pre mba books/ courses etc

Question

Any of you guys doing anything.

Any suggesstions on what books to get. I have a CS/Math background, so I will be very behind. 
Finance/Acctng is what i am worried about..

sonibubu · Answer

Marquis parker says in his blog that Stanford suggested reading  Essentials of Accounting  to all matriculating students.

rhyme · Answer

I might throw together a post on this subject if there's interest.

bewakoof · Answer

PLEASEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE... it be really helpful.. 3 months.. especially for us engineeering students! .. i want to know what finance is all about.. and the girl i am seeing right now is a finance major.. so i can ask her all the questions..

rhyme · Answer

Will trade mba prep tips for photos of totally hawt college aged finance Private Equity girl. just kidding.

I'll try to type up some general advice tomorrow from school. I dont plan on actually covering the material, just pointing you guys to what I would recommend you look at and what I would say not to bother with.

In general, my advice would be not to study anything, but I realize some people wont be able to help themselves.

Bdevil25 · Answer

Rhyme-- I'm just that person

I always feel like I need to be learning and moving forward...Stagnation is a horrible feeling to me. I'd be very interested in hearing what you have to say about what would be good to focus on. I've actually been reading some great corporate scandal classics (Smartest Guys in the Room, Den of Thieves, Barbarians at the Gate, When Genius Failed) and have been learning a lot just from those. Any others that should be considered? Gracias

kryzak · Answer

haha, I'll have to tell myself not to study too much. I'll probably spend the summer doing informational interviews with students on what VC is all about and how I can position myself to get a VC internship. Yes, I'm starting way early and most VC students told me I didn't have to do anything in the summer, but if I'm bored, why not?

agold · Answer

For future bankers, The Predators Ball by Connie Bruck is a must read.

For people interested in VC, a couple books I've read that I really enjoyed were: The VC Way by Jeffrey Zygmont and Valley Boy by Tom Perkins.

These books won't brush up your accounting or finance skills, but they are great reads that will give you an insight into the industry. If you're looking for technical books, Damodaran on Valuation is a great place to start.

skaballet · Answer

Monkey Business (IB) and Liar's Poker (bond trading) are both good reads.

bewakoof · Answer

well instead of photos, I will take you out one night in Chicago and we will be good as far as girls are concerned..

) yeah.. I am looking for the advice on what books to read, what to do.. I am definitely travelling, and visiting family and other stuff.. but i want to be a bit productive at the same time. I dont know anyone in M&A for technology firms and that is something which sounds interesting to me. I dont even know how to get informational interviews from people in and around that area..

navy01 · Answer

More Fun Reads... 
Liar's Poker (sales, Salomon Brothers)
Monkey Business (CorpFin, DLJ, now Credit Suisse)
Bombardiers (sales, more of a story)
When Genius Failed (crash of Long Term Capital Managment)
The Smartest Guys in the Room (Enron, I think, haven't read it yet)
The Predator's Ball (IB)
Barbarians at the Gate
Den of Thieves
Moneyball
Accidental Investor

Career Reads... 
Vault Guides
Wetfeet Guides

Reading on Different Firms... 
McKinsey Culture
Goldman: Culture of Success (I'm assuming it will be really dry)
House of Morgan (Another rediculously boring and long read)

Motley Fools Recommended Reading (for individual stock evaluation type stuff)... 
"Elementary"
One Up on Wall Street, by Peter Lynch 
Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist, by Roger Lowenstein 
Value Investing With the Masters, by Kirk Kazanjian 
The Davis Dynasty, by John Rothchild 
Valuegrowth Investing, by Glen Arnold 
"Junior High"
The 5 Keys to Value Investing, by J. Dennis Jean-Jacques 
Beating the Street, by Peter Lynch 
Investment Fables, by Aswath Damodaran 
The Vest Pocket Guide to Value Investing, by C. Thomas Howard 
Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits, by Philip Fisher 
"High School"
Made in America, by Sam Walton 
Forbes' Greatest Investing Stories, by Richard Phalon 
John Neff on Investing, by John Neff 
The Intelligent Investor, by Benjamin Graham 
The Money Masters, by John Train 
"University"
Stocks for the Long Run, by Jeremy Siegel 
Quality of Earnings, by Thornton Oglove 
Investing in Small-Cap Stocks, by Christopher Graja and Elizabeth Ungar 
The Book of Investing Wisdom, by Peter Krass 
You Can Be a Stock Market Genius, by Joel Greenblatt 
"Grad School"
Break Up!, by Campbell, Koch & Sadtler 
Investment Gurus, by Peter Tanous 
Value Investing: A Balanced Approach, by Martin Whitman 
Value Investing: From Graham to Buffett and Beyond, by Bruce Greenwald 
The Road to Serfdom, by F.A. Hayek

agold · Answer

If you can find it - I highly recommend the movie Barbarians at the Gate. Or the book. Excellent book and movie about private equity and the buyout craze in the 80s.

rhyme · Answer

Ok, ill go with something brief for now...

In general, my advice is to do nothing and relax. There will be lots of other people in the same boat as you anyway, and you'll be fine. Admittedly, this is more likely the case at the GSB than at other schools (were, for instance, those with a CFA Level III cert will self select out of basic investments, while at other schools you may well find those people in your class), but in general, I don't think its something you have to do. Enjoy your free time now because time gets to be pretty precious later.

As for what to study, I'd say there are four general areas that are probably considered rudimentary.

1: Statistics:
Pretty fundamental, especially important if you plan on doing finance. I prepared with these notes and found them quite helpful: https://faculty.chicagogsb.edu/alan.best ... index.html

If you want an EASY book to read, I recommend the cartoon guide to statistics. I know, it sounds retarded, and it sort of it sometimes, but its actually something you can tolerate reading. https://www.amazon.com/Cartoon-Guide-Sta ... 0062731025

OCW Link: https://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Mathematics/1 ... /index.htm

2: Accounting
Painful. Just painful. Not an easy subject to learn on your own. Scribd and many many many other sites have tons and tons of stuff to get you started.
See for instance: https://www.scribd.com/doc/2541346/Financial-Accounting
Also helpful: https://ac.boisestate.edu/ac205novakes/
More complete, despite the stab-me-in-the-eye color scheme:
https://intra.som.umass.edu/mannino/Cove ... %20630.htm

I've also attached some notes I had found somewhere once. Not very helpful if you havent seen accounting before, but still.

OCW Link: https://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Sloan-School- ... /index.htm

3: Economics
Personally, I'd focus elsewhere but.... if you need a memory jog:
https://web.mit.edu/~bilalw/www/cases/microeconomics.ppt
(yes, its a GSB ppt hosted by someone at mit, cute)

If you want something more substantial:
https://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Economics/14- ... /index.htm

4: Investments / Basic Finance
Probably not worth studying if you have seen this stuff before. Invest in an HP 12C calculator now and learn it over the summer. I recommend the anniversary edition.

OCW: https://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Sloan-School- ... /index.htm

Attachments

Accounting.zip [1.28 MiB]
Downloaded 148 times

rhyme · Answer

Also, If you want to start thinking about interviews... https://web.mit.edu/~bilalw/www/cases/

bewakoof · Answer

thanks a ton - rhyme..

Toploader · Answer

FWIW, Texas-McCombs recommends Essentials of Accounting and Freakonomics for incoming 1st years.

MBAbot · Answer

Automated notice from GMAT Club MBAbot: 

A member just gave Kudos to this thread, showing it’s still useful. I’ve bumped it to the top so more people can benefit. Feel free to add your own questions or solutions.

 This post was generated automatically.

pre mba books/ courses etc

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards