Last weekend was A-days weekend, where UCLA Anderson admits are invited to campus to meet the dean, professors, fellow students, and get a small taste of life at UCLA Anderson. There is a weekend for the Round 1 admits, and a weekend for the Round 2 admits sometime in May.
I had the chance to participate in the Meet The Class of 2011 panel organized by my fellow blogeteer John Park. Of all of the questions we received, there was one that really stood out in my mind about being married during business school. I think this is a critically important component of business school and I wanted to highlight it further here.
And to give it justice, I have to give both the bright side and the dark side. Important Note -- this applies not just to UCLA Anderson, but to any top-ranked business school around the world.
All facets of the business school life, including the socializing, is focused entirely on you, the student. That's very different from the situation when both partners are working, where the home life is focused on both people jointly. So you have to decide before starting the MBA program how active your partner is going to be.
One of my closest friends from London put it this way: you and your partner have to decide whether the partner is involved in everything at school (bar classes and recruiting, of course), or whether the partner is completely uninvolved in school. Both are equally viable, so I'm not advocating one over the other; that's something you have to decide personally.
The ALL option goes like this -- your partner goes to every party, social, activity, or meeting that you do, and you turn down the events that your partner can't or won't attend. Then, your partner is completely integrated into the class and your classmates treat your partner just like any other student.
The NONE option is the opposite -- you specifically schedule time (a weekend, say) that you will specifically be off-campus; on those days, you step away from the MBA program and focus on your non-MBA life. You can socialize, but do it with non-MBA friends; the focus should be on spending time with the partner as you would when you were working. Then you will be refreshed when you step back onto campus rejuvenated with a wonderful home life.
Don't underestimate how much hard work both options are. The ALL option is a very difficult road for your partner; she has to socialize and network with loads of new people with whom she has nothing in common, but who all have a shared MBA experience to bond with. The NONE option requires that your partner place a lot of trust in you to still be a loving partner in the face of a stunning number of career and social opportunities.
But you have to choose, because there is no middle ground. In the abyss between the ALL or NONE options is a no-man's land, where you have made no time for your partner, but your partner has not really integrated herself into the culture of your school. As you become busier in the MBA program, she'll feel lost, confused, and lonely, especially if you and your partner have moved to school from out-of-town. There is no worse feeling than seeing your partner struggling and unhappy while you feel like you have the Midas touch.
Is all that hard work worth it? Of course it is. If you decide on the ALL option, your partner will have loads of new friends in a hurry. I can't say enough nice things about how welcoming my classmates have been for Mrs. V. When it all goes well, there's no greater feeling than seeing your partner be as friendly as you are with your new friends from school -- or, in my case, seeing my friends run up to her just as we walked into the karaoke bar and pull her up on stage to sing "I Gotta Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas.
The NONE option can be equally sweet: I see my friends in that position (especially those whose partners don't live in town), and you can tell the extra energy they get in the days before and the days after they see their partners. And as a student, you know your classmates that are in that position, so when you get the chance to meet their partners, you also go out of your way to welcome the partners for the short time they are on campus. Plus, the partner still have their own lives, friends, careers, and agendas, so they don't feel like time is just moving on.
If you, as a reader and potential MBA student, get nothing else out of reading my blog, please keep this in mind, have that conversation with your partner before you go, and whichever option you choose, make sure you put the time and effort in to make the MBA program work not just for you, but also for your partner.
-- Sreesha
