So, I can finally start planning my summer. My to do:
1. Research post-MBA jobs by connecting with more alumni, MBA2s etc.
2. Maybe brush up on some pre-MBA math? I don't exactly feel like shelling out $100 for the MBA Math course. Need to find other, less expensive options.
3. Trip to Italy (planned), and India (not yet planned).
4. Finally make some progress with Spanish. And learn some basic Italian for trip.
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Closure
It wasn't even an anticlimax. Felt like a non-event.
I was in the middle of a conference call, absent-mindedly refreshing my google homepage, and there it was - the Status Update mail from Columbia. Exactly 8 weeks to the day.
As expected (in those moments when i dared to think realistically), it was a DING without an interview.
Four hours later, it finally sunk in on the train ride home.
"How the fuck could they not even invite me for an interview?"
"If only I'd applied for ED or RD"
Anyway, it's done, and I can move on.
I was in the middle of a conference call, absent-mindedly refreshing my google homepage, and there it was - the Status Update mail from Columbia. Exactly 8 weeks to the day.
As expected (in those moments when i dared to think realistically), it was a DING without an interview.
Four hours later, it finally sunk in on the train ride home.
"How the fuck could they not even invite me for an interview?"
"If only I'd applied for ED or RD"
Anyway, it's done, and I can move on.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
Are you Linked In?
About a year and a half ago, as if under mass hypnosis, seemingly everyone on my team decided to join LinkedIn. After receiving around 10 LinkedIn invitations everyday for a week, I finally caved. I signed up, accepted the invitations and promptly forgot about the whole thing (Yes, Yes, I know. For a techie, I'm an incredibly slow adopter and usually pretty skeptical about The New New Thing. *gasp*!).
Sometime last month, I received a LinkedIn invite from a high-school classmate of mine whom I hadn't seen in years! Intrigued, I signed in, and decided to investigate further.
For the next two hours, I looked through my connections' networks (somehow, this feels a bit dirty - like secretively going through someone else's letters), and what I found was an eye-opener. I had expected the networks to consist mostly of people from the IT industry. However, in addition to techies, there are tons of people from the ibanking and consulting industries, among others. Also a lot of MBA candidates from various schools. Not just that, most profiles I looked at were quite detailed, listing entire employment and educational history!
I did some random searches on ex-classmates from high school and college, with whom I'd falled out of touch. I was able to get back in touch with a lot of them (contacting some of them required a paid subscription, which kinda sucked). The site even tells you how many degrees of seperation there are between you and the person you seek (kinda like playing Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon :-)), and allows you to contact the person through someone in your immediate network.
This is what LinkedIn had to say about my network:
"Your connections are in 11 industries, but your network gives you access to 147 additional industries, including:
Apparel & Fashion
International Trade and Development
Utilities"
11 industries!! And I thought I only knew people in tech and finance! Maybe I'll seek out someone in "Apparel and Fashion" to get some discounts on designer-wear :-). Or not. I keep forgetting I'll have to start living the penurious student-life soon.
The point is, LinkedIn seems like a very effective professional networking and recruiting tool. I'm curious to find out how many of my fellow mba applicant bloggers are linked in (for all I know, everyone on the planet is already on it, having been networking aggressively for the last 3 years while I was relying on the good ol' approach of "any idea what so-and-so is doing now? last i heard he had some sort of lame blog detailing his mba application process").
------
An interview with one of LinkedIn's co-founders from about a month ago:
Interview
Sometime last month, I received a LinkedIn invite from a high-school classmate of mine whom I hadn't seen in years! Intrigued, I signed in, and decided to investigate further.
For the next two hours, I looked through my connections' networks (somehow, this feels a bit dirty - like secretively going through someone else's letters), and what I found was an eye-opener. I had expected the networks to consist mostly of people from the IT industry. However, in addition to techies, there are tons of people from the ibanking and consulting industries, among others. Also a lot of MBA candidates from various schools. Not just that, most profiles I looked at were quite detailed, listing entire employment and educational history!
I did some random searches on ex-classmates from high school and college, with whom I'd falled out of touch. I was able to get back in touch with a lot of them (contacting some of them required a paid subscription, which kinda sucked). The site even tells you how many degrees of seperation there are between you and the person you seek (kinda like playing Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon :-)), and allows you to contact the person through someone in your immediate network.
This is what LinkedIn had to say about my network:
"Your connections are in 11 industries, but your network gives you access to 147 additional industries, including:
Apparel & Fashion
International Trade and Development
Utilities"
11 industries!! And I thought I only knew people in tech and finance! Maybe I'll seek out someone in "Apparel and Fashion" to get some discounts on designer-wear :-). Or not. I keep forgetting I'll have to start living the penurious student-life soon.
The point is, LinkedIn seems like a very effective professional networking and recruiting tool. I'm curious to find out how many of my fellow mba applicant bloggers are linked in (for all I know, everyone on the planet is already on it, having been networking aggressively for the last 3 years while I was relying on the good ol' approach of "any idea what so-and-so is doing now? last i heard he had some sort of lame blog detailing his mba application process").
------
An interview with one of LinkedIn's co-founders from about a month ago:
Interview
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