#150 Behind the Scenes of an MBA Employment Report

03/26/19 • 55 min

Darren invites Susan Bertulli, Director, MBA Career Management at Ivey Business School at Western University to discuss MBA employment reports. First, why and how are MBA employment reports produced? Then, what should you look for? Which employment figures and statistics matter? How can you use them to shortlist b-schools and plan your career?

The Ivey MBA has been ranked #1 in Canada for five years running by Bloomberg Businessweek for both student and recruiter satisfaction, so don't miss this inside look into how a top MBA career services team produces their employment report.

Questions

Susan's background (5:00)
The role of MBA career services (6:55)
The challenges of MBA career management in a 1-year MBA program (9:12)
What applicants should look for from MBA career management teams (12:16)
The context surrounding MBA employment reports (14:30)
The challenges of producing an annual employment report (18:00)
Key figures for applicants to focus on (20:43)
How applicants can approach career services with employment statistics questions (26:15)
Does a business school's size affect diversity of industry recruiters? (30:17)
Understanding a school's list of recruiting firms (34:00)
How should applicants use employment reports to shortlist b-schools (39:40)
How applicants can show employability in MBA interviews (42:30)
MBA Career services: expectations vs reality (44:47)
Actions of students & alumni that succeed in their career search (48:00)
Have employers' criteria changed for MBAs? (50:20)
Susan's recommended resources for career planning (53:05)

About our Guest

Susan Bertulli is Director, MBA Career Management at Ivey Business School at Western University, where she manages student engagement in career planning, from admissions through to job employment. Over her 10+ years with Ivey, MBAs have achieved 90% placement with over 90% of the students reporting on their success. Susan also serves on several boards including the Dorchester Minor Hockey Association and St. Peter’s Anglican Church.

Episode summary, show notes and more at: http://touchmba.com/behind-the-scenes-mba-employment-report

Questions

Susan's background (5:00)
The role of MBA career services (6:55)
The challenges of MBA career management in a 1-year MBA program (9:12)
What applicants should look for from MBA career management teams (12:16)
The context surrounding MBA employment reports (14:30)
The challenges of producing an annual employment report (18:00)
Key figures for applicants to focus on (20:43)
How applicants can approach career services with employment statistics questions (26:15)
Does a business school's size affect diversity of industry recruiters? (30:17)
Understanding a school's list of recruiting firms (34:00)
How should applicants use employment reports to shortlist b-schools (39:40)
How applicants can show employability in MBA interviews (42:30)
MBA Career services: expectations vs reality (44:47)
Actions of students & alumni that succeed in their career search (48:00)
Have employers' criteria changed for MBAs? (50:20)
Susan's recommended resources for career planning (53:05)

About our Guest

Episode summary, show notes and more at: http://touchmba.com/behind-the-scenes-mba-employment-report

Previous Episode

#149 Wisconsin MBA Program & Admissions Interview with Betsy Kacizak and Brad Chandler - "Focus Creates Advantage"

Betsy Kacizak, Director of MBA Admissions and Recruitment, and Brad Chandler, Director, Nicholas Center for Corporate Finance and Investment Banking at the Wisconsin School of Business of University Wisconsin-Madison, discuss what makes the Wisconsin MBA unique, the school's admissions process, career opportunities and more.

Program Highlights (10:45) | Admissions (29:56) | Scholarships (45:32) | Careers (49:08

About Our Guests

Betsy Kacizakis the Director of MBA Admissions and Recruitment at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Betsy excels at walking you through the admissions process, including helping guide you toward the specialization that best fits your passions and career aspirations. She has expertise as a leader in the field of graduate admissions. She has worked for the Wisconsin School of Business for 11 years and worked for seven years at Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC).

Brad Chandleris the Director of the Nicholas Center for Corporate Finance and Investment Banking at the Wisconsin School of Business. At the Nicholas Center, Brad is responsible for both administering the Center's specialized programming focused on MBA and undergraduate students and teaching a number of its core courses. Prior to joining the Nicholas Center in 2017, Brad was a Managing Director in the Investment Banking Division at Morgan Stanley in New York City. While at Morgan Stanley, Brad advised corporate and private equity clients on mergers and acquisitions, shareholder activism and defense, leveraged buyouts, debt and equity financings, restructurings, and fund-level financings. Brad successfully executed over 55 transactions representing over $225 billion in transaction value. Representative transactions include advising Dow on its merger with DuPont, advising Axiall on its hostile defense against Westlake Corporation, advising Agrium on its proxy contest victory over JANA Partners, advising Dresser Rand on its sale to Siemens AG, the Trinseo and Sensata IPOs, and numerous financings for Bain Capital, Advent Capital Management, Clayton Dubilier & Rice, CF Industries, and Eastman Chemical.

What is unique about the Wisconsin MBA? What are its key advantages?

The Wisconsin MBA asks applicants to select from 10 career specializations at the time they apply: Brand and Product Management, Marketing Research, Corporate Finance and Investment Banking, Applied Security Analysis, Real Estate and Risk Management and Insurance, Operations and Technology Management, Supply Chain Management, Strategic Management, Strategic Human Resource Management, and Arts Administration
Wisconsin MBAs start taking courses and doing applied learning related to their specialization from very first semester
Center Directors running Wisconsin's 10 specializations play a big role in admissions, curriculum design and career advising, as they connect students to alumni, recruiters and thought leaders in the space
Wisconsin offers a tailored and customized approach to 80 students
Wisconsin was one of 3 founding members of the Consortium in 1966

Episode summary, show notes and more at: http://touchmba.com/wisconsin-mba-program-admissions-interview-betsy-kacizak-brad-chandler

Next Episode

#151 City University Hong Kong MBA Program & Admissions Interview with Christoph Schneider

Dr. Christoph Schneider, Associate Director of MBA Programme and Assistant Professor in the Department of Information Systems, City University Hong Kong, discusses what makes the City U Hong Kong MBA unique, the school's admissions process, career opportunities and more.

Program Highlights (4:06) | Admissions (18:30) | Scholarships (33:58) | Careers (36:38)

About Our Guest

Christoph Schneider is the Associate Director of the MBA Programme at City University Hong Kong, where he has also been Assistant Professor in the Department of Information Systems for over a decade. Christoph has published in premier business journals as well as best-selling textbooks on management information systems and project management. Christoph got his PhD in Business Administration - Management Information Systems from Washington State University.

What is unique about the City U Hong Kong MBA? What are its key advantages?

1-year program includes study trips to Silicon Valley (UC Berkeley), London (Imperial College) and an Asian country for a consulting project
Offers (5 concentrations: Accounting, Finance, Information Management, Marketing, and Supply Chain Management
The business mentoring programme matches students to 25+ MBA mentors according to their backgrounds, experiences and interests; During a 6-month period, mentors and students meet through events, workshops, and 1-1s
City U Hong Kong was ranked the #4 university for Economics and Business in Asia by US News and World Report (2019) and placed #55 worldwide by QS' World University Rankings (2019)

Episode summary, show notes and more at: http://touchmba.com/city-university-hong-kong-mba-program-admissions-interview-christoph-schneider