Calling all Kellogg Applicants (2016 Intake) Class of 2018!!

Hi,

Do you mind sharing your profile?

Thanks!

FROM Kellogg MBA Blog: Dining with Kellogg alumnae in technology

By Nuria Alonso Lamamie de Clairac I recently had the opportunity to participate in the first Tech Women Alumni Dinner with nine other Kellogg women. We were very lucky to have three Kellogg alumni join us for dinner and share their experiences with us. It was great to have a wide variety of backgrounds represented, from professionals at IBM and Google to employee No. 1 of a startup that now employs 20 people. The dinner environment was perfect to allow real conversations where we got to know these tech professionals. During dinner we talked about the challenges of the tech industry across different areas. We were able to discuss new tech retail trends with Dawn Goulbourn ’12 (Lead Account Partner for Retail Top Accounts at IBM). We discussed how data analytics is disrupting the industry, allowing for more targeted promotions and changing the store experience. We also got the opportunity to teach her about Tilt and Venmo. I also had the opportunity to talk with Mina Arsala ’06 (VP of Marketing and Operations at Medtelligent Inc.) about the challenges of introducing technology in traditional industries such as health care, where resistance to change is high. She also shared with us that the biggest challenge of being the first employee of a company is having to take all the strategic decisions on your own without being able to brainstorm with other people. She mentioned this was both a challenging and rewarding experience. They were all very open to talking about challenges for women in tech. It was very comforting to hear that companies in this industry are making a lot of progress to increase women retention and facilitate a better work-life balance. This conversation was just after Mark Zuckerberg announced he was taking a paternity leave and increasing paternity leave at Facebook to four months. As we have heard before from several alumni, Michelle Devereux Schumaker ’06 (Head of Sales Development, Retail and Technology Sectors at Google) shared how Kellogg’s managerial classes helped her navigate her path to — and through — Google. She has had six different roles in five years, rotating functionally, vertically and geographically. It was stressed that a lot of tech companies are organized internally as startups, despite their current big size. With that in mind, it is important to develop leadership, networking and managerial skills to succeed in this type of environment where your career path is not pre-defined. I left the dinner feeling even more eager to pursue a career in tech — with all the changes the industry in facing — and excited to be part of this challenge. Nuria Alonso Lamamie de Clairac is a first-year student in Kellogg’s MMM program. Prior to Kellogg, Nuria worked in Operations at British Telecommunications in Madrid, Spain. After graduating, she is looking forward to pursuing an Operations role in the tech industry. Filed under: Academics, Career, Student Life Tagged: alumni, Google, IBM, networking, tech, technology, WBA, Women's Business Association

DU graduate with MBA from a top 10 institute in India.
GMAT 730
4 years of post MBA work experience (all outside India)

I am from India too. I havent received any such invite as of yet.
Do they send in batches? Is there any criteria for invite? Do they send invite as per their preliminary review of application?

I'm not sure how they send invites. Even I haven't received any invite yet (Indian applicant based out of Delhi).

AssistOzil : Did you apply for the One year program ? (noticed that you have an MBA already)

I am an indian applicant. No invite as yet

I have applied for the two year MBA. I have a very unconventional profile. Can't reveal details.

It's still early days. Don't panic.

I would like to believe that a lot many Indian applicants will get interview calls later.

As a fellow Indian applicant with a very unconventional profile, I wish you all the best, man. :D

*Gets back to waiting for interview invite*

Can anyone confirm that we will not see any sort of status change or update on the admissions page when our interviewer submits their report?

I am a R1 admit for class of 2018 and I can confirm that you will not see any updates when your application is reviewed or when you receive interview invitation or when your interviewer submits the feedback. Nothing will change in your profile on the application portal till the final decision day.

Many applicants from India in R1 got their interview invites until the last week of the interview deadline. So be patient.

FROM Kellogg MBA Blog: The value of Kellogg’s Biotech and Healthcare Case Competition

By Tim Calkins This weekend, eleven teams of students from nine different business schools will gather at Northwestern to participate in the annual Kellogg Biotech and Healthcare Case Competition. Many of the teams will travel a great distance to attend: teams are flying in from cities ranging from San Francisco (from Haas-Berkeley) and Los Angeles (from Anderson-UCLA) to London (from Said-Oxford) and Washington, D.C. (from McDonough-Georgetown). This event is one of the oldest and best known healthcare case competitions. For more than a decade, teams have been meeting in January to consider some complicated healthcare questions. This year more than thirty teams applied to participate. The 11 teams invited to attend are impressive. So what is the appeal? Why do students devote time and energy to travel to Chicago in the middle of the winter to participate? It isn’t for the money. The case competition has a $5,000 first prize, which isn’t insignificant. Still, most teams won’t win it, and travel costs will likely consume much of the prize money even for the victor. There are three main benefits for students. First, the event is a tremendous opportunity for networking. On the student side, some of the top healthcare students in the country participate in the event. Many are MD/MBAs, some have PhDs. Most have worked in leading healthcare organizations and will head into the industry after graduation. This is a chance for students to meet their peers at different schools. Healthcare is a small world; there is a good chance they will bump into these people in the future. Students walk away with a resume book; the names and contacts are important. It is also an opportunity for students to interact with the judges, who are experienced healthcare executives from AbbVie. Second, the competition gives teams a chance to wrestle with a complex healthcare question outside of a class setting. Last year teams debated how best to launch Amgen’s new PCSK9 molecule. In prior years, teams had to forecast sales of a new molecule, develop a strategy for fighting pneumonia in Uganda and work through operational issues related to HIV tests in Africa. This year teams are debating the merits of direct-to-consumer marketing. By working through the issue, teams gain experience and confidence. Third, the event is great fun. It is exciting; one team will walk away as the winner. Others will fall short. At the start of the day, everything is up for grabs; teams have to create a strong presentation and then present it with flair. It isn’t easy to stand out as the winner. The event isn’t just a competition. Friday night there is a casual, fun dinner at a local pub in Evanston (with no judges in attendance). On Saturday, students can attend the Kellogg Business of Healthcare Conference. There is a celebratory dinner Saturday evening with an awards ceremony. Events like the Kellogg Biotech and Healthcare Case Competition are unique learning and networking experiences. One of the joys of going to business school is the opportunity to participate in events like this. Tim Calkins is a clinical professor of marketing at Kellogg, where he teaches marketing strategy, biomedical marketing and strategic marketing decisions. He also leads Kellogg’s Super Bowl Ad Review. His professional blog can be found at timcalkins.com. Filed under: Academics, Career, Student Life Tagged: Biotech, case, Case Competition, competition, Healthcare, Tim Calkins

Received an invite for off campus interview - waiting for it to be scheduled.

Any correlation between how soon one gets an invite and acceptance rate?

Any African here applying to Kellogg?

Hello everyone,

I just wanted to post about my Kellogg interview experience. I submitted on the deadline, submitted video essay on the 13th, and received an interview invite on the 12th (so yes before the entire app was complete). I have to say that this was one of the best interviews I have ever had. The alum who I interview with, who works in finance, absolutely loved his Kellogg experience and sold the school for me. He talked of the collaborative nature, told me about his experience in Evanston, and about the awesome QUEST orientation that Kellogg offers (look it up if you don't know about it!) I am a nontraditional candidate in that I don't have direct corporate experience and I told him that I was interested in the Social Impact pathway and the Board Fellows program and even though he didn't participate in it he knew several classmates that did and could speak to their individual experiences. This was awesome because it let me know that investment bankers there don't just isolate themselves with people in the same industry. I hope I get admitted and if so can't wait to visit the campus. I also asked about meaningful relationships he had with professors and he spoke in depth about Professor Kraemer...how he's a family man, philanthropist, calls students back on their cell phones, and teaches this great class that encourages students to make sure their work aligns with their values. Overall he made me really excited about business school but even more excited about Kellogg.

P.S. In terms of questions I tried practicing based on what I read online and to be honest it was pointless. You must be able to articulate your story (I liked that my interviewer didn't straight out say "walk me through your resume" but instead "tell me what I should know about you"...this aligned of course with my resume but for some reason was less stressful) and why an MBA and why Kellogg but beyond that the rest was purely conversation.

FROM Kellogg MBA Blog: My thoughts on marketing strategy and branding

Second-year student Rohan Rajiv is blogging once a week about important lessons he is learning at Kellogg. Read more of his posts here. Marketing strategy, to me, comes down to one central insight: “Be cheap or be different.” Everything else is a losing strategy in the long run. A brand, on the other hand, is just a set of associations. Wal-Mart, to take an example, is built on the “be cheap” strategy. And it is likely that you associate Wal-Mart with “cheap” as well. Apple, on the other hand, is built on the “think different” idea. And it is likely you associate Apple with “think different” as well. This is particularly interesting where Apple is concerned because Apple products don’t offer much customization. Every iPhone is exactly the same, with limited ability to customize anything beyond colors. So in some ways, it is think different but own the same thing. In Apple’s case, I would posit that the source of its differentiation has moved from just “think different” to something that points to being cool/aspirational over time. It has clearly worked well for them. When the marketing strategy and the brand’s associations align, it is pretty magical. It means all other components of marketing – e.g. advertising – are aligned, too. Since alignment is key, it points to why marketing needs to begin with the product. Shoving lots of differentiation-based advertising on a bad product isn’t a route to winning in the long term. Customers find out. The product I was thinking about as I was writing this was me/us. As CEO’s of Me, Inc., I think these lessons raise some interesting questions for you and me. In particular, there were two questions that crossed my mind. 1. What is our marketing strategy built off of?  This a bit of a long-term question: Are you going to be cheap, or different? Cheap means undifferentiated on everything except price, and it implies an ability to do something with a cost advantage. If differentiation is the goal, however, it likely means being differentiated on skills. There are two ways to be different on skills – either be among the world’s best in one thing or possess a very unique combination of skills. If you’re going down the “world’s best” path, it means consistent, deliberate practice to be among the world’s best craftsman in your field. For everyone else, it is all about combining various complementary skills. A famous example of the latter is from Scott Adams, author of the Dilbert comic. Scott Adams, in his own words, combined an average sense of humor, average drawing skills and average corporate experience to create a killer comic targeted at a corporate audience. Some of the most valuable professions today require skills across disciplines. For example, it is certain that business leaders for the next two decades will need to be proficient with data. So data analytics and statistics are skills that will matter more as time goes by. But is there a perfect combination that works for your field? While I would posit that there are essential skills depending on your industry (for example, most non-founder CEO’s of leading technology companies seem to have experience running product organizations), I am almost certain there isn’t one set path. Instead, what probably matters here is to just be a learning machine and keep picking up skills. The dots only connect backward. 2. What are the associations linked to our brands?  Ellen Kullman ’83, former CEO of DuPont, recently spoke at Kellogg. She said that people who work with you or know you professionally have a “book” on you. The book typically has answers to two questions: “Does this person get stuff done?” And “does this person have the ability to inspire people to follow them?” Her advice to us was to know what the book about you says, because you can shape it over time. The third question I would add is “what are you good at?” Your professional reputation is likely built on your skills, your ability to get stuff done and your ability to lead. But “how” we do it is something that is unique to our personalities. Ellen’s point was to be aware of what your reputation is and to think intentionally about what you’d like it to be. A quick note on self promotion – I think of self promotion as advertising. Some brands are fantastic at it, and then there are others who shun it completely and rely on word-of-mouth/influencers. My sense on advertising/self-promotion is that you need to pick a strategy that suits your personality. You also need to target it in the right places. Mass market brands need to spend a lot of money on advertising. Niche brands are much more targeted and, in some cases, may not need any at all. The point-of-difference here is that advertising is not marketing. Marketing is the story around your product – the promises it makes and how it keeps those promises. And as a result, it begins with the product. Rohan Rajiv is a second-year student in Kellogg’s Full-Time Two-Year Program. Prior to Kellogg he worked as a consultant serving clients across 14 countries in Europe, Asia, Australia and South America. He interned at LinkedIn in Business Operations and will be heading back to LinkedIn full-time after he graduates in June 2016. He blogs a learning every day, including his MBA Learnings series, on www.ALearningaDay.com. Filed under: Academics, Student Life Tagged: Advertising, alumni, Ellen Kullman, marketing, MBA Learnings, strategy