Michmax3 wrote:
So theoretically you can interview for the on-campus companies and ask them questions, talk to more people etc and if you don't get a good feeling about them, you still have time to then go through a second wave of interviews with some lesser known companies? Or is this not really something that is likely to be pulled off?
It sort of works like b-school admissions. If you get an offer, you have to get back to them with a yes/no before you'll get a chance to hear back from other companies that aren't on the same recruiting cycle.
Here's basically how it works for the heaviest MBA recruiters (banks, consulting firms mostly):
FIRST YEAR
September: start class
November: firms do the shrimp cocktail recruiting presentations for summer internships
December-February: resume submissions for summer internships
February: interviews for summer internships
March: offers made, most want you to say yes/no before April
June - August: summer internship; offers for full-time made to summer interns by end of summer
SECOND YEAR
September: back in class; full-time recruiting starts pretty soon
October: resume submissions, interviews
November: full-time offers made
January/February: most want you to say yes/no to their offers by now
September: first day on the job
So you can see the challenges of trying to do non-traditional and traditional recruiting at the same time. For the MBA factories (i.e. banks and consulting firms that hire MBAs by the boatload), they know their headcount needs way in advance because of their labor model:
Churn and burn.
80-90% of MBA hires either leave or get fired within the first 2 years. So they know they need to replenish the labor pool and approximately the numbers they need well in advance (+/- 10-15%, but still, as a bank/consulting firm you know you need to hire a boatload no matter what).
As such, they can plan their recruiting well in advance, and the schedule above reflects that. In order to ensure their "yield" is as high as possible, they will try and get you to say yes to an offer sooner than later. Some banks will pressure you to say yes right away, or soon thereafter (like a cheap used car salesman, but calling them that would be insulting to used car salesmen). Consulting firms will give you a bit more time but still they will want an answer before you've had a chance to even look at non-traditional jobs/industries.
For summer internships that start in late May or early June, the banks and consulting firms are giving out offers in March (sometimes even as early as January or February depending on the firm). That's MONTHS in advance for basically a 2 month internship. A lot of firms outside of these MBA factories won't even know what they need until a few weeks beforehand. Or even a week beforehand (i.e. "can you start next week?"). So if you're looking to do an internship at a small company, an industry not accustomed to hiring MBAs, and so forth - you're going to have to wait it out until like April or May to really focus on internship recruiting. Which means you're forced to choose between going through the banking/consulting recruiting or avoiding it altogether.
Same goes with full-time recruiting. Some folks know at the end of the summer whether they've gotten an offer from the firm they interned for (i.e. they find out in August for a job that starts a year later in September after they've graduated - a YEAR in advance). And if not that, most banks/consulting firms give out offers by November of your 2nd year, with a deadline to say yes/no by Jan/Feb for a September start date. Which means that these recruiters know a year or so in advance what their hiring/headcount needs are.
And this also forces the hand of many other traditional MBA recruiters that don't hire armies - like consumer products, F500 firms, tech companies and so forth -- but they can only do so much to push their recruiting schedule to match the banks and consulting firms. Most will try, but may be a month or so behind the banks/consulting firms. Most of the time, you will have *barely* enough time between when you have to say yes/no to a bank or consulting firm, and when these firms give out offers. In other words, Microsoft or GE may try to give an offer by February of your 2nd year. And even then, that means that these bigger MBA recruiters know their hiring needs 6 months in advance. Moreover, some of these firms that aren't banks or consulting firms would rather have you start sooner than later. So if they give you an offer in say February, they ideally want you to start as soon as you graduate in May.
Which then leaves the truly non-traditional industries and small firms (i.e. VC, PE, HF, IM, etc with small staff, or startups, boutiques, etc.). Most of these firms operate like normal businesses. When they need someone, they need them right away. So when you interview with them and they like you, it's usually "can you start tomorrow?" or something to that effect (i.e. within weeks, not months of getting the offer).
As such, if you're looking at non-traditional full-time, you have to wait until April or May of your 2nd year before you even start interviewing, and even then, you likely won't have a "summer off" -- expect that they'll want you to start right away, not in September. Most companies that aren't MBA factories or traditional MBA recruiters may only be looking to hire 1-2 people TOTAL, not 25-50 *per* school like Citigroup, McKinsey, or whatever. So their needs (if any) are typically very specific and immediate. That goes with the coveted private equity jobs as well which so many MBAs seem to drool over like hungry dogs. If you want those jobs, you have to wait until close to the end of the year for the most part.
So that's what you're faced with, and why so many MBAs end up going to these MBA factories -- the timing of the offers doesn't really give you the opportunity to pursue non-traditional paths -- UNLESS you are committed to the non-traditional path and completely eschew the banking/consulting recruiting process altogether.
close
06 May 2011, 12:32
You don't need to stress or worry about the future. You can relax now and look forward to a new environment, smart people (some stupid ones too), and a chapter in your life like no other. At the same time, if you can have a plan - a list of goals , priorities, and milestones you will be more successful than 50% of your classmates (more than 80% if you actually write them down).
