Hey baseishome,
Thanks for reaching out to me. You want to real careful with defining your more immediate goals as VC. It's like telling the admissions committee you are going to hit a grand slam, when perhaps you only need to get on base. Very few applicants land jobs in venture capital, so try to increase your attractiveness (as an applicant) by defining something a little more palatable to a recruiter, and thus the admissions committee. If anyone tells you that VC is a realistic path, turnaround walk in the other direction. Again, the possibility exists, but not the probability. Bro - you want to live in the world of probability.
Look around at the guys and gals who have left your firm and on to get an MBA in and work in finance. What was there immediate role upon graduation? Is there a trend or a tried and true path?
Also, if you want to get into a firm that covers high-tech, is your current buy-side research within tech? That is also something that may be critical to define your goals well.
As far as your short list of schools, Stanford and HBS are worlds apart with respect to culture. Just take a look at their essays - night and day. Your other school choices are fine. If you go outside that list, you may want to take a look at MIT and Yale – even Tuck and NYU. The schools send a significant portion of their graduates back in the finance. I suppose you could consider Haas, but really the finance goals you want to go to are out east, and we are not really in Europe either.
Your quant score concerns me -
slightly. Would you be up for re-taking the GMAT and scoring slightly higher on the quant? I know it is bloody hell.
If you would like to discuss your candidacy further during a complimentary consultation, please email me at
mba@amerasiaconsulting.com.
Respectfully,
Paul Lanzillotti
baseishome wrote:
Greetings,
I’m looking to start an MBA in 2014. Any ideas which programs I have a shot at?
Target Schools:
- HBS, Stanford, Booth, Wharton, Columbia
Here are the key details of my profile:
Canadian/Caucasian Male, 25
Education: Undergraduate from a top business school in Canada
GPA 3.6
GMAT 720 (94%), Q45 (68%) V44 (97%), AWA 6 (90%), IR 8 (92%)
Work Experience:
- 2 years at a no-name asset management firm in buy-side equity research
- 1 year at PricewaterhouseCoopers in audit (co-op term)
Extracurricular:
- Good at University (club presidency, other charity work)
- Great after University (board of directors of a charity helping kids with learning disabilities, scout leader, other stuff)
Other Stuff:
- Diagnosed with the learning disability, Dyslexia
- Legacy Status at HBS (brother went there)
Career Goals: Hedge Funds or Venture Capital with high-tech industry focus
Thank you very much for your advice.
Cheers,