MBA Crystal Ball

Thanks Rohit. :-)

Hii Ritwik,

Congrats on your admission to Tepper MBA.

I am Prudhvi from Andhra Pradesh, India. I am thinking of apply to Tepper for 2014-16 MBA program.

A Little about myself:

GMAT Score : 710

Graduation : Mechanical Engg, IIT - BHU, 7.71/10 ( BHU honors degree )
Work Ex : 2.5 yrs at Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd as Executive Engineer in Engineering and Projects Department.
Other Certifications : CFA Level 2.

Query :

As my post MBA career, I am considering management consulting ( esp. Operations consulting ) or Corp Fin roles. How good are the opportunities at Tepper , so I can have successful career change and land in the job of my wish.I am mainly concerned on job prospects for Indian students without any previous experience either in consulting or finance.

If career switch is not possible, do any companies with engineering/operations roles visit the campus.

What are fields/courses with good faculty at Tepper. Would applying to Tepper be beneficial if I want a career in consulting. Any other colleges in US which are good for consulting ?


Also, how good are the chances to get a scholarship at Tepper in context of Indian Students.


Grateful, If you can help me in figuring these issues and share any addl info you think will be relevant to ponder upon while making decision to apply to Tepper.

Prudhvi wrote:Hii Ritwik,

Congrats on your admission to Tepper MBA.
:

Hi Prudhvi,

First of all, accept my apologies for the delayed response.

Have been busy with VISA and other stuff.

I am glad that you are thinking about an MBA and that too with a clear goal.

Let me answer your questions in the order that I have understood them.

1. Does Tepper offer opportunities for a career in Management Consulting and Finance?

Yes! Tepper gets Management Consulting companies such as AT Kearny, Booze Allen Hamilton and McKinsey on campus. In fact there is a McKinsey Office in Pittsburgh, with some of the Tepper grads working there. So, if you want to go into Management Consulting, Tepper is definitely a place that can land you there. But, you must know that MC jobs are highly competitive and out of a batch of 200-300 students at Tepper, merely 5-10% make it to Management Consulting jobs. So, if you really want to grab a coveted job like Management Consulting, you have to be at the top of your game. If you are looking for some other colleges that are good for Management Consulting jobs, you can look at the top 5 schools, specially Kellogg which recently topped the list of schools that sent highest number of students to Management Consulting jobs.

As far as Finance is concerned, Tepper is not THE place for finance to be honest. Although, there are people who have moved to Investment Banking and Corp. Finance jobs, you might want to look at other schools if you are looking at purely finance related jobs; you might want to look at Booth, Columbia, Stern or may be Simon (lower ranked but good in Finance). And as far as I know, the recruitments at Tepper for Finance jobs have gone down in past couple of years. (Some say that's the general trend across colleges, not sure!)

2. Is Tepper good in Operations?

Oh yes! Tepper is quite famous for its Operations course. So, if you are really interested in operations, Tepper is definitely the place for you. Tepper's program is quite quant-heavy and I guess that's why its Operations program is very strong too. I have heard about Tepper's reputation in Operations even from people who didn't know much about Tepper. So, the answer is a big YES!

3. What are the chances of scholarship at Tepper?

I believe Scholarships depend on how badly the school wants you compared to the other admitted students. It's not that Tepper is not a scholarship friendly school. Some of my peers who are going to join Tepper this year received Scholarships of $10k. I am sure some of the students would have got 50%-100% scholarships too. But with a score of 710 and 2.5 years of experience, I would say the chances of a significant amount of scholarship are less.

And if 'financing the MBA' is a decisive constraint, bear in mind that Tepper doesn't provide you an option of non co-signor loans from US. So, you will have to manage that either from India or get it through the help of some relatives in the US (who have Green Card).

There are other schools which provide you option of non co-signor loan at low rates in the US. You can easily find a list of such colleges. Sameer posted a blog on this topic too - Non cosigner students loans for international MBA

I hope I have answered all your queries. Feel free to ask me anything else that you feel is necessary for you to know before you decide on Tepper.

And I will try to send a quick reply this time! ;-)

Hi

I need help with a situation.

I am having a hard time deciding between a full ride at Vanderbilt Owen and no scholarship at Tepper.

I am a 25 year old Indian male Engineer with 4 years of work experience in an internal consulting/general management profile for a fortune 100 company (Electrical/Energy) in India.

My post MBA goal is to get into management consulting. I want to focus on Strategy and Operations.

I would like to know your experience so far and If Tepper will be worth the extra 100K I would have to spend.

Thanks !

Hammerhead wrote:I am having a hard time deciding between a full ride at Vanderbilt Owen and no scholarship at Tepper.
:
My post MBA goal is to get into management consulting. I want to focus on Strategy and Operations.

If you can afford it, for your specific goals (to break into management consulting), my vote goes to Tepper.

Ritwik might have other fresh perspectives to share, as he's currently attending the program.

In the meanwhile, see if this story helps. It's about a Tepper student who got into all 3 top strategy consulting firms.

Hi ritwik

Hi

I am Aditya Pande. I just gave my GMAT and got a score of 710 (Quant 50, VA 35, IR 6, AWA 5.5). I am looking for 2016 admissions

Indian/ manufacturing sector(supply chain) / GMAT - 710 / Average academics /work ex - 3.5 years by dec 2015

Following is my educational background:-
10th - 79.8%
12th - 82.2%
Co - curricular - participated in various adventure camps, represented school in regional level swimming competition, Short Story written by me was displayed to public in Delhi Haat during AIDS awareness week selected among 5 schools, participated in various quizes and occasional painting and dramas, was house vice captain in 12th standard.

Engineering - 8.54/10 from Vishwakarma Institute of Technology (an autonomous institute under University of Pune) comes in top 3 of University.
Co - curricular - participated in various national level technology fests in robotics, organised An event Micromind in College techfest, Part of college editorial team, was part of college NGO (but dont have any certificate for this), participated in national level paper presentation event

I have already one MBA from Symbiosis Institute of Management studies , Symbiosis International University in Operations Management - 2.942 /4 (CGPA)
Co - curriculum - came 3rd in a strategy event called estrategia in SIBM business festival (national level event), Part of noesis the operations club, volunteered at Pranay an NGO, part of placement brochure presentation team, part of Group Discussion / Personal Interview team for 2011 admissions.
Internship
1. KIMS specialty hospital - analysis of security at the hospital and do manpower optimization (2 months)
2. Larsen & toubro - supply chain revamping project (3 months)

I am currently working in Tata Chemicals Limited as Deputy Manager - Strategic Sourcing & Vessel Chartering (August 2014 - Present). In this capacity i am looking after commodity import of almost 2 million MT per year of different types of coal, limestone etc and am responsible for chartering vessels and movement of material from load port to discharge port. I am involved in all contractual negotiation activities and market MIS. I have undertaken project realising significant company savings.

Earlier I was working as Deputy manager - Packaging, Automation & Quality Assurance in Tata Chemicals(July 2013 - August 2014) . In this capacity i was looking after 5 packing centers catering to regional and national demand of 13 SKUs of different products. Complete end to end value chain mapping and management was done by me for these 5 packing units. In this capacity 3 quality supervisors directly reported to me and more than 300 workers were indirectly under me.

Prior to that i was Management Trainee with Tata Chemicals Limited. In this period i have done a project with NGO for 4 months (working in sales, inventory management system), a 4 month project with Agricultural business in market research and benchmarking project and 4 months with consumer products business to improve efficiency of southern region packing centers
Awards: best management trainee project
Gold medal in Business excellence stewardship training
Awarded certificate of recognition for reducing downtime and maintenance cost.
I am also certified six sigma green belt

I want to further specialize in International SCM and get into a consulting firm. Will Tepper be a good fit ??

Can you please advice to which programs should i apply and if my earlier MBA will be a hinderance in admission process.

Hey Ritwik
Great article about your GMAT-to-Tepper Experience.
I am targeting Tepper this year and I would love to get your feedback on my profile.

2012 pass out from BITS Pilani with CGPA - 6.7
Dual degree course ( BE-Mechanical eng. with MSc. in Biological Studies) .... <Its a weird combination, I know>
10th - 84 %
12th - 89 %

Extra curricular : In my opinion, less. There is not much in college, except some department work.
Till school years I was a good TT player, district level. I might be able to elaborate on other extra curr. experiences from school.

2 years work ex in operations , including 1 year extensive experience in SCM of one of the reputed automotive company.
GMAT - 730 ......TOEFL - expecting them by the end of this month, but it should be satisfactory.

I have been told that I can target carey, ross, fisher, TAMU and Kelley. Need your opinion on this.
Your help is much appreciated.

Shourya