Summer Reading...

Question

I did not see a thread on this yet. What are admits reading before school starts? At Yale we are required to read the following 3:

The Company: A Short History of a Revolutionary Idea by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge

Buffett by Roger Lowenstein

Personal History by Katharine Graham

Raabend · Answer

That is kind of funny that B-schools have Summer reading lists! Are those books required for certain classes or are they just required in general. Will you get quizzed on them?

They should at least throw in *one* fluff book.

lanter1 · Answer

The Company is required for orientation and the other two are required for Careers class (integrated curriculum class) so technically they are all required.

togafoot · Answer

I bought a selection of books to go through :-
Monkey Business
Liar's Poker
A Random Walk Down Wall Street
Case In Point
Managers Not MBA's
The Goal

and the OG GMAT books (plan on resitting the GMAT before the course starts).

I've read 3 of them already!!!

rhyme · Answer

Managers Not MBA's is best read AFTER you've sent in your deposit.

That said, I think its easily one of the best books I've read in the last two years.

3underscore · Answer

Despite numerous recommendations, I find this book only marginally less frustrating than Taleb. Maybe I am in the wrong mindset all the time for it. I definitely won't be reading it over the summer.

My professor insisted he would present the goal in two minutes and assign alternative reading that was less "currently popular".

agold · Answer

For future financiers, 3 more that I highly recommend are:

The Predators Ball by Connie Bruck
Barbarians at the Gate by Bryan Burrough
Mergers & Acquisitions by Dana Vachon

VC/Entrepeneurship guys, I really liked these 2:

The VC Way by Jeffrey Zygmont
Valley Boy: The Education of Tom Perkins

togafoot · Answer

I can see his point about MBA's not being optimal for management development, but on the counter, a lot of people do MBA's to learn about business practises and may not want to go into management. (I'm only on page 40

) Furthermore, a lot of post-mba jobs are not heavy on soft-skills. I would assume getting a post-mba soft-skill related role would require you to have demonstrated soft-skill experience. E.g. at the Manager level of consultancies, a lot of coaching is required to ensure the consultants can develop further and a key objective is to develop staff in a way that is good for the company and motivating for the employee in their career development plan.

djhouse81 · Answer

We have various online courses and tutorials, all do before we start Orientation. Some of the courses have tests and some have papers. Back in college, I would be throwing my teddy bear arond about this. But, now, I can't wait!!! It's funny how my perspective on summer school work has changed!

terry12 · Answer

For Stanford we were supposed to have required reading in preparation for Critical and Analytical Thinking (CAT). Thankfully, though, the reading was cancelled :-D

I've been trying to read up a bit on business. Recently read Liar's Poker (hilarious) and Built to Last (incredible/inspiring). Also hitting WSJ much more than I ever have before. I'll take a look at some of the stuff suggested by toga and terp as well. Dj, sounds like we've got a set-up pretty similar to Columbia's. We're supposed to read up on basic calculus and accounting and take online proficiency exams. No papers for us though!

sm332 · Answer

I am almost done with Liar's Poker - very entertaining even though it is dated. 
I will check out some of the other ones on this thread.

kryzak · Answer

not sure what the reading list is yet, but will definitely have to start reading WSJ every day.

How long does it take for most of you current students to get through each WSJ?

sm332 · Answer

Add The Economist to your weekly reading list. If you are going to read one news magazine - that is the one.

kryzak · Answer

yes, I have definitely been recommended to read the Economist...

Read the WSJ on the plane back from China yesterday. Learned a lot of economic principles (with the help of my friend) in that one issue.

djhouse81 · Answer

I prefer the WSJ.com. You get the newspaper articles, plus constantly updated articles. Not sure how that's going to work out for me when I am not at a desk all day. It might be the WSJ paper on the subway like the rest of Manhattan.

togafoot · Answer

download and save the articles on the phone so you can read them on the subway. That's what I would do. i.e. browse to articles of interest on the phone and then save the page. Then later you can just go to the saved pages and open them. No need for wifi or network connection because its not accessible underground.

lepium · Answer

I had to read that for a FIN class (during the winter term). Interesting book. I'd say, though, that it is likely to be more useful to the non-finance person who wants to do finance because it helps understand what different companies do and how deals are made, etc. If you know that already, then the reading is more about a specific deal and could prove a little too long to enjoy.

L.

bherronp · Answer

Great magazine, but boy is it dense (as in alot of content). I read businessweek while i do my cardio at the gym, and I can burn through the entire thing in 2 cardio days. Not so for the economist. I didn't renew my subscription to the economist because its very expensive and I just wasn't getting the time to make it through much of it. I may pick it back up before school starts.

sm332 · Answer

All I can I say is conditioning ... my dad started forcing me to read it when I was 16-17 .. needless to say I couldnt make head or tail of 75% of the material back then.

Now I can run through it fairly quickly ... I think everyone just has to make it a point to work through it. As you do more of it, you will start grasping many more of the concepts. It is one of the few news weeklies left which isnt dumbed down.

togafoot · Answer

As much as i like browsing through business publications, there never seems to be enough articles about soft skills... the area I'm most interested in. Learning about different types of people and how to co-operate with them in both a team and coaching manner are the areas i want to focus on utilising tools such as Belbin and Myers-Briggs, and creating strategies and organisations without confirmation bias when analysing them. I don't think business publications have enough articles on soft skills... experiential anecdotes. It's mostly statistics and figures. Too much WHAT, not enough HOW!

Summer Reading...

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