The MBA Student Voice

Guest Post: Lessons Learned to Make the Most of your MBA Experience

With a little over one week left in my 5th quarter out of 6 at Anderson, I've begun getting a little nostalgic. When I look back at my first year and where I was prior to starting school, I'm amazed at the number of experiences I've been through and how much I've changed personally and professionally. 

I started thinking of lessons learned to share with prospective MBA students, but was saved by a classmate of mine, Nathan Adelman. 

He recently wrote the below 5 lessons learned for The Anderson Exchange, our student newspaper. 

Keep in mind that these lessons are Nate's view on how to maximize your MBA experience at Anderson, and thus might not all be applicable to those of you who are reading this for fun and might not attend our program. 

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As I approach the home stretch of my Anderson MBA, I have had some time to reflect on some of the most meaningful lessons that I have learned as both a student and as a Teaching Assistant.  I believe the following ideas apply to most Anderson students, regardless of your career track.  Here is my list of the top five things to help you make the most of your time at Anderson.

 

Looking to Career Switch? An Interesting Graphic from Parker CMC

The Parker Career Management Center posted this interesting graphic today that I thought would be worth sharing with the MBA Student Voice readers. 

As you can see, there's a lot of career transition between industries - which is one reason why many people choose to get an MBA. What isn't highlighted in the graphic is that, for the people who stay within the same industry, a lot of them are moving to a different sector or part of the value chain. For example, some people in the technology industry might transition from a hardware company doing corporate finance to a software company doing marketing. 

This graphic also highlights the career diversity at Anderson, both pre and post graduation. That diversity is one unique strength of the program, and enables students to tap into incredible networks as they figure out their career. 

Anyways - that's all I've got! Just thought the graphic would be an interesting data point for people considering getting their MBA in general and at Anderson. 

Until next time, 

~Kyle Forrest, follow me on Twitter and follow UCLAMBA

 

Guest Post - High Tech Business Association

An increasing number of UCLA Anderson students are pursuing careers in tech after business school, so it's not surprising that the High Tech Business Association (HTBA) is one of the most popular professional clubs on campus.  The HTBA hosts numerous networking and professional development activities for members, one of which is highlighted below by 1st year student Leslie Kwoh. Read on to learn more!

As we learned during orientation, technology is an increasingly popular career path among UCLA Anderson students, with one-quarter of last year's class entering the field upon graduating. 

The trend appears to be continuing this year; nearly 120 students, including myself, attended the High Tech Business Association's Fall Career Night in November. Representatives from 11 tech firms, including Amazon, Microsoft, LinkedIn, LiveNation and AT&T, joined us for the networking event.

Career Night was so popular this year that HTBA said it had to draw up wait lists for both students and companies alike. "Companies were knocking down HTBA's doors to meet Anderson's best and brightest tech talent," said Ashley Mallinson, president of the club.

The event follows a roundtable rotation format, and each of us were assigned to three company tables for the evening (I sat with Amazon, LiveNation and LinkedIn). Over the course of three hours, my classmates and I gained a better understanding of each company's mission, culture, workflow and strategic direction.

One of my favorite parts of the evening was a keynote speech by Symantec senior product manager Rafael Alvarez, who gave a humorous but candid glimpse into the life of a tech employee. The job isn't always easy, he said. Ideas sometimes don't move as quickly as one would like, and the process can be bogged down by the need to get buy-in from many different divisions. A simple task like redesigning a webpage, for example, can require many iterations -- so knowing how to build consensus across functions is extremely valuable. 

But the final product, he assured us, is almost always worth it.

Learn more about the HTBA on their website.

Guest Post - Marketing Association

Today's guest post comes from Craig Rosenkranz, First Year Director of Admissions for the Marketing Association (MA). The MA, with over 150 members, provides networking and professional development opportunities for students interested in marketing careers.  Read on for highlights from one of these recent events with General Mills!

 

Aside from all of my classmates and me studying like crazy for our first 2 midterms, last week was a pretty eventful and exciting week here for members of the Marketing Association (MA) at UCLA Anderson.

To start things off, representatives from General Mills came to campus and held informal “coffee chats” with small groups of first year students. We had the chance to sit down with two UCLA Anderson alums and talk candidly about their career experiences and what life is really like working as a Brand Manager at General Mills.

That afternoon, the MA kicked-off a series of lunch time marketing workshops led by General Mills reps Doug and Brad. The first one entitled “Putting Marketing into Real-World Practice” was led by marketing guru and UCLA Anderson alum, Doug Martin. We took a look at some current marketing campaigns and broke down what we think they’re doing well and what we think they could be doing better. This Smart ad really stood out (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0dkjtQdJzI) and was a crowd favorite.

Brad led the next workshop, entitled “Marketing in a Connected World” which focused on how brands can connect and provide value to their consumers beyond simple needs like good taste. Brad ran through a real life General Mills example of the rebranding of the classic kids cereal, Kix. It was great to get an insight into how Brand Managers approached a problem and turned around a brand.  

Both workshops were super engaging and highly interactive. I can’t wait to see what the rest of first quarter brings!

To learn more about the MA, visit their website.

Life after Business School - AKA "Back to Reality"

This will most likely be my final post on the UCLA Anderson blog.  What prompted (possessed?) me to write this blog post is that I happened to run across today for the second time the late David Foster Wallace's speech, "This is Water."  It was a commencement speech given to a graduating class of undergrads back in 2005.

 

I won't bore you with the details, but it really is a worthwhile video to watch when you have ten minutes to spare.  At first glance, the immediate thought that came to mind was, "Wow, that's a bit cheesy,"  which makes sense given that it's a commencement speech addressed to a room full of starry-eyed (or open-mouthed) 22-year olds.  But then, as the video kept playing, and as the late author's voice kept reverberating throughout in that quasi-didactic yet oddly-magnetic way, I began to get pulled into the deeper message lying behind the fancy graphics and pretty typefaces.  

It really is so easy to get lost in the shuffle of each of our so-called "busy lives."  It really is so easy to get pulled in so many directions that we just want to shut down and get ourselves off the grid.  It really is so easy to forget that basic human compassion and kindness go such a long way in making someone's day go from terrible to bad to good to great to awesome.  And this basic notion of being "aware" and "conscious" of others around us is so important.  We are each the center of our own universe--that goes without saying--but we must understand that we, as students and graduates who have had the privilage of attending great undergrad colleges as well as a great business school, really hit the jackpot and have it so much better than many will ever experience in their lifetimes.

I wasn't intending for this post to become as philosophic as it now has, but I'm in a weirdly nostalgic and pensive mood so you guys will have to bear with me.  Since graduating back in June of this year, I've become gainfully employed again (thank goodness!) and started working in a career path that I pursued in business school.  I've also recently moved to San Francisco, which I love, and have met many new, amazing people who continue to help me grow in all aspects of my life.  Is my life easy-ish, as it had been in bschool?  Heck no!  A meaningful career path will never be easy.  It's not merely a job; it's a career.  It'll take a whole bunch of adjusting before I feel comfortable enough to say that I'm comfortable in my job, and then it'll be up to me to keep myself engaged--to keep trekking and to keep learning.

So this is my advice to those still in school or thinking about going to school (wow, sorry it took so long to get to the punch line.  This is why I could never be a writer by vocation)--life after bschool will be a challenge.  A graduate degree will not be a silver bullet to end all tedium and boredom in life.  Ennui is going to set in and people will career-hop and city-hop looking for the next best thing.  But during this shuffle that we call life after business school, I hope that most of us will be able to take the time to appreciate all that we have, to appreciate those around us, and to keep forging ahead and keep growing--both in our selves as well as in our careers.

--Connie Kim, c/o 2013

[email protected]

Looking Ahead to Year Two

It's finally arrived... the end of the internship chapter of my MBA and the beginning of year two. Nothing sums it up better than a song I'll be sure to karaoke this year, The Final Countdown.  

While many of you have been hearing a great deal about why Anderson and how to prepare for the MBA experience from the fantastic bloggers in the class of 2015 (Aimee, Alena, Buzz , Daniel, Devon, Lorraine), this post will provide some perspective on what I'm looking forward to as a 2nd year student. 

Internship wrap-up and career decisions

As of today, August 30th, I'm officially done with my summer internship with HP. It's been a wonderful learning experience. I worked with an incredible team, discovered what it's like to actually work for Corporate HR, and even gained exposure to additional functions, such as Supply Chain. 

While my time at HP helped me realize that I could have a future career within Corporate HR, especially at a company like HP, or others within the technology industry, I now have a lot of thinking to do as to whether Corporate HR, or another function, is the right next step for me. I'll give you an update on my career decision in the coming month. 

The Results Are In!

Class may not start until September 23, but don't tell that to the team at Anderson's Parker Career Management Center. With their strategic selection of pre-orientation deliverables (and due dates!), they've had the incoming Class of 2015 hard at work well before any of us have set foot on campus.

Among the deliverables is the CareerLeader Self-Assessment Tool. CareerLeader is a research and data-supported "approach to business career self-assessment built on the premise that one's interests, motivators and skills will drive their future career success and satisfaction."

My reasons to choose UCLA Anderson

    A question "what school to attend" comes to a great number of accepted applicants and the answer is always specific to your particular goals. See below my reasons for attending Anderson this fall and some thoughts and things to consider when you have to make a decision.

    1. Rankings. A lot of people consider school's placement in different rankings and I was also the one who googled Full time MBA rankings before I made my decision, so I could understand the inclination to just go with TOP-5 or TOP-10 school and be just fine. But then I made a consideration of other factors (that I will mention below) and decided just for myself that rankings is just one factor and not the decisive one. I even compared it with GMAT score during application process - it is good if it is withtin school's 80% range and is balanced, but not "the make or break". So, with ratings I decided that a school within TOP -20 in the US will be this "80% range" and I never turned to rankings again.

    2. Employment report or companies that recruit on campus.  I have talked to dozens of alums from different schools and the majority of them said to look closely to the employment reports first. The closer the school year is, the better I realize how right they were. For instance, if you dream to work for company X, you should look at the # of graduates and interns this company hired from the latest intake in the school. I made a close look at Anderson employment report, considered trends within several years and came to 2 conclusions:

• Tech companies have very good presence at Anderson and they hire about 1/5th of the class and as I look closely on technology sector, this school is very much for me!
• Anderson class is very diverse in terms of career paths people choose. There is no dominant industry and I like this fact from the learning environment point of view.

5 Application Fallacies

The original title of my blog post was going to be "5 Application Fallacies That I Straight Up Debunk Cuz That's How We Roll at Anderson", but the more conservative "me" took hold and I went with the plain vanilla title.  There is a latin phrase "res ipsa loquitur" which means "the thing speaks for itself."  This blog post hopefully does just that and helps all of you out there to approach your applications with correct expectations.

1.  If I don't get a 700 on the GMAT I have no chance and should lock myself in a dark, damp closet as punishment.

Have you ever seen those "Keep Calm and..." signs?  They should make one that says "Keep Calm and Be Happy with Your 690."  Let me qualify this.  If you have taken the GMAT multiple times and you max out in the 670-690 range, calm down and realize that the GMAT is but one of many measurements the admissions committee takes into consideration when evaluating your candidacy.  Here is some basic information about how the adcom looks at the GMAT.  The more balanced the score, the better.  If you have to be better off in one section, be better in quant.  Why?  They want to make sure you don't have a nervous breakdown when you dive into the very quantitative courseload.  If you only take the GMAT once and your high score is 670, take it again.  The adcom will appreciate that you attempted improving your score, even if it goes up a mere 10 points.  If your GMAT is a 590, you're in trouble.  However, each top business school admits someone with a very poor GMAT score, but that's probably because they had an AMAZING story to tell in their essays, work experience, or recommendation letters (i.e. you were a member of Seal Team Six, you made a career out of saving stray animals and turning them into trained acrobats, etc.).  Here's the bottom line--remember that the GMAT is but a piece in the puzzle.  Don't let it discourage you.

10 Unobvious Things Incoming Students Can Do Before School Starts

Hey people!  Whether you are trekking through a jungle in Asia, packing your moving truck, or sitting at work (still???  I applaud you!), I hope you find yourself getting more excited for the MBA journey to begin!  We all have long lists of "things-to-do" and I don't want anyone of us to miss anything important.  I've compiled a list of 10 unobvious things we can do before school starts to make the transition smoother.  Enjoy!!!

1) REST!!!  It sounds weird, right?  We don't need no sleep!  We're still young!  Although it's true, you definitely may want to consider building up those energy reserves for the onslaught of orientation, first quarter classes, and endless meet-and-greets.  Come to school fresh and only burn the candle at both ends a few nights a week.

You don't want to end up like this...