Work experience in medical field? (premed changing fields) Help.

Question

Hi all!

I am going to graduate with a 3.0 cumulative GPA and a science bachelors degree. I am 27 years old, been in school a while, got held back 1 year in HS (wasn't serious about school, graduated with sub-2.0 GPA I believe, completely turned my life around after wards), took 1 year off after HS basically. I have SOME (not enough to justify it all) reasons for my poor GPA (death of someone close, had big surgery, some mental/emotional issues too).

I am an older applicant (or future applicant) who was premed for a while. I realized that medical school wasn't the route for me, my heart wasn't in it, and recent events made it even more clear.

My goal is a top 20 b-school. I take the GMAT in the fall. I decided on the path of the MBA based on advice from some of my friends and mentors, including someone who worked for a large hedge fund and a friend who is in Stanford b-school currently.

I have a lot of volunteer work and work with nonprofit organizations. I've been on several medical missions trips to different countries, etc., but that's obviously unpaid, in-fact, I paid to do it lol. I do have the option of doing a 1-year long internship for a nonprofit. Started an organization on campus for human rights, and held a national position with a human rights organization. The 1-year position was stipended, not sure if that counts as work at all.

The issue is that my degrees are designed to be stepping stone degrees into professional medical programs, and they are VERY useless career wise when used alone.

I've worked 6 months as a science and math tutor at my college, and 6 months at Abercrombie as a model (lol).   Does that count as 1 year work experience?   I know the second one sounds like a joke job, but I liked it and it demonstrates being sociable, which is less common among people from my major.

How much does part-time work experience count? Like if I worked several years part-time?   I really can't find the answer to this, everywhere says b-schools desire full-time, but that you can also list part-time.

Should I get an MPH (masters in public health) or an MS in a hard science (like biomed or biotech or biomed engineering) and work a few years after that?   This would take 2 more years. Even then, I would also mostly be working in a medically related field. But at least it wouldn't be an entry-level job. But it's still not a business-y related field.

Getting a second BS in something business related to get a job for a few years?   This would take 2 years though.

Or what about getting an MBA from a lower ranked school, working a few years, and then applying to a higher ranked school for a second MBA?   This one sounds like a bad choice.

Does work in the medical field count towards hours? Like working as a medical assistant, an EMT, or a scribe?   None of these are managerial, or even in typical business settings. I'll be an EMT in a month or 2. I could easily become a scribe or a medical assistant.

I also don't know ANY traditional business/managerial positions that I am even qualified for with my degrees and background,   so what if I end up working in some low end job like at Publix or something?

Or working as a personal trainer at my university's gym?   I'm qualified for it.

Does unpaid work in a research lab count for anything?   It would be 10-20 hours a week for 2 years if I decided to do that. It would be the exact same work that somebody being paid in a lab would do, it would just be unpaid.

Thanks ya'll!

VeritasPrepDozie · Answer

Thanks for sharing your profile. Lots of questions here, I'm going to give you some overarching guidance, you basically don't have any formal business work experience which is not terrible as many people transition from non traditional backgrounds but most of your work experience will not be considered formal FT work experience including your PT gigs and retail stuff. i would not suggest any more degrees that don't get you closer to your ultimate career goals, which are??? If you are interested in pursuing a career on the business side of the medical field I would look for work experience there for a few years before pursuing an MBA.

jeffreyadcom · Answer

My advice: Don't keep MBA as your goal, as with your hotchpotch of work-ex, even a M7 MBA wouldn't get you anywhere. MBA is only an icing over a robust "work-ex" cake.

Analyse your areas of interest, pick one, specialise and make a career out of it. Atleast 5 years of focused work and then you can think of MBA, if it still interests you.

solarfly · Answer

My "hotchpotch" of work experience is mostly due to focusing on school. I was premed, which doesn't require work experience at all, so any work experience I had was incidental. Most premeds have similar (emt, scribe, nursing assistant, pharmacy technician, tutor, etc.) or nonexistent work experiences (good amount of people I know who matriculated to med school never worked in college or they worked jobs like retail briefly), as this is a sort of all-or-nothing endeavor.

My only issue with your advice of analyzing my areas of interest and specializing in one to make a career out of it is that my degrees are essentially worthless. I don't qualify for any jobs in my field. My degrees are stepping-stone degrees into graduate schools, without a graduate degree, I would be working at Publix or Target or something.

Which is why I am writing this post, to find out if any of my listed work experience might count, and if there's any potential careers that I could do which would make me more competitive for b-schools while simultaneously being a career that I actually have a chance of getting into without doing additional schooling..

Also, with 5 years of work, I would be 32... Wouldn't it be better to get an MBA and then work? Also, why is the 5 year your recommendation when there are business schools that admit applicants with 0 work experience?

Thanks.

solarfly · Answer

Hi, 
Glad that you clarified that my prior "work experience" doesn't count. At least now I know where I stand and what I need to do. 
Gotcha! I'm really not sure if I want to continue even being in the business side of medicine.. My experiences have not been that great. (An MBA wouldn't even be necessary for the management side of medicine, however, an MBA could help with that and open more doors than that, for now, I want a complete change of scenery) 
 What would your recommendations be if I wanted to get work experience OUTSIDE the medical field entirely, in order to be more competitive for MBA programs?  
I have no idea what I am even qualified for, if anything. 
I contacted an MBA consulting co. and they said that I don't really qualify for any jobs that would help with getting into MBA programs. 
Also, for the business side of the medical field, I don't think I qualify for any of that either. Those require MPH or MHA or MBAs. 
My degrees are pretty useless, and in my field a graduate degree is a minimum requirement for most jobs.

Work experience in medical field? (premed changing fields) Help.

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