Berkeley / Haas - 07-25-2024 | Clear Admit ApplyWire

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July 24, 2024 5:21pm ET

Applying: Berkeley / Haas, Duke / Fuqua, Michigan / Ross, Stanford GSB, Yale SOM

Intake Year: 2025

Pre-MBA Career: Energy Project Manager

Post-MBA Target Industry: Other

GRE: 328

GPA: 3.45

Years of Work Experience: 2.5

Location: Greater Boston

Post MBA Location: West Coast

Notes:

I have jumped around a bit in my early career, looking to get an MBA to find my niche in sustainability more efficiently and build financial analysis skills since I am strongly considering a pivot into climate investing. Looking for a school that offers strong sustainability offerings, ideally a joint Master's degree or concentration in energy/sustainability/climate

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Show Comments (4) Last: July 25, 2024

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1640 Showing impact and growth at work, despite jumping around a little, will be important. Are you also involved in activities outside of work, any additional hobbies and interests?

Many top MBA programs are offering more coursework and concentrations in this area, so your interests should be widely available. Do you plan to be on the west coast, post MBA?

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grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1184 Can you shed some more light in terms of exactly what you mean by climate investing? Are you hoping to work for an asset management firm that places funds in ESG type investments? To work as an investment banker helping to take ESG startups public? To join a VC that does early stage ESG funding? The reason I ask is because each of these paths may involve a slightly different set of target schools - and different short-term, post-MBA goals to make the jump to where you want to be.

I should also emphasize that without past finance experience, you may need to start with something more generalist (like IB) to build the skills sought after in the PE/VC/asset mgmt domains... Best of luck!
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anon29987 Likes Earned: 0 Thank you so much for the comments! To give some more context here, my undergrad degree was in Environmental Engineering at a top 10 ranked institution. To address the growth piece, I started a new role last month, but in my previous role I was promoted. I am planning to submit a recommendation from my supervisor from my previous role. My main activity outside of work is a semi-professional sport along with helping run team operations and volunteer coaching disadvantaged youth. I also was a D1 athlete in college, completed an entrepreneurship project, and was president of a sustainability club. For my future goals, I am hoping for a VC that funds climate tech companies, but I am still mostly undecided and wondering if I need to come up with a more specific idea for the sake of the applications. Post-MBA I'd prefer to be remote or on the west coast. Thanks again for the helpful insights! (0)

grichmond Verified User. Likes Earned: 1184 Thanks for adding these details. It sounds like you attended a rigorous undergraduate program and a challenging major, and it's impressive that you were also a D1 athlete and have presumably kept some of that involvement alive post-grad with your outside activities.

I appreciate your clarifying your goals. Two points on this:

First, I suggest you have some informational interviews with folks doing the kind of work you hope to do - ideally those who have also attended leading business schools. This will help you to better understand the pathways that may be available to you. VC can be very hard to break into without having previously been in banking or having already founded/funded/sold your own venture - this is why so many MBAs do banking (or in some instances consulting) as a first step.

Second, you will indeed need to have a hypothetical goals plan for the MBA application process (both short- and long-term). Nearly every school will ask for this information - if not in an essay than often during the interview. You should read our tip and watch the Clear Admit video on defining goals if possible.

Best of luck!
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