CA: What other interesting trends or shifts have you been observing?
SK: There has been increased interest among our students in the MBA roles they can play in the retail sector. Also, ensuring one’s social media presence is well thought out, consistent and appropriate for the industry being targeted will continue to be important.
CA: How many incoming students do you see each year who are actually undecided about their post-MBA path? Obviously they’ve provided a best guess for the sake of the admissions process, but how much exploratory career counseling does your team actually end up doing? What kinds of services do you offer students who are really struggling to choose a path? How frowned upon is it to come into the Sloan MBA essentially undecided?
SK: There is a self-reflection piece in the admissions process that is very helpful in preparing students for the eventual process of finding a job. The vast majority of incoming students, I find, have done some sort of self-reflection before arriving. I will say that it is very helpful if people are able to take this step before they arrive on campus because things hit so hard and fast once they’re here.
If any questions remain, there are certainly enough avenues and ways for students to gain clarity once they get here. Our career advising sessions are open to whatever students want to talk about, and some do use them to give thought to who they are, what they want, why they want it and how they will add value to their next job or the company they want to launch.
CA: What do you lose sleep over with regard to the Sloan Career Development Office and what it offers?
SK: As the students’ lives are incredibly busy, how do you best ensure they are doing the things they need to be doing when they need to be doing them.
Our Career Core was designed with some of this in mind. It includes sessions on navigating the MBA market. For example, in sessions for students interested in a particular sector, say consulting, energy or media, we talk about what this has looked like at MIT Sloan in the past, what the timing looks like, who the hiring companies are, etc. We offer these 30-minute sessions for a variety of different industries.
We also offer classes with our communications and organizational processes professors, where students can discuss and explore cover letters, resumes, interviewing, negotiations and thinking about work/life management both as an individual and as a manager. Students also have access to advisors for resume reviews, cover letter reviews and interviewing prep as discussed earlier.
Second-year students also play an integral role. They are active in clubs, where they often do a lot of advising to our first-year students. We have an extremely rich club culture here, and we work in concert with them.
We have tremendously talented students, and it is exciting to support and work with them to help them realize their career goals.
