{"id":3212,"date":"2010-05-19T11:28:32","date_gmt":"2010-05-19T19:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/?p=3212"},"modified":"2010-05-20T11:33:50","modified_gmt":"2010-05-20T19:33:50","slug":"kellogg-a-current-mba-student-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/kellogg-a-current-mba-student-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"Kellogg: A Current MBA Student Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Accepted.com has started a new blog series offering our readers a behind-the-scenes look at selected MBA programs. We hope to offer you a candid picture of student life, and what you should consider as you prepare your application.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Here are some excerpts from an interview with a current\u00a0Kellogg MBA student from a\u00a0financial services\/retail\u00a0background.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>_____________________________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>What is your goal for getting the MBA?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I plan to start my own company in my country (probably grocery or other retail) or join the family retail business to lead new initiatives and ultimately manage a new line or division; so in general I take a highly entrepreneurial focus. My classes at Kellogg have been in general management, family business, and entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n<p><em>How well has Kellogg met your expectations in these areas?<\/em><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Academic\/curriculum<\/em>\u2014I\u2019ve been very happy with the program overall. One nice thing is that many of my professors have extensive field experience, so they bring a lot of practical knowledge to the theory they teach. This makes them much more credible. I especially enjoyed Professor Hennessy\u2019s Marketing core course\u2014she highlighted different ways of approaching markets and targeting consumers and positioning products, much of which came from her real-world experience. Also, I came to b-school to shift from a finance focus to general management and entrepreneurship, but learned a lot from a core Finance course I had to take, and my current Corporate Finance class has been great. Learning so much within finance has been an unexpected surprise.<\/li>\n<li><em>Students<\/em>\u2014They are a very bright group. Very committed. Very analytical, and with good communication skills. Everyone seems to do all the reading for every class, which doesn\u2019t seem humanly possible! But the geographic diversity of my class is not as high as I hoped\u2014Kellogg\u2019s \u201c30% international\u201d breaks down a bit when you consider people who have been living here a long time (e.g., moved as a child from their country to the US). Professional diversity is also limited, too\u2014lots of consulting and banking people, but that\u2019s probably true of most top schools.<\/li>\n<li><em>Extracurricular\/outside of class activities<\/em>\u2014Has been as valuable, if not more, than the academics. I\u2019m very involved in Center for Family Enterprise events, so I\u2019m getting to know CEOs of family business and lots of future family business execs. We also have great speakers on a regular basis\u2014almost every week we get to hear from the CEO of major company. Last week we had the President of the European Central Bank and the CEO of 7-11 speak at different events. I\u2019ve really enjoyed being part of the Family Enterprise Club and LAHIMA, through which I\u2019m helping to plan the Latin America Business Conference.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em>What about the Evanston\/Chicago location?\u00a0 How did that affect your experience? <\/em><\/p>\n<p>This has been a great surprise. I\u2019ve really enjoyed Evanston\u2014it\u2019s a nice little city with an urban feel. The location makes the Kellogg community stronger because everyone lives here. We enjoy the lake and lots of outdoor activities. It\u2019s also very easy to go to Chicago\u2014I go twice a week, on average; definitely every weekend.<\/p>\n<p><em>What have been the trade-offs associated with Kellogg\/b-school in general?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a lot going on in my home country, and sometimes I wish I could be part of it, but I\u2019m getting a lot out of the program, so the tradeoff is worthwhile. In terms of my personal life, b-school hasn\u2019t been too challenging. After my tough work schedule, business school isn\u2019t so bad. I make my own schedule, which is a nice change after working as a trader.<\/p>\n<p><em>What did you find out the school offers that you couldn't find out from the website or an information session?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The collaborative community\/environment. Everyone knows about it, but you don\u2019t really understand its value until you experience it firsthand. It\u2019s very genuine here. People are bright and ambitious, but not overly competitive. Friends at other programs report that their classmates are more cutthroat. Everything here is student-led. It\u2019s really all up to the students. I was surprised by the extent of this, and have gained great teamwork skills because of it.<\/p>\n<p><em>Any effects of the gap between deans (Kellogg\u2019s Dean Dipak Jain left last year, and incoming Dean Sally Blount starts this July)?<\/em><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p>Not really. Interim Dean Chopra has been great, and everyone\u2019s excited about incoming Dean Blount. But I don\u2019t really know what effect she\u2019ll have on the curriculum and culture.<\/p>\n<p><em>What kind of leadership training or mentoring do you receive at Kellogg?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a lot of teamwork. Fits with the culture. I\u2019ve definitely learned leadership skills from working with diverse teams. But there hasn\u2019t been much formal leadership training.<\/p>\n<p><em>How much help has career services been to you?\u00a0 How much of the job search have you had to do on your own?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I was looking for a non-traditional internship, so I had to do a lot of my search on my own. But I worked with Career Management Center coaches and learned from their seminars. They are very thorough; it\u2019s a great resource overall. The downside is that it\u2019s hard for international students to find opportunities outside the US. It doesn\u2019t seem to be as much of a focus for Kellogg.<\/p>\n<p><em>Best thing about Kellogg?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The contacts I\u2019ve made through the Family Enterprise Club and the coursework in this area. Regardless of industry\/seniority, all the visiting executives face the same challenges and are willing to connect. I\u2019ve made lots of friends from family businesses, and I know we\u2019ll be great collaborators and sources of support in the future.<\/p>\n<p><em>The biggest challenge about Kellogg?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Some people do get caught up in academics and focus on grades or just on getting the right job, rather than other types of learning experiences. So much of what I\u2019ve learned here has been outside of courses\/recruiting, but some people focus almost solely on those.<\/p>\n<p><em>Words of advice for current applicants?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Even if you think you\u2019d like Kellogg, it\u2019s very important to visit and really experience the environment\u2014that\u2019s what helped me get a feel for the school and ultimately choose Kellogg over other programs. And I\u2019ve never regretted that decision.<\/p>\n<p>__________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.accepted.com\/aboutus\/AboutUs.aspx?linkid=leftnav\">Accepted.com's staff would<\/a> be happy to guide you as you apply to <a title=\"https:\/\/www.accepted.com\/mba\/northwesternkellogg.aspx\" href=\"https:\/\/www.accepted.com\/mba\/northwesternkellogg.aspx\" target=\"_blank\">Kellogg <\/a>or any other program.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-family: Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,sans-serif;font-size: 12px;line-height: 18px;text-align: left\"><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.accepted.com\/aboutus\/editors.aspx?editorid=24\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"full-image-inline ssNonEditable\"><\/span><\/a> By\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.accepted.com\/aboutus\/editors.aspx?editorid=24\">Dr. Sachin Waikar<\/a><\/em><em>, former McKinsey consultant, published author, and advisor to applicants to business and grad schools.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Accepted.com has started a new blog series offering our readers a behind-the-scenes look at selected MBA programs. We hope to offer you a candid picture of student life, and what&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,3,6,8,10],"tags":[7,109,39,52],"class_list":["post-3212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mba","category-b-school-life","category-current-events","category-fun-stuff","category-interviews","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-family-business","tag-mba-admissions","tag-northwestern-kellogg","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3212"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3214,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3212\/revisions\/3214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}