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Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA

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sfhmr
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Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA [#permalink] New post   Updated on: 28 Feb 2021, 02:46
Hi everyone! I apologize if this is not the right place to post this, but I would highly appreciate your advice :)

I’m a Spanish lawyer (Female, 28 yo) with over six years of experience in M&A, business operations and corporate law. I have been working for only two months now as the sole in-house lawyer of a Spanish b-corp fintech startup and prior to that I worked as a senior business lawyer for a UK listed law firm, providing legal advice to startups and VC funds. I hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Law from #1 law school in Spain and an LLM from ESADE Business School.

I am really interested in shifting careers and would love to move to business development / operations roles, specially within a high-growth startup in US, and would like to start my own startup/company in a few years from now. This is why I decided I wanted to pursue an MBA, and was looking initially at European MBAs (IESE and HEC), but since I’m moving with my partner to Washington DC I have been considering Georgetown McDonough or UVA Darden FT MBA. I know there are stronger schools in terms of entrepreneurship (Wharton, Haas) but since my GPAs are pretty low I have not considered applying.

My question is, should I consider other more “non-traditional” MBAs if I’m not interested in following the typical consulting / IB career after graduation? I was thinking perhaps in Babson FT MBA. I am worried that schools such as McDonough or Darden do not offer their graduates many opportunities in terms of entrepreneurship or connexions with startups or even incubators / VC funds, etc.

Any kind of advice / suggestion, would be highly appreciated!

Thank you for your time!

Originally posted by sfhmr on 27 Feb 2021, 10:39.
Last edited by sfhmr on 28 Feb 2021, 02:46, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA [#permalink] New post   27 Feb 2021, 12:12
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Hi and welcome to GMAT Club. Many business schools have entrepreneurship tracks in entrepreneurship clubs and groups specifically focus on start apps and things like that. If anything, you better off going to a larger school that is higher ranked because you would have a stronger group and more opportunities rather than to school like Babson that May deliver a number of these items but only with a small number of their students. My suggestion for you would be to apply to number of schools and start your research now.

Do you have a great background and while your GPA may not be great, GPs are not created equal. Also, the GPA is from years ago and you are a different person now. Do not underestimate yourself. :-)

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Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA [#permalink] New post   28 Feb 2021, 12:06
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sfhmr wrote:
I’m a Spanish lawyer (Female, 28 yo) with over six years of experience in M&A, business operations and corporate law. I have been working for only two months now as the sole in-house lawyer of a Spanish b-corp fintech startup and prior to that I worked as a senior business lawyer for a UK listed law firm, providing legal advice to startups and VC funds. I hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Law from #1 law school in Spain and an LLM from ESADE Business School.


This is an impressive background, and I think your profile will really stand out both for your achievements and the diversity you will bring to the class. It's evident that you've done your research and introspection to form your post-MBA goals as well. A BizDev/Ops/Strategy role in a late-stage startup or even BigTech will be an achievable goal for you with your background and will give you good experience for starting up down the line.

Here's what I think:

  • DO NOT let the GPA hold you back from considering top programs.
    As bb mentioned, GPAs are just one factor, and you can demonstrate your academic and quantitative potential in many other ways: GMAT, TOEFL, an MBA Math transcript, etc. As someone who comes from a very academically competitive demographic and has average GPAs in both my undergrad and postgrad, I can tell you that this is one of those weaknesses for which you have ample countermeasures.

  • How particular are you about being in DC with your partner?
    The US News Top 10 schools most synonymous with tech and entrepreneurship are Stanford, Sloan, Haas, Harvard, and Wharton - they are also in the top 6 in the US News entrepreneurship rankings. Additionally, Ross, Kellogg, Tuck, Stern, and McCombs are also strong programs that would be a good fit for your goals. (And I don't think that Darden is a good fit for your goals.)
    Depending on your location flexibility and GMAT, several of these schools could be in play, and success will come down to flawless execution in other parts of your application.

  • Regarding applying to entrepreneurship-specialist schools like Babson, one-word advice: don't.
    Entrepreneurship is best learned through on-ground experience from hands-on courses, consulting projects and/or in-term internships at startups, and working/co-founding with your classmates. I can argue that the programs I mentioned above are all stronger than Babson in providing you exposure to such resources, plus their brand value, alumni network, cohort strength, and the overall value of MBA is far superior. Not to mention, there are so many other hard and soft skills you'd want to learn in those two years, besides just entrepreneurship. When you're thinking of an MBA, you should think of multi-dimensional value, and so, picking a specialist school doesn't make a lot of sense.
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Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA [#permalink] New post   28 Feb 2021, 13:50
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sfhmr I went from law to entrepreneurship myself and I am so glad that I did. It was funny because when I was at to Tulane Law my colleague said I think you’re more of a people person than a bookworm and that was extremely accurate :-)

i’m meh about Georgetown given your ambitions but Darden is absolutely a fantastic place for entrepreneurship. I’m very bullish about it. They have lots of externships where the students work very closely with start ups in Charlottesville. They have a terrific entrepreneurship center and they’re placing more focus on this all the time. That coupled with the case method makes me always very enthusiastic about Darden for entrepreneurship.

sfhmr wrote:
Hi everyone! I apologize if this is not the right place to post this, but I would highly appreciate your advice :)

I’m a Spanish lawyer (Female, 28 yo) with over six years of experience in M&A, business operations and corporate law. I have been working for only two months now as the sole in-house lawyer of a Spanish b-corp fintech startup and prior to that I worked as a senior business lawyer for a UK listed law firm, providing legal advice to startups and VC funds. I hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Law from #1 law school in Spain and an LLM from ESADE Business School.

I am really interested in shifting careers and would love to move to business development / operations roles, specially within a high-growth startup in US, and would like to start my own startup/company in a few years from now. This is why I decided I wanted to pursue an MBA, and was looking initially at European MBAs (IESE and HEC), but since I’m moving with my partner to Washington DC I have been considering Georgetown McDonough or UVA Darden FT MBA. I know there are stronger schools in terms of entrepreneurship (Wharton, Haas) but since my GPAs are pretty low I have not considered applying.

My question is, should I consider other more “non-traditional” MBAs if I’m not interested in following the typical consulting / IB career after graduation? I was thinking perhaps in Babson FT MBA. I am worried that schools such as McDonough or Darden do not offer their graduates many opportunities in terms of entrepreneurship or connexions with startups or even incubators / VC funds, etc.

Any kind of advice / suggestion, would be highly appreciated!

Thank you for your time!


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Lawyer to MBA - wanting to work in a startup post-MBA [#permalink]
28 Feb 2021, 13:50

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