Beat The GMAT

beatthegmat · Mon Nov 16, 2009 12:44 pm

Want to talk to a Stanford GSB student about the GSB student experience? Ask here!

We're lucky to have two GSB representatives fielding your questions:

Pepe Carillo, 1st Year
Tal Morgenstern, 1st Year

Please note that this isn't a discussion thread (or forum) for application advice. It's meant for talking about life inside the GSB program.

A big thanks to our Stanford GSB volunteers!

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beatthegmat · Mon Nov 16, 2009 2:22 pm

Seed question for Pepe and Tal:

What have you enjoyed most about your first year?

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GSBee · Mon Nov 16, 2009 8:41 pm

Excited to be the first GSB representative on the new forum Smile

I have to say that so far, the best part of the experience (for me at least) was my classmates.

They are, by far, the most talented and smart group of people I have ever met. They are also (luckily) super-friendly and funny and the small class size contributes to the fact that it sometimes feels just like high school. In a good way!

Sure, there were a lot of other things going on, from Condi Rice teaching in our Global Management class, through meeting the Director of the FBI and various other CEO's to weekly trips to HQs of companies around the Bay Area (Cisco, Google etc) but the best part for me is definitely the people who make this experience enjoyable.

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beatthegmat · Mon Nov 16, 2009 10:15 pm

Thanks Tal for sharing that perspective. I may be biased (since I went to Stanford for undergrad), but I think that the GSB has some of the coolest people of any MBA program as well. The people seem very smart, very cool, and slightly irreverant.

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josercv · Tue Nov 17, 2009 12:00 am

Hey everyone!

I totally agree with Tal, the people are what make this school so great. Everyone is extremely friendly and approachable. This in turn makes classes much more interesting because everyone feels comfortable engaging the conversation. Everyone in the class makes significant contributions, and whenever someone stumbles along the way, people are always willing to help out.

I also like the fact that the school takes very seriously the role of leadership in today's organizations. Leadership is about service and understanding, and I value greatly that the GSB takes it upon itself to convey that message to us constantly.

The Stanford GSB in my opinion is much more than just a business school, it is fertile ground for leaders that care for people and understand the effect businesses have on societies and communities.

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beatthegmat · Wed Nov 18, 2009 5:19 pm

Thanks Pepe for sharing that! Doesn't sound like Stanford is very cutthroat, which is a perception that a lot of folks hold about top business schools. Impressive that a bunch of Type-A personalities are so nice to each other. Smile

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Yes.WeCan · Sun Jan 24, 2010 8:10 am

I was curious as to how the recruiting procedures are organized at Stanford and how you have experienced them.

I've heard there's a lot of elbow work going on during recruiting events for the "traditional" MBA-exits: finance, consulting.

Stanford is definately one of the schools I'm targeting at, mainly due to its' small class size I have the feeling trips to company HQs etc are much more personal. That's what I heard at least.

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GSBee · Sun Jan 24, 2010 1:31 pm

So..

1. Yes, we do a lot of traveling to companies and it is SO much easier for us especially with Tech, BioTech, VC duo to the proximity to campus and the strong ties with student clubs. during the past 3 weeks I hosted friends from MIT, HBS and Wharton who came here for a week of "meet the company" events on their own dime and time.

2. Recruiting - HBS and the GSB made a joint decision this year to push back the on-campus recruiting dates this year so the first round of interviews is starting February 10th and it's mostly consulting and banking. Personally, I think this is a great thing for us, especially the students who, like me, have no idea what they really want to do this summer.

3. Elbowing - sounds too good to be true but I haven't seen too much of this going around. Some people were up tight about talking to certain people when companies came to campus but after a week or two everyone realized that if consulting firm X is interviewing a 100 people and the class size is 380 there's really nothing to worry about. Bottom line - if you want to interview with a specific company and you focus your efforts on it, chances are you'll get your interview.

Not sure if it's the class size or the admission process but people seem to be very relaxed and positive about the whole job seeking process.

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