Yale School of Management - Research Excerpt

 

This is second post about my research on B-schools I'm applying into. This research is very crucial in selecting the right B-school for me, for finding the ideal cycle to apply and for preparing a competitive application. I'll describe how my research is organized so that if you want to read only a particular aspect of my research you can jump directly onto it. First, I describe about reason for my selection of school. Second, I describe what are the plus point for me in the schools. Third, I describe what else I'm looking for in the school. And last, other areas for more research.

Like Tuck, Yale School of Management is on top my B-school list. Among the top elite B-Schools, Yale is the youngest B-school. Yale seems so lucrative to me that it actually fits the definition of "Dream School". It has extraordinary and very distinctive Curriculum. Yale under the leadership of Dean Snyder is gaining new heights every year. Current FT ranking places Yale at 10th position, jump of 5 in a year.

Things I like about Yale -

1. Class Strength - Yale's class strength of class of 2016 is 219. The small student body has the advantage of having the opportunity to get to know each member of your class, build a personal relation with each member and learn more comfortably about the different perspectives, cultures and traditions at more personal level.

2. Raw Case - Yale's Raw Case is unique version of popular case study method. The cases, synthesized by Yale's research team and faculty,  are quite similar to the real case method that one might encounter in real world and involve multimedia platform. These case are available on Yale's site for reference and it seems other colleges also use them in their curriculum.

3. International Experience -  First year students are required to gain the international experience by going on the tour to one of the several part of the world to study the area of their interest. This seems quiet fascinating method to me.

Things that are not so attractive about Yale -

1. Smaller Alumni Network - Because Yale is very young and because it has small student body, its Alumni network is small compared to other elite B-school's; however, I feel that this factor is not much of a concern as being part of Yale's network, you not only have access to SOM alumni but also to other schools of Yale university and because of the close association of SOM curriculum with other schools one has network possibilities with other student bodies and alumni . Also having a small alumni body means reach to the seniors would be easy and effective.

2. Tougher Selection Process - Because Yale has smaller student body means the admission team will be very selective. One need to make quiet an impression to get into this wonderful school.


This is pretty much all from my research about Yale SOM. I'm not finished with conversation with current students, hence I delaying conversation with Yale's student for later period.

If you like me to consider any specific detail about college do comment below.


Sources - Poetsandquant.com, Veritas Prep Essential Guide, Yale SOM website

My Round 1 Application Schools list

 

With almost every schools application going online for round 1, every prospective candidate is rushing to prepare a competitive application. I'm also planning to apply to most of my shortlisted schools in round 1. Applying into earlier round will not give one edge over an equally eligible candidate, who is applying in round 2; however, there are few advantages of applying earlier. One benefit of applying in round 1 is that in case if your application gets dinged you have time to recover and can apply into other less competitive schools . The other benefit of applying in round 1 is that if you get accepted into your dream school, you can plan many things such as visa, any travel plan, organized monetary fund, etc.

I too have shortlisted list of my B-schools and now working towards making a competitive application, but first I need to be organized for my journey so that I don't blemish my application in any sense. Here is the list of my B-schools in which I'm applying in round 1.

1. The Fuqua School of Business - Early Action Round
2. Yale SOM
3. Columbia Business School
4. Tuck School of Business
5. Darden School of Business
6. UCLA Anderson School of Management

To few of you my 6th choice might seems bit edgy because it is the only B-school in my list on west coast. Reason to choose UCLA is that it has great program for M&E and being the situated in the capital of Entertainment Business, it  has edge over other similar programs.

I'll be tracking my progress of each application and will be updating my research on regular basis, so if you would like to know anything particular of my research do let me know.

Duke (Fuqua) Daytime MBA Program - Research Part 1

Duke, Fuqua is one the top B-school around the world but is it right fit for me? I still don't have a solid answer but the program seems to be very enchanting and attractive. In my research I identified few points that gave me positive vibes about the program but there are few points on which I've to do more research  to come to the ultimate conclusion - is it right fit for me? Here is the excerpt of my first draft of Research.

Things I liked about Fuqua -

1. Interdisciplinary Structure - Courses on different domains/fields/disciplines. This would be great for me, as post-MBA I'm tempted about 2 fields  - Media and Entertainment and Core Finance.

2. Fuqua's Media, Entertainment & Sports (MES) Club - Fuqua is one of the very few B-schools that have centre for M&E. I information about it M&E club is quiet handful.

3. Professor Lopomo's simulation program - I really love the whole concept of this program. In my graduation school one of my professor also uses the same method in his teaching and I quite enjoyed his classes for the same reason.

 Things I need to do more research -

1. Bigger Class size - Fuqua has a typical class size of  437 and the whole class is divided into section of some 70ish student. In my earlier firm, Intel Security - formally known as McAfee, we had a big working force and because of such a big strength I was able to make acquaintance with not many of the team, however, I feel that class strength is actually beneficial in Fuqua as they have much diversity. This is actually not ice-breaker but I would like to know how current students feel about the strength.

2. Centres - I touch superficially on Fuqua's various program centres. In part -2 of my research I'll update about how program centres at Fuqua's stand against those of other college.

That is all from my initial draft. If you like me to consider any specific detail about college do comment below.

Greetings,
Hemant

MBA application process

Many people are now opting for B-school/MBA program. These people have different reason for going for a MBA program. Whatever may be your reason you need to do certain things before you get an admission into any B-school. Here I'm going to explain  these per-requisites and alternatives if any - 

GMAT/GRE -

Most B-schools need to analyze you from the highly competitive pool of applicants; thus they use the score of standardize test. Few years early GMAT was the only acceptable standardize test that global B-schools were accepting for the evaluation of applicants, however, now many schools are accepting the GRE as well. Most of the people stuck between the dilemma to take GMAT or GRE. The confusion is basically on the preference of which standardize test score schools will favor. The truth is most B-school actually don't have preference between GMAT and GRE score, however, there are many B-schools which don't accept GRE scorecard. So if you are opting for GRE , make sure your school do accept the GRE score. For this reason most of the applicants opt for GMAT exam.

Now, another question rises is what is the safe score to get into top B-school? The answer is there is no safe score, there are lots of applicants who got rejected from School like Harvard, Stanford, Wharton, etc. for a great score such as 780 and there are applicants who got into these same school with the score of 500 only. Surprise, well yes it actually not that surprising as most of the admission experts says that your GMAT/GRE score counts for any 20-25% of your chances of getting into any B-schools. So what is the rest of the percentage account for? The answer to this question is explained in next point.

School Essays - 

Once you're done with your GMAT/GRE exam, you need to submit your application to each B-school separately. Every B-school has different procedures that includes essays, recommendations, resume, interviews, and in some cases video introduction. B-school have round system in which they accept application from candidates, evaluate these application against applicant of the same round and declare the results. An applicant can be accepted, rejected or wait-listed, depending on his competitiveness with rest of the pool of applicants. This here is a very important point, as applying in the early round can make your chances stronger to get into B-schools as many people opt for round 2 or 3 usually. But at the same time even with your strong credentials if you apply in the later rounds you may get yourself a rejection because as the round passes B-schools become very picky. 

Applying to B-school is a very tiresome job when you are working full-time and wanted to deliver a standout application so that your dream school can't reject you. So how should you balance every aspect of your B-school journey? I'll explain this in my next post.

Let me know if you find my post useful by leaving your comment below.