Letter of Motivation for Quality & Operation Management Graduate Course

Hi guys,

I am writing letter of motivation for graduate school. Below is my first draft.
Thank you very much in advance.

Essay prompt:

•The letter of motivation should not exceed one page and must be in English.
•The autobiographic section can be fairly brief, since submitting a CV is mandatory when applying to Chalmers.
•You may provide more than one letter of motivation, each directed to a specific Master's programme.
•Other than the above there are no standardised forms or templates for the letter of motivation, since the letter/s should be personal.

you should state the reason why you have chosen a specific Master's programme, and also why you have chosen Chalmers University of Technology. In the letter of motivation you should explain the connection to your current studies in your choice of programme, how your interests and skills will contribute to your success as a Master's student at Chalmers and what you hope to gain by being admitted, for your future career and for the society where you will practice your profession. You may also outline a thesis proposal based on your interests and view on the subject field.

SMES IMPROVEMENT THROUGH SUSTAINABLE PROCESSES

Management has never been main focus during my undergraduate study at UIB except for cost management course. I develop interest for management after I worked in a local shipyard company and actively participate in development of the Quality Management System. I learned more about management after took ISO 9001 standard awareness and internal audit trainings, version 2008 and 2015. I was fascinated with PDCA concept and pyramid connection of all company operation to company vision, mission and objectives. I put my knowledge in use for development and improvement of QMS in my current work as ISO Consultant.

As a consultant I see through many different management style and organization culture in our client companies. I found out that a lot of problem which cause low performance and even bankruptcy in a company lies within the management methods used by managerial people. I think that to sustain a business, one must not only be prepared financially but also possessed the right and socially responsible way to manage all the organizational processes. However a lot of people, especially Chinese descendant Indonesian who are born ambitious in establishing business neglecting important aspect in management such as monitoring, improvement, risk assessment and control which eventually lead their business to bankruptcy. This is such a loss because if the business managed to survive, it can provide increase to the country GDP and improve the economics. Thus, I am compelled to provide professional service to help the management of core business processes such as production and process quality improvement of Indonesia companies especially in Batam.

Chalmers University of Technology is ideal institution to support my academic pursuit because Quality & Operation Management course have a lot of research focus on operation sustainability issue which is perfectly align with my research interest. I believe I would be a valuable asset to the research teams' endeavor to solve operations problem in various industries specifically with my research focus in production processes sustainability for SMEs. In particular, I have developed particular interest to several researches led by Professor Mats Winroth on production strategies as supports for competitiveness in SMEs and indicators of sustainable production among Sweden manufacturing companies. A large research project for BPMS improvement that is currently progressing also caught my attention. It is also my intention to conduct a practical management research that benefits both academics and business.

I believe QOM is the most suitable for my master course because what the programme offers is exactly what I need. My intended outcomes after completing QOM are to be a lecturer and Management consultant involved in system improvement, research, and workshops meant to educate managers and develop cutting edge management strategies for future use in business management. In order to achieve it, I need to obtain knowledge and skills in managing, improving and transforming business processes and solid understanding about technical and managerial especially in quality and operation management.

I understand the differences of education system and environment between my home country and Sweden and may feel surprised in the beginning of my study. However, with independence and resilient that was forged by life experience to me. I am confidence that I can cope with the transition and course work, build professional connections for future research opportunities and complete my master degree within stipulated time frame. DONE.

@StreetWalker
in my assessment, your essay is nice and well written. But I will advise you continue to review it. There be details you will like to add in the course of the review.

"I worked in a local shipyard company and actively participate in development of ..." Please add 'd' to the participate since it is a past tense.

Messal, you need to add a paragraph about your current work experience that can possibly relate to the QOM masters course. The foundation for your interest needs to come from the practical need for your advanced training in this field. What work experience, training, or seminars attended have prepared you to undergo the rigorous studies that this course demands? You said you only took one course in management in college. Then you work experience did not really cover the basics regarding the requirements for this course. You were only exposed to it through work observation, which led to your desire to learn more about the field. Since you do not have the undergraduate background to support your desire for higher education in an unrelated field, you will need to justify it using work experience in the actual QOM field. The rest of your letter of motivation is good enough. It just needs to justify your qualifications for study in this field in a summarized form. The lengthy discussion can be saved for the statement of purpose.

@Holt

Thank you Holt for your valuable comment as usual.

Actually, I majored in Accountancy but there are also other management courses than Cost Management that is not related directly to Accountancy field such as Strategic Management, Investment & Portfolio Management, Finance Management and Operational Management. But I never concentrate on it as with my other compulsory subjects in Accountancy. After read you comment, I think it is better to mention this to strengthen my background for QOM.

Do I need to explain more about my work experience? I'm sorry to ask this simple questions, but I have mentioned that I worked as ISO Consultant and develop QMS for companies, and took awareness training for ISO 9001 both 2008 and 2015 version in paragraph one, how do you want me to explain more about it?

Hi Messal. You should definitely expand a bit on the management courses that you took in college, but only in a brief, summary form. You can do that by adjusting your opening statement. Change it from the current form that indicated you do not have much exposure to the academic side of management. Keep it brief though. Remember, this is only a motivational letter and not a statement of purpose. More detailed discussions of the overall topics presented in the letter of motivation is done on the statement of purpose essay. If you can give an overview of your work experience and the questions that you were left with regarding the improvement of the system, then that should allow you present more than just a mere observation of how the Chinese in Indonesia function within this field.

Since you already explained that you worked in the QMS field and presented your observations, it stands to reason that you have questions that were developed during this time that led to your motivation to gain more information in this field. A simple summary of these questions in relation to the motivation to study ought to work just fine.

Don't apologize for asking questions. I actually appreciated being asked questions because it shows me that you are really focused on developing the best possible paper and that you are really considering and applying the suggestions I am giving to you. Ask as many questions as you need to, provided it can help me create responses that will help you reach the final form of your essay.

@Holt

Thank you Holt. I will add my essay with your suggestions. I will post my second draft later.

After this actually I still have one LOM , one SOP and three essay to work on..

This web really help me a lot. You know, when I read the comment of contributors on the essays, mostly the current reply is from you, I keep repeating words "Angels.. OMG, these guys are angles.."

@Holt

Hi Holt,

Here is the revised essay according to your suggestion. However, do you think it is strange for the last sentence in third paragraph to be that long? I combine my previous 4 paragraph with my problem that led me to take a master degree in QOM.

Thank you very much.

SMES IMPROVEMENT THROUGH SUSTAINABLE PROCESSES

When studying Accountancy in my undergraduate course, I have completed several elective management courses related to QOM such as Strategic Management and Operation Management. I develop an interest for management after I worked in a local shipyard company and actively participated in the development of the Quality Management System. I deepen my understanding of management by attending ISO 9001 standard awareness and internal audit trainings, version 2008 and 2015.

As an ISO consultant, I have seen through many different management style and organizational culture in our client companies. I found out that a lot of problems which cause low business performance and even bankruptcy lies within the management methods used by managerial people. I think that to sustain a business, one must not only be prepared financially, but also possessed the correct and socially responsible way to manage all the organizational processes. However a lot of people, especially Indonesian who are born ambitious in establishing business neglecting important aspects in management, such as monitoring, improvement, risk assessment and control which eventually lead their business to bankruptcy when they cannot change according to economic climate.

My solution to address this problem is involved in system improvement, research, and workshops meant to educate managers and develop cutting edge management strategies for future use in business management. However, my capacity for this solution was limited since right now as an ISO Consultant, I can only address problems that related to resources and process management to improve performance and achieve customer satisfaction. Thus, I am compelled to upgrade my qualification through taking graduate courses and obtain knowledge and skills in managing, improving and transforming business processes especially in quality and operational management in order to provide professional management consultancy services to help in the design and improvement of core business processes such as production and process quality improvement of Indonesia companies especially in Batam.

Chalmers University of Technology is the ideal institution for my academic pursuit because Quality & Operation Management course focus more on research of operation sustainability issue which is perfectly aligned with my research interest. I believe I would be a valuable asset to the research teams in solving operations problem within various industries specifically with my research focus is production processes sustainability for SMEs. I have also developed a particular interest to two researches led by Professor Mats Winroth which are "production strategies as supports for competitiveness in SMEs" and "indicators of sustainable production among Sweden manufacturing companies".

I understand the differences of education system and environment between my home country and Sweden and expected to be surprised at the beginning of my study. However, with independence and resilient that was forged by life experience to me. I am confident that I can cope with the transition and course works, build professional connections for future research opportunities and complete my master degree within stipulated time frame. DONE.

Messal, I have to congratulate you on creating what I believe to be a very good motivational letter. Your background is clear, your experiences speak volumes about why you would get personally involved with this issue and your ideas of the possible solution to the problem all fit in a perfect overview form. However, I do not believe that your last paragraph is necessary to the discussion because you are speaking of the difference in the educational system of the two countries. Since that is not even remotely related to your motivation to study this course, I can confidently advise you to remove that paragraph and just close the essay on the note about your desire to study at Chalmers University instead. That way the letter conveys only the required motivational letter elements.

@Holt

Thank you very much Holt.

I will omit the last paragraph as you suggested.

I am working on my second ML. I am working slow while the deadline is tomorrow. I hope I can finished on time.