How do I get an MBA in the summer before I start?
That is the question most future enrolled students ask me. I remember asking the same question in 2020. At the time, I was dissatisfied with the general advice of taking a vacation, relaxing and traveling (I was off the table anyway because of COVID). Indeed, the MBA gets busy very quickly between classes, group work assignments, club events, recruitment, and whirlwind social calendars. Therefore, a little rest for mental preparation is a reasonable suggestion.
However, most MBA candidates are ambitious and are looking for more than just “taking a vacation.” This is the first advice I give now. Think critically about what you experience, what you do, what you change, and what you want to be during your two years as a student. These guiding concepts (as my professor Jonathan Feinstein says) are tiebreakers that allow you to choose when to say “yes”.
Still, your approach probably doesn’t follow a rigorous framework. For example, this fall, I took a course called “Medical Innovation, Investment, and the New Frontier” taught by Steven Knight. A graduate of SOM and Yale School of Medicine, Dr. Knight is a venture capitalist investing in healthcare. At first, I wasn’t sure if I could catch up. I’m deeply interested in venture capital, but I haven’t taken science classes for 10 years. With the help of Dr. Knight, I faced the challenge. He bought great speakers every week, including the speakers that led us to a solid conversation about pricing ethics for the treatment of rare diseases. In our final project, we worked as a group to estimate the cost of developing new medicines and proposed an ethically defensive and economically wise pricing strategy.
You can be ready to have such an unexpected experience. In effect, you can make amazing plans. When you orbit your MBA, follow three categories: individual, professional, and academic.
Claire Masters (’22), Yale School of Management
Personal
At SOM, the 1st grade student union elections begin in the first week of September. Other clubs will open a yearly leader application later in the month. Every week there seems to be new applications for programs, experiences and club events. Having a clear roadmap of the most exciting extracurricular activities will help you navigate the proliferation of applications and prioritize the opportunities you choose.
For a year, I have identified racial equality as one of the closest causes to my mind. I decided to look for more opportunities on campus to provide education, resources, conversations and actions to promote racial equality. In the spring of my first year, a student wrote to Slack that Emory’s student team is partnering with another business school to host the John R. Lewis Racial Equity Case Competition. I was looking for a concrete way to elevate the conversation about racial justice to the campus, so I was able to jump right away when I read the question. Within a week, I met Emory’s team, talked to government contacts about the paperwork needed to host the competition, secured my leadership team, and organized the competition in the case. I still consider this to be the highlight of my time as an MBA.
Scheduling is especially important if you want to be socially voluntary. If you are a parent, have a time-consuming hobby, or have a long-distance relationship, you need to be especially careful about how you manage those time-consuming responsibilities. For example, I’m an avid Outlook user. My daily schedule includes time blocked for having lunch the next day, going out for a marathon training run, or going out for grocery shopping.
Yale SOM Student
professional
The MBA is about a lot, but the main thing is to get the job you want. Still, you don’t have to find that dream job in the first year. Whether you’re set in one career path or embrace new ideas, it’s my experience to help sketch the calendar for the first year to get you on track.
Investment banking recruitment begins in September and will be consulted shortly thereafter. Both cover the entire fall semester. For those who haven’t adopted either, the process can be slow and can extend to the spring semester. For new students who want to step into many different industries, it’s important to know when each industry will hire. Talk to current students or recent graduates in your industry. Make sure you know when and how to network your industry to make your application stand out, not just when job listings are posted and offers are offered.
I tended to hit the ground after procrastination, which stressed recruitment. My time at Yale SOM flew so fast that I couldn’t believe the next quarter was about to begin. Fortunately, thanks to my reliance on Outlook, I set up regular calendar reminders and checked in myself every week to make sure I was always hiring in my head.
During the summer of a year ago, you may also receive an email from your school’s career office. At SOM, the Career Development Office (CDO) reviews summer and early autumn resumes and conducts brainstorming sessions. Remember to set aside time on a regular basis to work on your recruitment strategy.
For many non-traditional post-MBA jobs, hiring can be a long and frustrating process. During my last two months as an MBA, I spent a lot of time on the Slack channel for fellow students who are still recruiting, and called the network about new jobs at a CDO event on the composition of the remaining time. It all helped me feel lonely.
It’s easy to be fooled by LinkedIn. There it looks like everyone has made a clear journey from A to B. But real life is much more awkward — certainly for me — and most people find that they want to do something else during the MBA than the intent of their application. .. During my two years at Yale SOM, I’ve often considered moving in a different direction. In fact, I was looking for a full-time opportunity until I graduated. Even the tendency towards procrastination worked, as the employment market is enthusiastic and still employed by many companies. After all, I’m doing exactly what I was thinking of doing. It’s investment consulting for nonprofits. And I’m excited about it.
Finally, I learned that “networking” should be thought of as getting to know people. You need to prepare for the meeting in advance, but think of it as a natural conversation and don’t be afraid to show who you are. I want to tell people that hiring is like a date, with all the tension and excitement it means. People don’t want to feel they are connected to the network. They remember you for you, not what you have in your resume.
Yale SOM exterior. Photo courtesy of Harold Shapiro
academic
I’ve heard several SOM professors say that the MBA’s favorite answer to a question is “depending on the situation.” That’s a good joke, but when the next student asks me how to prepare academically for the first semester, it’s still my response. At SOM, the core curriculum moves very quickly. Most courses are only 6 weeks. Due to schedule quirks, students will have their first final in mid-September. The pace leaves little room for delay. Tutors are free and readily available on SOM. Be proactive in reaching out before anxiety becomes a problem. By the time you realize you need help, you may not have enough time to catch up.
As well as social and professional schedules, it is also helpful to build your own “back office” to manage your daily academic tasks. Setting up an organizational system for reading, assignments, syllabuses, and projects will help you get going when things get busy.
We have built a simple and effective file system for each class. This saves time by keeping you organized when you have a pile of reading material and assignments. We also leveraged the spreadsheets created by our classmates to see all the challenges and deadlines for our core MBA class and to make sure they’re always on track.
Some preparations are more specific. Many freshmen have a rich background to successfully process the MBA core curriculum. Many others come from non-traditional backgrounds and have limited financial and accounting exposure. No one knows your background better than you. If your Quants Chop was the biggest worry when applying for school, check out many free online resources for accounting, statistics, or economics.
Your program will probably help fill the gap. SOM and many other schools offer pre-semester jobs for people with non-traditional backgrounds. It provides valuable academic preparation and important reminders. About 20% of the enrolled students participate in the “math camp” before SOM. The Wall Street Journal Explain it and help students “understand the basics of topics such as calculus and statistics”. Needless to say, we offer the opportunity to make friends with other students before the start of the semester.
Despite my financial background, I struggled with some of the core curriculum because I had little access to accounting and financial statements. Think about where your weaknesses are, and whether more than 5 or 10 years from an undergraduate may remain rusty in the course work you have already studied.
The MBA is a timely and costly pursuit and you are ultimately responsible for creating the experience you will gain. With a little introspection, you can set yourself to make the most of your time (and your money). It’s that structure that allows you to improvise. It concludes an unprecedented final with issues set in corporate finance, exams in behavioral finance, modeling assignments for financial statement analysis, and multimedia art projects for creativity and innovation. It was worth exploring all the roads.
Finally, I was always advised not to compare myself to someone else’s timeline, whether in club activities, personal purposes, or recruitment. That’s some advice I sometimes found difficult to take, but I still think it’s true. Once you land that acceptance, you can be confident that you entered for a reason, and you belong here. Good luck!
Claire Masters is a sophomore at Yale School of Management in Nyack, NY. Prior to SOM, he worked for Moody’s and the Council on Foreign Relations and was an intern at Hillhouse Capital. At SOM, she is involved in racial equity initiatives, investment management, and admissions.
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