Elites that accept good % of zero-experience students?

Umm... 0%.

Neither internships nor research experience? some schools accept college graduates but the students must have demonstrated SOME potential, either by an impressive internship, start-up...etc.

HBS 2+2 tries to attract students from other fields (i.e. the sciences, people with a lot of impressive research experience)

If you have nothing besides school- no internships, work experience, research experience, then you're definitely not getting admitted.

Please see the above post..

To be honest, and in my opinion, I think it's going to be harder to convince an elite school to let you in if you're coming straight from a master's in engineering management. They may tend to think either 1) why didn't the person do an MBA in the first place? - he/she didn't plan very well and doesn't't know what he/she really wants, or 2) one may come across as a degree collector. Not that it would be impossible, but I would think that one would need a very convincing story as to why they first got an engineering management master's degree and now want/need an MBA.

Now to answer your original question, I don't think there are any elite schools that accept a *significant* or *good* number of candidates with no work experience. There are a few schools that accept a *few* students without work experience (Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Chicago?, Cornell, UCLA, and perhaps a few others), but the few that are accepted are by and large complete rock stars. And in most cases, they have some sort of transferable experience, whether it be starting a company during undergrad (and often selling it successfully), acting as a student body president that oversees a large budget, and so on. Or they're legacy.

Internship experience will count for something, but in my experience, it is certainly not viewed on the same level as full-time professional work experience (not even close, in most cases). Sorry if this sounds discouraging - you just have to have a really, really good reason to be coming straight from another master's degree (especially another management degree) with no work experience. Just my two cents.

Thanks, smkrn. Really appreciate your honest comments. I have thought from your angle before and yes my chances are slim - but I'm not going to give up. MEM is still not MBA and there were reasons why I went for MEM over say M.S. Computer Science (My Bachelor's was in CS & Math) and why I want to go for MBA after MEM....MEM can be specific as it focuses a lot more on Strategic Management, NPD, User Innovation, Operations Research etc. (where you really need to have experience..) than say General Management (where my interest in Risk/Knowledge Management etc. lies..)..As my advisor, a Sloan PhD alum and mentee of Eric Von Hippel, says, MEM is a "de-geeking" degree. I learned and learning a lot in MEM and my experiences here are preparing me to do well in MBA.

I do understand that I may not/won't land up with a $100K position if I get into a top MBA school and graduate with good grades, but money is not everything after all..

Certainly, if you think it make sense for you, go for it. I definitely wasn't saying it is impossible- just that if you're going to have a real shot, you need to have carefully thought through why you've done what you've done to this point and why this is the right next step. It sounds like you're thinking about those things. Good luck!

Not answering your question here but .... keep in mind that an MBA is a unique opportunity to wipe the slate clean - a "tabula rasa". Exercising the option early uses up that value when you least need it - and if in five years you decide that you want to do something completely different, that opportunity won't be there. Just food for thought.

Also agree that no program admits a "good" percentage.

As per Rhyme. Except I am currently applying for jobs pretty much the same as what I used to do, which is kind of soul destroying.

3underscore, I feel for you.

Been following this tread for several post, never seem to have any constructive to add because frankly, I still don't know what you want to do. It seems like you know what you want to do, most specificly, seems like you know what you want to do THIS MINUTE.

Right now, you want an MBA, then the question is why did you get an MEM? A BS in comp sci and math with an MBA from a elite school makes your MEM completely useless.

And then previously you wanted an MEM to move away from engineering, (de-geeking). Then I have to ask, if You don't want to do anything Geek and/or work in a tech field, why did you get BS in comp sci and math??

After your MBA, you want to do General Management?? You can achieve that with working within industry, and with an MEM. Why would General Management be specific to only MBA and unattainable with MEM or to CS/Math BS graduates? (also your interest in Risk Analysis seems specifically geared toward the skills of a BS/MEM grad)


I understand people change their mind and go back to school, but most people at least get a job first before they realize they hate their life I think you should get a Ph'D. That way you can be a student forever.


Personally, working may give you time to evaulate while strengthing your chances to get into a better school. You can only get an MBA once, Save it for when you need it.

The people who get in with little or no experience at all the elites have amazing creds. Top undergrads and grades, and compelling stories. Personally I am not a fan of people going with no experience even if they get in. You dont bring much to the classroom beyond book smarts and you arent going to get as much out of your time in school either. Recruiting is a nightmare with no experience, very few companies will give you the same look as they will someone with 3+ years of proven work experience. You will be viewed like an undergrad hire...a roll of the dice and hope for the best.

Besides like Rhyme, the best thing about the MBA is the break to reevaluate your career path after get a sense of what the working world is really like. Give it 2-4 years of working. Applying because you can't find a job isn't going to be the best alternative, for one if you can't find a job schools probably wont think you are that compelling of a candidate and two its just pushing off the difficult job search period.

Thank you all for sharing your insights. I will reply to the above posts at a later time. Just stopped by to reply to riverripper's latest post - having interned with a bunch of GSB, Kellogg and HBS 2nd years, one HR TA Manager noticed that I seemed to "know" more than them..This is something I felt too (hehe pardon my snobby attitude here) - considering my bookish nature of reading tons of journals every day, keeping myself up-to-date with whatever that's going on in my domain + quality research work. [\self-boasting off] Yes, I'm personally counting on good GMAT scores and stories.

You should definitely get that manager to write you a recommendation then!

I don't really have anything to add other than I think this is a really good point by Rhyme and one that is good to keep in mind when applying and selecting the schools to which you apply. You only get one shot at an MBA, so don't settle.

Right - this has to be taken as just straight talking kaloposia. I am sure you are smart and everything. Being smart really doesn't count for **** at business school. Everyone is pretty smart, and some of them are the most charming people you will ever meet.

The point is - why do you want to go to school now, rather than later? The price isn't going to change, and if you are as smart as you sell, you will have a good career. The point you don't get as an undergrad is that a huge amount of the jobs you think sound great now, turn out to suck balls. You don't know that yet, but when you learn that you get a feel for what you want from a job, where you like to be challenged, things you absolutely hate... summer internships don't give you that. A taste, yes, and an idea, but little else (it is enough to get an idea if you think you could do it for a while or hate it).

Being in a job for about four years should be pre-requisite for my mind, unless you are completely on an entrepreneurial track. The bitterness and twisted nature of having worked through some pretty terrible nonsense, experienced extreme bureaucracy, whistle blown on a boss who was concealing important data - it gives you a tale, it gives you clarity on what you want to do, it gives you a way to contribute in class.

You can get a business school degree without opening a book. You can get a distinction that way in fact. It isn't academia, which I fear you are mistaking it for. It is a highly tailored course of classes that are directly work-place appropriate. No deriving Black Scholes from first principles, no great detail on Ito's lemma unless you want to do it on your own (and you won't have time).

I enjoyed it a lot, and I found it really valuable. But I am also kind of annoyed that I didn't do a PhD (we may be back on this one again, long time followers - met with an MIT HF guy today and chatted about it, he got my bug going).

An MBA isn't about knowing anything, it is about applying everything. And context of understanding for that learning is huge, as is bringing experiences to the table.

And that is *real* experience - internship tales don't cut it so much as out of 400-800 people, they have years of nonsense to talk about. You will probably feel really left out as an undergrad as people discuss corporate structure and how it leads to antipathy through excessive restructure, how a silo system sucks, but a basket-weave matrix system sucks even more. The point is you should enjoy school, and you enjoy it through being able to contribute and being able to really relate to where the learning is. Outside of that framework (and I ignore technical finance courses here - if you want those, do an MFE anyway) there are very few classes, and a lot of chance you won't pick up on the real stuff you should get.

I have a list of about ten or twenty things that I didn't have make sense, but know they will in about 15 years time in my career, and I have seven years experience with a lot of different roles. I can only imagine how big that list could be without the reference I have.

Sorry if this seems like I am raining on your parade - I really feel we are doing you an enormous favor if we convince you to wait at least three years. Maybe more, given you are already heading toward serial academia.