Dartmouth / Tuck - 09-18-2024 | Clear Admit ApplyWire

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September 18, 2024 1:23pm ET

Applying: Dartmouth / Tuck, Harvard Business School, Michigan / Ross, UPenn / Wharton, UVA / Darden, Yale SOM

Intake Year: 2025

Pre-MBA Career: Law

Post-MBA Target Industry: Consulting, Non Profit/SI

GMAT: 675

GPA: 3.75

Years of Work Experience: 9

Location: USA

Post MBA Location: Northeast USA

Notes:

Practiced law for 9 years.

~4 years in commercial litigation specializing in real estate litigation (eminent domain, transactional disputes), products liability, bankruptcy, and other business/individual litigation.

~5 years as federal prosecutor (narcotics and violent crime). My cases focused on prolonged domestic and international investigations targeting complex criminal organizations (primarily narcotics and firearms trafficking and gangs). Tried numerous federal jury trials as first-chair / lead prosecutor, also substantial experience in arbitration, depositions, and other in-court appearances.

Currently run my own law firm as a solo practitioner representing clients in commercial litigation matters.

Focused on pivoting career to social impact work, short-term as a social impact or public-sector consultant and long-term in a nonprofit or CSR/Government Affairs role.

Like (1)

Show Comments (7) Last: September 21, 2024

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1693 Be interesting to learn more about your career pivot, which may well be related to your experiences, to date. If that’s the case, it strengthens your profile.

Your career to date is non traditional, for MBAs. But that can be good in terms of allowing you to stand out, as long as you can then show fit, for the programs you’re targeting. Showing impact and growth, through your legal career, is important, backed up by strong recommendations.

Are you also involved in activities outside of work? Any additional hobbies and interests?

(0)

dogtown2012 Likes Earned: 7 Thanks for your comment - I’ll try to include everything below: My career pivot, to be succinct, is because of my lifelong goal to make a positive impact in the world and my community. This is why I went into the law and why I became a prosecutor in the first place. Over time, however, I felt like there were many problems I wasn’t capable of solving in my role (including the many systemic problems that led individuals to be wrapped up in my cases). Instead, my impact was fairly limited in the sense that I could only punish - problem is, that only addressed past conduct (and mistakes). I want to be more proactive. That’s why I’ve pursued the pivot and social impact / nonprofit work. I believe businesses are in a unique and influential position to address some of our society’s larger problems (in concert with the public-sector), and I want to help achieve that vision. In terms of extras - pretty limited for most of my career, on account of the time demands of my job. In undergrad, I was in leadership positions for two years in my fraternity. In law school, I was executive chair of the mock trial student group. I competed on my law school’s national mock trial team (and won several competitions at my law school as well). As a lawyer, I received pro-bono awards while in private practice, providing well over 100 hours per year of pro bono work representing incarcerated individuals in various matters. For the last 8 months, I have been a volunteer coach with a nonprofit locally that provides mentorship, training, and education to help aspiring entrepreneurs from historically underserved communities (and previously incarcerated individuals) launch their businesses. Personally, I’m a lifelong snowboarder and love to be outside - camping, hiking, you name it. In my spare time, I build computers and read (literature and news - I’m politics and history nerd). (1)

dogtown2012 Likes Earned: 7 Sorry, not sure why my paragraph spacing did not take! (0)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1693 Nice, you do have an impressive profile, imo. Why is Stanford mot on your list? Although I do see you want to be in the North east, post MBA. Might also look at 1-2 more M7s. Are you targeting the first rounds? (0)

dogtown2012 Likes Earned: 7 Yes, I have applied to all of these schools in R1 this year, so applications are already in. I did not apply to Stanford primarily because of the location and where I want to end up long-term. My entire family lives in the northeast, and I want to be closer to them. My wife's family is in the midwest as well, and we want to be closer to our parents as they get older and be able to visit with them more consistently. I also had concerns about the cost of living at Stanford (which is also why I avoided applying to NYC schools). That said, I am considering applying there in R2 if R1 does not go well, and have a few other schools that I was considering there as well. Do you think my profile fits Stanford well? Also, I initially eliminated some of the other M7s that have a more "finance" reputation (Booth, Columbia, MIT) and other schools like NYU for the same reason. I'm just not sure if my profile would make much sense at those places, so I tried to target programs that would be more in-line with my career goals. Curious whether you think my concerns there are valid or if that is overblown. Please let me know if you have other questions! (1)

alexbr4 Verified User. Likes Earned: 1693 I think your concerns might be a little overblown. The MBA is a more generalist degree, and the top programs will have depth in multiple areas. And I do think Stanford is an interesting fit. Whether you apply to Stanford or not, working on their first essay may be very helpful? (0)

dogtown2012 Likes Earned: 7 Thanks for your feedback - I'll take another look at Stanford for Round 2 if Round 1 doesn't go well. Still a lot of time to wait and see, so keeping my fingers crossed. (1)