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MBA with no work experience

by gmat387 » Tue Jul 09, 2013 2:55 pm
I will be entering my senior year (4th year) in college in September. I am a humanities major, and have no formal work experience (but have had internships). I took the GMAT the previous week and received 740 on it. My GPA is 3.91 from a top-ranked North American university.

I know almost all MBA programs require work experience, but I would like to apply for MBA right now. So far, I have found the following programs:

Harvard 2+2
Yale Silver Scholars
Various other MSc Management programs


What I would like to know is which business schools are most friendly to applicants without work experience? For example, I know Cornell is more receptive to applicants such as myself. Are there any others?
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by CriticalSquareMBA » Tue Jul 09, 2013 6:31 pm
Hi there,

I feel it's my responsibility to ask you why you're looking to get your MBA in such a rush? With your GMAT and GPA, you clearly have some of the key components of your profile set. You're clearly adamant about the time frame so if you could shed some light on why that is, that would be really helpful.

An MBA is most useful when you have some real world experience. It's better for the school, it's better for your classmates, and it's better for you. The MBA is an opportunity to take your past experiences, assess yourself and your gaps, and work to improve and close them. It's an opportunity accelerate or change your career at a pivotal moment. Essentially, the reason most schools want work experience is the same reason you should want work experience.

So the question to you is - what would an MBA right out of undergrad provide you that A) you can't get on your own now and B) that would justify the loss of an MBA experience a few years down the road?

[On a side note, I don't disagree with the HBS 2+2 because that still gives you work experience - but that option doesn't align with your statement about wanting an MBA now]

Bhavik
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by gmat387 » Tue Jul 09, 2013 6:36 pm
CriticalSquareMBA wrote:Hi there,

I feel it's my responsibility to ask you why you're looking to get your MBA in such a rush? With your GMAT and GPA, you clearly have some of the key components of your profile set. You're clearly adamant about the time frame so if you could shed some light on why that is, that would be really helpful.

An MBA is most useful when you have some real world experience. It's better for the school, it's better for your classmates, and it's better for you. The MBA is an opportunity to take your past experiences, assess yourself and your gaps, and work to improve and close them. It's an opportunity accelerate or change your career at a pivotal moment. Essentially, the reason most schools want work experience is the same reason you should want work experience.

So the question to you is - what would an MBA right out of undergrad provide you that A) you can't get on your own now and B) that would justify the loss of an MBA experience a few years down the road?

[On a side note, I don't disagree with the HBS 2+2 because that still gives you work experience - but that option doesn't align with your statement about wanting an MBA now]

Bhavik
I want a MBA right now (instead of , say, 3-4 years down the line) because I face rather grim career prospects. I mentioned I'm a humanities major. Although I can get a job, those positions are relatively low ones (both in terms of pay and responsibility). Basically, they are entry level positions and I wouldn't even be able to gain that much experience from them anyways.

Therefore, I want to get a MBA so that my time could be more productively spent.
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by CriticalSquareMBA » Tue Jul 09, 2013 7:12 pm
I definitely understand where you're coming from and I can see why you're looking to an MBA to position yourself differently in the marketplace.

A question (and I'm sorry I keep asking you questions instead of providing you answers) would be what are you looking to do professionally. I don't necessarily mean that post-MBA specifically, but at a more general level. Is your goal consulting? Finance?

There are a handful of programs in the top 20 that are less demanding in terms of work experience (I'm excluding here deferment programs) but the majority have a few key things they're known for. So what you want to do is going to play a big role in what program might be useful to you.

Essentially, if you're using an MBA to reposition yourself immediately after your undergraduate degree, you have to make sure it points you in the right direction. If it doesn't, your chances down the road of any major course correction may be limited.

While I'm asking this litany of questions, two more :). What types of internships have you had and what are some of the types of leading contenders for job offers on the table currently? I'm not looking for specifics by any means in a public setting merely guiding comments around what "entry level" and "low experience" really mean.

I'm happy to continue this conversation via the forum if that's what's most convenient for you but this discussion may be easier through a consultation. I'll leave that decision up to you!

Cheers,

Bhavik
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by Jon@Admissionado » Tue Jul 09, 2013 11:13 pm
Bhavik left you some great advice...
Let me add a few thoughts though too, my friend. First, keep in mind that what you will get out of an MBA at this point in your life will be far less useful than what you get after you have worked for a few years. Even as a humanities major, you have great grades and a fantastic GMAT, and you can try and leverage that to get yourself a good business job. Don't fear the real world or the poor-looking job prospects at this point! You have PLENTY of time to do at least two good internships (I'm hoping you have one this summer!).

If you get into HBS 2+2 or Yale, then great, you have your program specifically designed for people your age.. and well, HBS is still HBS!!!

If not though, you might think about other options - besides a job, a more "professional" Masters could also be an option (and what with your great grades and all, you might even get some money from schools)... so if you REALLY want to go into business look into Finance, Economics, Analytics, etc... (basically wherever your passions and interests are). The advantage of doing a different Masters is that many of these Masters are academic and knowledge-based, whereas the MBA is heavily experience-based....

Hope this helps you out dude, and if you got anything else, just drop a line.
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by gmat387 » Wed Jul 10, 2013 2:16 am
Jon@Admissionado wrote:Bhavik left you some great advice...
Let me add a few thoughts though too, my friend. First, keep in mind that what you will get out of an MBA at this point in your life will be far less useful than what you get after you have worked for a few years. Even as a humanities major, you have great grades and a fantastic GMAT, and you can try and leverage that to get yourself a good business job. Don't fear the real world or the poor-looking job prospects at this point! You have PLENTY of time to do at least two good internships (I'm hoping you have one this summer!).

If you get into HBS 2+2 or Yale, then great, you have your program specifically designed for people your age.. and well, HBS is still HBS!!!

If not though, you might think about other options - besides a job, a more "professional" Masters could also be an option (and what with your great grades and all, you might even get some money from schools)... so if you REALLY want to go into business look into Finance, Economics, Analytics, etc... (basically wherever your passions and interests are). The advantage of doing a different Masters is that many of these Masters are academic and knowledge-based, whereas the MBA is heavily experience-based....

Hope this helps you out dude, and if you got anything else, just drop a line.
I have looked at those professional masters programs... specifically Duke's MSc Management program.

It seems to me that they're all rather flimsy. For example, if I recall correctly, the average salary after graduation from Duke's MSM is only roughly $40,000. I don't mind the money so much as the fact that I'll probably just be doing glorified busywork for the next year or two.

In short, I want a MBA and want it now... I wish there were more programs like 2+2. Are there?
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by CriticalSquareMBA » Wed Jul 10, 2013 10:40 am
There are only a handful of schools that support a deferment program unfortunately.

The fact of the matter is the MBA isn't designed for individuals with little to no experience. HBS 2+2 and Yale's program don't exist to give you an option to rush into an MBA. They're there to make sure they have visibility into the top talent. It's a pipeline management thing, and even then they do want you to have SOME experience.

Bhavik
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