Brown and Cornell Are Second Tier

College Search & Selection
41

<p>Yep…employers, often very superficial hiring managers, make decisions based on credentialism…they rationalize this and that, but at the end of the day, its all about credentialism…particularly in law firms… which they then use in glossy marketing brochures to lure clients…its sickening. </p>

<p>We all know that elite colleges, as good as they are, do not hold an exclusive on brilliant students, strong programs and knowledge. That is an urban legend, if they think so. </p>

<p>But we must accede somewhat to what employers want…to land that job. </p>

<p>Just the same, some of the smartest and most ethical and respected attorneys and judges in the country didnt attend top 20 law schools. Think about that.</p>

<p>Always strive for the best, but also strive for what is the best fit for you. Its about personal growth and giving back to community. </p>

<p>Wall Street is full of Ivy Leaguers…and we all know what role they had in the financial meltdown, don’t we? All that glitters is not gold.</p>

42

<p>“Gosh, it truly amazes me that my nephew who graduated from Univ of Wisconsin - Madison landed a plush Wall Street job in financial services. However did he do it? Must have slipped through the cracks.”</p>

<p>To know if he “slipped through the cracks” one would have to know more.
If he landed a front-office line position in mergers, in the NYC main office at a bulge-bracket, straight out of college, based soleley on his undergraduate credential as terminal degree, unhooked, I would agree he somehow slipped through the cracks.</p>

<p>On the other hand if he is working as a stockbroker or in retail sales, frankly people with all sorts of backgrounds can get in there. Standards and practices for various back-office areas can also be quite different.</p>

<p>“Financial Sevices” is not a monlith, all jobs within it are not the same. And typical hiring practices in different areas are not the same. And different firms are not the same.</p>

<p>The article may be considered closer to accurate if they are talking solely about the very snootiest areas of the very snootiest firms.</p>

43

<p>monydad</p>

<p>HYP business major students always get positions over MIT/Cornell engineering major/business minor students? I have a hard time believing that.</p>

<p>The engineering programs at these schools are top notch, very rigorous.</p>

44

<p>Ok, am I the only that is aware that HYP dont have busines majors? The athletes there major in sociology, psychology e.t.c not business lol</p>

45

<p>“HYP business major students always get positions over MIT/Cornell engineering major/business minor students? I have a hard time believing that.”</p>

<p>It depends on the job, and the department, and the firm. You read the consulting guy’s quote, from the article, just like I did. At the investment bank I worked at, when they did associate hiring for MBAs they did not recruit at engineering schools for those positions, they recruited at graduate business schools. So yes, for those positions, they would not be interviewing engineering school grads from MIT or Cornell. Unless those individuals had gone on to get MBAs from the graduate business schools they were recruiting at.</p>

<p>For other jobs at the same firm they likely would be interviewing those people.</p>

<p>The engineering programs may be top notch and rigorous, but remember we are not talking about engineering jobs. Many jobs at these firms require skill sets that are not in strong display during those rigorous programs. Some top engineers have these skills, many don’t. There are other jobs within the same organizations that draw more heavily on what these people are more obviously suited for, and they will get those jobs. But they are not always the same jobs as the Harvard MBAs are taking.</p>

<p>I can imagine there may be particular areas or jobs in that guy’s same consulting firm where they might prefer the MIT engineer.</p>

<p>Unfortunately, evidently the article does not address these nuances.</p>

46

<p>Sefago,</p>

<p>Even worse.</p>

47

<p>

</p>

<p>But, for the purposes of recruiting, that doesn’t matter. After all, firms would prefer not to pay the search costs to try to find those top students at lower-ranked schools when they can find a proliferation at the top schools.</p>

<p>To quote from p.11 of the paper:</p>

<p>“The best kid in the country may
be at like Bowling Green, right.But to go to Bowling
Green, interview 20 kids just to find that one needle in
the haystack doesn’t make sense, when you can go to
Harvard it’s like 30 kids that are all superqualified and
great.”</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Again, nobody is saying that hiring decisions are made deterministically according to your school. The paper mentions that this does not occur and that some people from lower-ranked schools will be hired, and indeed, it indeed explicitly discusses how such a hiring decision might occur, for example, if the student states that he was admitted to a higher-ranked school but chose not to go for personal reasons - as the firms seem to care more about where you were admitted than what you learned - or by (luckily) being chosen to interview with those firm employees who themselves had not attended top schools. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>And that tends to be the highest paying and most prestigious positions. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>But they’re returned to making record bonuses. More importantly, all of those bankers who had been surreptitiously building financial bombs during the 2000’s that ultimately exploded upon the world economy had made large bonuses all along the way…and they’re not giving any of it back. The financial system may therefore have been a raw deal for society, but it was a fantastic deal for the participants, so why wouldn’t the best students continue to want to enter?</p>

48

<p>

</p>

<p>Really whats wrong with majoring in sociology? Any proof that sociology is more rigorous than engineering? Or is it based on intuition</p>

49

<p>I see no relationship between majoring in sociology and working at an investment bank. I think most would agree hard sciences are in general more rigorous.</p>

<p>sakky</p>

<p>I am not saying banks are going to search for the brightest at many different colleges. Again, my point was that engineers with a minor in business from MIT/Cornell are extremely qualified candidates. It is hard for me to believe that they could not get a job at a presitigious investment bank. Engineers have proven their ability at quantitave and qualitative analysis(course rigor).</p>

50

<p>I see no relationship between majoring in sociology and working at an investment bank. I think most would agree hard sciences are in general more rigorous.</p>

<p>sakky</p>

<p>I am not saying banks are going to search for the brightest at many different colleges. Again, my point was that engineers with a minor in business from MIT/Cornell are extremely qualified candidates. It is hard for me to believe that they could not get a job at presitigious investment bank. Engineers have proven their ability at quantitave and qualitative analysis(course rigor). I don’t think you have to be a graduate from HYP.</p>

51

<p>

</p>

<p>And they can! Nobody has ever asserted otherwise. </p>

<p>The issue is about likelihoods. Obviously some people from non-targeted schools can nevertheless obtain job offers, and indeed, the article explicitly mentions how some people do exactly that - but it is more difficult to do so. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>But that’s not what the firms want, as they have explicitly mentions that the jobs themselves are not that hard. </p>

<p>prevalent belief that the daily work performed within professional service firms “was not rocket science”</p>

<p>Such firms are also highly suspicious of engineers - presumably especially MIT engineers - because those firms are “nerd-averse”. </p>

<p>*I would trade an
outgoing, friendly confident person for a rocket scientist
anyday.”</p>

<p>those without significant
extracurricular experiences or those who participated
in activities that were primarily academically or pre-
professionally oriented were perceived to be “boring,”
“tools,” “bookworms,”or“nerds” who might turn out
to be “corporate drones” if hired. A consultant(white,
male) articulated the essence of this sentiment:
We like to interview at schools like Harvard and Yale,
but people who have like 4.0s and are in the engineer-
ing department but you know don’t have any friends,
have huge glasses, read their textbooks all day,those
people have no chance here. . .I have always said,[my
firm] is like a fraternity of smart people.
A banking recruitment head(white,female)unpacked
the rationale behind the aversion to“nerds:”</p>

<p>We look for someone who’s got a personality,has
something to bring to the table. You know, for lack
of a better term, someone you can shoot the ****
with. . . Typically. . .they were in sports, they were
involved in different activities on campus. The more
well-rounded individual versus the candidate who has
the 4.0,who’s got all the honors and all the different
Econ classes."
*</p>

<p>[Rivera</a> forthcoming](<a href=“http://www.docstoc.com/docs/69081703/Rivera-forthcoming]Rivera”>http://www.docstoc.com/docs/69081703/Rivera-forthcoming)</p>

52

<p>There are plenty of engineers who not socially enept. Your painting all engineers with a broad stroke. I think the best candidate…engineering undergraduate degree(top program MIT/Cornell) with a MBA(from a top school).</p>

<p>Just because you go to HYP does not mean you are a social butterfly. I know plenty of students majoring in engineering who played sports at a high level. Just not talented enough to get recruited for it. I also know many recruited athletes who don’t have the smarts…and that is why the interview is important.</p>

53

<p>Some comments:
After reading the study, Sakky’s comments in post #36 (and in subsequent posts) were right on the mark. </p>

<p>While there certainly are some tweaks that might have improved the study, the author did examine the topic in a fairly systematic fashion, given the qualitative methodology she employed. The study does add to our understanding of the process by which attendance at an elite school translates into employment outcomes in certain industries, a topic about which there is a paucity of previous research. It’s apparent that some of the amateur social scientists on this thread dismissed the study without understanding it.</p>

<p>As I read the study, one of the most striking things in the quotes from the interviewers at the various firms was the extent of the cognitive biases in their review of the resumes, especially their attributions of moral and characterological qualities to applicants based merely on the schools they attended—certainly, not much evidence of analytic thinking there.</p>

<p>In the larger scheme of things, when one thinks of all the hard work and accomplishments that must have gone into the successful applicants’ admission to certain elite universities, one can’t help but think, what waste of an education and talent. (Of course, that’s not their perspective—they won the prize: They got to Wall Street.)</p>

54

<p>Sakky, you keep restating the opinions of interviewees, we have no clue what our researcher has chosen to omit, until I see some data, people can conjecture all they please. people see patterns in randomness all the time. I take back that the research is worthless, but until someone comes up with a way to quantify the effect of going to a “superelite” schools as opposed to an elite school, on elite law/mc/IB recruiting, or even shows that such an effect actually exists, this research is useless to us.</p>

55

<p>

</p>

<p>To be clear, I am not the one who is making those statements. Those statements are quotes derived from the interviews within the research paper. I am simply telling you what the paper says. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>But it doesn’t matter what you or I think. It only matters what the people in those firms who are doing the hiring think, and if they have an “anti-engineering” or “anti-MIT” bias, there’s not much that we can do about it. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>And, again, nobody has ever argued that all HYP are social butterflies or that hiring decisions at those firms are otherwise deterministically made. In fact, the paper explicitly discusses the fact that plenty of HYP graduates also will not be hired precisely because they lack the desired social skills. Furthermore, nobody is arguing that recruited athletes are always desirable. The typical football player at Auburn would probably not be hired, however athletically talented he may be. The article also explicitly mentions that plenty of engineers also play sports. But as we all know, plenty don’t. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>The article states that as well, and in fact, explicitly states that once you have the interview, whatever other factors may have detracted from your candidacy no longer matter.</p>

<p>*Once you make it to your interview,your resume stops
mattering. I mean you need to know what’s on your
resume and articulate what you’ve done persuasively,
but things like GPA and school don’t matter after the
screen. You can be from University of Texas and have
a 3.2GPAbutifyoudowellintheinterview,you’ll
still get hired." *</p>

<p>But the key issue then is: how do you get the interview in the first place?. And that’s where the other considerations take hold:</p>

<p>Without significant and
appropriate involvement in formalized leisure pursuits,
candidates were unlikely to move to the interview stage.</p>

<p>Without substantial extracurricular commitment, a candidate was unlikely to advance to the interview stage. Although involvement in “any” activity was typically necessary for being “passed on” to the next round, it was frequently not sufficient for being so, as evaluators tended to gravitate towards specific types of extracurricular activities. Across the board, they privileged activities that were motivated by “personal” rather than “professional” interest</p>

<p>*Whereas just being kind of average at Harvard might get you an interview. *</p>

56

<p>

</p>

<p>Look, what do you expect? This is a qualitative ‘first-cut’ research paper on a heretofore poorly understood social dynamic. Nobody is ever going to fully characterize a new social dynamic with a single research paper. That is why I hope this paper spurs follow-on work in order to elucidate greater detail upon this particular topic. Rome was not built in one day. </p>

<p>I agree that researcher bias is an issue with qualitative research. But, frankly, bias is also an issue with quantitative research as well. Nobody ever knows how many econometric regression models you analyzed but simply chose not to report, nobody ever knows how many variables you chose to exclude or include in order to ‘fit’ your model. But the same is true with news articles: reporters are not exactly champing at the bit to report that nothing happened. This is a general epistemological issue that will not be resolved here. </p>

<p>But what is indisputable - unless somebody is prepared to formally accuse the author of academic fraud - is that the researcher did indeed find people who stated those quotes. Granted, these people may be prejudiced, and they may be unrepresentative of their field, but these people - perhaps unfairly - have the power to decide whether you will be hired at their firms or not. </p>

<p>Put another way, let’s say that you’re a highly qualified student at a 2nd tier school who wants a job at one of those firms…only to be shot down by one of those prejudiced guys? Then it doesn’t matter whether he was prejudiced or unrepresentative. All that matters is that you didn’t get the job that you wanted.</p>

57

<p>“Once you make it to your interview,your resume stops
mattering. I mean you need to know what’s on your
resume and articulate what you’ve done persuasively,
but things like GPA and school don’t matter after the
screen.”</p>

<p>At my former firm, once people were called back for interviews, it wasn’t just one interview, it was a series of interviews by numerous people at the firm. Each of those people gets your resume, and they each come with their own opinions and biases. If someone has the bias that everyone from Harvard is great and everyone from U Texas is likely worse, he’s not going to magically lose that bias simply because a kid from U Texas shows up in front of him. The kid will have the chance to change his mind though, about him particularly, which all those screened out wouldn’t get. But that doesn’t mean the bias won’t have some impact on that interviewer’s opinion.</p>

<p>The reason GPA and school don’t seem to matter so much, once people are called back, is because the only people that get called back generally have sufficiently impressive GPAs and schools. Everyone else is screened out. If that were not the case, then those factors would certainly continue to weigh on the various interviewers’ opinions to a greater extent, IMO.</p>

58

<p>

This is so absolutely false that it’s not even worth commenting on but I want to so people aren’t misled by this statement. Choosing Williams over UC Berkeley is a TERRIBLE DECISION if you want to work in Managemen Consulting.</p>

<p>It probably bothers me more as a Cal graduate, but I see such ignorance when it comes to private school kids commenting on the supposed value of a Berkeley degree. Internationally, Berkeley is considered one of the finest institutions in the world while the half of your Tier 1 / 2 schools would not even register a “huh.” Berkeley’s selectivity is also top notch, and its UG Business and Econ programs are phenomenal and extremely well-respected. Whether or not every firm considers Cal a target school, many of my classmates got FO positions at GS/MS/KKR/MBB. Fact is if you get cum laude in Econ/BA at UCB or UCLA you’ve earned the interview, and if you´re well prepared you´ll get the offer too.</p>

<p>Much of what the article in the OP references, and what I see occurring your post, though with your own mark on it, is that people have very little understanding of what is prestigious (or the fact that prestige is not the same anywhere, in NY people would say many Iveys, though not the lessers, best Berkeley, but in London the only Ivey that matches Berkeley for prestige is HYP, and even then Berkeley is seen as on par / better, especially for YP). The author is commenting on trash talking and rumor mongering among recruiters. Granted thats a great insight into many of their minds, but this is an anecdotal tale and many of the empirics when you analyze hiring paint a very different picture from what is stated. The problem that the author is trying to address is this closed attitude people have to any school they don´t consider part of their network, and every school is eager to pretend they are part of the networks and the rest aren´t. (For example, see cheesy acronyms like HYPSWM.)</p>

<p>You´ll rarely hear a succesful Harvard grad talk about what school is or isn’t target because he doesn’t give a ****, but schools with more of a chip on their shoulder, prestigious institutions that don’t have the rep of HBS, are all eager to claim they’re in the same club while they eagerly berate equal and even better schools for spurious reasons. People who jockey prestige do so because they haven’t earned prestige on their own.</p>

<p>Wall Street is evolving. Hiring is evolving. The days when Harvard & Stanford were the only decent business programs in the nation are long over and top companies recognize this immediately. Some HR people are behind the curve or close-minded, others are up to date and use their hiring choices to add value to their companies, not “prestige.” MBB & GS/MS don’t need an Ivey diploma to meet their prestige quota for their week, some years we hire way fewer Harvard or Princeton kids because not every graduating class is equally capable. I couldn´t give a **** if our new hires degree was “prestigious” enough. Prestige we can supply just fine. Whats important is that this candidate adds value to our firm.</p>

59

<p>

</p>

<p>Is it? Well, I can tell you that, right now, of the current MBA students at Harvard Business School who were former Williams College undergrads, a far higher percentage of them seemed to have worked in IB or consulting than did their counterparts from Berkeley. {On the other hand, there do seem to be a proliferation of Berkeley undergrads who worked as engineers.} Now, granted, the HBS student population is a skewed sample, but it’s not clear to me which way it skews, either for or against Berkeley/Williams. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>But we’re not talking about international here. Whether we like it or not, the most lucrative and prestigious jobs for new college graduates tend to be located in the US. Heck, many children of foreign elites choose to attend top US universities rather than study at home with the specific intent of landing one of those high-prestige jobs. </p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I admire your tenacity and I wish that what you were saying was true. Yet the fact remains that many Berkeley econ graduates - including likely even many of the ‘cum laude’ (read: top 20%) graduates - do not garner great jobs. Believe me, I wish they did. </p>

<p><a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Econ.stm[/url]”>https://career.berkeley.edu/Major/Econ.stm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>

</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I am not defending the attitudes of those recruiters, and neither is the author of the research study - and I doubt lesdiablesblues is either. I agree with you that many recruiters at top firms are indeed close-minded and misinformed.</p>

<p>But so what? That certain schools appeal to close-minded people is not an argument against going to those schools, but is actually an argument for it, for there are plenty of close-minded people in the world, and they sometimes can offer jobs that you may want. We sometimes have to deal with close-minded people whether we like it or not.</p>

60

<p>Sakky, perhaps you could share with us the total number of Cal alums that have attended HBS compared to say the total number of Williams or Duke alums?</p>