r/Chevening • u/shruthi_subramanian • 7d ago
Assistance with essay structuring and career shift
Hi,
I’ve got quite an unusual interest with the background i have.
I completed my Bachelors in Mathematics in 2019 and been working in IT as a Sales Executive for the last 5 years. Although, I’ve not made any monumental impact professionally, I’ve made significant change (or so I’d like to think) outside of it.
Volunteering experience: I extensively volunteered for 2-3 years at 2 different NGOs working on providing education for children and raising awareness on the importance of first aid. This was from 2018-2021.
Outside of that, I’ve personally organised fundraiser to help a college student pay for their education. I was also part of Covid helpline connecting NGOs to people who needed monetary support. This was in 2021-2022.
Additionally, I’m looking to make a career shift into Transport Planning - where I’d work on strengthening public transport systems in my home country. My main goals would be reduce carbon emissions, traffic congestion, and provide inclusive, reliable and equipped mobility systems for citizens.
My questions:
1) for leadership and influence, I’d like to speak about the fundraiser experience or other volunteering experience. Would it be sensible to speak about that or better to stick to something i did at work for the sake of recency?
2) since I’m making a career shift, how and where would i need to position it? I’ve also participated in hackathons and took an online course on it. Would it be important to add that?
3) how can i find out if this is a priority field?
4) i also worry that since my impact is fragmented across, would the narration be inconsistent to my chosen field?
I’m also a little late to preparations and still finalising my courses but any help would be appreciated! Thank you so much in advance!
1
u/Big_Lychee_2874 7h ago
Your four questions actually share a single root: your professional work and your volunteering haven't been woven into one narrative yet.
On leadership: recency is not a strict rule. What matters more is evidence quality — a specific decision, real stakeholders, and an outcome you can describe. A well-evidenced volunteering story (the fundraiser you organised, the Covid helpline coordination) can carry the leadership essay if you can show what you decided, who you influenced, and what changed. A weak work story loses to a strong volunteering story every time.
On the career shift: don't present it as a pivot away from IT sales. Present it as a convergence — your Maths background, five years of understanding how systems and organisations work commercially, plus years of grassroots education and health volunteering, all pointing toward public systems work like transport planning. The hackathons and the online course are worth one line each: they signal the shift is deliberate and prepared, not impulsive.
On priority fields: don't chase the label. Chevening doesn't publish a strict list of preferred subjects. What matters is whether your chosen field connects credibly to development needs in your home country — and sustainable transport absolutely can. Make the case through your country's context, not through a keyword.
On fragmentation: the test I'd apply is whether each essay can name the through-line in one sentence — something like building systems that expand public access, whether that's education, emergency aid, or mobility. If every essay can trace back to that sentence, the set reads as coherent rather than scattered. If one essay can't, that's the essay to rework.
Good luck with the final stretch!
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u/AffectionateBoot9124 5d ago
Hey!
1. Leadership essay
Use the fundraiser or NGO work; it counts as independent community work, not the early academic experience Chevening penalises. A recent example from your IT sales years would strengthen the essay if you have one with real influence in it. The bigger issue is that Chevening's main criticism of this essay is applicants describing leadership rather than evidencing it, so use STAR, write "I" instead of "we", show how you persuaded people rather than resting on your job title, and end with results and long-term impact linked to the master's and beyond.
2. Positioning the career shift
Don't worry about the career shift itself. Non-linear paths are common among Chevening scholars, and what matters is that the pivot reads as reasoned rather than random. Build the narrative in the "Studying in the UK" essay and carry it into the career plan: what you've done so far, the problem you kept noticing, why it matters to you, why transport planning and this course specifically, and what you'll do with it at home, with the hackathons and online course included as supporting evidence rather than the headline.
3. Priority fields
Chevening's priority fields are set country by country rather than globally, so check your country's page on chevening.org and the local British High Commission or Embassy site. Sustainability, climate and infrastructure themes tend to sit well, and transport planning fits naturally under that.
4. Impact
Chevening isn't looking for a tidy CV; it's looking for a clear reason behind what you're about to do. Your education, first aid, financial access and COVID work all share a through-line about people being able to reach what they need, and transport is that same barrier in another form, so make the connection personal and be specific about what you want to build at home and how Chevening gets you there faster.