Jonathan Pfeffer
Just Got into Stanford GSB? What You Need to Know About Financial Aid
If you are among the lucky applicants who got word last week that you’d been accepted to the MBA program at Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB), a hearty congratulations! Surely you know that you’ve just gotten into THE most selective business school in the world. We hope you took a little time to bask in that. Even so, if you’re like most admitted MBA students, your thoughts have probably now turned to how you’re going to pay for it. We’ve devoted this week here on Clear Admit to financial aid—both in publishing our four-part Financing Your MBA Guide—but also in looking... Read more »
Thanking Your MBA Recommenders—Our Guide to Gift Giving
The process of applying to business school is a complicated beast with numerous steps to consider along the path from application to acceptance. As Round 2 decisions roll in, many applicants may find themselves approaching one of the final steps in the process: Finding an appropriate gift for thanking your MBA recommenders. While this step might seem insignificant on the surface—or at the very least merely symbolic—make no mistake: Experts hold this one in especially high esteem. Clear Admit’s DecisionWeek is brought to you by HBX. HBX brings the dynamism of the Harvard Business School classroom to online learning—preparing participants... Read more »
Fridays from the Frontline: HBS Student Shares Why Applying in Round 3 Made Sense
Fridays from the Frontline Better late than never? For b-school hopefuls who for one reason or another let the Round 1 and Round 2 deadlines pass them by, conventional wisdom has often been to wait until next year. But most schools do feature a Round 3, and for the right applicants, applying in this late round can work out just as well. To be sure, applying to MBA programs during Round 3 has its challenges—classes have largely been filled and scholarship aid is at its most scarce. That said, Round 3 can actually have more of a strategic function than... Read more »
Starting a Business Straight Out of Business School? How HBS Supports Student Entrepreneurship
This coming weekend, Harvard Business School (HBS) will host an annual Entrepreneurship Conference sponsored by its own homegrown Entrepreneurship Club. The conference brings together hundreds of participants including “founders, joiners, and venture capitalists,” all of whom hope to connect through a smorgasbord of lectures, panels, chats, and networking sessions. Tuck Professor and Strava Co-Founder will give one of the Entrepreneurship Conference’s keynote addresses This year’s conference, scheduled for Saturday, March 31st, is expected to draw more than 500 participants, including many top professors and professionals holding court on a variety of topics. Three keynote lectures will be given by CEOs... Read more »
April Fills Up with MBA Admitted Students’ Weekends
Spring has officially sprung, which means that business schools around the country have geared up to host their admitted student welcome events. In doing so, top schools aim to attract the best and brightest by giving them an early look at what their programs and institutions have to offer. Virtually every school has some sort of welcome event planned—either a single day or an entire weekend in many cases. This profile is a glimpse at just a few of many exciting events taking place around the country next month. Clear Admit’s DecisionWeek is brought to you by HBX. HBX brings... Read more »
An MIT Sloan Fellow on Purpose, Possibilities, Passion, and Letting Go
Fridays from the Frontline The MIT Sloan Fellows cohort is a “microcosm of the global leadership community” developed by GM CEO Alfred P. Sloan himself between 1937 and 1956 to incubate the ideal manager among “experienced leaders and mid-career professionals.” The 12-month program gives Sloan Fellows an “improve-the-world” toolkit packed with what it describes as “critical assets for your future: a personal network that spans industries and oceans, enhanced skills and capabilities, and the confidence to lead and make a difference on a global scale.” Prominent alumni include former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, three U.S.... Read more »
Joe Biden Discusses How to Revive Slumping Industrial Cities at Kellogg
On Friday, March 9th, an eager audience gathered at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management to hear what wisdom Joe Biden might have to impart from his distinguished political career to the world of business. Speaking the day after observations of International Women’s Day around the world, the former vice president opened his talk with with a message about inclusion. He cautioned the crowd that “in order for a country to succeed… it has to husband all its assets. It cannot leave half its initiative, half its brain power, half of its courage, half of its capability, half of its strive... Read more »
Four Things to Consider When Visiting Full-Time MBA Programs
Fridays from the Frontline The process of picking a business school is both an art and a science. Broadly speaking, prospective students must decide which industry they ultimately want to infiltrate and then figure out which MBA program will give them the necessary tools to get where they need to go. This all sounds simple and straightforward enough, but there are a host of other variables prospective b-schoolers must weigh in order to make an informed choice—geographic location, small, tight-knit community vs. huge class with expansive network, the prevailing on-campus cultural attitude, and the reputation of the school within one’s... Read more »
Is Tuck the Best Business School for Studying Emerging Markets?
As stateside opportunities wax and wane, MBA students at U.S. business schools have become increasingly interested in emerging markets in developing countries around the globe. Though they can present greater risks, there are career opportunities unique to these often overlooked economies that appeal to many sides of the MBA in training—particularly the part that longs to get in on the ground floor of the next big thing. Recently, students at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business have become increasingly interested in emerging markets. In response, the school earlier this month hosted its first-ever conference devoted exclusively to the theme. Entitled “Leapfrogging... Read more »
Our Five Favorite MBA Podcasts Right Now
Many business schools and MBA students have recently begun to produce podcasts, discussing the diverse range of student and graduate experiences as well as current trends and relevant topics in business. These podcasts are unique in that they provide a candid, first-person look at business school from those currently enrolled, allowing for an open platform to discuss business topics outside of the confines of the university. While this is a fairly new trend, there are several different podcasts out there for those who might be interested to learn more. We’ve assembled our five favorite MBA podcasts right now, and we’ll... Read more »
How to Secure the MBA Summer Internship You Want
Sponsored Content According to research published the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) last year, 86 percent of companies planned to hire an MBA graduate. It comes as no surprise that the reason most MBA candidates choose a business school is to strengthen their position in the job market. One of the most popular and effective employment strategies is to pursue an internship like one of the many offered at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business. Career Preparedness At Georgetown McDonough, the MBA Career Center believes that career planning starts the moment an MBA applicant is accepted into the program—and for... Read more »
The Skinny on Corporate MBA Fellowship Programs—Could One Be Right for You?
Prospective MBA students looking to join a program at a leading business school have a wealth of opportunities available to them in the form of corporate MBA fellowship programs. These highly competitive fellowships, often geared toward under-represented minorities, are offered by many major corporate recruiters hoping to secure top MBA talent early in their time at business school. Corporate MBA fellowship programs can present a great option for those looking to offset the cost of business school, since many include stipends that cover some or all of awardees’ MBA tuition costs. Corporate MBA fellowship programs also can be an excellent way... Read more »
The Vision Behind the Cornell MBA FinTech Intensive
Fridays from the Frontline Fintech is one of those buzzy, disruptive industries the business world loves to hate and hates to love. But very much unlike their tech brethren—edtech, cleantech, insurtech— the financial services sector, which should by all accounts be shaking in its skivvies about going the way of the Guam flying fox, has strangely begun to embrace fintech innovations like open banking and cryptocurrency. MBA students are taking notice and beginning to flock toward fintech in lieu of more traditional financial services gigs. Enter Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management’s FinTech Intensive, “a cutting-edge curriculum in NYC that... Read more »
7 Top Takeaways from Leading Business School 2017 Employment Reports
There’s been a steady stream of salary and employment data from leading business schools over the past several months as one after another has released 2017 employment reports. We’ve shared a lot of it along the way, including special reports on Kellogg, McDonough, NYU Stern, Tuck, and Stanford. With results from nearly every top school now in, prospective MBA students can take heart that the news is pretty universally encouraging. Overall, data gathered about the Class of 2017 reveal growing salaries across all industries and very high employment rates among graduates from all top institutions. Taking a look at the reports as a group,... Read more »
Snagging a Job at Amazon—A Ross Business School Student Shares How He Did It
Fridays from the Frontline Amazon is a leading recruiter of MBA students—indeed, the top hirer on many business school campuses. Among those is Michigan’s Ross School of Business, which has supplied a steady stream of reliable talent to the e-commerce giant. As Amazon’s plans for HQ2 continue to unfold—much to everyone’s anticipation and consternation—many applicants applying to business school want to know: what’s the behind-the-scenes process of landing a job at Amazon really like? When the soaring mortar boards return to earth, how can they, too, be among the MBA grads headed off toward a career at Amazon. Dhanishth Khosla... Read more »
