Business School

As Part II of our series "Rescue Your Round-One Application," Anna Ivey and Marlena Corcoran continue their Q&A. (Read Part I here.)

Couldn't people put this all off for a while, and apply in Round Two or Round Three? Do they really need to go for Round One?

Marlena: Round One, hands down. Admissions officers who are asked this question are quick to say, "Apply when you are truly ready." Well, sure, but my advice is, "Get ready for Round One."

Just think about it. If enough great candidates apply in Round One, a lot of slots are filled. We're not just talking absolute numbers, but kinds of applicants. A committee cannot accept a class composed entirely of, say, engineers. And if they already accepted a large number of engineers in Round One, you may apply in Round Three with engineering qualifications that are just as good, but you're going to need some major sparkle to make the committee say, "Move over, we've got another great engineer."

How about schools like LBS and Columbia that have rolling admissions?

Marlena: If you're applying to a school that has rolling admissions, bear in mind that with every week that passes, you must be more impressive than every candidate they've seen so far—and distinctive enough to create a slot for yourself.

Now, I did not say that every program has a quota. I am saying that the next time you listen to an admissions committee member waffle on this one, you should put on your common-sense spectacles.

But what about European MBA programs? Aren't they geared toward a more leisurely schedule?

Marlena: There's no need to glorify procrastination by dubbing it "Euro-chic." If you're putting off the GMAT now, you may find yourself putting it off six months from now.

Yes, it is worth noting that INSEAD admits two classes per year. Also, INSEAD has three rounds for the January intake and four rounds for the September intake. You may have overheard the INSEAD rep at the AIGAC [Association of International Graduate Admissions Consultants] conference in New York last week sigh, "There is never a time when we are not reading." This is a lifesaver for applicants!

But remember: INSEAD is the exception. "Rescue Your Round-One Application" is a series for applicants who are aiming at the top U.S. MBA programs. I think you would agree, Anna, that when it comes to those schools, there is no doubt about it: Submit your application in Round One.

Not only will you be on time for the U.S. schools, but you might make the first-round deadline at INSEAD, too.

 

Dr. Marlena Corcoran studied for two years at the École normale supérieure in Paris and holds a Ph.D. in English from Brown University. She has held research appointments at Harvard, Princeton, and Brown Universities, and at Wolfson College, Oxford. She has many years' experience teaching and has also worked in the business world. In 2004, she published two novels designed to help non-native speakers improve their English. In 2003, she received an award from Brown for her work with the international community. Marlena speaks fluent German and French in addition to her native English.

Marlena works with college applicants, applicants to masters and PhD programs, international LLM applicants, and MBA applicants. 

I did an online Q&A recently with Dr. Marlena Corcoran, one of our educational consultants who counsels international MBA applicants. Marlena is based out of Boston, Massachusetts, and Munich, Germany.

Marlena, what's the biggest mistake you see non-US applicants make in applying to the top U.S. MBA programs?

They do not allow enough time to compose a convincing application. If your goal is to start at a top U.S. MBA program in the fall of 2010, I sincerely hope that you began preparing your application last winter. If you didn't, this newsletter is for you! Please remember that we will not be discussing an ideal scenario, but how to rescue your round-one application.

That sounds dramatic. Just to put this in context, how do non-U.S. applicants fall into this predicament?

Here in Germany, the problem arises from the difference between the general university admissions processes in Germany and the United States. German secondary-school students must wait until they have their diploma, or Abitur, before they can apply to university.

So that means they apply in, say, July, to begin their bachelor's studies in the fall?

That's right, Anna. And from the German point of view, it is just as startling to hear that the American admissions process is so complicated—and so long. In Germany, it's pretty much point-and-click. Unless you want to study, for example, medicine at a popular location, you can expect to be accepted at the university you designate. People will tell me smugly, "I want to do my MBA at Stanford." They assume that all they need to do is let Stanford know they are coming.

Do MBA-hopefuls still have a chance to prepare for Round One, if they begin today?

Yes. Sit down right now and make yourself a schedule for the next months. Fill in the big rocks, such as:

• take the GMAT
• take it again
• research programs
• draft your essays
• choose and approach your recommenders
• submit transcripts
• enter program deadlines

You'll be surprised at how few weeks are left in which to accomplish all of this before the October deadlines are upon us.

They had better start practicing for the GMAT soon . . .

Today would be good. Go to http://www.mba.com/mba/thegmat and download the free test preparation software. Set aside time to complete a full-length test. The full test is more grueling than you think. It's not only about content. In fact, a large part of success on the exam is developing habits of delivering consistently correct responses over a long period of time and under a great deal of pressure. This can be trained! As one of our GMAT trainers, a brilliant woman from Beijing, says: "I have been taking tests all my life." No wonder she has nerves of steel! You should start training today.

(Read Part II of our Q&A here.) 

Marlena Corcoran studied for two years at the École normale supérieure in Paris and holds a Ph.D. in English from Brown University. She has held research appointments at Harvard, Princeton, and Brown Universities, and at Wolfson College, Oxford. She has many years' experience teaching and has also worked in the business world. In 2004, she published two novels designed to help non-native speakers improve their English. In 2003, she received an award from Brown for her work with the international community. Marlena speaks fluent German and French in addition to her native English.

Marlena works with college applicants, applicants to masters and PhD programs, international LLM applicants, and international MBA applicants.

Last week, 900 students gathered on a sunny day in Boston, 100 years after the founders of Harvard Business School determined that they would create a school to professionalize the art of management.  It was an honor being among those who received a diploma, but the afternoon session the prior day offered a different kind of special feeling.  After the class heard Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan Chase, talk about life lessons and a greater responsibility to local communities and society, several hundred graduating students gathered in the business school auditorium to take an oath to live up to a higher standard as managers.

My experience with business ethics started during my undergraduate years at the University of Notre Dame.  There, the faculty and administration were among the leading proponents of business ethics, not least because of the Catholic nature of the school.  As I was preparing to enter the working world, I wondered how all of this ethical focus was going to tangibly affect my decisions.

I got a clearer answer when I sat for the CPA and CFA exams, which each have a large ethical component as well as a code of conduct by which members are expected to act in their professional and personal lives—if these are broken, the penalties are severe, and can lead to loss of credibility and accreditation.

So, after several years in the management consulting world, I came back to graduate school to study business and public administration at Harvard.  While I was surrounded by both capitalistic and public/non-profit peers and inundated with businesses cases across sectors, I have always wondered how the lessons we learned in my classes would bear on our day-to-day actions.

That is why I was so enthused when a classmate of mine told me about an idea he had for a ‘hippocratic oath’ for MBAs, just like doctors take.  In my mind the idea of both having an ethical framework as well as adding professionalization and accountability to the MBA graduate cohort was a great thing. 

Twenty-five of us have been working on this for the last month, and we have received a huge response from the current HBS graduating class (more than 50% signed the oath), graduating students at other business schools, alumni from several business schools, as well as several national press outlets.  While the press coverage and blogs have ranged from completely against/skeptical of the Oath to completely backing the effort, it has been a great thing to get a balanced discussion going on business ethics and how we as a profession and as a society need to learn from the current financial crisis.

A couple of the highlights from the Oath include:

Goal: Our long-term goal is to transform the field of management into a true profession, one in which MBAs are respected for their integrity, professionalism, and leadership. We hope to see hundreds of thousands of MBAs take the MBA oath, or something like it, as a step towards realizing this vision.

Preamble: As a manager, my purpose is to serve the greater good by bringing people and resources together to create value that no single individual can build alone. Therefore I will seek a course that enhances the value my enterprise can create for society over the long term. I recognize my decisions can have far-reaching consequences that affect the well-being of individuals inside and outside my enterprise, today and in the future. As I reconcile the interests of different constituencies, I will face difficult choices.

So, what does this mean for all of those folks out there preparing to apply to schools this fall.  There are several questions you should consider and attempt to answer:  What am I expecting to garner from a prospective business school in terms of business ethics education and institutional knowledge about the causes of the financial crisis or business failures in general?  Do I see a value in having accountability for my actions as an MBA?  What sort of ethical code to I live by and aspire to?  Knowing that the Oath and its tenets are top of mind for many business school professors (and likely admissions committees), how can I relay these thoughts successfully in my applications?

While many bloggers have criticized the Oath for lacking teeth or any process for accountability, I am confident that this aspirational first step has been necessary to get the word out there.  I see a strong possibility that, like an MD, JD, or CPA, the MBA will begin to take on a stronger meaning and will embrace accountability standards that will reward and punish ethical and un-Oath-like behavior, respectively.

To learn more about the Oath, go to http://mbaoath.org.

Below is a selection of national news media on the Oath:

New York Times – “A Promise to be Ethical in an Era of Immorality”

Financial Times – “Harvard MBAs Pledge to Do Good”

The Economist – "Forswearing Greed"

CNN - “MBA Students Pledge to Serve the Greater Good”

BusinessWeek – “MBAs – First, Do No Harm”

Please share your thoughts and comments! 

 

Originally hailing from the Midwest, Paul Buser attended the University of Notre Dame for his undergraduate education. There he studied Finance, Accounting, and Public Policy while tirelessly cheering (in vain) for a Notre Dame football championship. After graduating summa cum laude in 2003, Paul worked as a management consultant at the Boston Consulting Group in Chicago and Thailand, specializing in operations and strategy. He has also directed a non-profit consulting team in Cambodia, Kosovo, and the U.S. through the International Business Council. Paul is a CPA and holds a CFA charter, and he just graduated with combined degrees from Harvard Business School (MBA) and the Kennedy School of Government (MPA). As part of the Ivey Consulting team, Paul works with business school and public policy school applicants.

Just two weeks ago (a Tuesday to be exact), I was in my law school class, constantly stealing glances at my computer screen to check if there were any new messages. I was anxious.

"Any news?" I typed, then clicked send.

"Nope, not yet."  Rohini replied within seconds.

Rohini and I are part of a five-person team. Earlier in the Spring Quarter, we had decided to participate in a venture capital competition sponsored by the University of Chicago Booth School of Business - the "New Venture Challenge" (NVC).

"I just got asked how we spell our company name. That might mean we're in…?" Rohini was hanging out near the Polsky Center, where the judges were finalizing their results; she too was obviously anxious.

The suspense was driving me crazy, so I turned off my laptop, and tried to keep my mind focused on my law professor. I didn't turn on my computer again, until after class. When I open my email inbox, I found a message from Ravi (another team member): "WE'RE A FINALIST!"

Business Plan Competitions

Practically every big name business school in the nation hosts some form of annual business plan competition. Hundreds (perhaps thousands) of entrepreneurially minded students from all walks and disciplines submit their ideas in hopes to get a chance to stand before venture capitalists, who may invest in their ideas and help them realize their dreams.

Some of the representative business competitions out there, by region, are:

West Coast
E-Challenge: Stanford's Business Plan Competition (see here)
UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition (see here)

East Coast
Harvard's Business Plan Contest (see here)
MIT Entrepreneurship Competition (see here)

The South
Moot Corp Competition McCombs School of Business (UT) (see here)

The Midwest
New Venture Challenge (NVC) (see here)

NVC Selection Process

There are essentially three levels in NVC: Phase I, Phase II, and Final Round.

During Phase I, hundreds of entrepreneurs from all across the nation submit a feasibility summary (basically, a brief summary describing the business concept, financials, and management) to the business school. 29 teams are selected to move onto Phase II.

During Phase II, the selected teams have the opportunity to create their business plan (a document introducing the business concept, marketing strategy, management team, and financial milestones) and practice pitching their slide decks before a panel of venture capitalists. Based on the business plan and pitch, 10 teams are selected to move onto the Final Round.

During the Final Round, selected teams submit their business plans and pitch their ideas to 30 high profile venture capitalists. One winner is chosen. The winner gets a cash prize. But the real prize is the glory that follows from winning and the invaluable investment relationships built throughout the process.

But it’s probably best to think of the competition as something akin to American Idol. There is only one winner, but many participants, especially those in the Final Round, get noticed and "picked up" by some investor. In short, just because a team doesn't win, doesn't mean it won't get financed; many losing teams from the past are now extremely successful businesses.

The Beginning of NVC

My team consists of 3 MBAs and 2 JDs. It's quite an amazing bunch. Collectively the team has experience in virtually every single industry imaginable (e.g., i-banking, IT consulting, law, restaurant management, etc.)

I personally have no background in finance or economics. But long before attending law school, I was fascinated with venture capital ("VC") financing. Venture capitalists ("VCs") basically invest in ideas. An entrepreneur who approaches VCs needs to convince them that his/her business plan (a.k.a. the idea) is worth the VCs’ time (~5 years) and money (millions of dollars).  The thought of being funded to realize an idea as well as investing in the next brilliant idea (not stocks, bonds or real property) is so exciting to me.

Because of that long-standing interest, naturally, during the beginning of my 2L year, I took a law school course called "Entrepreneurship in Practice" with John Rodkin. The class was basically a course on how to successfully obtain venture financing. As an experienced entrepreneur and venture capitalist, John made a point to help us experience the VC world by running through case studies. These case studies often forced us to role play and act as either the entrepreneur's lawyer or as the VC. The final exam was to conceive a business, draft a business plan, and present the business.

After my classmates and I finished presenting our businesses, John encouraged us submit our business plans to NVC. That was the beginning of my NVC journey.

What is a Business Plan?

A business plan is basically the blueprint of the business. The objective is to draft a persuasive and easy-to-read document that will convince anyone reading the plan to agree that the idea proposed in the plan is a sure winner.

But the process of drafting a good business plan is long and arduous. First, for my "Entrepreneurship in Practice" final exam, my teammate and I had to find a venture-finance worthy business proposal. Most VCs invest only in easily scalable business models that will bring huge returns in fewer than five years (e.g., Google, Facebook). After bouncing ideas back and forth, we eventually found an entrepreneur in Florida who had developed "Peelable Paint." Although I can't discuss the details due to privacy concerns, suffice it to say that my teammate and I were convinced that this cutting-edge paint would have any VC going gaga.

Now that we had an idea, we had to create our pitch deck (= PowerPoint presentation). Writing a great business plan is a lot like drafting a great legal brief: the writing has to be clear, concise, persuasive, and to the point. The process of creating a pitch deck forces people to focus and clarify their thoughts. Guy Kawasaki, a VC godfather, preaches the 10-20-30 strategy for creating a successful pitch deck:

1. No more than 10 slides;
2. No presentation more than 20 minutes; and
3. No font smaller than size 30.

My teammate and I faithfully followed Kawasaki's advice. The most difficult aspect, for me, was creating financial projections: cash trough, earnings, growth in EBITDA, etc. This is where it helped to have an MBA teammate.  

After creating the pitch deck, we finally got down to writing our business plan. We stayed up many a night - one night we worked 20 hours straight - drafting the "perfect" business plan.

To make the long story short, we received very high marks on our final exam. My teammate eventually submitted the business plan to Tuft's business plan competition, where it won a cash prize.

Tune in for Part II tomorrow! Please share your comments, reactions, and experiences.

David Yi attended Middlebury College and graduated with a degree in Political Science and Chinese. A Peace Corps volunteer in the People's Republic of China, he also acquired extensive experience teaching and training college and post-college level students in China and Korea. David then returned to the United States, where he founded oneAsia, a non-profit organization committed to encouraging unity and volunteerism among Asian nations. He soon had two jobs: running a non-profit by day and teaching the LSAT by night. David is currently a 2L at the University of Chicago Law School and works with law school applicants as part of the Ivey Consulting team.

There's a nice collection of articles in today's WSJ for aspiring lawyers and JD/MBAs:

Creating a Shorter Path to a JD/MBA: This is a good discussion of the pros and cons of the 3-year joint degree. I would add that the 3-year program is too short unless you have a fair amount of work experience and very targeted goals for the joint program (and what comes after). You would need to hit the ground running as soon as you get there, and be very smart about mapping out those three years and the summers in between. Most law school applicants and many business school applicants I cross paths with don't have that much focus yet. They are going to graduate school to figure out what they want to do with themselves, and they are not really the ones who would benefit from the fast-track joint degree.

Law Firms Embrace Business School 101: Law firms are realizing that their attorneys lack management and business training and are therefore sending them to executive ed classes at business schools ("We realized our associates don't have an inside view of how our clients work").

Lawyers Often Lack the Skills Needed to Draw, Keep Clients: They don't teach you business development or client relations in law school, and I often remind law school applicants who tell me they're "not interested in business" that at a minimum, if they hope to advance as lawyers and own an equity stake in a law firm one day (whether at a large firm or as solo practitioners), they will have to learn how to think like business owners and learn how to run a business.

Hand in hand with client relations, it's also important for young attorneys to learn how to interact appropriately with more senior associates and law firm partners. Here's a recent example, in the form of an email exchange, of a junior law firm associate who needs to learn those skills (tone, content, spelling, judgment). It's a good reminder that going to a top law school is not the same thing as knowing how to succeed in the working world.

Thoughts? Comments? Please share.

Could you tell me if schools gives applicants time to visit if they are admitted from the waitlist or hold category? Also, when do they make this decision?

Some schools give an option to visit (or at least give you a little time to decide), while others will give you only a short window to accept or decline the offer. The latter is more likely; if you were admitted off the waitlist, you may be told that you have a week (or less) to decide because they need to know whether to offer the position to someone else on the waitlist. In short, I would not bank on having time to set up a formal visit.

In terms of timing, there’s no way to predict that, because it all depends on how few or how many people who have already put down deposits decide to withdraw over the course of the summer (either because they themselves have been admitted from waitlists at other schools, their plans change, or they just fail to show up at orientation). That's called the "summer melt." I’ve known students to be admitted from a waitlist as late as August and even during orientation in September.

My suggestion is to put down the initial deposit at your top choice and then if you are admitted elsewhere and want to make the switch, all you’ve lost is the deposit. Just be sure you read the fine print on the letter of acceptance and/or letter for the deposit to make sure they aren’t asking you to withdraw your applications at other school (in which case, you can't stay on wailtists elsewhere). More on that below.

 

Say that next month I am admitted from a waitlist at School X. Can I still remain on other waitlists?

Waitlists are very odd, and there’s no way to predict if or when you’ll be admitted from one of them. Chances are relatively low, in fact, so I don’t think you’ll be faced with acceptances from more than one waitlist. That said, if you are accepted at School X, you will send in a deposit to secure your spot in the class. If, at some point after that, you are admitted to School Y, the “loss” to you of accepting the later School Y offer is the deposit you have at School X.

Many schools take deposits in stages, and follow-up deposits will typically be larger than the initial deposit. At some point you may be asked to send in your first tuition check (typically before classes start). In that situation, the “loss” to you would increase since you’d have more money invested in School X.

One caveat to this (and it’s an important one): read the fine print when you send in admissions deposits to make sure the school isn’t saying, “By sending us this $ you are promising to withdraw from all other waitlists.” In many cases, if a school is offering you a spot off a waitlist, then they are under the impression that you are committed to that school. That will vary by school, so read the language and/or listen to any communications you have with the schools.

 

I am on multiple waitlists. I don’t want to commit to my genuine number one choice, get rejected, and then not get into to my second choice because I didn’t make as strong a declaration of interest or intent to accept Is a declaration of intent binding? If it is unlikely that I would be admitted from more than one waitlist, would it be OK to send a declaration of intent to more than one school?

I understand your issue with writing to one school, getting rejected, and not getting into a second choice. There is no formal policy saying that a letter of continued interest in which you “pledge” to attend is binding. That said, the process requires honesty from everyone—applicants, admissions people, etc. You can certainly write to multiple schools and express “strong” interest in remaining on the waitlist to be admitted (or some other phrasing), but you should definitely not make a “pledge” (or anything that could be construed that way) to more than one school.

 

I want to send a "pledge" letter to a school that waitlisted me. How do I phrase it? What does pledging mean for me and the school? Can it ever hurt my chances of admission?

A letter of interest (or email) in which you "pledge" to attend a school if admitted from its waitlist is fine. Generally, people say something along the lines of: “If offered a place in the class, I would definitely accept” or “if admitted, I would definitely attend.” There is no formulaic answer or phrasing needed.

Pledging won’t hurt you. It is used to signal to the school that you will have a positive impact on its yield (the percentage of admitted applicants who accept a school's offer). That is, you’re telling the school that if it offers you a spot, you’ll help the school's overall yield by definitely accepting the offer. For the school, it’s a signal—a message indicating that it will not be wasting an offer (and take a hit to its yield) if it extends one to you from the waitlist.

There is no formal policy saying that a letter of continued interest (or email) in which you pledge to attend is binding. That said, you should definitely not make a pledge (or anything that could be construed that way) to more than one school.

 

I'm planning a trip to a school where I'm waitlisted. Is this a good idea? If they let me visit, is there anything I need to do?

There's no reason for them to not “let you” visit; in fact, you can visit whenever you’d like. Whether you get to speak to someone in admissions is a different story, but at the very least you can visit and see what’s what.

If you get a chance to speak with someone from admissions, make sure to introduce yourself clearly so he/she knows your name. You'll need to show specific (rather than generic) interest in the school and emphasize your fit. You can also use that opportunity to update them on any developments or more recent accomplishments.

School visits can be helpful to you in identifying what you like (and dislike) about a particular place, but don't expect that a visit will cause you to be removed from the waitlist and rewarded with an offer of admission. While you can make an impression on admissions representatives during your visit, there's no guarantee that the school will take anyone from the waitlist.

Still, visits can make an impression about the sincerity of your interest in the school, and they also help you in your own planning. If you haven't visited the school before, it can be hard to decide, on the spot, whether to accept a waitlist offer or not (particularly if a given waitlist school is not your obvious first choice). The more you know about the school before accepting, the better.

As an aside: If you can't visit, it's still a good idea to emphasizefit and update them about any developments in a LOCI (a letter ofcontinued interest, which you should be sending them about once amonth). If you've already included those pieces of information inprevious communications, it's fine simply to say that you're still veryinterested in remaining on the waitlist and thanking them for theircontinued consideration of your application.

 

Do you have any tips or feedback from your own waitlist experiences? Please share in a comment. You can find more waitlist advice in a previous posting here.

 

Gregory Henning is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Virginia Law School. After graduating from law school, he clerked for Judge R. Lanier Anderson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and then became an Assistant District Attorney in Boston. As part of the Anna Ivey team, works primarily with law school applicants.

As a member of the Association of International Graduate Admissions Consultants (AIGAC), we are conducting a survey to help us better understand MBA applicants' goals and needs.  We invite you to share your thoughts and opinions on the MBA search process with us.  We have created a short online survey to explore the factors that matter most to you as a business school applicant.

This online survey should take about 10 minutes to complete.  We would love to receive as many responses as possible before the closing date of Friday, March 20th, and we'll be giving away an iPod Touch and two iPod Shuffles as a token of our gratitude.

Thanks in advance for your participation!

Click here to begin the survey.

I've written before about the significant quality control challenges that law school study-abroad programs pose. Here are some perspectives, courtesy of the Chronicle of Higher Education, from the business school side about global MBA programs and exchanges, from a recent meeting of 400 business school deans last week, where they raised questions "about whether the sweeping globalization of management education amounted to more rhetoric than reality." Bullets below are direct quotations from the article:

• Pankaj Ghemawat, a professor of global strategy at IESE Business School... argued that most of the international collaborations business schools have been touting on their Web sites are limited to student and faculty exchanges, with little meaningful exchange in the curriculum. "If that's all we do, we risk becoming a specialized segment of the travel and hospitality industry."... He also dismissed a "globaloney" the premise that global borders matter little today in solving the world's business problems. "If you're an MBA student, what could be more seductive than being told the world is one, and you're now perfectly equipped, once you get your degree, to go out and stamp out global management programs, wherever they spring up -- kind of a global SWAT team."
• "It's time to stop pretending that we're doing more than we really are," Edward A. Snyder, dean of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, told a packed audience at the annual deans' meeting....  "Given the worldwide economic meltdown, fewer MBA programs will be able to recruit students from around the world, educate them at an overseas campus, and then place them in high-level jobs, Mr. Snyder said. "The good number of jobs that will justify the cost of bringing people in will decline."
• Blair H. Sheppard, dean of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, said Duke is moving ahead this summer with an expanded version if its "cross-continent MBA," in which students will do much of their work over the Internet, but also spend periods working and studying at campuses in Britain, China, India, Russia, and the United Arab Emirates, as well as Duke's main campus in North Carolina."

 

These are not the happiest times to be coming out of law school or business school. An article and a blog posting in today's Wall Street Journal jumped out at me:

"Recession Batters Law Firms, Triggering Layoffs, Closings" is a sad post-mortem of the once-venerable San Francisco law firm Heller, Ehrman, which closed its doors last year. I summered there as a 2L, during much happier times (thank you, internet bubble). It sounds as if Heller, like many other firms, had been in the process of renegotiating its business model, and that's been a problem industry-wide. But check out this paragraph: 

When Heller lawyers gathered for a retreat in March 2007 in Santa Barbara, Calif., some had grown anxious about the firm's finances. Mr. Bomse staged a mock opera about the firm's struggles. It featured professional opera singers and members of the Santa Barbara orchestra, and cost the firm more than $200,000, according to a member of the firm's executive committee. During the performance, lawyer David Goodwin says his wife turned to him, aghast at what she imagined the cost to be, and said, "This is a poorly managed firm. You need to leave."

After reading the whole article, and this anecdote in particular, I find the article's title misleading. It's not clear to me at all that the recession is responsible for killing off Heller. The article points to the firm's overreliance on big cases that ended up settling, as well as clients in general who have been wising up and learning to avoid long, costly trials. And throwing money around on stupid things also says something about a firm's managerial priorities.

So lawyer-guy's wife got me thinking. When you're out intervieiwng, for any kind of job, you can take a look around at your prospective employer and, like that wife at the retreat, do a gut check. I know firms are spending a lot less on recruiting these days, but they still have to recruit. So if employers are being frugal in recruiting you, think about whether that's actually a good sign. Same goes for colleges and grad schools that try to lure you with stupid bling.

"Nowadays, an MBA Doesn't Equal Job Security" states the obvious to some degree -- did it ever equal job security? -- but take a look at the interesting comments to that blog posting, where we see a debate unfold about the commodification of MBA degrees vs. the school of thought that still puts a lot of stock in the "seal of approval" you're getting from the top schools. I'll add to that debate this observation: I'm hearing from a number of MBAs from the very top schools who are having trouble finding jobs right now. It's grim. Hang in there. An MBA, even from a top school, and even during economically healthy times, is not some sort of magic pixie dust you can sprinkle on your resume. You still have to do the work of figuring out what you want to do with your career, and figuring out how you're going to get from A to B. See here for more thoughts on that.

BusinessWeek just launched a year-by-year guide to get you on track to apply to business school in five years. This is perfect for recent college graduates.

Here's their plan for Year 1, with special emphasis on your first job out of school.