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Cornell - Culture

by gmat7m » Sun Aug 28, 2016 5:30 am
Hi everyone

I have a 710 on the GMAT with 5+ years of risk consulting experience with the current firm being a big-4.

I want to move into a top tier strategy consulting firm after b-school. In my primary research Cornell seemed like the best fit for my profile (GMAT score being a big parameter, the other two are much higher). But then I stumbled across a thread on P&Q in which the comments section gave out a very conflicting image of the culture at Cornell. Specific concerns were around the Park scholarships (even if I am not targeting one, I would want the process to be fair), the way CMC is run, the brand being diluted because 1 year and Canada/China programs award the same degree etc.

Do you think I should ignore this and go ahead with the application or should I switch Cornell with another college (maybe Tuck, or Darden).

Would appreciate help on this.
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by Donna@Stratus » Tue Aug 30, 2016 9:44 am
gmat7m wrote:Hi everyone

I have a 710 on the GMAT with 5+ years of risk consulting experience with the current firm being a big-4.

I want to move into a top tier strategy consulting firm after b-school. In my primary research Cornell seemed like the best fit for my profile (GMAT score being a big parameter, the other two are much higher). But then I stumbled across a thread on P&Q in which the comments section gave out a very conflicting image of the culture at Cornell. Specific concerns were around the Park scholarships (even if I am not targeting one, I would want the process to be fair), the way CMC is run, the brand being diluted because 1 year and Canada/China programs award the same degree etc.

Do you think I should ignore this and go ahead with the application or should I switch Cornell with another college (maybe Tuck, or Darden).

Would appreciate help on this.
Actually- I would consider switching out Cornell and adding Tuck or Darden on strategy consulting. Here's a recent link ranking those schools higher on strategy consulting outcomes. https://managementconsulted.com/mbas-an ... onsulting/
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by mcbMcK » Fri Sep 02, 2016 6:11 am
Gmat7m,

I have a different perspective to add here, one that may not be straight-forward and may force you to think. The bare profile details provided by you don't do justice I believe? Just basis those, one might be tempted to say that your entire consideration set is aggressive - so make sure you can differentiate from the crowd.

The move from risk to management consulting is not a common one and not many accomplish that - again, do your research on that front.

And finally, why switch? Why not use an 'and'? Assuming you are going to apply to more than 1 school?

Hope this pushes some more thoughts.

Cheers,
MG (Manish Gupta)|The MBA Crystal Ball Team

Website: https://www.mbacrystalball.com
Email: mcb at mbacrystalball dot com
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by gmat7m » Fri Sep 02, 2016 12:38 pm
Thanks you both for the advice - appreciate you taking time out.

@Donna:
I had the opportunity to attend Darden's reception and I am sold on that. So definitely applying there.

@mcbMcK
It's definitely an 'and' now. The field is risk consulting which is very different from pure risk management. Operational reviews and such. And because I have had the chance to work on some very good operational re-engineering engagements for service oriented organisation (which are not risk consulting's bread and butter), I want to move to a firm that does that full time. I hope this makes sense.
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by mcbMcK » Fri Sep 02, 2016 7:11 pm
gmat7m wrote:Thanks you both for the advice - appreciate you taking time out.

@mcbMcK
It's definitely an 'and' now. The field is risk consulting which is very different from pure risk management. Operational reviews and such. And because I have had the chance to work on some very good operational re-engineering engagements for service oriented organisation (which are not risk consulting's bread and butter), I want to move to a firm that does that full time. I hope this makes sense.



Got it. The re-engineering project definitely sounds right. Risk consulting can mean different things so important to clearly show the on-ground nature of your work. Even so, would still recommend expanding the target list some.

All the best.

Cheers,
MG (Manish Gupta)|The MBA Crystal Ball Team

Website: https://www.mbacrystalball.com
Email: mcb at mbacrystalball dot com
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