Potential students are often surprised--and relieved--that the DMBA program doesn't require taking the GMAT test. From the beginning, we felt that such tests often penalize those from design backgrounds that aren't, necessarily quantitatively-focused. In the same way that requiring a portfolio would put those with non-design backgrounds at a disadvantage, the GMAT test might have the opposite effect.
It's more work to evaluate people on the basis of their backgrounds, experiences, essays, and interactions, but we always felt it was also more accurate. Now, there's even some validation to our expectation that GMAT scores don't necessarily correlate to business success anyway. The GISMA Business School in Hannover, Germany just published the results of a study into just this.
The study found that while GMAT scores correlate well with quantitative performance in school, they don't correlate well with qualitative performance (such as innovation, leadership, cultural intelligence, etc.). These are precisely the skills that we fell most matter in business performance outside the program, in the actual business world. Furthermore, the report only compared scores to academic performance and not to actual success after business school.