MBA on the Horizon

I received a request for a more detailed breakdown of my school selections and why, and in considering it, I realized that this might actually be helpful in my essay writing process.

To give a little background, I have been aiming to enter a top MBA program since I was in undergrad over 4 years ago, so I have had some time to research and narrow this list during that time. It's been amost a process of osmosis as I have researched endlessly, so putting together a breakdown listing specifically why I have chosen as I have is probably a good idea.


A quick disclaimer...considering how many fantastic business schools are available in this country (not to mention the world), it's tough to distinguish between versions of a great thing. As a result, some of my reasons aren't huge, but when one school has negative reason X and another school doesn't, despite how small the reason, it's a leg up for the second school. I guess all I'm saying is take my analysis with a grain of salt. This selection is highly specific to me, as school everyone's school choice be. These are my opinions, and I am quite sure that some, if not many of them are wrong or misguided in some way (unintentionally, of course). Nothing makes up for ones own research, whether it be online, school visits, talking to alumni, MBA fairs...you get the idea.


First, the broad qualifications. I'm looking to switch careers into management consulting, specifically one of the big firms, and I know that I'll need all of the prestige factor I can get from a school. My secondary goal is a related entrepreneurial venture, for which I would like to lean on an impressive and large alumni network...again, presitigious schools fit the bill, but it's less crucial than the first reason. Regardless, prestige is important to me for the reasons I mentioned, and I believe that my stats warrant at least a try at those schools.


I live in California, in the city where I have lived my entire life. From a location perspective, I want to go far away to try something different, including more than one season. That chops out the West Coast contingent...Stanford, Haas, UCLA, etc.

Stern and Columbia are cut out for a personal reason - while I have been physically and financially separated from my parents for years, their opinions remain important to me and my dad has strong feelings against those two. As I don't have strong feelings either way about them and have plenty of schools on my list already, I removed those.

I visited UVA earlier this year...I discussed it in my prior post here. It's a great school, beautiful area and very well-respected, but it's not a fit for me. The town where it's located is tiny compared to what I'm used to, it's a smaller school, and I worried that I would feel a little trapped there. My undergrad was very small, so I want to try something larger this time around.

Ross - I don't want to live in Michigan for two years, and the program/school itself wasn't compelling enough to change my mind of that.

Duke - from a mgmt consulting career help perspective, I feel it's not on par with the W/K/H etc schools, and that's a big point for me. Also, I'm not wild about the idea of North Carolina. I tend towards the big cities and the Northeast.


As I mentioned previously, Booth used to be on the list. In fact, it's been on the list for some time, but after some further research and consideration, I removed it. As I mentioned, it's a fantastic school that would certainly provide career opportunities. However, part of what I'm paying an obscene amount of money for is the two year MBA experience itself, and I don't quite feel that the school itself fits me. While I have heard that it has evolved somewhat, it seems that the cohesiveness of the student body and relationship building isn't quite there to the same extent as it is at other schools, and students are possibly a bit more cerebral that social. I'll again reference my disclaimer here, as of course there are a million opinions and perspectives and mine could be completely off base. However, since the other student aspect is so crucial to me (part of what is keeping me going at work is my relationships with co-workers) and there are other schools that seem to excel in this area, I made a tough decision to cut this one out.

Tuck - when I removed Booth, I considered adding Tuck. It's a good school and has a good reputation, but I decided that five was enough for me and I didnt' love Tuck enough to push it to six.

Now, to the "selected" schools. I say that as if I'm not the one hoping and praying that they will select me. I'll order them from with my most coveted school last, and on up.

Cornell - I know - this school goes against a couple of the items that I mentioned were "no's" for me. It's in a small (tiny!) town, and it's a small program. However, it has one thing that sold me despite those setbacks...the Park Fellowship. Any school giving out 25 full tuition scholarships plus stipend with leadership/community service type factors going into the decision is going to get a shot from me. It's a fantastic school - a solid top 20 on most lists - and it's the "safest" of the schools that I'm applying to in that my stats are above average on all your basic admissions data points for this school. I put quotes around "safe" because I feel a bit presumptuous calling it that, being that I would be honored to be accepted here as well, but I think it's more in contrast to the following four...

Sloan - unfortunately, when I visited Boston (reference the same post I linked for UVA) it was spring break so I only got to tour the campus sans students/faculty. However, I like it's entrepreneurial spirit, I LOVE Boston, and the hands-on approach really is my style. I think I would like this school, plus the name and career services opportunities here are stellar.

Kellogg - I remember falling in love with this school sometime last year in my researching efforts. I haven't visited this one either, and am considering requesting an on campus interview to 1) see the school and 2) show my serious interest in the school in hopes of improving my chances in some small way. Any insight there, anyone? Anyway, I love the teamwork aspect of this school while maintaining a good quant side. I enjoy numbers and analysis, and it seems that they have a good balance of both worlds here. The location also won me over a bit - Evanston seems gorgeous from what I can tell, it has many of the outdoor activites I love, it's near a beautiful body of water. KWEST seems like an exciting opportunity, too. Obviously the brand/career services/ranking is there.

Harvard - I think I discussed this in the aforementioned UVA visit post, but I had high hopes that I would visit HBS and reject them before they had the chance to reject me. But alas, I visited, fell in love, and here it is, number two. I love the section setup in the beginning, giving you a community and helping build relationships...I love the set first year and flexible second year...I love the campus (who wouldn't??)...I love Boston...yep, I drank the Kool-Aid. Brand and career opportunities go with out saying.

Wharton. Ahh...Wharton. This has actually been my dream school since undergrad, and when I visited in March, I just fell further in love. Let's see if I can sum it up in a non-gushy fashion: similar to Kellogg, I love that the quant skills are joined with the class cohesion here. I appreciated that the most often heard answer from current students about what they love about the school is...the other students (back to people making the experience for me). Despite the "meh" opinions I've heard on Philly and UPenn's campus, I felt right at home on the campus and in the surrounding area, too. The city was beautiful and the "big city" feel that I want was there without being overwhelming or dangerous. The campus had these big, beautiful old buildings. The opportunities abound...community service, international, clubs enough to make your head spin...and again, the brand and career services are fantastic.

Wharton scares me a bit because I lack international experience that I know they like, but my career plans do include it. My quant is below the fabled 80th percentile, despite the 710/92nd percentile overall. This is also the school where my stories didn't fall naturally into their essay questions, so that concerns me too. I need to put some more time in here and see what I can do to put together the best picture I can for them. Beyond that, if I'm not accepted here, I've done my best and I must have been meant for another school.

Hopefully that helps someone out there. I will tell you that it was an enlightening process for me, and it helped me to remember that my choices do have some logic to them, even if it makes sense for no one in the world but me. I again reiterate my disclaimer that these opinions and choices are specific to me, and everyone's school selection will be different and unique to them. That's what's both exciting and terrifying about this process - both parties deciding that the fit is there. Best of luck in all of your selection processes!

Posted in: business school, management consulting, school visits on Saturday, August 29, 2009 at at 8:37 PM 4 comments Links to this post    

Since we're getting closer and closer to the big date(s), I'll probably continue to have more frequent updates. I met my goal of finishing a draft of all essays by last weekend to some degree. Cornell hasn't posted questions yet so that one is beyond my control, and as I mentioned last time, I'm reconsidering applying to Booth. I also had a brief moment of doubt about MIT, but after a bit more research, I remembered why I liked it and why I think I could fit there.

Booth, on the other hand, didn't do well with further research. I also spoke with a relative who graduated a few years ago from Haas, and in conversation, he mentioned some of the connotations of Booth that I'm concerned about which just reinforced my doubts. However, my dad summed it up best when he said that it's a school of theorists, and I'm very much a practical, hands on type. Booth is a fantastic school, which is why I struggle in giving it up, but I think he's right - it's just not a fit for me.

As a result, I didn't write that set of essays (clearly). I am considering replacing it with Tuck, however, as I think I could fit there. So technically, I haven't written that set either.

I've become somewhat stressed in the past few days however, because it's recently occurred to me that Wharton and HBS are both due Oct 1st - just a bit over a month away - and I a) haven't asked my other two recommenders yet, and b) I will be busy every moment of both this weekend and next weekend. Which will make for very busy weekdays, except that I happen to be buried at work currently. Oh, joy.

I know I'll be fine. Honestly, in college I tended to work best at the last minute and under pressure. But considering I have been preparing and planning and dreaming about this since I graduated from college in 2005, I feel I should really put everything I have into this, which tends to work better when it isn't a last minute situation.

All I can do is take baby steps. The essays are written (except Wharton's perspectives...dang that prompt...) and I'm distributing them to my editors tonight. I also plan to begin to put together recommender "packets" including my goals, positioning, etc.

Deep breath, here goes...

Posted in: essays, recommendations on Wednesday, August 26, 2009 at at 6:37 PM 4 comments Links to this post    

My goal is to get through a draft of each school's essays within the next week or two. I would like to have September to revise, as well as put together applications and recommendations.

I'm tackling Kellogg today. I was expecting it to be easier than it is. For whatever reason, the broad nature of the questions is actually more difficult for me than the more specific, shorter Harvard and Wharton group (other than my major block on Wharton's perspectives question). It's taken me quite a bit longer than usual to write the career goals essay - 600 words gives me a lot of room to describe and many options of what to share. I'm getting close, however - my current "stuck" point is how to get from my job now to the management consulting goal. It's not that it's not a logical leap, I'm just having trouble articulating the transition. I think I just need a break...which I'm taking now as I blog!

The other thing on my mind at the moment is the recommendations - I need to get on top of them. My boss has asked that I write hers, which I'm a little uncomfortable with, but I am going to put together bullet points and information for her so that it's as easy of a process as possible. I still need to select my other recommender (two for Harvard) and ask them. I'm close - I'm deciding between someone who I work with in a different functional area, and someone who is external to my company but I work with very regularly and have about a four year history with.

I'm considering asking one person to do a few and the other person to do the others. Obviously they would both have to do Harvard. I don't mind asking my boss for six recommendations, but for anyone else, that seems like a lot. I have a little more time than usual this week, so one of the nights I'm going to put together the recommendation details.

The last thing on my mind are a few second thoughts about my school list. The schools that I have written essays for so far are confirmed "yes," - Harvard, Wharton and Kellogg - and I'm fairly sure that Cornell will stay. I'm a little on the fence about Chicago and MIT. I need to do some more research, probably on that recommendation night, and make a final decision so I can proceed full force with applications for all of them.

I suppose my break is over - time to go back to that transition from my current job to management consulting.

Posted in: business school, essays, recommendations on Sunday, August 16, 2009 at at 5:18 PM 1 comments Links to this post