<p>Is attending a target school and majoring in business, econ., math, etc. enough to land a job?</p>
<p>No. Just going is not good enough.
It also depends on the firm. (are you talking top tier like McKinsey? Or slightly lower like Deloitte? Or even slightly more lower… like IBM?)</p>
<p>The following stuff is only what I’ve heard:</p>
<p>For a prestigious firm, one path is that you need to go to a target school and have a good GPA (or extracurriculars that make up for a bad GPA) to even land an interview.</p>
<p>The second path is that you “network” your way into an interview (i.e. talk to alumni, have connections).</p>
<p>Once you land the interview, your college and GPA matters much less, and it’s all about your reasoning skills and ability to articulate yourself.</p>
<p>Obviously for a “lesser” consulting firm, you can come from a non-target.</p>
<p>It also does not matter what you major in (if you go to a target). Seriously. It’s a good idea to have good math skills, but you should major in what you like to do. A business/econ major would certainly help, though it is not required or even that big of a boost.</p>
<p>For a non-target, you should major in business to maximize your chances.</p>
<p>I also did some stalking of your profile. Cornell is a target. An engineering major is looked upon highly favorably, due to the quantitative skills (the drawback is that it is harder to get a good GPA, but there’s a more leeway in GPA for engineers).
If you like engineering, you should do it and maybe have some business-related extracurriculars, and maybe take two or three business classes on accounting, finance, etc.</p>
<p>As a final note, work experience (summer internships) are absolutely critical, and are worth much much more than ECs.</p>
<p>Is work at a lesser firm less strenuous and less rewarding than work at Bain, McKinsey, etc.?</p>
<p>From what I’ve heard:
You do work less hours at less prestigious firms. (for McKinsey, Bain, and Boston Consulting, there is typically quite long hours; not as long as investment banking, but still long). IMO it can be difficult to get into these firms; their interview process is where they decide whether to hire you.</p>
<p>I don’t know if it is less rewarding. I would guess that working at M/B/B would be more stimulating because you would work on high-level projects and get to meet executives.</p>
<p>I would like to add that going to M/B/B is highly prestigious, and gives you a 60%+ chance of getting into Harvard Business School (and a basically 100% chance of a top 10 business school).
EDIT: These are just made up numbers, but M/B/B are the #1 feeder into hbs, etc.</p>
<p>Terenec makes some pretty accurate generalizations, but they are that - generalizations. Travel and hours varies wildly between firms and isn’t exactly correlated with prestige.</p>
<p>MBB is the best, but in most circles, places like deloitte, OW, booz, monitor, etc are still very well respected and place into M7 business schools at a similar rate as MBB</p>
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<p>This has been talked about a lot on Wall Street Oasis but I think there is a general consensus that being a “big fish in a small pond” may benefit b-school applicants compared to being a “small fish in a big pond”. And by pond I’m not limiting it to just “financial services”. The preference for diversity may not result in the best possible applicants, but that’s another discussion for another time…</p>
<p>M/B/B prefer engineering/business/econ/finance/science/math majors. It will be much harder for english/pysch/etc. majors to land one of these jobs. This is probably more so for the second tier firms.</p>
<p>The interview process is key to landing one of these positions.</p>
<p>I want an MBA from a top 10 business school, so a top firm would be ideal for that. But, I feel that a “lower” firm would be just fine, too. If I end up at a school with engineering, then I think I’ll be an engineering major (or at least start out as one). If I end up at an LAC, etc., then I’ll probably do math, econ., or computer science (some combination).</p>
<p>Engineering is looked highly upon for M/B/B.</p>
<p>You should really shoot for the stars, though, and not decide too early that you are going to “settle” for a “lower” firm, because it really is self-fulfilling.</p>
<p>But it’s all about 1)the GPA, and 2)the interview.
The major matters very little. Math/Econ/Engineers have an advantage only because they have very rigorous logical analysis skills during the interviews.</p>
<p>How do engineering majors know how to answer interview questions that are case studies? Do they ask engineering majors different types of interview questions? If they have never taken business classes, how would they prepare for the interview?</p>
<p>Which undergrad schools could be considered target schools?</p>
<p>I’m under the impression that a large part of the case studies are logic-based. You can always supplement these skills by joining business-related ECs or taking 1-3 classes in business.</p>
<p>Undergrad targets = All Ivies, Stanford, MIT, Caltech, Berkeley, UVA.
I’m missing a couple, and I’m unsure about some (like Georgetown)</p>
<p>how are Williams/Amherst, Duke, and Northwestern?</p>
<p>Terenac’s list is a little liberal (in my opinion). Some are most likely semi-targets. Williams, Amherst, Duke, and Northwestern are all recruited (semi targets at worst)</p>
<p>I’m going to NYU Stern - any hope?</p>
<p>Of course, I’m not completely sure about exactly what I want to do.</p>
<p>This is what I’ve heard:
Yes- some of the schools are semi-targets, but the distinction is not very important: the key is that what makes a school a target is the fact that the companies come to visit and pickup resumes. UVA is probably a semi-target, Berkeley non Haas and non-engineering are semi-targets (but engineering+haas I would still consider targets).</p>
<p>I think Northwestern is a target.</p>
<p>Williams/Amherst are targets, Duke is a target, U Chicago is probably a target.
I’m not sure about NYU Stern. It goes without saying that NYU Stern sends MANY people to Wall Street and finance, and its reputation is primarily in finance (due to proximity), so I suppose it could be considered a target.
Also, if you’re not sure what you want to do, NYU Stern kind of pigeonholes you.</p>
<p>Let me add some more schools that are mostly semi-targets: Michigan, Emory, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt.</p>
<p>Now, going to a semi-target just means you’ll have to be a little more persistent to get interview offers, and maybe have a slightly higher GPA.</p>
<p>I know that I want to know something within business/finance, just not that I specifically want to do consulting. I think working in a hedge fund would be really exciting (for ME, I know not everyone agrees), but I’m not sure how sustainable that would be. I’m also interested in venture capitalism.</p>
<p>For hedge fund work and venture capital (rofl at venture “capitalism”), you would want to go into investment banking (finance). For this, NYU Stern will adequately prepare you, and you will have an advantage when it comes to getting an internship because you could do internships DURING the school year, if you were so inclined.</p>
<p>It is possible to enter VC through consulting, but it is hard to enter hedge funds through consulting.</p>
<p>I would like to add that it is difficult to get into a reputable hedge fund or venture capital firm, EVEN IF you were to work at Goldman Sachs or something like that.
For venture capital, for example, you would need experience/knowledge of the tech industry.</p>
<p>Terenc, two questions:</p>
<p>1) What are the top 5 truly target schools (not semi target, but targets at their fintest), outside of the Ivies?
2) Would SMU’s Cox school be a target, or W&M’s business school? What about Boston College or Middlebury or UT Austin’s McCombs?</p>
<p>I’ll be joining one of MBB this fall after having served as an intern the previous summer at the same firm. A few notes:</p>
<p>1) Not all the Ivies are targets for all the MBB. For instance, there have been a few years where McKinsey and Bain have not done on-campus recruiting at Dartmouth. And obviously, some of the Ivies are better for recruiting than others. One Ivy’s students represented 1/5 of the undergrad interns at the MBB I was at this past summer. </p>
<p>2) Beyond the Ivies, there are still quite a few targets, some of which may surprise you. Stanford and MIT are both well represented at all the MBB. You’ll regularly find students from Duke and NU in the MBB intern classes. Several of the flagship state universities also do well in recruiting, perhaps even better than some of the private universities with better USNWR reputations. UM-Ann Arbor, UT-Austin, UNC-Chapel Hill, and UVA regularly send students to all MBB, particularly to some of the regional, non-NYC offices they are geographically close to (think, respectively, Detroit/Chicago, Dallas/Houston, Charlotte/Atlanta, etc.).</p>
<p>3) I would disagree with Terenc’s claim that there are no important distinctions between targets and semi-targets. The biggest distinction is that targets send 5-10 students for intern classes and 10-30 (one of MBB gave offers to 35 seniors from one target for full-time positions this past fall) for full-time positions each year, while semi-targets might send only 0-4 for intern classes and 5-8 for full-time. The key consequence of this disparity is that, as a semi-target, you have to truly be a “top student” to get into MBB. For non-targets, the bar is even higher. My colleagues this summer from non-targets were truly standouts at their respective institutions. </p>
<p>You still have to have decent grades and work experience coming from a target to get into MBB, but the recruiting process is much easier for targets. MBB interview 30-80 students at each target, so as long as you get the interview, your performance on the case primarily dictates whether or not you get the offer. At a non-target or semi-target, there are many fewer interview slots, so getting the interview in the first place is the biggest hurdle to getting an offer. In that sense, what you do before you apply to MBB - including networking - matters more for semi-targets and non-targets than for targets, although the case interview is still important for both groups (but I would argue, carries lesser importance for semi-targets/non-targets).</p>