Latest / Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast / MBA Wire Taps 497: Brazilian at Big 4. Indian Army Officer. Darden vs Yale and Tuck.

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MBA Wire Taps 497: Brazilian at Big 4. Indian Army Officer. Darden vs Yale and Tuck. · Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker A: Foreign. Welcome to the Clear Admit MBA Admissions Podcast. I'm Graham Richmond, and this is your Wiretaps for Monday, June 22, 2026. I'm joined by Alex Brown from Cornwall, England. How are things going, Alex?
• 0:29
  Speaker B: Good. Thank you, Graham.
• 0:30
  Speaker A: So, just as a reminder again, for anyone who's just kind of come into the ClearAdmit podcast community, Alex is a former admissions officer from the Wharton School, current Clear Admit community manager and podcaster, and you also, Alex, teach digital marketing for several top business schools, including Columbia, LBS and Stanford. And I'm the co founder of Clear Admit. Also worked in admissions at Wharton, where Alex and I first crossed paths. And I have an MBA from the program, too. But, Alex, we have a really busy week, as you know, because I was away last week in Philadelphia at all these conferences. There's just been a lot happening on the website that we didn't really tackle last week. So there's, you know, some news out of UNC and Emory. There's been a bit of a change in GMAT score reporting that we'll talk about. We launched our admissions director Q and A series for the 2627 season. We've got real humans, so there's just a ton to get to. But one thing I wanted to ask you before we start. Well, actually, two things. The first is our usual, like, what's going on? Anything we need to know about. But the second is, do you know that this is the 497th episode of the Clear Admit podcast? And do you have any idea what we should do with 500? Because it sounds like it's, like, just right around the corner here, and I haven't thought about it at all.
• 1:39
  Speaker B: I thought you were going to ask me about the World Cup. That's way more important. Oh, that's true.
• 1:43
  Speaker A: Yes. Yeah, yeah. You guys.
• 1:46
  Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, the 497th episode, I think it's brilliant. I mean, hopefully we'll hit 500 here pretty soon and talk about it. But the idea that we've done a wiretaps episode every week since we began, not skipping a week, I think that's more the marker because I think it's important, right? You be reliable, you keep producing, we keep producing the same. So. Yeah. Very good. So upcoming next week, we still got a couple of decision deadlines from the deferred enrollment programs, Right. So this upcoming week, Harvard and Booth, that's scheduled to release those deferred enrollment decisions. And then the following week, it's Wharton, and then we're pretty much done. Okay. There might be still A little bit of waitlist activity and so forth, but, you know, we're pretty much putting a wrapper now on the admission cycle for last season.
• 2:40
  Speaker A: Yeah, that makes sense. So, yeah, this is that time of year. We're kind of transitioning. Hey, I didn't ask you, though, but going back to the World cup, are you staying up for these games? Because I think some of them must be in the middle of the night, your time. Right.
• 2:52
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, no, I'm not. But I am super impressed with England's first game.
• 2:58
  Speaker A: Yeah. Croatia.
• 3:01
  Speaker B: And in our media and that we are absolutely convinced England are going to win the World cup. No doubt. That second half performance, the first 15 minutes of it. Absolutely. Screamer.
• 3:15
  Speaker A: All right, well, we will see. I know in the media. The media here in Paris is convinced that the French are going to go all the way. So we'll see. And I think the US is excited. Excited too, because they looked pretty good in their first answer.
• 3:26
  Speaker B: Yeah, they might make the quarterfinals. They might. Who knows?
• 3:29
  Speaker A: We shall see. In any event, lots to discuss this week, so let's dive in. So the first thing I wanted to mention is we do have. We're actually trying to cook up a special event in kind of mid July. We'll get word out to everyone as soon as possible, but I think we're gonna have Travis, our friend who had come, he's an immigration lawyer, used to work in a consulate, and he knows everything there is to know about international students coming to the us so we're going to try to do a special sort of ama, you know, virtual event with him in July, just getting the details sort of sorted on that. And then late 7-21-22, and then 28, 29 of July, we have our famous Essay Insight series. I just want everyone to know we not only talk essays in that series, but we also talk video exercises. Because a lot of schools now have these kind of video exercises that you have to do kind of in place of essays or in addition to. So we talk about all that stuff. And it's a really good group of schools, as I've been saying. You know, a lot of the top schools. I mean, it's. We have about 20 schools joining us over the course of those four days. So, you know, including the likes of, you know, Columbia and Wharton and Chicago, Berkeley, insead. I think LBs is on the list too. So it's a big list. And, you know, come on out. Sign up for that@clearadmit.com events. Otherwise, Alex, some good things happening. UNC, Kenan, Flagler open a new building. And I didn't realize this. I knew they were building this space because I'd seen them building it for years. But they opened this space called Bell hall and it literally doubles their space. So they've really. It's kind of revolutionizing the amount of space people have on that campus to study business. And I thought this was really kind of a cool tidbit about the building. So it's basically at the edge of the campus and it kind of sticks out into the woods a bit. And so it says here in the press release. Designed to take full advantage of its wooded surroundings, Bell hall features outdoor classrooms, terraces, gardens and social spaces. So I'm trying to picture what these outdoor classrooms are like. I'm going to have to go, I think, to experience this, but it just sounds kind of wild.
• 5:36
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, very different.
• 5:38
  Speaker A: Yeah, but in any event, I know the building's right next to, you know, the other business school building, so it's all contiguous space, I believe, and really nice. And obviously, you know, the way buildings are today. The other news while we're in that region of the United States comes from Emory Guissueta. They named a new dean. His name is Sabi Mitra and he had been dean at U Florida Warrington and also maybe an associate dean at Georgia Tech, Scheller. So he's been in this space for a long time. He went to one of the IITs in India for undergrad and then earned a PhD at the University of Iowa at the Tippie School of Business. He said something interesting which I wanted to read you in his. In the kind of press release. This was his quote. He said Guzuera has a stellar reputation, a long history of research and program excellence, and is located in the most dynamic city and region in the country. I believe it can be one of the best business schools in the world and I'm excited to be part of its future. So he's got a lot of, just a lot of optimism coming into the role and a lot of experience. So it sounds like he's got. Got what it takes. We'll see how it goes.
• 6:46
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, good luck to them. And yeah, I'm a big believer in, in, in Atlanta and Emory and goes outta and so forth, but I think there might be some folks in New York that would challenge that quote.
• 6:58
  Speaker A: Yeah, of course. Yeah, well, I'm down in San Francisco,
• 7:01
  Speaker B: Silicon Valley or whatever.
• 7:03
  Speaker A: Yeah, but that's the fun rivalry. And we also, you know, I've had some folks on the podcast from like SMU and schools in Texas and that, you know, there's a lot of buzz around those cities in Texas too. So. But that's fine.
• 7:12
  Speaker B: Well, I love that. There is absolutely no doubt the landscape is shifting towards Texas. Whether that's shifted enough to put Texas at number one, I don't know if and when that might happen. But the landscape is shifting towards Texas.
• 7:27
  Speaker A: Yeah, definitely. The other thing I wanted to share is that GMAC made a big announcement. They're going to allow for what's called super scoring on the GMAT exam. And what that means is basically your GMAT super score is kind of an automatic calculation of your best aggregate performance across your GMAT attempts. So if you've taken the test a couple of different times, the, the super score basically takes your best results from math and verbal and puts them together and apparently they don't, you know, the GMAC doesn't charge you to do this. It's just part of the score reporting that's now in place and it allows, you know, candidates to kind of put their best foot forward. I know this is a little controversial because. Well, why don't you talk about that? Because I know we had a little discussion before we came on air. It is something that's done with the sat, but. Yeah, what were you had a thought when we were, before we jumped on the air here?
• 8:17
  Speaker B: Yeah, my thought's not positive at all. So I might actually keep it to myself simply because at some point GMAT might become a sponsor. I don't want to be on record. But the point is it's clearly a play for people to take the test more often.
• 8:31
  Speaker A: Right.
• 8:32
  Speaker B: So they're saying they're not charging more for this initiative, which is great, but they're incentivizing folks to take the test on multiple occasions. Right. Or at least, I mean, and I, and I'm certainly not a, not, not, not down on the idea of, you know, if you haven't got your, your best overall score, make sure you have time to retake it. I get all that. But this idea I think is a little bit self serving for, for, for, for, for gmat. But also it could be gamed right by the candidate. So anyway, I can leave it at that.
• 9:11
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I think it is interesting. I mean obviously some people are used to this from the sat and yeah, people do take the test multiple times. And I always had thought, I mean one of the things that we would tell candidates if they had multiple scores and had this sort of difference of performance across, they may be like, wow, I did really well in this math section and really well in this other sitting where I took the verbal. We often would say in an optional essay to be like, hey, I recognize that my two scores are not perfect, but if you look, I actually did pretty well here on the math. Pretty well here on the verbal. And that just to show the school that you were capable. But yeah. So anyway, we'll see how this sort of shakes out, but it is a new thing and we covered it. There's an article on the site that goes into a lot of detail on how it works and stuff. So I don't know what it does for the rankings and how schools report all that stuff, but that's a whole other podcast episode. Moving right along, we did run a couple of admissions tips over the past week. One was about considering the campus. And this is great for people who are starting to look at schools or even those with offers in hand trying to decide. I mean, we basically break it down into three things, which is facilities, surroundings, and atmosphere. So, you know, obviously we just talked about UNC probably has, you know, some of the best facilities, but then what's the surroundings like? You know, are you in an urban center, are you in the countryside, or
• 10:28
  Speaker B: are you in the woods?
• 10:30
  Speaker A: Yeah. Then what's the atmosphere is more the culture and community of the school itself. So just taking those things into consideration. And then we did one of my favorite admissions tips, which is about addressing unemployment or gaps in employment. Is there anything you want to say about that, Alex? I know we have an admissions tip as well as a video about this on the site, but any just sort of quick advice. What do you do if you've got a period of unemployment on your resume?
• 10:56
  Speaker B: Well, I mean, I think this is going to become more topical. Maybe we even need to revisit the tip just to make sure it is completely current to the current climate. Because, you know, at the end of the day, we're going to see more and more candidates applying to top business schools not because they got unemployed, but. But. But they've been laid off as part of the sequence of events that are currently going on with the transition to AI in. In the workplace. I'm a big believer that this is. The impact that we've seen so far is going to be quite small compared to what we will see. So. Yeah. So how do you handle this? The answer is in some part anyway, how have you occupied your time during these gaps? So if it's a current gap or was it a prior three or four months between roles? So what are you doing? And it's an opportunity perhaps to pick up some volunteer work to do something that you've always wanted to do, but you've been constrained because of work and so on and so forth to explore an interesting passion or concept or language or whatever it might be. So there's all that opportunity that's provided and then yeah, making sort of adding the context of why does the employment gap or the current situation, that'd be important too. But I do think this is going to become a bit of a bigger issue, Graham.
• 12:34
  Speaker A: Yeah, very possibly. And I think, you know, one thing that you just articulated that's really important is just this idea of. And I would just add that it's not just about, you know, showing that you're occupied, but I think if you are employed, it is good to have something else. Like I know you're going to spend a lot of your time looking for that next job, but you know, if you're spending an hour or so a day doing something else, that can also just show that you're active and you know, be a good message for the admissions team, but also just good for your own sanity to have something that you're working towards that's not just the
• 13:03
  Speaker B: job search and align with that is a great time to be an entrepreneur. Yes, it's a lot cheaper now to build something right. With the tools that we have available to us, claw code or whatever it might be. So absolutely learn. I mean, one thing you need to do if you have this employment gap is make sure you learn good AI tools.
• 13:25
  Speaker A: Right?
• 13:26
  Speaker B: So, so take it upon yourself to subscribe to Claude Claude or you know, if you go OpenAI route or whatever it might be, but then build a product, right. Even if you're just doing an MVP to test and learn, etc. Etc. Now is the time to do all that stuff.
• 13:42
  Speaker A: Yeah, totally agree. Other thing that we've done that I wanted to point out is we've launched our admissions director Q and A series and this year is going to be a little different. So we'll do our articles on the site with these in depth interviews with all the admissions director at the top MBA programs around the world. But we're also going to have some of them come on the podcast. So I've already got a bunch of them scheduled to record and so we'll have. And there'll be different questions in the podcast episode, sort of a different approach that I'm taking versus the articles, but. So I'm really excited. But in any event, the articles have started to come out already. And to kick us off, it was so appropriate. We had Melissa Rapp of Emory Goizuera, and I say it's appropriate because she's just such a figure in our industry. She'd been at Kellogg for many years before jumping over to Emory. She's, you know, just a lovely person and a human being. And, and yeah, so I was so happy to see that she was the first one to get hers back in. So we ran her story and I just wanted to read a couple of quotes that she shared because she is just some of this stuff is just gold. If you're applying to business school. She says, I always tell applicants that we are not trying to admit one type of student and there are no perfect applicants. We're building a class made up of people who will challenge one another, support one another, and learn from one another. That requires thoughtful discussion and a holistic process. And then she goes on to say, honestly, the essays that stay with me are rarely the most polished. They are the ones that feel honest, thoughtful, and self aware. On the video essay, she says, my biggest piece of advice is not to overthink it. We are not looking for polished performances or perfectly scripted responses. We're looking for authenticity, thoughtfulness, and presence. And then the last thing she said, because we have this new question in our admissions director Q and A this year about roi and besides the kind of revenue return on the mba, what else kind of matters? And so we asked her that question and she said career outcomes absolutely matter and applicants should think carefully about roi. But some of the most important parts of the MBA experience are much harder to quantify up front because they reveal themselves over time. One of the biggest shifts I see in students is confidence. Not confidence in the sense of having all the answers, but confidence in their ability to handle uncertainty, lead through complexity, and step into opportunities they may not have pursued before business school. So those are just a few of the nuggets from Melissa Rapp's admissions director Q and A over at Emory. And there's a ton more in there. And obviously we've already run a handful of these for other schools, too, so they're just going to keep coming. And I love this series. It's such a great one.
• 16:26
  Speaker B: Yeah, I know. It's very revealing. And like you say, when you're hearing from someone that's been in the industry for that length of time, has real good insight to share. These nuggets are really, really important. And as I'm listening to you quoting Lisa, I'm like yes, that makes perfect sense. Yes, yes, yes. So, yeah, absolutely brilliant.
• 16:53
  Speaker A: Yeah. So the other couple that we've run out there are, we talked to Rebecca Mallon Churchill who's at ASU WP Carey School over in Arizona, and then also Denise Pu of Siebes in China. So those are all up on the site. You can read them. They all have great nuggets of insight and they're a bunch that are coming. I can't even keep up with them. But we'll, we'll try to profile some of the key ones as we go through here on the show. One last thing before we get into our candidates. We do have some real humans alumni that we're still connecting with. This has been such a great series again talking to candidates who are, have graduated or out in the workforce and can reflect on the mba, the recruitment process for their jobs and everything else. So we connected first with Isabel, who is a talk Dartmouth grad and works as a private wealth advisor at Goldman Sachs. She's 30, she's originally from Los Altos Hills in California and she went to university at University of California Santa Barbara where she studied economics. Then she went and took a job at what looks to be a consulting firm, but a small consulting firm boutique before moving on to work at Uber for three years before business school. And as I said now she's a private wealth advisor at Goldman. And we asked her why did you choose to attend business school? And I love, she gave this really short answer but I thought was kind of interesting. She said, I chose to attend business school because I wanted to expand my network, gain clarity on my long term career goals and grow my leadership skills. I thought that was kind of interesting, Alex, just because it's not exactly the usual answer we get, especially that bit about gaining clarity on long term career goals. So I don't know if you have any thoughts on that, but I thought it was interesting.
• 18:33
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, it is interesting because as you were stating that I'm like, aren't you supposed to know that before you start business school? Or at least that's how we sort of couch it. But I can understand that. Obviously when you get to business school, especially a school like Tuck, you do start to see opportunities that might be tangentially related to what you, you were first thinking and exploring. So it sort of helps expand your windows of opportunity. So I can understand that. I'm not advocating though that people apply to business school if they don't have any idea of what that long term goal might look like.
• 19:15
  Speaker A: Yeah. And I Think what's nice about this is because these folks that we talk to in the Real Humans alumni series are, you know, they've already done business school. They're, they're no longer kind of putting on that like I'm writing an essay Cap. You know, they're really just being brutally honest. And it sounds like, yeah, when she looks back she realizes that part of her reason for going was to gain that clarity. She also just commented a little bit about Tuck and she said the resources at Tuck were phenomenal when it came to figuring out what career path was right. For me, one of the benefits of being in a small class is that we never had to compete for time with career counselors, alums who came back to network or even time with professors. I found that at Tuck, the well rounded curriculum and vast resources helped me make an informed and confident decision when moving into the next phase of my career. So yeah, a little bit of a plug there for Tuck, but also for smaller programs. I understand why people like that kind of environment. Let's move on. We've got another one. This is Paul who went to Yale SOM. He's now a consultant at Bain Company. He's 27 years old, originally from Charlotte, North Carolina. He went to Clemson as an undergrad where he studied civil engineering. And before business school he was working as kind of a civil engineer in the construction domain. And now obviously at Bain we asked him why did you go to business school? And he had a good quote for that. He said as an engineer I realized that technical know how is not the gating factor to progress. We have the capacity to build great things, carbon free, energy efficient transportation, abundant housing. However, the barriers are non technical. I chose business school to better understand the financial, legal and human factors that impede progress and to shift my career into a position where I can play a greater role in building great things. So I thought that was a really interesting take and a fair one. And I mean really, you know, that underlines the value of management education right there.
• 21:11
  Speaker B: Yeah, I completely agree with the sentiment coming from an engineer.
• 21:15
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 21:16
  Speaker B: And I'm a big believer in the value of the MBA for engineers. And I think that persists through this big transformation we're going through with AI and so on and so forth. Those that are, I think most likely to benefit are the ones that have those harder skills, sort of undergrad disciplines and so forth. But yeah, no, and that's, and I thought that was a really eloquent sort of thesis. So yeah, it makes a lot of sense.
• 21:44
  Speaker A: He Also had this other great line when we asked about, like, you know, what's the value of an mba? And he said something really interesting. He said, a fish in water doesn't necessarily know it is in water. Likewise, it is difficult to understand the career benefits of a great MBA program without attending. I believe that the greatest career preparation is the friendships and professional networks you build. So I guess he just seems like he's trying to say, until you've come to an MBA program, you can't fully appreciate all that it's going to give you, which I thought was well said as well. And then the last one that we connected with is this woman named Carlotta. She's from Milan, Italy. She's 32, went to IMD business school, and she's now a senior product manager at Amazon. And she studied at the Polytechnic School in Milan, where she studied biomedical engineering for undergrad. And then she worked in what looks to be, kind of, well, it says field service management. She was like a product manager in a technical kind of company after undergrad. And now, as I said, she's been at Amazon for over a year, working in retail, e commerce. And we just said, what's a piece of advice you wish you'd been given during your mba? And she said, I wish someone had emphasized earlier that the job search is as much about exploration as it is about landing a role. Taking the time to test different industries, speak to people in various functions, and reflect on what energizes you can make a big difference in finding a role that truly fits. So, again, this theme of, like, maybe she didn't know exactly what she wanted, but by talking to people, it really helped her to kind of triangulate in on what she wanted to do. Yeah.
• 23:22
  Speaker B: No. Very good.
• 23:23
  Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah. So anyway, lots to cover this week, as you know, but I know you picked out some candidates, so obviously, if people want to reach out to us, you can write to infoearadmit.com, use the subject line wiretaps, and we'll write you back. But, Alex, is there anything else before we talk about this week's candidates?
• 23:39
  Speaker B: Let's kick on.
• 23:40
  Speaker A: All right, so this is WireTaps Candidate number one. Our first candidate this week has come from an apply wire entry. So this person's targeting business school next fall 27. And they have seven schools on the target list. The schools are Dartmouth, Duke, Emory, Michigan, Kellogg, Stanford, and Darden. And this person's been working in kind of business consulting, risk advisory. They want to pivot into strategy consulting. They have Bain, BCG, et cetera on the list. Their GPA out of Brazil is a 7.79. That's on a 10 scale. They have three years of work experience and they wanted to just tell us that they'd studied batch bachelor's in engineering, so civil engineering. But then they pivoted their career to finance strategy and operations. And essentially they had two different experiences that they shared with us. One was in this kind of family automotive business where they, you know, had to work in operations and strategy. It's their own family's business, but they had some good learning experiences there before moving into a Big four firm where they're doing. Doing, you know, risk consulting and, you know, all kinds of technical, kind of financial consulting and stuff that goes with working for a Big four. The other things I wanted to share is that they have a pretty big extracurricular activity in the domain of baseball. They help to run a. They're the co founder and treasurer for a local nonprofit baseball association, which they've grown to 120 engaged communities members, lots of different activities there. And then again, they want to go to MBB after business school. And they're hoping to go to mbb, they say, to rapidly pay off potential debt and solidify their strategic acumen. And then that will be a stepping stone to the ultimate goal, which is senior product management at a big tech company. So, Alex, what do you make of this candidate?
• 25:38
  Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, in the first place, they've got to take the GMAT or gre, right?
• 25:44
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 25:44
  Speaker B: I'm just checking again that that that still needs to happen and. And a lot of their sort of application strategy will resolve around how well they do on that test, because I think there's a lot of potential here, you know, that work experience, even though it's on the slightly shorter side. They've got a nice sort of balance between, you know, family business and then moving on into, you know, risk advisory, etc. At a big four firm. So I think that might play quite well in admissions, as you point out. They look like they've got some really interesting extracurricular stuff dealing with that thing that you call the sport over there, whatever popular, right? Baseball. So I think that actually will help them stand out a little bit. And if they can show some real leadership in. In that aspect too, as well as in their work, I think that'll work out really well for them. So if they could come, you know, if they could get a test score that's at the median of the very top programs, I think that sort of puts them in play a little bit for some of those very top programs. And. And yeah, I. I think, you know, quite frankly, Graham, there's. There's potentially a lot to like here. Even though, like you say, their work experience is on the slightly shorter side, I like the balance of what they've been doing.
• 27:15
  Speaker A: Yeah. So it's three years in total so far, but they'd have four, I guess, by the time they matriculate. So. Yeah, so a little bit lighter. But I do think the test score will be important here because that 7.79 in civil engineering, like, we don't know exactly, you know, what school was it, how, what's the quality there? I mean, it's probably. There's probably less grade inflation in Brazil than there is in the US and stuff. But yeah, so getting a good test result will help them. But yeah, I like the story. Overall, they have seemed to be well rounded and they have a plan one. You know, I don't think they should mention that they want to use MBB to pay off the debt from the degree. They should focus on why. It's a great kind of building block for the next step in their career. But anyway, yeah. So I want to wish them the best of luck and thank them for sharing their profile. But this is someone with a lot of potential. They just need to buckle down and take the test.
• 28:01
  Speaker B: Yeah. And give themselves enough time if they have to retake the test. I don't think they have to be in round one. Right. They're not going to be necessarily overrepresented.
• 28:10
  Speaker A: Good point. Yeah. So they should definitely plan in case they need to take the test more than once. And if it's the gmat, they can now super score if they end up with a mismatch performance. In any event, let's turn our attention to wiretaps candidate number two.
• 28:26
  Speaker B: So, yeah, you put. I know we're running late on this podcast, but you say with the Super Score, but we don't know that all schools are committed to accepting super scores, do we? Like, like, can't schools decide? No, we don't want to accept a super score. Or is that a done deal?
• 28:42
  Speaker A: No, that's a good point. I mean, I think we'll have to see how that shakes out. I mean, it was just announced, so I don't know what the policy will be.
• 28:49
  Speaker B: I mean, don't rely on schools accepting super scores until you know that a super score is. Is a valid. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 28:56
  Speaker A: I mean, I do think for. For eon, schools would look at both, you know, if you took the test multiple times, they would look and see. So. But anyway, we'll see how that shakes out. All right, well, let's move on and talk about wiretaps. Category number two. This is also an apply wire entry. This person has 10 schools on the target list and they want to start in 27. They're looking at Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Duke, HEC, INSEAD, LBs, Michigan, UVA and Yale. And this candidate is currently an Indian Armed Forces officer and they're hoping to pivot either to consulting or tech after business school. They have a whopping 334 on the GRE. They have a 4.0 GPA. I'm guessing maybe they've converted that from the system in India. But in any event, very strong gpa, five years of work experience in the Army. They say they want to land in either the US or Europe after business school. And they indicate that their experience includes technical leadership, instructor tenure and digital transformation initiatives. They say that they've led cross functional teams and managed projects with multiple stakeholders. They said their preferences for a STEM designated mba. I feel like all the top MBA programs in the US are STEM designated. And they do mention that scholarship opportunities are a major factor in school selection. They'd love to know what we think of their profile, but also whether we think they're better suited for consulting or for like a PM role after business school. So, Alex, what do you make of this candidate?
• 30:29
  Speaker B: I mean, they're from India, so they're going to be potentially pigeonholed into being overrepresented. So they're going to have to overcome that a little bit. Even though I would argue that being an Indian Armed Forces officer is less traditional for Indian candidates. Right. So that might help them stand out a little bit. But I would certainly put more weight into targeting round one to mitigate any of those potential issues. I love, you know, the, the GRE is very good. I assume the GPA is very good. So they're clearly super smart. Looks like they've done some interesting things as an army officer in or, you know, in the armed forces and so forth. So potentially there is a lot to like here. You know, they say would appreciate feedback on whether my profile is better suited for consulting or PM roles. I think it's up to them to make that call. Obviously they've done some pretty interesting technical leadership and so forth and digital transformation initiatives. So yeah, technical product management roles would probably fit quite well, but so would consulting. Right. So consulting obviously can have it lean quite heavily towards technical stuff. You're Just not owning a product in that way, but consulting give you a broader set of experience. I would like to know what is the long term goal here that might help sort of solidify which way to go with the short term goal. Because again, both short term goals could probably fit this profile. Well, I'm not quite sure. You know, their school selection is literally all over the map in terms of geography as well as sort of degree of difficulty. So they've got to narrow that focus a little bit. And you know, they say obviously scholarship is really super important to them. So if that's the case, then maybe M7 is less, you know, target. But everything else in their profile suggests to me that Maybe looking at M7 might work. Right. Because again, they've got super numbers, they're an army officer, which is different for Indian candidates. And I think there's quite a lot of potential here, Graham, if they get their application sort of really well developed.
• 32:56
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, two things jumped out at me for this candidate, like you said. I mean, so the numbers are great. 334gre is kind of off the charts and a perfect GPA. So this is exactly. And good work experience from the military. This is kind of, to me, someone who could really be looking at M7. And I don't know why they seem to be hedging a little bit. And I think it's because they're thinking about scholarships. But I would argue if you can go to Wharton or Harvard or Stanford or one of these schools. I don't know why people really obsess about the debt. It's a newer trend that we've seen over the years as people become increasingly debt averse. And I think that the mba, I mean, these folks read the real humans on our website. These people are, they're not really talking about, oh, I had trouble paying off my loans after business school. So obviously when you are an international student, there are factors to keep in mind. But this person points out they want to go to a STEM program which allows them in theory to stay in the US for three years and apply for the H1B during that time period. And obviously, as we've talked before, you don't pay the $100,000 to get an H1B if you're already in the States. And I think the courts are kind of pushing that aside anyway. So I think there's a lot of opportunity. All I'm saying is for someone who goes to a top school, they don't necessarily need to optimize around graduating with zero debt. The jobs that people get after business school are insane. They're really great jobs. So I. In event that's a sidebar, the other thing I would say is it'd be nice for them to pick a continent. Like they have sort of a bunch of European schools, a bunch of American schools. And I don't know if they're hedging. Like they just don't know. Maybe something will happen. Every day is a new adventure right now in the United States. But. So maybe they're hedging there. But it would be obviously helpful if they could just sort of focus because they have a lot of schools on their list and they might want to narrow that down for round one. So in any event. But really interesting candidate with a lot of potential.
• 34:42
  Speaker B: Yes, very good.
• 34:43
  Speaker A: Yeah. All right, so let's move along and talk about wiretaps. Candidate number three. So our final candidate this week comes from a decision wire entry. And this person applied to Dartmouth, Kellogg, Darden and Yale. And they reported getting in at Dartmouth, Darden and Yale. So they didn't get into Kellogg, but the other three they got into. And they indicated that they have essentially 100% scholarship at all three schools. Schools, I mean, it's like a 98 scholarship at Tuck, they indicated, but essentially free ride at all three schools. This, Canada indicates their location is Germany, but they also say currently back in the usa. So I don't know what that means exactly, whether they're German or American or maybe they'd worked in the U.S. who knows? But in any event, that's kind of the little bit of background they gave us. They had a 316 on the GRE, which I'm just going to call out, is a pretty low score for these top school schools, especially to get that kind of money. So I'm guessing that there's some other pretty impressive aspects to their background, and they're just saying they're really looking for advice about which whether there's any difference between these programs. They do mention that they've already deposited and put down a kind of arranged housing for Darden. So they're kind of committed to Darden. They want to work in MBB Consulting after business school and then, you know, or maybe General manager, Management Leadership Development as a secondary goal. Last tidbit, Alex, I'll give you is they say that they want to work in either Seattle, Texas, Chicago, or Washington, D.C. so what do you make of this? Let's assume money is all even and that these are basically free Tuck, Darden or Yale, if you want to Work at MBB and land in one of those four markets.
• 36:25
  Speaker B: Yeah, I mean it's a difficult call and they're already sort of biased obviously towards Darden because they've got a deposit in, they've already gone through some of the hoops to AT housing and that I would try to remove all that from the decision if they can and make a sort of very clear headed decision because in the long run it, it'll have significant impact. Although as I pointed out, I think last week or the week before, they'll never know the counterfactual. Right. If they go to top, they'll never know what their life would have been like if they went to Yale or Darden for example.
• 36:59
  Speaker A: Right.
• 37:00
  Speaker B: But you know, both are really two of our real humans this week went to Yale and took, they had fantastic experiences. One of them went off to work for Bain. So that fits right in this, this person's wheelhouse, you know, the Yale real humans. But so I mean I, I do think it's a really difficult decision, Graham. I, I would, you know, in the clear light today put Yale and TOC potentially in the slightly higher tier. Darden is renowned for its case study methodology and preparing for consulting careers. So that might help equalize a little bit. But I just think this is a really difficult decision and potentially it will matter if they are looking at an international career versus a US based career in the long run because again maybe Yale and TOC have a slightly better sort of global brand, institutional brand, etc. Etc. But I think it's a very difficult decision. And both schools, all three schools, I should say good, provide decent access to mbb.
• 38:18
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean that's the thing here is that they're not going to go wrong. They can get an MBB job out of any of these three. If they really want to get into the, you know, really dig into this. What I would advise they do is, you know, they know they want to be in Seattle, Chicago or D.C. so they owe it to themselves to look at the alumni clubs for these three programs and how active they are in those cities.
• 38:37
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 38:38
  Speaker A: They could also look at the McKinsey, Bain and BCG offices in those markets and see like do they have some grads from these programs or you know, is there, is there already kind of a network path in. But then as you point out, if they are from Germany or have some connection to Europe and are thinking about going back in the long term. Yeah. What's the strength of these three programs? Network in Europe, you know, are there is there a, you know, is there a tuck club in Berlin or Munich? Is there the same for Darden and Yale? So looking into that is going to be really important because some of these schools might tap into even broader networks. You think of Yale with an international reputation as an Ivy League school, same with Dartmouth and being able to tap into the other Ivies. So, yeah, just something to think about. But obviously they're not going to go wrong. And they've deposited and set their housing up at Darden, so I get it. If they go there. The case method is absolutely superb. Way to get ready for consulting. Right. So, yeah, they're not going to go wrong. I want to congratulate them on these offers. Really impressive. But, yeah, they need to do some more due diligence if they, you know, if they want to talk to people in these different markets and at different firms. But again, they're not going to go wrong.
• 39:48
  Speaker B: Very good.
• 39:48
  Speaker A: All right. So, Alex, thanks for picking these out. I'm going to noodle on what we should be doing for our 500th episode. And I'll talk to Dennis, our producer, as well, because maybe he'll have some ideas from having been forced to listen to us for hundreds of episodes. In any event, let's get together next week and do it all again.
• 40:04
  Speaker B: Very good. Stay safe, everyone. Take care.
• 40:25
  Speaker A: Of.