UCLA Anderson Introduces New Online Journal
UCLA’s Anderson School of Management recently debuted the UCLA Anderson Review, an online journal that features the research from its faculty. The journal will showcase the vast business and economic research that the UCLA faculty spearheads.
“The faculty of Anderson (School of Management) is doing cutting-edge research that can have an important impact and elevate national discussion on crucial issues, and so the review is a way to put spotlight on that,” Rebecca Trounson, Director of Executive and Brand Communications, said.
The publication is written and assembled by Anderson’s Marketing and Communications department and a team of freelance writers.
“Our writers are top journalists from places like the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, and they are very sufficient to understand these research papers and explain them in an acceptable way for a wide audience,” Trounson said.
UCLA Anderson Dean Judy Olian expressed her own enthusiasm about the journal’s debut.
“A key priority for all of us at Anderson is to showcase the impact of our faculty’s wide-ranging research, and make it accessible to students, alumni, business professionals, the media and others. We are please to share the inaugural edition of the UCLA Anderson Review, offering important and practical insights derived from the rigorous scholarship of our faculty,” Olian said in a recent release.
As of now, the review is publishing two articles per week that feature topics like retirement savings, healthcare, and workplace behavior.
UCLA Anderson Review Editor-in-Chief Jeff Bailey meets with both the faculty and the writers to determine what content will be included each week. Bailey does some preliminary investigating to learn what faculty members are working on, and then meets with them to find out more about their research.
The review’s articles can be found on their website, or readers can subscribe to the journal to receive monthly emails that include new articles.
UCLA Anderson Professor Andres Terech Talks Halo Top Success In LA Times
Halo Top, the healthier alternative to standard ice cream, has ousted Ben & Jerry’s and Haagen-Dazs, and is now the number one selling ice cream pint in grocery stores. In an interview with the LA Times from Ronald White, UCLA Anderson School of Management professor Andres Terech spoke on whether Halo Top’s model is sustainable.
Halo Top’s founder, Justin Woolverton, another UCLA graduate, perfected the ice cream recipe in his kitchen with a $20 ice cream maker. Woolverton was working as a lawyer at Latham & Watkins when he started experimenting in the kitchen to create an ice cream that would fit into his diet. After establishing Halo Top, Woolverton got the product into Whole Foods and a few other chains via cold-calling.
“It took me a year to figure out how to really make ice cream. I had a good $150,000 in credit cards just to rack up. I mean, it was headfirst. It was a risk,” Woolverton said.
Woolverton’s team does not work in traditional offices, but rather a co-working space in the Fairfax District of LA. The team members generally do the bulk of their work from home. They alternate between getting together at the co-working space and communicating electronically. According to Cal State Northridge Professor and Interim Dean, Deborah Cours, the team’s technique is to outsource production and distribution so that they can focus solely on brand strategy. In this way, Halo Top’s success is widely considered a testament to building a strong brand.
Halo Top has also been in the news lately because of its completely bizarre Kubrick-esque commercial, which is both the year’s most frightening ad as well as its best.
Terech received his Ph.D. in marketing from Anderson in 2004. His work on branding, pricing, and retail has appeared in publications like Case Research Journal and Harvard Business Review.
The Best Nonprofit MBA Programs in Los Angeles
Many believe that business is inherently selfish. However, there are a plethora of nonprofit organizations that could not exist without the skills of talented administrators, dedicated solely to the business and financial aspects of the company. MBA skills are coveted in the nonprofit industry, as they can make a massive contribution to helping the organization thrive.
Many MBA programs take into account the need for overlap in business and social change. Below, we’ve laid out three of the best Los Angeles programs for MBAs looking to pursue nonprofit work.
The 3 Best Los Angeles Nonprofit MBA Programs
Anderson School of Management—UCLA
The UCLA Anderson School of Management MBA program offers a specialization in Social Impact for students hoping to use their business acumen to have a positive influence on their community, both locally and globally. This program provides ample opportunities for students to better parts of the world through innovation and creative problem-solving, positioning them to pursue a career in the nonprofit arena, if that is their goal.
International Field Study Projects are an integral part of the nonprofit learning experience. For their second year Capstone Projects, all Anderson MBA students can choose to pursue the Applied Management Research (AMR) program. The AMR Projects give students a chance to work with companies and nonprofits to solve a strategic problem. Many of the AMR Projects help struggling communities. In 2017, a group of students tackled building a model to improve screening and treatment of non-communicable diseases to a rural village in South Africa.
SEE ALSO: “The Most Affordable Los Angeles MBA Programs”
Marshall School of Business—USC
Marshall School of Business at USC partnered with Zelikow School of Jewish Nonprofit Management at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion to provide students with the chance to obtain a dual degree (MBA/M.A.) in Business Administration and Jewish Nonprofit Management. The M.A. emphasizes both nonprofit management and Jewish studies. This challenging track requires 88 units of coursework as well as two years of fieldwork. Students in this program can take a 12-month internship in Sacramento, CA or Washington DC while continuing to attend classes in these areas. This track is ideal for students pursuing a career in the Jewish nonprofit sector, and includes classes like Nonprofit Management and Leadership and Grant Writing Practicum.
Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management—Claremont Graduate University
The Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management dual degree in Public Health and Business Administration is an excellent option for students seeking a career in the nonprofit healthcare field. This MBA/MPH allows students to combine business acumen with an exhaustive knowledge of the intricacies of public health over the course of three years. Though this program does not exist exclusively to educate students in the nonprofit sector, the combination of healthcare and business education makes these grads a perfect fit for health care-related nonprofit work. Students will also benefit from the knowledge of professors like Jay Prag, Ph.D., who serves on the board of directors at LINC Housing, a nonprofit low-income housing developer, and whose research often delves into the nonprofit world. This program will enable students to use business skills to increase the effectiveness of healthcare institutions in their communities, as well as internationally.
Top MBA Programs for Producing Founders: 2017-2018 Report
Recently, PitchBook released its latest 2017-2018 Top 50 Universities Report. The ranking focused on those universities that produced the “ultimate building blocks of the venture industry: founders.”
This ranking is vastly different from rankings of top schools for entrepreneurship by U.S. News & World Report, Princeton Review, and Entrepreneur Magazine, all of which focus on factors like peer assessment surveys, curriculum, and entrepreneurial study options. Instead, PitchBook looked at a single criterion: founders of companies who received venture capital (VC) funding between January 1, 2006, and August 18, 2017, and where they went to school.
The report provides a fairly detailed breakdown of top undergraduate programs, companies (by capital raised), MBA programs, female founders, unicorns (companies that have attained the coveted $1 billion evaluation), and more. This article will focus solely on the results that relate to MBA programs, including information on female founders and unicorns.
Top MBA Programs
For the 2017-18 academic year, the top 10 MBA programs to produce founders who received VC funding were ranked as follows:
- Harvard Business School (HBS): 1,203 entrepreneurs, 1,086 companies, and $28,495 million raised
- Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB): 802 entrepreneurs, 716 companies, and $18,259 million raised
- University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School: 666 entrepreneurs, 585 companies, and $16,001 million raised
- INSEAD: 455 entrepreneurs, 406 companies, and $7,795 million raised
- Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management: 445 entrepreneurs, 417 companies, and $5,680 million raised
- Columbia Business School: 441 entrepreneurs, 410 companies, and $5,465 million raised
- MIT Sloan School of Management: 437 entrepreneurs, 384 companies, and $7,797 million raised
- University of Chicago Booth School of Business: 405 entrepreneurs, 368 companies, and $5,470 million raised
- University of California – Berkeley Haas School of Business: 344 entrepreneurs, 314 companies, and $5,191 million raised
- UCLA Anderson School of Management: 247 entrepreneurs, 232 companies, and $3,957 million raised
HBS stands out immediately for producing founders who receive VC funding. Harvard produced twice as many founders as its next closest competitor, and those founders pulled in $10M more in funding for their 1,000+ companies.
As for the reason behind Harvard’s success, there are multiple elements that contribute to its production of entrepreneurs. The school is home to the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship, which offers programs for budding entrepreneurs including curricular offerings (over a dozen courses), a New Venture Competition (which offers $300,000 in cash prizes), the Rock Accelerator, the Harvard Innovation Lab, and even a Loan Reduction program that supports graduating entrepreneurs with a one-time, need-based award of $10,000 to $20,000. HBS’s extensive alumni network also provides students with connections with managing directors, partners, and founders of top VC firms including Bain Capital Ventures, Apax Partners, and Accel Partners.
Another standout for the 2017-2018 year was INSEAD. The only non-U.S. MBA program to appear in the top 10, it also moved up a spot this year over last. INSEAD grew from 393 entrepreneurs, 348 companies, and $6,131 million in capital raised to 455, 406, and $7,794 million respectively.
INSEAD’s students are supported by the INSEAD Centre for Entrepreneurship (ICE), which was founded in 2003. The center offers MBA students a chance to participate in the INSEAD Venture Competition (IVC), Entrepreneurship Bootcamps, and the Entrepreneurship Teaching Innovation (ETI) Fund, which supports the development of the “Your First Hundred Days” elective for budding entrepreneurs.
Another MBA program of note is MIT Sloan School of Management, which was fourth in capital raised on this year’s PitchBook ranking. This could indicate more successful companies coming out of MIT or a higher percentage of VC funding available to Massachusetts’ graduates.
Some of the unique entrepreneurship opportunities available from other top programs include Stanford GSB’s Startup Garage, an intensive, hands-on project course for MBA students, as well as MIT Sloan’s Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship, which includes an accelerator, coaching, and various events. Finally, the Penn Wharton Entrepreneurship Center offers resources, events, and courses for MBAs looking to explore, develop, launch, and scale a startup.
Top Female Founders & Unicorns
PitchBook also reviewed the top MBA programs for female founders. Once again, HBS and Stanford GSB ranked first and second, respectively, with 202 and 119 female founders. Columbia Business School ranked third with 77, Wharton ranked fourth with 71, and MIT came in at fifth with 60 female founders.
As for the unicorns, the top five MBA programs are similar to the previous lists.
- HBS: 22 entrepreneurs, 17 companies
- Stanford GSB: 14 entrepreneurs, 11 companies
- Wharton: 11 entrepreneurs, 8 companies
- INSEAD: 8 entrepreneurs, 7 companies
- MIT Sloan: 6 entrepreneurs, 6 companies
This article has been edited and republished with permissions from Clear Admit.
UC Irvine Becomes Latest LA Business School to Offer GMAT/GRE Waiver
Applying for an MBA program is a long process: There’s plenty of applications, essays, and interviews involved in getting you into the program atop your list. To add insult to injury, many programs require a GMAT or GRE score, only adding to potential workload and stress. Continue reading…
A Recommendation Revolution Is Underway in MBA Admissions: What You Need to Know
I’m busy, you’re busy, your boss is most definitely busy. Indeed, publications ranging from Men’s Health to the Atlantic, the Washington Post to Forbes are all reporting that “busyness“ has become the new status symbol for our times. Which is part of what makes asking someone to write you a letter of recommendation for business school so daunting. Now, try telling that person that you actually need five different letters for five different schools. Oy vey.
As uncomfortable a spot as it puts applicants in—it’s no better for recommenders. Even your most vociferous supporter is going to wonder what in the world she’s gotten herself into when she realizes that helping you in your pursuit of acceptance to business school means taking time away from work or play or family or whatever else to labor over leadership assessment grids, each a little different from the one before, and write 10 slightly different answers to 10 slightly different questions. Here’s hoping that your top-choice school doesn’t happen to be the last one she gets around to…
Good news. The graduate management education industry recognizes the strain that letters of recommendation put on applicants and recommenders alike and has been wrestling with ways to make the process easier for everyone involved. To this end, the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) established a committee made up of admissions representatives from dozens of leading business schools to brainstorm about ways to lessen the burden while still collecting the third-party assessments of candidates that are so critical to the MBA application process.
GMAC Pilots Common MBA Letter of Recommendation
As an outgrowth of that committee’s work, GMAC last year piloted a common MBA letter of recommendation (LOR) that schools can choose to incorporate into their applications to reduce the burden placed on applicants and recommenders alike.
“The Common Letter of Recommendation (LOR) effort is intended to save you and recommenders valuable time by providing a single set of recommendation questions for each participating school,” reads the GMAC website. “This allows your recommenders to use the same answers for multiple letter submissions, alleviating the workload of having to answer different questions for each school multiple times. You benefit because it makes the ask for several different letters to be written on your behalf much easier.”
Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, NYU Stern School of Business, and Michigan’s Ross School of Business were among the first schools to pilot the Common LOR last year. In addition to a single set of open-ended essay questions, the pilot Common LOR also included a leadership assessment grid inviting recommenders to rate applicants on 16 “competencies and character traits” grouped into four main categories of achievement, influence, personal qualities and academic ability.
“At Johnson, we saw the Common LoR as a clear opportunity to improve the admissions process for candidates and their recommenders in a way that would also add value to our own assessment of applicants,” Judi Byers, Johnson executive director of admissions & financial aid, told Clear Admit. “A thorough and consistent review is important to us and the grid provides a straightforward base of insights that can be assessed and compared reliably while the accompanying letter adds meaningful detail and context,” she added.
Soojin Kwon, managing director of full-time MBA admissions and program at Ross, sees applicants and recommenders as the main beneficiaries of the Common LOR and is pleased that more schools are coming on board. “As more schools adopt it, applicants won’t have to feel like they’re burdening their recommender with completing multiple rec letters with different questions and ratings grids,” she told Clear Admit. “This year, more than a dozen of the top 20 schools are using it.”
Ross was also among the schools to first pilot the Common LOR last year, and Kwon served as part of the GMAC committee that helped craft it.
Common Questions Easy to Agree on, Common Leadership Grid Not
“What we found in using the Common LOR this year past year was that the questions gave us helpful insights into applicants, particularly on the important area of constructive feedback. The questions, however, were fairly similar to what we and other schools were using before, so it was easy for the AdCom to use it,” she notes.
Those questions are as follow:
- Please provide a brief description of your interaction with the applicant and, if applicable, the applicant’s role in your organization. (50 words)
- How does the performance of the applicant compare to that of other well-qualified individuals in similar roles? (E.g. what are the applicant’s principal strengths?) (500 words)
- Describe the most important piece of constructive feedback you have given the applicant. Please detail the circumstances and the applicant’s response. (500 words)
- Is there anything else we should know? (Optional)
“The rating grid was quite different from what we’d used in the past,” Kwon continued. “It was also the most difficult part for the GMAC advisory group to develop and get agreement upon. The group worked this past year to revise and simplify the grid so that AdComs could get more meaningful insights from it.”
This year, the 16 competencies and character traits from the original grid have been distilled to 12, with specific questions about analytical thinking and information seeking omitted. Johnson and Ross have both incorporated the revised leadership grid into the LOR distributed to applicants as part of their applications, as have most other schools that have this year decided to incorporate both the grid and open-ended essay question portions of the form. UT’s McCombs School of Business and Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business, notably, still seem to feature the earlier version of the leadership grid in their application, the one that calls on recommenders to assesses applicants on 16 competencies and traits.
