What's your situation at work?

I feel your pain, guys. It is very difficult to keep up the enthusiasm at work when you know your plan is to move on. However, I've been trying to be as enthusiastic and energetic as possible... I am hoping that if I keep it up, I can leave on a high note and have some great references for the future.

If it doesn't work out, and they tell me to pack my bags in January or February, oh well. Like others have said, you only live once and you won't have gaps like this very often ever again. I'd probably travel or try to hunt for a pre-MBA internship.

The difficulties and anxiety that go along with announcing are magnified by the state of the economy. If your company has to do layoffs, restructure, etc. it is difficult to hang on.

This is something I've been debating. Hoping that I hear some good news this week, I would like to leave somewhat shortly after I get my march bonus. It would eat up some of my savings, but I could use the break and would love to travel, etc. The problem is, I have completed all three levels of my CFA, but need 48 months of work experience before I can say I have a CFA charter, which would mean ~ June. Should I stick it out at work just to officially complete the CFA or will it not matter that much in the long run?

Is it typical for MBA students to need pre-MBA references during recruitment? Never really occurred to me. I'd prefer to just make a clean break from everything here.

That's a good point. I'm thinking the same way. I've already told my manager and I plan to quit by end of march and spend sometime in India and travel. Though I don't have any bonus coming my way

How are you going about hunting for a pre-MBA internship. I think it's a great idea, but don't know where to start.

I'm also hunting for one in India. From what I have heard and also through experience applying to a couple of places...this won't work out through normal channels. We have to tap into friends/family network. The regular channel accepts interns only after the 1st year MBA, but if we have connections in a company we can probably get it, sometimes unpaid
I haven't found one yet though.

I'd probably do unpaid if it was a great company and nothing was turning up otherwise.

ETA: I'd REALLY like to have a few summer months off though to get everything prepped for school.

Great thread. My situation is a little different. I have been accepted to my school of choice and would love nothing more than to quit tomorrow. I have other opportunities that I could take advantage of immediately after leaving my current job. However, I work on a relatively small project team and we are approaching the end of a two year project (substantially complete 12/21). Things are crazy right now but will hopefully start to slow down after New Years as we get more into the project closeout phase. I don't feel that I'm really need for that part of the project and could be replaced pretty easily. However, it would be more of an inconvenience to my coworkers because they would have to bring in someone less familiar with our project. I want to leave on good terms, but I'm so over my current job and really excited to pursue other things. My bosses know I've been accepted and would probably prefer me to stay though March. I sort of feel like there will never be a "good" time to make the break and it may be best just to get it over with late Jan/early Feb.

Anyone else have experience with this. Do bosses take it personally and hold grudges or will they get over it?

Is it too much to ask to just get laid off with a couple months severance!!

hmm. that's a good question. did anyone ask to be laid off (or did anyone's managers agree to lay them off) so that you could collect unemployment? i know it's ethically wrong, but to collect a few checks for the month or two before school, that would be sweet

I let my company know over the summer. I got an LOR from my manager, and then I also told the owners directly right after (it's a smallish company, 60-70 people). I also told quite a few of my friends at work, and it spread pretty quickly. Everyone has been very supportive from the execs all the way down, which is great. There was some risk in telling early, but I thought it would help my company a lot more if they knew in advance, and it looks like they appreciated the warning.

Right now my last project is scheduled to run through the week of June 18th. Normally, there are few months of post-event reconciliation that I work on, but I'll be leaving right after this project operates. The truth is, I'd like to leave earlier, but we have a lot of business for 2010 and we'll be pretty short-staffed even with me working. My manager jokingly asks me every couple of weeks if I'm sure I want to leave, as she would rather have me stay. But she can see an MBA would benefit me a great deal, and makes a lot more sense for my career than chugging along here. I feel a little obligated to stay until June at least - if I leave earlier, it will create a staffing nightmare that she would have to deal with, and I owe it to her to help as much as I can. And my clients don't know anything about it yet...

Ideally, I'd like to have 2 months off, but it looks like I'll stop working at the very end of June, travel for most of July, then move in August. Here's hoping to good health this summer!

RE: References

I believe that you will need to have references for recruitment during your MBA program, but I could be wrong. Most companies are very mum about reference checks on former employees these days, due to litigation risks, and I'm not sure whether reference checks play a big role in the process. Personally, I know that if I was looking to hire a six-figure employee, I wouldn't do it without a fair amount of reference checks.

RE: Finding a pre-MBA internship

This is indeed easier said than done. It's something that I hope I never have to do. I would assume it's comparable to "networking for a job" -- i.e. you're just going to have to cold call and cold e-mail alums of the program that you've been accepted to, and hope to strike gold somewhere. It may very well be unpaid. Either that, or you have some family/personal connections that can get you in somewhere.

I believe that some people have taken voluntary buyouts in the past after they got admitted. Generally, this only happens if their company is actually conducting real lay offs/reductions in force and is actually offering this to employees.

What you mentioned would be highly unethical and also very short-term thinking. Is a few thousand $ worth a tainted record at one of your employers? To me, it isn't.

in case anyone is curious, here is the thread regarding pre-mba internships: pre-mba-internship-87881.html

It wouldn't taint your record if your manager/organization agreed to it. If your company would rather "let you go" than let you leave on your own, then obviously they agreed to the arrangement...and I'll be honest, I don't work with the most ethical people. I'm personally not going this route as I feel my profile could benefit from the added months of experience, but it's a viable option if someone wanted to collect income while using the month before b-school to decompress or travel.

My situation is different than most, I guess. I'm coming directly from academia and I have to wrap up a PhD thesis before I leave. I'm currently writing on research paper number 3 and trying to write on the thesis at the same time. I told my boss already last summer when I needed recommendations. He was very supportive even when I let him understand I would not continue to make a career in research science. He could've made my last year difficult, thinking "no use to be nice to her, she's a lost cause", but instead he's been perfectly supportive and enthusiastic.

I'm going to have to work full-time until a couple of weeks before I leave. I will also have to brush up on some business and management skills, been thinking of getting myself some study books or CD-ROMs. I will have to do all this while preparing to defend my thesis in the first weeks of August. Going to be a tough summer.

I agree with eminent. I can't even image of how you would phrase it to ask your employer that... The only time it could work is during a lay-off, which actually happened to one applicant I know at my company back in 2007. In that case, she volunteering to be laid-off actually saved another colleague's job. Everything is situational I guess.

We had a layoff in 2007 where a guy got laid off after getting into an MBA program... worked out extremely well for him, essentially had a free summer getting paid analyst money.

On the flipside, I'd never expect / request this...