, there are current Chevening scholars studying subjects

I’ve never even heard of, so unfortunately, I cannot give personalised advice when it comes to your application.  Despite being a Chevening scholar, I don’t know how Chevening applications are evaluated. I succeeded because I wrote what was authentic to me and my experiences, and a lot of the things I explained in my articles are publicly available information on the Chevening website. I cannot tell you if your application will succeed, or if you are qualified to apply, because I am not a deciding authority on this subject. That being said, I am always happy to connect with prospective Chevening scholars and hear your stories, and help in any way that I can. Please do feel free to send me a message. Thank you and good luck!