June MBA Deadlines You Need to Know
Don’t be left behind, and get a jump on the MBA application process this June! Here’s your guide to this month’s MBA admissions deadlines in our top metros. Continue reading…
Harvard Halts Round 3 MBA Admissions
Beginning this application season, Harvard Business School (HBS) will no longer feature a Round 3 for applicants to its MBA program, the school’s admissions director announced in a post to his blog this morning.
“After careful consideration, we have decided to focus our MBA application process on two rounds—with deadlines in September and January—and to focus our spring round on 2+2 applications,” Chad Losee, HBS managing director of admissions and financial aid wrote on his Direct from the Director blog. “To be considered for the Harvard Business School Class of 2021, you need to apply in either Round 1 (September 5, 2018) or Round 2 (January 4, 2019),” he added.
“We are trying to do what is in the best interest of the admits,” Losee explained to Clear Admit yesterday. The customary May release of Round 3 decisions has created a time crunch for incoming students in terms of securing housing, securing visas in the case of international students, and completing HBX Core, a set of online foundational courses all students are expected to finish prior to arriving on campus.
So, what do these changes mean for the next round of applicants? For starters, HBS will now admit its entire class in Rounds 1 and 2—with the exception of applicants to the 2+2 Program, the deferred admissions program for college students. The 2+2 deadline will still be in March.In addition to giving all admitted students adequate time to be fully prepared for fall enrollment, the decision to scrap Round 3 also reflects applicant behavior, Losee added. “One thing we have noticed over the last three years is that applicants are choosing this on their own,” he said. “Round 3 application numbers have been going down, and Round 2 application numbers have been going up.”
There are not plans to significantly change the timing of Rounds 1 and 2 this year, Losee said. “We might adjust the date a little bit for Round 2, just by a day or two,” he said. But the application deadlines for those two rounds will continue to be in September and January respectively.
Chad Losee, HBS managing director of MBA admissions and financial aid
As in the past, HBS will place some applicants on the waitlist as part of Rounds 1 and 2. As for whether the switch from three rounds to two will necessitate a change in terms of the overall size of the waitlist, time will tell, Losee said. “We never take for granted the people who are on the waitlist because we know they put a lot out there,” he said. “We try to keep the waitlist as small as possible and to let waitlisted applicants know as soon as possible—and that will continue to be true.”
Losee also noted that with the elimination of Round 3, some waitlist decisions could come earlier than they have in the past. “Until now we have needed to wait until Round 3 happens to make decisions with regard to our waitlist,” he said.
HBS Decision Comes as No Surprise
“Based on the multiple calls for Round 3 applicants from a number of leading schools this year, this decision by HBS comes as no surprise,” Clear Admit Co-Founder Graham Richmond said on hearing the news. “Today’s MBA applicants are increasingly applying early.” It’s a trend that has been evolving over the past 10 to 15 years, during which time Round 1 has slowly eclipsed Round 2 as the round of preference and the message from schools to “apply early” has gradually sunk in for applicants.
“It’s also likely a reflection of two new realities “ Richmond added. “First, the new challenges faced in the U.S. immigration policies, even for student visas. And second, the fact that more and more MBA students seek to spend the summer months in pre-MBA internships (as opposed to leisurely backpacking around the globe).”
These forces together with the messages from leading schools for “serious” candidates to apply early likely contributed to the elimination of Round 3 by HBS, Richmond concludes. “With that said, one can’t help but wonder if some Round 3 candidates—particularly the non-traditional sort who aren’t in the MBA pipeline from an early date—may fall ‘out of the process,’” he added.
Richmond added that he is not sure that every school will follow HBS’s lead and eliminate Round 3, however. “There are likely many applicants who won’t make the cut in Round 2 at the likes of Harvard, Stanford, and Wharton, who then may seek to submit late-round apps elsewhere,” he said. “As such, I don’t expect schools in the next tier (e.g. non-top-3) who are seeing declines in application volume to take this step.”
To read Losee’s complete post, click here.
This article has been edited and republished with permissions from our sister site, Clear Admit.
MIT Hackathon Yields Planned Parenthood for Substance Abuse – Boston News
Let’s explore some of the most interesting stories that have emerged from Boston business schools this week.
Planned Parenthood for Substance Abuse Idea Wins MIT Enterprise Management Lab Hackathon – MIT Sloan Newsroom
MIT Sloan’s 2018 Enterprise Management Lab hackathon recently came and went. This year’s winning concept applied Planned Parenthood’s business model to substance abuse in an attempt to creatively address the ongoing American opioid crisis.
The idea extended substance treatment to include support for friends and family and offer “a one-stop shop for information” to “government entities, nonprofits, hospitals, and rehab clinics.” Kyle R. Chapman, MBA ’19, and member of the winning team, writes:
“We knew a lot of people would try to solve the problem by going upstream. A smart pillbox might address part of the opioid crisis, but the problem is that’s only attacking one point of a really systemic problem.”
Learn more about this year’s hackathon winner here.
Trending Topics in Marketing and Media – Sawyer Business Blog
Sawyer Business School at Suffolk University recently recapped its recent Bridging the Gap seminar, which offered a platform for Boston marketing and media pros to highlight a number of key industry issues for students, including the impact of data privacy on digital advertising; voice-activated devices; and strategies for building brands in the modern era.
Ereni Markos, associate professor of marketing and co-organizer of the event, writes:
“It’s especially important for all of us in the Marketing Department to bring real-world expertise to the Suffolk community and, in turn, for us to share our thinking from the classroom and working with students. Networking is crucial for students to build their professional network early on in their careers.”
You can read more about the seminar here.
Lessons from Tim Ryan ’88 of PwC – Babson Blog
Babson College recently hosted a guest lecture from Senior Partner and Chairman of PwC US Tim Ryan ‘88, who used his talk to highlight three key bits of advice that touched upon respect, reputation, and recognition. He also spoke extensively with the Babson blog after his appearance about what diversity and inclusion means to him.
“If we don’t truly understand one another, we’ll never be the most inclusive workplace in the world. Outside of family, work is where we spend the most amount of our time. It was a catalytic moment, after over a decade of investing in programs, trainings, studies, and testing, when we realized that the baseline of talking and communicating was missed.”
Read more from Babson’s talk with Tim Ryan here.
76ers’ JJ Redick Had To Reschedule GMAT to Accommodate Playoff Schedule
When the Philadelphia 76ers season hit its lowest point, guard JJ Redick, a Duke University alum, was apparently planning on earning his MBA.
What are the Fastest MBA Programs in Boston?
Some students want to complete their MBA coursework as quickly and efficiently as possible—time is money after all! Continue reading…
MIT Sloan Debunks Entrepreneur Myths, and More – Boston News
Let’s explore some of the most interesting stories that have emerged from Boston business schools this week.
The 20-Year-Old Entrepreneur is a Lie – MIT Sloan Newsroom
MIT Sloan School of Business professor Pierre Azoulay and Ph.D. student Daniel Kim used a new working paper as an opportunity to debunk the myth of the 20-year-old Silicon Valley tech-prodigy entrepreneur. The reality is that the average age of successful entrepreneurs veers closer to 42. Azoulay elaborates:
“If you knew nothing else, and you had two identical ideas, one proposed by a very young person, one proposed by a middle-aged person, and that’s the only thing you have to go on, you would be better off—if you wanted to predict success—betting on a middle-aged person.”
Kim adds: “In theory, we know that with age a lot of benefits accumulate. For instance, you get a lot of human capital from experience, you also get more financial resources as you age, as well as social connections, all of which will likely boost your odds of success as an entrepreneur.”
Read more about the duo’s research here.
Case Study: Can This Japanese Snack Food Company Break into the U.S. Market? – Harvard Business Review
As part of a fictionalized case study, HBR recently published a profile on Kenko USA, the American subsidiary of Japan’s largest rice cracker producer, about its ongoing plans to enter the American market. Kenko USA hopes to become synonymous with rice crackers much in the same way that Kikkoman became inextricably linked with soy sauce.
In 2012, Riku Nakamura relocated from Tokyo to San Mateo, California to oversee the launch of Kenko’s first foreign subsidiary. According to the article, “Riku knew that the key was to expand beyond Asian supermarkets and grocery stores’ “international” sections and get Kenko crackers into the snack aisles of mainstream U.S. food outlets, but his team’s efforts had yet to bear fruit.”
You can read the entire case study here.
Hybrid Strategy Leaves Auto Industry Leaders Playing Catch-up, Professor Says – D’Amore McKim News & Research
There’s quite a bit of chatter within the auto industry about the so-called “hybrid trap” in which established industry leaders have been forced to catch up to the hybrid strategies of more aggressive startups to varying degrees of success.
Northeastern University D’Amore-McKim School of Business‘ Jean C. Tempel professor of entrepreneurship and innovation Fernando Suarez explored this phenomenon in detail as part of an MIT Sloan Management Review article. He elaborates:
“Most established corporations follow the hybrid approach because it gives them peace of mind. It allows incumbents to convince themselves that they’re responding to technology-driven transformation in their industry when, in fact, they’re losing ground. They fall back on learned patterns, which slows development. When you are serious about going the route of new technology, you have to rethink all of your designs and processes.”
Read more about Suarez’s research here.
