It was sometime around July 2015 when I once again decided to apply for MBA courses after a gap of almost three years. I had tried applying to a few schools in 2012 but it didn’t really work out because of two main reasons. First, I hardly had any idea of how to represent myself. Secondly, I hadn’t challenged myself enough at work to set me apart from the pool of engineers applying to business schools. Oh and thirdly, I didn’t know and still don’t know how objectively any application process works.

• Read more about Why Not INSEAD!

Entering INSEAD as a 16J Partner, I viewed the coming year as an endless stream of potential paths, but one avenue I didn’t expect to go down was towards the start-up world. However, one can say that at INSEAD there are a growing number of Entrepreneur-spirited individuals. Personally, this journey started during the first few weeks when my B-schooler and I received an invitation to the INSEAD Entrepreneurship Bootcamp, hosted by the INSEAD Centre for Entrepreneurship. Why not, we said, lets have a go at this.

• Read more about Discover Your Inner Entrepreneur

When I was researching about MBA schools last year, I asked alumni what made INSEAD so special from others. Diversity, they said. You will not find more nationalities in a single location anywhere else than INSEAD. The international outlook it provides you is unrivalled. After listening to their stories and seeing the diversity statistics on the INSEAD website, I thought I understood what diversity meant. Or so I thought until I lived through it myself in the past two months.

• Read more about Diversity at INSEAD and the People You Meet

In October 2016, on a Saturday morning, I was standing in front of 500+ alumni; ready to deliver my speech during the Alumni Reunion. I have always dreaded public speaking. Yet there I was, completely out of my comfort zone, preparing to speak to batches of INSEAD alumni who had graduated at least 25 years ago.

• Read more about Why INSEAD?

Ah INSEAD…. So unique that it’s hard to describe it to other people sometimes. The diversity, the pace, the combination of hard work and social life… but what makes INSEAD stand apart (and be the BEST MBA IN THE WORLD) is its short length mixed with the incredible number of options it offers to students. The hard part: choosing what to do. Finding out what we really want. And make decisions. Just like when we go to a restaurant with a long menu…

• Read more about The INSEAD Menu

I reach INSEAD's Singapore campus late for a gym class and for the start of another crazy packed week of school. There are balloons in the hallway, in different shades of green. I have no idea what is going on, but I love this school, never a dull moment. At the gym I overhear a conversation that the Financial Times has ranked INSEAD as the #1 MBA programme in the world.

• Read more about The Day We Became #1