Ellipsing My Way...to Business School

New MBA.com Video Blog!

2013-04-04T13:43:00.000-04:00

Hey Guys,

I know it's been a while since I've updated this blog, but I just wanted to drop a quick link to MBA.COm which has my second installment of my 4 video blogs.

http://www.mba.com/why-b-school/typical-mba-candidates/richard-battle-baxter.aspx

Enjoy!

Bonding With 1st Years

2013-03-12T01:46:00.002-04:00

So I just wanted to write this blog post about my day today. It wasn't incredibly eventful, but was a very pleasant day. I had class at 10:10am and then was "free" for the rest of the day. In business school you never really have "free" time but you do have time that isn't allocated to something else.

At 4:30, I had a meeting to talk with about 25 of my other classmates about our class donations as alums. Yes, that conversation is starting now. I told you in previous posts that it feels like we're being pushed out of business school haha. That's all I say about that meeting because it was bitter sweet.

Then, around 8, I went over to a couple of my fellow 2nd years' house to BBQ and watch soccer. We talked for about... oh I dunno 2 hours or so and then some of them went to go play poker at another classmate's apartment. I'm not a big gambler, so I walked home. When I got into my apartment I heard music and talking coming from the townhouse of some 1st years. I posted on FB that I was glad that they were having fun and I immediately got a text message insisting that I come over.

So, me.. being the social butterfly, headed over to their house. They were "finsihing up" the party but a couple of us stuck around and just chatted for 3 hours about life, trips abroad, b-school, recruiting.... D) all of the above. What I really loved about the conversation is that the experience that I had last year, when I was a first year, is being replayed in their class. To me, that means that the culture that MY second years, Class of 2012, and their predecessors instilled in the community at Johnson is still holding true.

I just hope that it continues because to us all Johnson is a very special unpretentious place and it will always be near and dear to my heart. I can't wait to see all of the incredible things that the 1st years end up doing over the summer and in their lives. So thrilled for ALL OF US!

I wanted to write this quick blog post because... well.. my mind is clouded with the thought that I'm going to BRAZIL in 2 days with 30 of my classmates. What's more, is that the 1st years are going on spring break to Costa Rica with 60 of their classmates! It's going to be... EPIC to say the least for both parties!

MBA.com Video Blog!

2013-03-05T00:39:00.001-05:00

So a while back I kind of alluded to the fact that something BIG would be coming through from my end.

Well... Here it is!

Who would have been able to foresee my face being in the student section of MBA.com / the website for the GMAT! While, I did NOT beat the GMAT, I definitely have come a long way hahaahha... Can you believe it? Now you ask, Why are you on there?

Well in the Fall I heard about an opportunity to become a Student Video Blogger and applied to do so. Thankfully I was chosen as one of the folks to do it. I've done 2 video blogs already (both are not on the site yet...just the one) and there are two more coming. I just had a call with them today to discuss the topics that I should discuss in the upcoming VLOGS!

Here is the link: http://www.mba.com/why-b-school/typical-mba-candidates/bloggers/richard-battle-baxter.aspx

i would post the video itself, but... it's not my content! :-) hehehehe I signed it over to them.

Johnson HARLEM SHAKE

2013-03-05T00:32:00.000-05:00

So, when I was at the Tuck Ski weekend a couple weeks ago, I had a Tuckie friend who DJed the Tuck Carnival then shot over to Vermont to DJ the TAABA event in Vermont. He and I were having lunch and he asked me "Do You Know _______, he's in your class?" I said, "Of course, I know him. We party together." Then my friend said, "He requested the Harlem Shake! Then I played it and he went crazy!"

So then I texted my friend, who was still at Tuck Carnival and said, "okay we gotta make the Harlem Shake happen in Sage at Johnson!" This came a couple days after one of our other classmates, who is abroad for the semester at IE Business School in Madrid posted the one that she was in.

So first! Here is the Johnson Harlem Shake!

We did this during Sage Social. I initially didn't think that many people would participate but when they made the announcement for everyone to go put on their costumes, I knew differently. If you want to find me, I'm on the bottom right in a purpose shirt and a backwards scarf. We had to do it for like 2 minutes straight and at some point all of my props were gone! I still had a blast though!!

Here is the IE Business school harlem shake. The WOMAN (hehe) walking across the screen in the beginning and who does the split at 0:15 is one of my classmates!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVap965t5Qc

My Alumni Mobile Application

2013-03-01T17:09:00.003-05:00

Hi all! So since one of my last posts was about graduation and all that stuff, I've been doing a lot of research into how I can stay connected when I am an Alum and/or find other Alums.

I came across this mobile application that I think is really cool. Check it out!

MY ALUMNI APP mobile application

Business School Graduation Already?!?

2013-02-26T01:58:00.001-05:00

I can't believe that I am making this post in FEBRUARY! But I've received two emails recently that has got me very sad. Here are two screenshots of emails that I received in my inbox:

This first one that I received was a notice from our financial aid office. It was a reminder for us to sign up to speak one-on-one with a student loan repayment expert!

This second email that I received is for us to log into some system and confirm that our names are correct for our diplomas.

My classmates and I were trying very hard to not think about Graduation that will occur on Memorial Day Weekend, but when we receive emails like these, you can't help but reminded that the end is near. I'm incredibly excited for the Class of 2015 to start their journey, but in all honesty there's a part of me that wants the current application process to be paused for a second. I'm not done making friends with the 1st years yet!

I'm not going to write much more about this topic because it makes me sad. I'll just keep in mind that I'm going to Brazil in 3 WEEKS!!!! hahaha...

Geez... I'm graduating soon. Where has the time gone?

Tuck Ski Weekend: Take 2

2013-02-25T06:26:00.000-05:00

This post is long overdue because I should have made it two weekends ago! So I know that I kept talking about going tup to Smugglers Notch for the Tuck TAABA sponsored Ski Weekend. I must caveat this by saying that this is different from the Winter Carnival that is held up at Tuck.

A second caveat is that yes, while I talk about Tuck on my blog that doesn't mean that I like Tuck more than Johnson. There are a lot of similarities between the two schools but there are also stark differences. Needless to say that I will ALWAYS support my Tuckie friends! I <3 them to death.

That being said, let me tell you all about my weekend. So we had a 7 hour drive from Ithaca to Smugg's as it's called. The car ride was fun after I woke up from my nap. The night prior had been a long night to say the least. Us Johnson students had 3 car loads head up there. I think there may have been about 16/17 of us. When we got to Smugg's we had to wait for our townhouse to be cleaned so we had about 6 hours to kill. Obviously that means that we ate food.

Then after we all got settled in to our places we headed over to the cocktail reception. I must say that us Johnson students definitely made ourselves known. Prior to our departure I told everyone to bring/wear Cornell or Johnson apparel. Last year we didn't have nearly enough but this year we wanted to represent! ;-) We definitely did that. Here are a couple of pictures from the cocktail reception.

Let me tell you about these phenomenal people below. We first bonded at CTLS the MLT event in 2011. Then a couple weeks after that we had the Consortium Orientation Program (OP) which was a blast. These three are amazing and we will be friends for life. I may even end up in the same city as two of them post-mba! We shall see though.

MLT!!! The one on the far right is my classmate. I love hanging out with her because she makes me feel as though I'm the funniest man in the world. I do try to be! I keep things lively hahaha...

The next day was a whole day dedicated to skiing. I tried to stay with my classmates but it was tough because they aren't as ::cough:: good ::cough:: as me. Nah, to be honest they just aren't at skiing. So I had to ditch them and do my own thing after lunch. At one point though before lunch I had to just start going by myself so I could get a couple more runs in before lunch. Here is a picture that I took at the top of the mountain.

After lunch I met up with two other Tuckie friends, one of whom is a DJ and had just gotten in from DJing the 1st night of the Tuck Carnival. He's much better at skiing that I, but I can definitely keep up. Anyone who has their own gear is most likely a better skier than me, but I do plan to buy gear once I start getting a paycheck again!

I probably skied for about a total of 7 hours that day. Unfortunately, Smugg's does not have twilight (night) skiing so I had to get my last run in at 4pm. But then that meant that it was time to party... there was a nice sit down dinner that was included in our package and then there was a dance party after that. I won't get into all of the details but let's just say that it was a fun time. I didn't go to an after party that night because I wanted to hit the slopes the next day. Thankfully we got in abotu 3 more hours of skiing.

Conclusion: What I find to be the best thing about this weekend is that we all MLTers/Consoritum Folks get to come together again in a non-stressful environment and essentially network. It's ideal for rekindling friendships made at previous events where one may have met someone else. Sure people talk on Fb and run into each other at case competitions or sporting events at different schools, but there's something about putting people in an atmosphere where there's essentially nothing to do buy ski and talk to one another.

I definitely forged new friendships and strengthened old ones. Even though there wasn't an official "recruiting" event or anything of that sort, I'm still enjoying the benefits of the connections that I made in that people are connecting me recruiters/companies that they have contact with. This is something that I think people miss when applying to business school. Sure we all go to different schools, but trust me when I say that you will intern with people from every school and they will also become a part of your network. You'll then help each other out in the future (obviously if you like them).

The TAABA event was run flawlessly and the collateral (i won't say damage) but collateral benefits is that by bringing everyone together it just made for an easy environment for people to mingle. I also found a highlight of my trip to be that I had the chance to bond with the 1st years. I hadn't really had that opportunity to spend THAT much time with them because they were going through the Core.

If you would like to read the post that I made last year after this same event. CLICK HERE

My how time flies!

30 Tips for B-School Admissions

2013-01-23T04:07:00.000-05:00

FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER: @money9111

So I was just perusing the b-school blogosphere and stumbled upon this blog post from a fellow blogger who is simply "Killing It" in the application process! I haven't spoken to this person before but I would love to in the future. Maybe I will in the future.

In any event, this person wrote a blog post Titled "The Laws of Getting In (to a top Business School).

The reason why I like this blog post so much is because when I was reading it, I kept saying to myself "yup... that's true... yup that's true too!" you get the idea. There are some things that I don't necessarily agree with, but that's because I was a different type of applicant than this person was. I was what this person would consider the "anomaly applicant." I didn't have the 730 GMAT score or the 3.7 Undergrad GPA. The points that I do agree with is how to go about navigating the admissions process. I actually want to go into this much deeper, but I'm sure that out of the 383 blog posts I've written since beginning the process until now as a 2nd year at Johnson at Cornell University, there are tips and tricks in there somewhere.

I hope this person continues to blog throughout business school because it will be interesting to see how his/her views change once the REAL impact of business school on one's life is exposed. I've always said, and will continue to say, that the best people to help you get into business school are those who have not just been accepted but those who immersed themselves in the process as I did and as this person did.

Here are some additional notes that I wanted to add to some of the points that were brought up by this person. To get the full effect, you must go read the original blog post. Link: HERE I could elaborate on some of these things, but it's 3:33am and I have class at 10:10 and don't really feel like elaborating. Just take my word for it at the moment haha...

Thou shall play to win: Don't half ass the process. The main reason is because your competition is NOT!

Thou shall respect the elite MBA application process by starting early: This is ideal, but it's also true that most people don't do this. I started a full year and a half before applications were due.

Thou shall respect the GMAT and take it seriously: I don't even want to this about this exam any more. It's the worst thing in life! Get it over with!!! i took it three times over the course of a year. The hardest thing was to study (and worry) about the GMAT while I was writing essays and tracking down recommenders.

Thou shall not ever attempt to explain a poor GMAT score: It is what it is... take it.. get it over with... move on to the next step.

Thou shall not shoot in the dark: Applying to 9 or 10 schools... not a good idea. There aren't even 9/10 schools that are that similar that should interest an applicant.

Thou shall perform rigorous research on thy target schools: Often neglected but easily transparent in an interview. Trust me on that one...

Thou shall not believe they own press: Sure, you're a great applicant. SO IS EVERYONE ELSE! Why should the school want you? It can't be because you have a high GMAT score and a high GPA and want to be president of a club.

Thou shall consider being reviewed by Sandy Kreisberg on Poets & Quants: If you're afraid to get harsh feedback and criticism then business school is NOT for you.

Thou shall leverage admissions consultants and previous applicants: This should be a no brainer.

Thou shall take admissions consultants with a grain of salt: They are there to make money... your incentives are not necessarily aligned.

Thou shall have multiple essay/application reviewers: One of the essay reviews should be a student at the school. They will be able to tell you about how to tailor your essay to the school.

Thou shall start an MBA blog: I'm clearly biased on this point haha... I can say that 383 blog posts later related to business school and the application process have made me incredibly aware of myself. There are some caveats to doing this though, but there can be a way to have it work in your advantage, as I did.

Thou shall apply as early as possible: Yup! Agreed!

Thou shall not apply in round 3 without an Olympic medal, performance at Carnegie Hall or cure for cancer on thy CV: This should say "last round" as some schools have 4 rounds. Mostly true though...

Thou shall not assume thyself the exception to the rule: KNOW YOUR WEAKNESSES THOUGH! I knew exactly what my weakness was because I had spoken to soooooooooo many people. Knowing that, I was able to mitigate it in a myriad of ways.

Thou shall play nice in the MBA sandbox: Remember, all information can be found online. That's all I'll say about that! ;-)

Thou shall not apply to “safety schools”: Agreed.

Thou shall have well researched, realistic goals: If they aren't realistic - you won't be admitted.

Thou shall know thy demographic and where thou fittest among thy peers: and be realistic and honest with yourself. If you're an indian male who worked in IT... well... sorry to say, you have a tough crowd to outshine.

Thou shall submit a well-balanced, rounded out application: Show as many sides of yourself as you can. You're an interesting person outside of your job... why are you interesting? If you're not interesting, then why should you be admitted to business school?

Thou shall communicate an upward trajectory in thy career: Muy importante.

Thou shall add context to thy academic performance: Also, explain red flags too.

Thou shall quantify responsibility and results: It's funny how not many people do this. The people who are accepted do this... so you should too.

Thou shall be a do-gooder: It better damn well be genuine though. It's incredibly easily to spot the person who just did to put it on his/her resume.

Thou shall write an optional essay for every application: TRUE STORY

Thou shall choose thy recommenders wisely: This is self explanatory.

Thou shall become the project manager of they recommendations: If you can't do this... you don't belong in business school. No matter who your recommender is, or how big of a title they have. If they've agreed to help you then you need to help them help you!

Thou shall focus on content and not production on video and PowerPoint essays: Just don't make anything ugly.

Thou shall prepare for thy interviews: Everything you say in an interview is quantifiable to the interviewer. They will rate you on a scale. So for those of you who think that the WAY you convey your experiences do not matter... well just know that you're mistaken.

Thou shall save thy money: You're going to need it... also for all of the trips that you'll take while in b-school

Tuck Ski Weekend TAABA

2013-01-17T16:14:00.002-05:00

So I'm excited for February 15th because I'll be going BACK up to Vermont for the Tuck Ski Weekend hosted by TAABA. Here is the late post that I wrote last year about attending:

TAABA Ski Weekend

I haven't been skiing yet this year, but I have a feeling that this semester will be filled with a ton of skiing. Yes, we do go after class at Johnson. We usually go to Greek Peak but now that I'm a 2nd year and have more time on my hands than before - who knows if we just don't go instead of class! I kid I kid...

This post actually reminds me that I need to buy new ski gloves. I'll do that right after I submit this post.

So yeah, I'm very excited to get back up to Smugglers' Notch and hit the slopes with not only my Johnson friends, but also my friends from other schools! I hung out with some of them over winter break but there is one Tuckie that I haven't seen since the MBA World Cup up at Tuck last year. He knows who I'm talking about and I'm giving him major ::side eyes:: right now!

Last year I didn't post any pictures from this ski weekend, mainly because my iphone was a hot mess! But... now I have a new iPhone so I plan to take many many pictures and share them with you guys. I always say that I'll share pictures with everyone and then I don't end up doing it because other stuff comes up. If you hold me too it... then I'll be able to do it!

One funny story from last year - So... I Ski... I'm pretty good and can keep up with most folks. Yeah yeah, i do black diamonds. So last year on the day we arrived, I took one of my classmates onto a black diamond. I didn't meant to take him on one but we had 15 minutes before the lift closed and I chose the wrong lift. HE HAD NEVER SKIED BEFORE. I remember when I started learning how to ski, I was about... 12 years old. Obviously when you're 11 you pick things up much quicker. I thought it would be just as easy for him to pick up....

Nope.. of course it wasn't. It was BAD hahaha.. It's funny now, but then it wasn't funny to him. He ended up having to take off his skis and walk down the mountain!

That's the end of my story! Hahah... #MBAProblems!

Talking to Current Students

2013-01-14T16:50:00.003-05:00

FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER: @Money9111

So, as I've said in previous posts, I've been perusing the MBA message boards letting all of the new Johnson admits know that they can use us current students as a resource. I've also been doing some other posting in random threads and someone messaged me asking if I could write a blog post speaking to how a prospective student should reach out to current students. I did write a post similar to that in previous days. I don't feel like re-reading it, but you definitely should! Click Here.

There may be some overlap in what I say, but that's okay it'll just drive home the advice.

So this post will be from the perspective of, me - a 2nd year. You've got to put yourselves in the shoes of the person that you're writing too in order to elicit the best response. I remember when I was a 1st year, people would reach out to me in say... September and ask me curriculum related questions pertaining to things that I have not even encountered yet.

For instance, at my school 1st years don't take finance, strategy, and statistics until the 2nd half of the 1st semester. We don't take operations until the spring, yet we would always get questions about those classes. That's all well and good and one wouldn't really know what the class schedule is until they ask. So questions like that I never got irritated over.

FIRST - When you reach out to 1st years, try to understand that they have not been in business school that long. So they haven't experienced many things that people are inquiring about. 2nd years are probably the best resource for curriculum/internship related questions. That's just how I feel now though. At a PROPER business school, a 1st year would say "oh, I'm not sure about X but here... talk to this 2nd year who can tell you more about that..." At least that's how we operate at Johnson!

SECOND - One thing that I didn't realize until I became a student is that current students get asked questions from prospective students almost daily. Sure, not all current students get asked questions, but I've found that the ones who do are the ones who put themselves out there as a resource for questions. This can be a double-edged sword because we do want to help everyone! It can get frustrating though when you get the same BROAD questions over and over again.

If someone asks me if they can email me some questions, I always ask them to be as specific as they can be. Think about it from OUR perspective.
A) we have answered these questions time and time again.
B) we are incredibly busy with clubs, homework, studying, partying... etc.

Given those things listed in B) it's tough for us to sit down and write an answer to a question like this:

"Can you tell me about the culture at Johnson?" or "How can I show that I FIT with Johnson?" Think about it... how would you answer these 3/4 times a week?

I've actually noticed a little bit of frustration with these types of questions, coming through in my responses. This is something that I need to be cognizant of. In my responses I always try to put the onus back on to the person asking the questions.

For me, if I'm busy doing something and I see a question like this being asked, I will usually prolong responding to the person simply because I usually cannot devote the time needed to answer the question properly. There is so much information that would go into a response like that. I feel that people should do their own research and figure out the culture themselves. Then when you reach out to current students, you're basically fact checking and being very specific with your questions. This not only helps us with our responses but also gives you a quicker response.

THIRD - Do not assume that every current student knows everything about the school, no matter how large or small the school is. I got a message the other day asking how someone would fit with the Parker Center. I think the only time I have stepped INTO the Parker Center was during orientation when I got to school in the summer of 2011. Sure, I know who works in the Parker Center, but that's just because I'm that social. Not everyone at every schools knows everything. The better way to ask a current student about this would be to ask if they KNOW SOMEONE INVOLVED with something. That would just be a simple response like, "Sure do! Here's the person's email address."

Even though it would be an easy response... remember what I said before. Current students are very busy and while most will always want to be helpful, you'll make our lives easier if we can read an email and know what to do immediately. What you should REALLY do, is find on the website who the people are that you need to get in touch with.

That's all the advice I have for now... maybe I'll think of something later I'll add it in...

The comments above DO NOT go for ADMITTED STUDENTS. The questions current students ask are for a different reason... which reminds me... I have to respond to an admitted applicant right now about housing options! :-)

MBA Application Tips

2013-01-14T03:59:00.003-05:00

So I had to rehash this topic just because there are a lot of people stressing over January deadlines. I rarely speak about GMATClub.com because I'm still affiliated with BeatTheGMAT.com and well, they're "competitors." BUT, I was just on GMAT Club updating my signature - this is something that I do every time I make a new blog post. Then I started clicking around and came across this thread about the BEST MBA Application Tips.

I started reading some of the comments from folks and this is probably one of the best (aside from my advice) threads that I've seen out there. I wanted to give you guys the link:

BEST MBA APPLICATION TIPS

I also started clicking around the thread from 2011 when I was applying and came across the post that I made when I got accepted!

Graduation Talk? No Thanks!

2013-01-14T02:01:00.001-05:00

All I will say is that I almost teared up when I clicked on a website that one of my friends posted in our class Facebook page just now. Here is what I was greeted with when I went to the page:

I mean wtf?!? it's January 13th and THIS is what I have to start thinking about? I still have another 5 months of schoo! I thought the 2 years of preparation to get into business school were tough? I think these next 5 months may be the toughest out of this whole experience.

I will say that I "disliked" the post that my classmate put up in the FB page... this is definitely NOT what I want to be thinking about now. Right now I want to enjoy my last week of Winter break, that has been almost a month and a half long. I'm actually getting the itch and feeling lonely not being with my classmates.

What's interesting is that a lot of us are not going back until maybe this Saturday/Sunday, but we're all home bored by ourselves. I know that I'm texting/tweeting and all of that jazz with many of my classmates asking when they're going back. I get the same response. I think it's going to be one of those situations where if we said "okay let's go back on Thursday," we would all get back on Thursday! Kind of like follow the leader - which is funny since we're all supposed to be leaders. ::side eyes::

In any event, there's no real topic or any advice in this blog post. I'm just bored at home and felt like blogging about something. If you guys have some questions, please post them in the comment box below and I can make sure to answer them or write a special blog post for it.

I need to finish this post because it's making me think of the next stage of my life and I'm not used to that thought process just yet... #SCARY!

Are You Waitlisted?

2013-01-06T20:44:00.000-05:00

I think last year, or maybe the year before, I wrote a blog post for waitlisted applicants. I actually think it was the year that I applied, so 2011. Here is the post if anyone is interested: Waitlisted Applicants.

I hope that this post offers some solace to those who are currently waitlisted, although it probably won't.

First and foremost, CALM DOWN. That's easier said than done because so much hard work has gone into putting in an application, but getting flustered is not the right course of action. Think of it as a test in staying composed. If you were the CEO of a large corporation and did not get something that you wanted, whatever it may be, would you overreact and get upset and all that jazz? No, you'd be upset for about a minute and then think of another course of action to get what you want.

This is how you need to approach the business school application process. Just because you were added to a waitlist isn't the end of the world. Sure, some people have been admitted but don't forget that other people have been REJECTED! So now you're in that middle gray area. I'm an optimist so I say to take this as good thing.

First realize that there are many, lemme repeat MANY, reasons that people are put on a waitlist. Granted, each applicant isn't sure why he/she was put on the waitlist but then again that's the beauty of admissions - you're not supposed to know. Sure many schools provide feedback on one's candidacy, but being on the other side of the table now, I can tell you that the things that they tell people are very BROAD & GENERIC. And then I see people harp on what the admissions committee says/thinks. I mean, I'm not going to lie, I would have done the same exact thing. I remember trying to decode everything that was said to me by an adcom member. While they were trying to help me out, I now know that they get my seemingly "targeted" question about 50 times a day.

With that being said, the one thing that you DON'T want to do is say - "Oh it was my GMAT score." This is probably the last thing that it would have been, ESPECIALLY, if you scored within range for said school. I hear of people saying this to themselves and then going to take the GMAT again. I'll be blunt.... if you scored a 710+ then it's probably not your GMAT score depending on the field that you want to go in to.

I think that sometimes there are some things that you can do to bolster your profile and other times there isn't anything that you can do. This is obviously a function of WHY you were put on a waitlist - agian which you don't know. This can be mitigated by the applicant being truly honest with him/herself during the application process. If you know what your weakness was in your whole application, then that was probably what may have put you on the waitlist, assuming the reason was within your control.

Waitlist with Interview - Another thing that applicants don't take into consideration is the interview - if he/she was actually interviewed. The interview is can make or break a candidate. I'm sure of that. That's why all of the top schools interview all admitted applicants. When I was applying, I knew that if invited to interview I had to "get in front of" the adcom in person. I consider myself to be a strong interviewer, so I knew my strength. Other people are not strong interviewers so they tend to not think that this is as important as it really is.

Waitlist without Interview - If you were put on a waitlist without an interview, then there could be a myriad of reasons why you were waitlisted. It has to do something with the rest of your application and from my experience it probably comes down to essays and conveying fit assuming GMAT/GPA aren't abysmal. I can say abysmal because mine were. When applicants submit essays they usually aren't thinking "well... this was a bad essay, but i'll submit it anyway." This is the one thing that when people submit, they believe that it's the best thing in the world. I can tell you, with tough love, that many essays don't answer the questions asked.

Essays should not only answer the questions that were asked, but also give the admissions committee a much broader view of the applicant. That last component is what I believe separates the non-traditional admit from the person who "should" have been admitted.

SO WHAT DO YOU DO NOW?

Should you email the admissions committee? Well, I think that depends on the school that you're applying too. They each have a certain protocol that they follow. If they do welcome update emails, then definitely send that! However, it should be a very genuine email.

1. Think hard about your application and why you may have not been admitted - BESIDES GMAT. I say besides GMAT because I think this is a cop--out in most instances. Again, if you were within range then do not use this as a basis for an email.

3. Go through your essays and write down every piece of information that you provided to the admissions committee through the stories that you told. Hopefully you did tell stories. If you didn't then your essays can seem very boring. If you're not a boring person and your essays seem boring, then there's an opportunity to show otherwise.

3. Start off by thanking them for the opportunity to stay in the process. Sure it would have been better to have been admitted, but that's not the case.

4. Reiterate your interest in the program but be genuine. Don't regurgitate things from the website that you like about the program. I can tell you that this is an immediate turn-off. The people I've seen be admitted off waitlists spoke from the heart. As dumb as that may sound, that's what's needed and what separates admitted candidates from dinged candidates.

5. Do NOT bombard the admissions committee with updates. 1 or 2 is fine, but not one every week. Also, do not ask when they will be making a decision by. That's actually a way to get dinged.

You've got to remember that the way that you interact with an admissions committee member is being evaluated in a way that they're asking themselves "Is this how the person would act with a corporate recruiter?" If you give them a bad impression then it's an easy way to remove yourself from the waitlist. They've got to cut the list somehow right? Unless you've proved that you are invaluable, then this is an easy way for them to say "AHH.. take that person off the waitlist."

If you've applied R1, which is probably the case at this point, then just sit tight. Remember that you're 1 amongst THOUSANDS and schools don't have that many spots given all of the applications that they receive. While, you are special... no applicant is THAT special. Well.... some ARE, but 99% of people are not.

That's all I've got for now! Best of luck to everyone who was waitlisted. Trust me... it will get easier as you are admitted to schools. I go to class with people who were admitted off the waitlist in June! I have a friend who was taken off of a waitlist the DAY BEFORE orientation in August.

I know there was a bit of tough love in this post, but these are the things that people wish were said to them!

Peace Out!

"I Told You So" - GMAT Ninja

2013-01-03T17:08:00.001-05:00

A word from my tutor: “I told you he’d kick some ass.” , by Charles Bibilos - aka - GMAT NINJA

Just over two years ago, I watched Richard suffer mightily while he simultaneously studied for the GMAT and wrote his MBA applications, and he generously agreed to let me rant and rave as an anonymous guest writer on his blog. Basically, I claimed that Richard would ultimately kick ass, regardless of how he performed on the GMAT:

…the best business leaders are usually what I call “grinders”: they may or may not be naturally brilliant at filling in little bubbles, but they’ll work like hell to achieve their goals….

I’m convinced that (Richard will) get into a badass b-school somehow, even if he doesn’t beat the tar out of the GMAT on his next attempt. One of the top MBA programs will figure out that Money 9111 is one of those “grinders” who will—some way or another—manage to get some serious shit done in the business world, even if he has to pull a lifetime of all-nighters to get it all done.

I really don’t like to say “I told you so,” but I think it’s appropriate here. Good things are happening to a deserving man.

As promised, Money 9111 was admitted to a top MBA program. And as promised, that MBA program is indeed lucky to have him: Richard is a featured Cornell blogger, a top student ambassador, a trained reader of MBA applications, a member of Student Council, a fixture of the Johnson social scene, and a frequent Johnson representative to nationwide MBA conferences. As promised, Richard is “grinding” and networking his way to success.

So what if his GMAT score was never phenomenal? Who cares that he only gained eight points on his quant, despite his Herculean study efforts? As his GMAT tutor, I obviously wish that I could have helped him to a 750. But it wasn’t in the cards, unfortunately.

Screw the GMAT: Richard is a wildly successful member of the MBA community at an Ivy League MBA program, and he’s on the brink of launching his own startup. He’s kicking all sorts of ass. And things will get even better for him—just wait until his startup gets off the ground. I’m 100% convinced that it will succeed.

The #1 reason why I’ve always had so much faith in Richard is that he’s a tireless networker.

He has more LinkedIn connections, facebook friends, and blog followers than most successful businesspeople. I’m pretty convinced that Richard has friends—real friends—at every top-20 MBA program in the country, and he obviously has an incredible network at Cornell. Richard is never afraid to reach out to people for help, and I’m convinced that he’ll always surround himself with friends and colleagues who can help him succeed as an entrepreneur.

It might be a cliché to say that business is all about your network… but it’s a very true cliché. Things will inevitably get tough for him; they always do in the business world. But Richard will inevitably find what he needs—or whom he needs—when things get rough.

The second reason for Richard’s success is simply that his work ethic is off the charts, even in comparison to other hard-working MBA types. If he’s determined to accomplish something (like, say, getting into a top-tier MBA program or starting a company), he’ll do whatever it takes to get it done. He’ll stay up all night—or all week—if he has to.

And now, I’ll stop inflating Richard’s ego, and I’ll try to tell you something useful about MBA admissions, since that’s probably the reason why you visit this website.

Some of you might not have read Richard’s posts from two years ago, but it’s fair to say that Richard’s GMAT score and undergraduate GPA weren’t exactly elite, and there wasn’t anything magical on his resume that would guarantee admission to a top b-school. So how the hell did he manage to end up at an Ivy League MBA program (which, incidentally, is now ranked #7 in the BusinessWeek MBA rankings)?

One word: determination. And it really, really matters.

Let’s imagine a perfect alumnus for an MBA program. Mr. Perfect would be an enthusiastic, dedicated student who builds a strong community while on campus… and continues to build that alumni community for the rest of their lives. And Mr. Perfect will also be a successful businessperson who tirelessly pursues his goals. Does anything else really matter in the long run?

During the admissions process, Richard successfully convinced the Johnson adcom that he was Mr. Perfect… in the long run. His application folder was bulging with evidence of his passion for business, for his dream of getting an MBA, and for Johnson in particular. He visited campus several times, exchanged countless emails with members of the adcom, retook the GMAT more than once, and spent hundreds of hours telling his blog readers about his passion for the entire enterprise of getting an MBA.

Smart adcoms are great at recognizing that type of passion and determination. Every year, several of my most imperfect students—the ones with a terrible GPA or a huge resume hole or a sub-700 GMAT score—end up at HBS or Cornell or Booth or Wharton. How? They visit campus repeatedly, build relationships with students and faculty and adcom members, and sell themselves as passionate, community-oriented applicants. Their common trait is that they’re tirelessly passionate, they’re great at networking, and they have incredible work ethics. And the best adcoms can recognize these traits when they decide to look hard enough.

Sure, lazy guys with 750s get into top b-schools sometimes, but the truly savvy and determined candidates always get in somewhere—with or without a GMAT score in the 700s.

I know that many of you have found this blog through Beat the GMAT or Clear Admit, and many of you are struggling with the GMAT or your essays right now. Take your best crack at the GMAT. Write the best essays you can. That stuff matters, too.

But if you really have a driving passion for business, and if you’re truly determined to get a spectacular business education, make sure that your energy and passion show in everything you do—it can compensate for plenty of other weaknesses. Richard was 100% himself during the entire application process, and he was tireless in pursuing his goals.

It’s no surprise that he succeeded, and it’s an honor to be able to say “I told you so” as I watch him kick ass in business school. And I look forward to saying it again within a few years, when Richard’s first successful business begins to make its fortune.

For those who are wondering - THIS WAS - my GMAT tutor when he was in NYC: GMAT NINJA

Recounting 1/5/2011 App Submission

2013-01-03T17:06:00.001-05:00

I just realized that today is January 5th! This date is significant because two years ago - to the day - was the day that I hit SUBMIT on my business school applications. It was around this time too - 4:45! I remember the day vividly because I was entering all of the application information while at work!

When I got home later that day, I wrote this blog post after finishing the Consortium application: Application Submission Exhaustion

I had to rehash this old post to remember where I came from and to reflect on the journey that I've been on to date. I write this blog post while sitting on my mother's couch in New Jersey. I'm currently on Winter break and have been since about the 6th of December. Thankfully, I was in Europe for 14 days in December, but now the cabin fever is getting to me.

My how the tables have turned. I was talking to our Director of Admissions at Johnson yesterday just recounting how much my life has changed in 2 years. Now I can really tell everyone the significance of business school for me. Honestly, it's not the hard skills that I've learned. Those are definitely great though... I can discount cashflows.... determine the best business strategy for a business... or at least stand behind a strategy that I think is appropriate and back it up. blah blah blah... Accounting knowledge.. marketing knowledge... negotiations... goaiheiuhahueihfajdfnksdfjk blah blah..

For me... the friends that I've made and the experiences that have been afforded to me are what puts the exclamation point on my business school experience. The people I've met have not only humbled me but have also given me confidence beyond my wildest dreams. This journey has required that I be honest with myself so that I can get the most out of it. I've been challenged in ways that most people never will be in their lives - both good and bad!

A main component of business school that I've realized is being able to deal with different situations on a daily basis that then prepare you for the real world. It's difficult to see and/or understand when you're in the moment of dealing with an issue or planning something, but when you take a step back and connect the dots among ALL similar situations dealt with in business school, then you really get an appreciation for what these 2 years can provide for someone.

It's interesting because when you're going through the application process, these are the types of things that need to be weaved into an essay and talked about in an interview. But it's a catch 22 because you can't possibly know the extent to which those types of experiences play a part in your business school experience until you're actually in business school.

I cannot believe that in 5 months it will all be over. :-( I try not to think about it though and know that I have to make the most of the next 5 months. IT'S GOING TO BE EPIC!

A couple weeks ago, I was talking to my GMAT tutor and he wanted to write another blog post for me and I think this is the most appropriate time to post it.

He is one of my biggest cheerleaders and here is the link to his thoughts: I TOLD YOU SO

Be Your Own Boyfriend KickStarter

2012-12-27T15:55:00.000-05:00

Hey All! I'm back from an amazing trip around Europe! I will write an update and post some pictures from the trip but first I wanted to promote my friend's book.

I met Kaneisha back when I was trolling BeatTheGMAT and GMATClub, prior to starting at Johnson. She gave great advice on the forums from the perspective of an HBS alum. She has been working on her self-help business for a minute now and it's beginning to take off. She has started a Kickstarter campaign to gain more momentum behind her and I wasn't asked to do this, but I want to promote her to all of you who read my blog.

From a 30,000 ft view, it's interesting that now that I've broadened my network, I have all of these friends who are starting businesses and doing amazing things. I think this is actually the third Kickstarter post that I've made in the last couple of months, and I can guarantee that it won't be the last one. This is a welcomed consequence of going to business school.

BE YOUR OWN BOYFRIEND: a guide to life and love

Visit Kaneisha's Kickstarter Page HERE:

Start-Up Needs Beta Testers!

2012-12-10T00:06:00.000-05:00

Here is an open letter from a friend of mine at Johnson at Cornell University (he's a first year)! He came up with this idea probably in September and has gained an incredible amount of traction since then. The team has competed in two start-up events here at Cornell, won Pitch competitions, participated in the eBay hack-a-thon, and is also part of a start-up incubator here at Cornell called eLabs.

Here is how you can help!

--------------------------------------

Dear Rosiefans,

Due to your support, we've received over 550 beta account signups over the last 5 days! We've applied to Startup Labs Syracuse (http://bit.ly/Vxh0xH). If selected, we will receive funding, free office space, and additional resources that will take our company to the next level.

We need to reach 1,000 beta account signups by Dec 14th to achieve our goal. Rosie predicts the household items you need before you run out, and enables you to order them at the lowest price from local grocers and online retailers. Please share this post with your friends and ask them to take 1 minute and 37 seconds to sign up for a free beta account at www.rosieapp.com.

Thank-you,

RosieTeam

Fundraising in Business School!

2012-12-06T02:59:00.001-05:00

Hey All! So in business school there is a lot of stuff going on at all times! One of our clubs - Community Impact - recently had a Pie In The Face contest to raise money. Here is the way it worked:

1. Throughout the week, in our common area - The Atrium - we put money on any of the 20 or so candidates who were up for getting pied.

2. The people with the 8 highest bids were the ones who got pied.

3. Then at our Sage Social, which is our Thursday open bar, we were allowed to bid for who we wanted to pie the most. The highest bid won, and the person with the highest bid or team with the highest bid got do "do the honors"

Here is a video from the event, and yes, the first person who is doing the Pieing is our Director of Admissions! We definitely are family here!

One of our Professors went for $350! One of my friends went for $400! It was good times!

Enjoy - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJ71N4Xemh0

Going to EUROPE!

2012-11-27T07:39:00.001-05:00

So many of you guys know that in May I went to Japan & Korea on a school trek. In Japan we went to Tokyo - Kyoto - Kariuzawa. In Korea we went to Jeju Island (beautiful) - Seoul - and the DMZ so technically I've been to North Korea too hehe...

Well another trip has come up and I will be going to Europe this time.

LONDON - Dec 11th - 13th - There are 6 of us who will be flying to London first. The school trip doesn't start in London but we figured that we might as well head there first for some fun in the rain! I saw a couple of posts from my friends at Tuck and some of them will be in London for a consultancy project. One is a friend I've known for quite a while now and another one is this young lady who was my confidant throughout the application season. You can read the post that i made about her acceptance to Tuck by clicking on the hyperlink. Mind you this was not too long ago (a year and a half ago) but it seems like eternity! So yeah, in London I plan to meet up with at least 2 Tuckie friends...

PRAGUE, Czech republic - Dec 13th - 16th - Of course we will do some touristy things but we will also be visiting:

- DuPont Czech Republic

- Google Czech Republic

Then we will head off to Frankfurt

FRANKFURT, Germany - Dec 16th - 17th, again... more Touristy things
- Accuracy, Corporate Finance Advisory
- European Central Bank

Then we will head off to Brussels

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Dec 17th - , more touristy things. Hopefully I can meet up with one of the exchange students who is here at Johnson this semester who is from Belgium. He's in one of my groups for our Pricing Tactics class.
- European Commission

- BusinessEurope

BEERSE, Belgium - Dec 19th -

- Janssen Pharmaceutica

Then we will head off to Paris

PARIS, France - Dec 19th - 23rd

- ESCP

- Whole-Day Visit to Fontainebleau and INSEAD where we meet up with some other classmates who are doing a INternational Consulting Practicum in France.
- We will also being going to a Wine & Cheese reception at one of our Professor's houses in Fountainebleau. Who you ask? Well... as you know, we just got a new Dean. Dean Dutta who was previously at INSEAD. His wife is also a professor, and will be over in France during that time, so we have a gracious host while we are over there! HEHEH... #Connections

Then I will fly home for two weeks, then head off to Patagonia, Chile for a leadership trek. MOre to come on that trip at a later date though. It's 7:30am here and I need to get some more work done before class at 12 ahah!

#BusinessSchool

Resumes (Pre & Post) Admissions

2012-11-21T05:07:00.001-05:00

I was just chatting with my friend (who used to just be a blog reader but we've met a couple times in person and he's now a friend) who goes to Haas. He was telling me how he was working on his resume and how different it was from the one he submitted for his Haas application. I thought about it and agreed with him. I went through the same thing last year.

It's so funny because I remember spending soooo much time on my resume and just making sure it was perfect for my application. Then I got to school and my resume was essentially ripped apart, in a good way of course. It wasn't ripped apart by our career center but rather by my 2nd years. Here at Johnson we have these things called Career Work Groups (CWGs).

Pretty simple concept actually... let's PRETEND that I was 1st year who wanted to do investment banking. I would be put in a group with 5/6 other 1st years who always wanted to do investment banking. The group would be led by two 2nd years who just completed their investment banking internships. We would then meet each week and go over different topics to prepare us for recruiting. One of those topics that ALL CWGs discuss are resumes. I am not a CWG leader but some of my 2nd yr classmates are and I saw the same red marks on the 1st year resumes that I had on mine last year.

I remember getting my resume back from one of my 2nd years CWG leaders and saying to myself "How is this possible?" But, the corrections were warranted, for sure! I'm thankful that they did that. Now when I see prospective students' resumes I cringe at most of them because I've been "trained" to see them differently now. This is not to say that the business school format is the end all be all in formatting and I see that some people have trouble with it, but that's just the way it is.

Here are three quick tips that I have for you all out there. If some of these seem obvious, trust me, they're not because not everyone does it.

1. ONE-PAGE (end of story)
2. Education goes at the bottom of the page, unless you've JUST completed Undergrad or a Masters program.
3. Don't list your daily duties, list the outcomes of those duties. For instance:

- WRONG = ...worked with X team in planning Y.
- CORRECT= ....worked with X team in planning Y, which increased of X for the month.

Business Week B-School Rankings

2012-11-16T21:07:00.002-05:00

I'm going to keep this broader than one might expect given the great placement of my school on the list. Just to get it out of the way - Johnson ranked 7th in the Business Week B-School rankings yesterday, up from 13th two years ago.

That said, I want to take a moment to speak to all of the people who are on the message boards complaining about all of the rankings (not just business week). In all honesty, if you guys simply look at the rankings and base your desired schools on a set of numbers from three different publications then you are missing the point. There's a reason why each publication ranks schools differently. There are things that some people deem more important than others.

It's interesting because, yes, while each school who goes up in the rankings is happy and schools who may drop in the rankings say "we'll do better next time", I feel like more comments are made from people who are not even in business school. Most of the comments are not warranted. I know an average of about 5/6 people at each of the top 20 schools. Our experiences at school are similar in some regards and very dissimilar in others.

How can someone who has not gone to 1 school say that one school has better X than another school? How would you even know? From visiting on a weekend? #FALSE you wouldn't. You would just know simply from the biases of others. Which is also inherent to each publication. They're all biased.

How can someone who has not gone to b-school know what recruiters from McKinsey think about the school or the students?

It's absurd some of the comments that I saw being made, and by whom? I mean sure we all - ALL looked at the rankings when applying to business school but some of those comments are just ridiculous. If you personal do not think that alumni satisfaction is a good proxy for a ranking criteria, then go focus on say US News and/or Economist. I'm not sure what their criteria are but there's no need to bash business week for theirs.

I was talking to a friend the other day and he said that his friend was applying to Harvard, Wharton, Yale, NYU, Columbia, Tuck, and maybe Johnson. I told him, "hahaha so what you're telling me is that the person hasn't done his/her homework because those schools are incredibly different in terms of culture so he doesn't really know what he wants."

This is what I tell everyone who I talk to. You will learn to discount cashflows at every school. You will learn to do a customer lifetime value analysis at every school. You will learn Porter's 5 Forces at every school. What will differentiate your b-school experience at 1 school vs. someone else's experience at another school are your classmates. Being at a school where the avg. GMAT is 720 is great for some folks. All that means is that people can score high on exams. Does not necessarily mean that they are smarter or have a higher EQ or what have you.

I don't want to make it seem like rankings don't matter at all, because the truth of the matter is that they do matter. The question one should be asking is "Does this methodology reflect what I deem important in a business school? If not, then why am I getting upset over it?" It's just very interesting because being on this side of things as a 2nd year, I definitely see things in a different way now. It's incredible the things that I focused on and thought were important just two years ago. Ask, any business school student what their thoughts are on that.

To that end, I will say "GO JOHNSON!"

Politics in Business School

2012-11-07T03:32:00.001-05:00

I'm writing this post tonight not because I love to talk about politics, but because I've noticed that political discussions in business school are much different from the ones that I had prior to business school.

Before business school I didn't have many friends who voted Republican. Being a gay male in NYC who hailed from the cheerleading industry didn't make for that much exposure to others who thought much differently from me. I did have Republican friends though and i love them to this day. However, In business school you're thrown together with a bunch of people with various viewpoints on ALL of the issues. This is due to the whole issue of diversity of thought that business schools tout when applicants inquire.

It makes for a great discussion and I must say that I've learned to respect the viewpoints of my classmates if they differ from mine. The only one that I will push back on them on is the issue of Gay Marriage. Other than that I just try to educate my classmates on experiences that I've had that they may not have had and they do the same for me even if they're not aware of it. I did come to business school with a myriad of stereotypes about different types of people but that's the beauty of business school - at least my business school. You quickly learn to throw all of the preconceived notions to the side since you really find out what people are about when you're with them 24 hours a day and 7 days a week during the 1st year. There are a lot of Type A personalities and if one can't let things go (like an argument where no one can be persuaded) then you'll have no friends.

With this being the case, I will say that up until tonight (Election Night) I always knew where my friends stood as either a Republican or Democrat but some of the quotes that I saw on Facebook after Obama had been re-elected really got under my skin. I think it was more of the fact that some of the things that were posted, while may not have been geared toward me, it sure felt that way. Now the question is, what do I do with that? Do I just let it go or do I address it? I think it's my duty to address it in a respectful manner. Like I said, these people are my friends and I'm perfectly fine with disagreeing with them and I do think that we have a friendship where I can ask "Hey what did you mean by that?" or "This is how I took that statement and I'm only telling you in case that's not what you meant, so you can know how it may have come off to some."

That's the most that I can do and I feel that if I don't then I'm at fault too because maybe some people are just not aware. Also, we are adults and have a bond that transcends an election and I don't take that lightly.

If you're curious - this is the picture post on FB that prompted this blog post:

So that's all I have to say about that. I have Student Council in 4 hours so I must be going to sleep now! Until next time!

Start-Ups in Business School

2012-10-30T00:38:00.000-04:00

I must first apologize to everyone for not having blogged in over a month! I don't think I have done this since I went on a blogging hiatus in December of 2010 when I was studying for the GMAT while writing my application essays. NOw that I think about it, even then I think I may have blogged a couple of times. In any event, I'm Sorry!

That being said, I think I've alluded to the types of things that I've been doing in my 2nd year of Business school. It's VERY different from the first year, but I'm feeling more and more in tune with myself now than ever before. Let me rephrase that... a couple of weeks ago I felt more in tune than ever before. Lately, I've been a little sidetracked with my own initiatives because of Johnson Means Business, Student Council, Halloween part planning, and helping the first year with their recruiting efforts. That being said, I want this post to be about what I've done for myself and why I feel that for certain entrepreneurs business school is a great experience.

Summer Internship - Let me back up to the summer first. So as you may know I was at a start up in NYC that's a member of General Assembly. The start-up that I was at is www.CraftCoffee.com and I was doing customer acquisitions while there. A great benefit of being within the walls of General Assembly is that I was working on the floor with 16/17 other start-ups so I was able to witness a great deal from their experiences.

Over the summer is when I thought of an idea for my own start-up. I started to map out exactly what this service (web/mobile application) would look like. While at General Assembly, someone taught a class and mentioned Keynotopia to me. Keynotopia is a "program" that enables non-programmers to create mock-ups of a mobile app and website using Apple's Keynote. The user is able to create hyperlinks between slides and then upload it to the Keynotopia app and basically go through the functionality of a working application. I know that I didn't quite explain that correctly, but if you're curious just Google: Keynotopia and you'll see what I'm talking about.

In any event, over the summer I was able to start working on the functionality of the application.

Back to Campus - Once I got back to Ithaca and was able to re-evaluate the classes that I wanted to take, I decided to take the following classes that would help move me along the start-up route.

- Entrepreneurship & Business Ownership (EBO)

- Start Up Issues & Venture Capital Terms

- Oral and Written Communication

- Pricing Strategics & Tactics

- Negotiations

- Managerial Decision Making

This grouping of classes is beneficial in that each class makes me think about a different aspect of my business plan. In my EBO class, our midterm was to form a group and come up with a business idea and pitch to two of our professors and a third person who invests in companies. Then for the final we are to pitch to investors/VCs. My group consists of my good buddies here. One who is a finance guy and wants to go into Private Equity, another who has a great operations background and is focusing on Marketing, and the third who also has a finance/sales background and has been involved in start-ups before.

In my Start-up Issues & VC terms class, I learn every day from a practicing Venture Capitalist. Professor Zach Schulman is his name and I sit right up front every class. I love learning about entrepreneurship then 15 minutes going to my Start-Up class with Professor Schulman where I hear about things from the VC perspective. Many times these views are conflicting but it's great to hear both narratives. Doing this every week has been a blessing.

My Oral & Written communication class is great because as an entrepreneur I will need to be incredibly comfortable with this. I won't say that I've never been one to get nervous talking in front of people because when I was younger, I was so shy that my mom used to ground me for "embarrassing" her with my lack of conversation. Right before my EBO midterm, we had to do a presentation in Oral & WRitten communication and I did a presentation on my pitch deck. It was great to get live feedback from my class, not necessarily on the idea or feasibility, but rather on the delivery which is something that many people will neglect to comment on.

So that's just a little bit of how my classes are helping me on my start-up journey, so lets switch gears a bit now.

Start-up Weekend: Back in September there was an event here at Johnson in Sage called Start-Up Weekend. Here's the URL: http://startupweekend.org/ Here's how it worked.

- On Friday, different people got up and pitched their ideas.

- Then the collective group voted on each idea that they liked and out of the 20 or so ideas 6/7 were chosen. Out of those 20, 2 of the 6 that were chosen were ideas from my fellow business school classmates (they are 1st years). I ended up working with both teams.

- Throughout the weekend we had 54 hours to build a product and vet the idea...do market research... etc all of that stuff.

- On the final day the "owner" of the project got up and pitched it to the group but also some investors.

Here's the picture of one of the teams:

I did make a great connection with someone who is an iPhone mobile application builder. I took him aside at one point over the weekend to vet my idea with him. he really liked it and told me to reach out to him when I knew if I was accepted to 3DS. He would also be willing to put me in touch with the students that he taught in the iPhone mobile application development class here at Cornell.

I know you're going to ask, "Why didn't you pitch your idea Richard?" Well, because I had never participated in an event like this, I wanted to see how it operated first. I wanted to do this knowing that I was going to apply to 3 Day Start-up (3DS) which is held in November. I will get to 3DS in a second. Business school has made me realize that my modus operandi is to observe first then dive in. This was my way to observe first. It positioned me very well for 3DS.

3 Day Start-Up: So 3DS is similar to Start-up weekend. There are some fundamental differences though and 3DS tends to be more technology focused than start-up weekend. For this reason, I was really hoping that I was accepted. It required an application and an interview process. I'm assuming that I did well with both of those because I WAS ACCEPTED TO 3DS!

Now a note about 3DS...one of the Founders of it, is someone who I interned for when I was 20 years old and in college. He and his partner owned an interactive advertising agency down by Wall Street. Now this may not seem like anything significant, but I forgot to mention that he was 18 at the time and lived in Texas, while his partner was 17 and lived in NYC. Neither one of them were in the office because they were in school! Here I was 20 years old interning for them, in their office space in NYC texting them while they were in HIGH SCHOOL! Cut to 10 years later, and I'm applying to 3DS which one of them founded. I actually had a phone call with him a couple of weeks ago A) to catch up but also to get some advice. I do have to give him a call again before 3DS so he can give me some more advice on how to approach the weekend. That's definitely to come though because he's very interested in the idea that I have. It's all about connections right? 10 years ago, who knew that I would be in this position with an idea? I spent years and years working on businesses for other young entrepreneurs who are heavily connected now. I feel that now is my time to shine.

So what I'm doing now in preparation for 3DS is getting my EBO team on the same page that I'm on in terms of a business plan and Keynotopia mock-ups. Our team needs to have a clear idea of the functionality that we're pitching so that at 3DS if my idea is picked, I know exactly the functionality that I can have the other students develop. That will all go into my elevator pitch! It is tough though managing a team of my classmates who have other things going on, but that's what business school is about right? My managerial decision making class has definitely helped me frame a plan of action for them. I'm still working on it though and plan to be for the rest of my life.

Reaching Out MBA Conference: 2 weeks ago I was at the Reaching Out MBA Conference in Boston. This was my 3rd time attending this conference as you would see by looking back in my blog! This time around I felt right at home and it was good to see old friends. One of the best things that happened was that I got to reunite with my friend Ryan Allis. I've definitely spoke to you guys about Ryan before in THIS POST. As i stated in that post he's now a 1st year at HBS so I thought it would be great for him and I to catch up and for me to run my idea by him and learn more about what he's doing. So we met by Harvard Square and had a great lunch. Now sure he's been in the entrepreneurship scene for years and years and years but he's been through A LOT and I would be re-missed if I didn't seek his advice ESPECIALLY because the company he just sold has a very similar business model to ours. We talked for about an hour and a half and then I had to get back to the conference and he had to do a skype call.

Here is a picture of us after dinner:

Back at Johnson: So after the Reaching Out Conference I got back to campus and had to hit the ground running. I downloaded (MBA buzzword) all of the information I had gathered over the weeks and sent it out to my EBO team. I have to keep them in the loop so I sent a looong email basically laying out the next few deliverables that I need from them and things that are coming up. In doing so, I failed to remember that the end of October is one of the busiest times for MBA students. The first years have started their 2nd groupings of classes and people who are TA's for those classes now have different schedules. Additionally, it's a time when us 2nd years are having midterms and recruiting gets into full swing. I'm finding myself having to spend a lot of time keeping everyone up to speed and trying to work around people's schedules. I think I'm going to have to start scheduling meetings at night, which is not something that I want to have to do. That being said, I understand my group and maybe we can meet while having beers. We seem to be in synch when we each have a beer in our hands.

I thought that I would have a week to decompress for a bit and get back into the swing of things regarding my own start-up but I am being pulled in a lot of different directions at the moment. It's going to be tough to do and I'm going to have to do two things:

Re-acclimate myself to not having much sleep. In addition to finishing the mobile app mock-ups, I have to start working on the mock-ups for the website. This is going to take a lot of time.
Stay organized and get things done well before their due dates. On top of being pulled in different ways for different initiatives that I'm working on here at Johnson, I still have classwork that needs to be done. Sure a lot of people say that 2nd year is easier, but let me translate that for you. I am no longer in the CORE. That's all that means. I suppose it's easier in that it's not as grueling and I am accustomed to the time crunch that is business school and the work is easier in that I actually enjoy everything that I have to do. However, it's still time consuming and I find myself with less hours in the day to get things done.

We shall see how much I can get done this week because at the end of this week is the eBay Hackathon.

eBay Hackathon: I've never been to a Hackathon in the true sense of a Hackathon, but again I'm all about having new experiences this year. I figured that I will go and make connections with the Computer Science community here at Johnson (mostly undergrads) and use it as another learning experience as I go into 3DS which is next weekend. The more information I can garner from folks - the better.

Now a lot of people would argue that if you want to do a start-up and be an entrepreneur, then business school is not needed. I would argue that for some people that is true. For other people it is not true. Of course I'm concerned about paying back my student loans after school as that is a REAL concern. However, I'm trying to hedge against having to "sell out" and get a corporate job in lieu of my dreams. I've paid too much money to go an grab the first job that gives me an offer and be seemingly unhappy for the next X years of my life. Business school has been too transformative for me that as I write this I think that would be a waste of my education. Let me say that my education thus far in business school transcends what I've formally learned in classes. That's for another post though...

I'm going to end this post right now because I still have to do a paper, send two important emails, do some research for another paper, and fix my pitch deck for a meeting with a professor tomorrow. it does not look like I will be going to sleep at all day, which will be tough because I have 12 hours until class. That is more than enough time to get everything accomplished but I know that in that 9 o'clock hour, I will be struggling. Thank goodness we get free Starbucks coffee @ school around that time!

Need Survey Respondents!!!!!

2012-10-11T04:23:00.000-04:00

Hi All! I know I've been missing in action for a while, but things are really starting to pick up here at Johnson. I'll keep this post short with the promise that by Friday I will have an updated post about how my life in the "Start-up" culture has been going here at Johnson.

In the mean time, I really need everyone's assistance. I'm conducting a survey and need respondents.

HERE IS THE LINK TO THE SURVEY: http://bit.ly/SSq5zP

Survey For Classmates' Start-Ups!

2012-09-30T02:05:00.000-04:00

So I'm going to write a very long blog post about my participation in the Start-Up weekend here at Cornell! But in the mean time, I have two survey's that I would love for you guys to fill out if you have 4 minutes total!

HERE IS THE FIRST SURVEY - WILL TAKE 1.5 MINUTES

HERE IS THE SECOND SURVEY - WILL TAKE 1 MINUTE

THANK'S ALL!

BOOM