About Eric: Eric Lin (’23) is a first-year at UCLA Anderson looking to enter big-tech as a product manager. Prior to business school, he was a business operations analyst at a tier-1 automotive supplier in Chicago. A mechanical engineer by education, he enjoys (not always) losing sleeping on the weekends to watch Formula 1, venturing to the SGV to try new restaurants, and swimming in the not always 70 degree and sunny Southern California weather).
Attending business school was never something I had thought about after college, until my wife Vivian (also a current first-year) mentioned the prospect to me as a way of expanding my horizons beyond engineering and exploring a career pivot. Fast forward several years later and here we are, both starting the next step in life together at UCLA Anderson.
The application process itself was rather challenging, as we had to carefully pick and choose programs that would fit both the type of culture we enjoyed as well as the profession and industry we wanted to pivot towards. We were both accepted into several programs together and decided on Anderson because (as mentioned in a previous blog post by Meggie) of the 3 P’s: People, Parker, and Place. And thus began our westward move from the windy city to sunny Los Angeles – funny story, it rained the day we landed in LA, just as it rained on our wedding day and when I proposed…probably good for the drought situation in California though!
I’m not sure if it was on purpose (it probably was) but we were split into separate sections and initially I was a bit disappointed, but it turned out to be a great situation for both of us. One of the goals we had both set ourselves was to grow our social circles and make more friends together and being in different sections provided the perfect opportunity for that to happen. The first two quarters of school have been an amazing experience so far and we’ve gotten really close with the people we’ve met, going on trips to Sequoia and Maui to name a few.
They say a sig-o is your best support system, and that holds true especially during business school. I’m not going to lie, it’s tough – balancing class, recruiting, networking, socializing, stressing, sleeping, it all feels near-impossible sometimes. But being able to not only talk to someone about what’s going on, but actually sharing those experiences and going through everything together is probably what’s gotten me through the first few months of school. I can’t imagine what it would have been like if only one of us had attended school, as the experience is just so difficult to put into words at times.
From a recruiting perspective, since we both have different education and work backgrounds and are targeting different industries, there’s less internal competition and a lot more of leaning on each other’s strengths and past experiences to help bolster resumes, cover letters, and interview responses. I never thought I would be interviewed/grilled by my wife about how to improve Google Maps or sizing the diaper market in China, but safe to say, I’ve checked those boxes now!
The one piece of advice I’ll give is this: find a sig-o before coming to business school! Just kidding. I will say that it’s been an amazing, shared experience and if you and your sig-o are on the fence about potentially attending the same school or even applying together at the same time, don’t hesitate - do it! You’ll thank me later.
Student Blogger: Eric Lin ‘23
Undergrad: Duke University ‘16
Pre-MBA: Business Operations Analyst, Engineer at UGN Inc.
Leadership@Anderson: Director of Admissions, AMSA; Director of Conference, ECA; Anderson Ambassador Corps