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I am interested in understanding my potential for admission to a few target schools.

Target schools: Harvard, Wharton

Age: 29 to 30 at application submission
Desired Industry: Investment Management
Location: Northwest US
Background: BA in Finance [State school], MS Computational Finance [top 10 CS, math] (3.5GPA)
Credentials: CFA charterholder
GMAT: Not yet taken.

Work experience: Progressive experience as quantitative analyst/risk manager at firm w/ >$500B AUM, 1 year as portfolio manager (managing $1.8 billion AUM at firm with > $150B total AUM), entrepreneurial experience building and launching a successful consulting startup. Highly successful performance evaluations in all roles (top 10%).

Total Comp:
2011 > $30,000
2012 > $70,000 Completed CFA, Enrolled in MS
2013 > $110,000
2014 > $120,000

Community Service: volunteer at local CFA society, volunteer work in thailand for optometry

Since GMAT is not complete, perhaps you may be able to provide insight if there is potential to be accepted in the schools and what I may need to do to make acceptance more likely.

Hi RR,
Good luck with the GMAT.
Assuming you are going to do well in the GMAT (700+), here are my 2 cents:
1. Wharton - with strong rec letters and solid essays you should get an interview. The outcome depends a lot on how you do in the interview (both the team and one on one), and also the class composition (there are a lot of finance people applying to Wharton).

2. HBS - the fact that you're already a PM is a very good sign of your career progression, however, to give you a good feedback on your chances there I will need more info about 1) community work 2) start-up. 3)brand diversity/special considerations.

I'd love to help - drop me a line at yael at admit1mba dot com and I can give you more feedback.

Yael
www.admit1mba.com

rrbest wrote:I am interested in understanding my potential for admission to a few target schools.

Target schools: Harvard, Wharton

Age: 29 to 30 at application submission

<<snip>>

Community Service: volunteer at local CFA society, volunteer work in thailand for optometry

Since GMAT is not complete, perhaps you may be able to provide insight if there is potential to be accepted in the schools and what I may need to do to make acceptance more likely.

A few additional questions and perspectives Rrbest:

1. I am assuming that GPA you have mentioned is for the MS? Not quite sure I understand the chronology of your MS. There doesn't seem to be a break in 2012 in your career - was this a less than a year course or something? The GPA would be a bit above average and not sure about your BA performance. With this, GMAT will become an important criteria to showcase a clear spike on academics. The CFA charter will definitely help there.
2. While I understand your career till being a Portfolio Manager, but the nature of your consulting startup is not clear. Is that in the investing space or elsewhere? How successful is it apart from the Comp. you have mentioned? And if successful, why put a break? Some of those questions will be important to defend going into the bschool process.
3. Finally, for reasons mentioned here and the above unknowns in the profile, it will be really premature to predict your chances especially in top schools. The information provided here looks promising but too scanty really to pass a verdict.

Hope this sparks a few additional thoughts.

Cheers,

Hi mcbMck,

To answer your questions:

1. The GPA is for the MS, which I completed while working full time. 2010-2012 were spent studying and passing the CFA exams, and I immediately enrolled in the computational finance program while keeping my job.

2. The consulting start up was for business planning, and I spend most of the time consulting with entrepreneurs on financial matters. I do not consider this role to be a highlight as my more successful roles came later and this was my first role after finishing my BA. I studied for the first part CFA during this time. The reason for taking the job was because it was an investment management role whereas the consulting role was general entrepreneurial financial consulting/modeling. The investment role was more aligned with how I saw my career developing. This is validated from the work I did prior and after the consulting role. I do still have an entrepreneurial spirit which I've learned to manifest in a corporate setting through innovation and leadership/management. The primary reason for an MBA at this point in my career is to enhance my ability to lead teams and effect change.

3. My career goal is to continue the path that I am on and focus on management and leadership opportunities if enrolling in an MBA program.

Hi rrbest,

I can see that you've done good work. Hopefully you will have the stories to support it as well - given this and a good GMAT - you should be able to get interviews at Harvard and Wharton.

Now if you want to improve your chances - you need to make the different aspects of your story tie well together. We need better post-MBA goals. Leading bigger teams in the investment management space is not a post-Harvard goal. Start thinking about sectors and functions. Finance is fine - but think more along the lines of Investment Banking. If you can bring out your entrepreneurial experience out to scale - that might help too.

Some initial thoughts.

Karthik

rrbest wrote:Hi mcbMck,

To answer your questions:

1. The GPA is for the MS, which I completed while working full time. 2010-2012 were spent studying and passing

<<snip>>

3. My career goal is to continue the path that I am on and focus on management and leadership opportunities if enrolling in an MBA program.

Right so just as I had suspected. A part-time course can have limited mileage but the CFA charter will complement your overall academic profile sufficiently well.

I am again confused with the career chronology. If you mentioned your career in reverse order, then that would mean you moved from being a portfolio manager to become a quant analyst (albeit in a larger fund)? That could be perceived as a good or a not so prudent move depending on the rationale.

Just nitpicking here as you are aiming aggressively so best to have all corners covered.

Timeline for all roles education is as follows:

2009, Graduated with BA in Finance, Enrolled for CFA program in late 2009
2010-2011: Entrepreneurial consulting (financial modeling) plus creating the start up
2011: Moved to quantitative analyst role
2012: Finished the third level of the CFA program, Enrolled in Part-time MS program in summer 2012
2013: Received CFA charter
2015: Moved to PM role

rrbest wrote:Timeline for all roles education is as follows:

2009, Graduated with BA in Finance, Enrolled for CFA program in late 2009
2010-2011: Entrepreneurial consulting (financial modeling) plus creating the start up
2011: Moved to quantitative analyst role
2012: Finished the third level of the CFA program, Enrolled in Part-time MS program in summer 2012
2013: Received CFA charter
2015: Moved to PM role

Perfect, makes the right sense now. With a PM role under your belt, it should be pretty exciting out there in terms of chances so go for it - assuming you can crack the GMAT out of the park too.

Cheers,

Hi - Your work history and performance (corroborated by your salary increases over time) seem to be A+/A. Was the start-up experience something you did on the side while working in finance or something you took time out to work on? Whichever the case I think that adds a nice layer of interest to your profile. Your volunteer work sounds interesting and unique - if those are things that you've continued pursuing post-undergrad they will strengthen your application.

I'm a little concerned about your GMAT - not what you will get on it because I'm pretty confident you'll get a 720+, but concerned as to when you'll take it and how that will effect the round you're able to apply in. You're in a competitive applicant pool and at 31 you're pushing the outer limit of the age spectrum.

You can reference my article about age distribution at HBS https://fxmbaconsulting.com/too-old-full ... r-kellogg/

To conclude - you do look like you might be competitive at Wharton (you'll definitely need a 720+ GMAT there though) You can read about Wharton here:https://fxmbaconsulting.com/wharton-mba- ... 2016-2018/

Feel free to reach out if you'd like to chat.

I am interested in understanding my potential for admission to a few target schools.

Target schools: Harvard, Wharton

Age: 29 to 30 at application submission
Desired Industry: Investment Management
Location: Northwest US
Background: BA in Finance [State school], MS Computational Finance [top 10 CS, math] (3.5GPA)
Credentials: CFA charterholder
GMAT: Not yet taken.

Work experience: Progressive experience as quantitative analyst/risk manager at firm w/ >$500B AUM, 1 year as portfolio manager (managing $1.8 billion AUM at firm with > $150B total AUM), entrepreneurial experience building and launching a successful consulting startup. Highly successful performance evaluations in all roles (top 10%).

Total Comp:
2011 > $30,000
2012 > $70,000 Completed CFA, Enrolled in MS
2013 > $110,000
2014 > $120,000

Community Service: volunteer at local CFA society, volunteer work in thailand for optometry

Since GMAT is not complete, perhaps you may be able to provide insight if there is potential to be accepted in the schools and what I may need to do to make acceptance more likely.

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