Hello again:

I always tell individuals to pay close attention to their resume, sometimes called in CV outside the US. Most MBA programs will require work experience so pay special attention to describing the work experience you've had. This can be in the form of internships as well as full-time jobs.

Always be honest when you do the experience part of your resume / CV. If it is a 2 month internship, then list it as June and July, 2009 If it is a 3 month internship, then list it as June - August 2009. If it is a full-time position, then you would also list the month and year you started and the month and year you completed the position. I always look very closely at the resume. If I see something listed as 2009 it immediately causes me to question....what months? When during 2009? And then if I look and see in your transcript that you were a full-time student in 2009-2010, it really makes me question the resume and the ethics of listing something as 2009.

Be careful in your :task statements" in your resume. If this is an internship, do not oversell what you did by stating something like "provided strategic direction" etc. Be honest in your task statements about what you did. Include numbers if possible - for example" "Provided editorial assistance to 4 directors, reading over their marketing materials and suggesting possible corrections and edits."

I recently had an applicant who worked as a Barista at Starbucks full-time for 1 year after graduation and then for 3 months at another company and was now applying for an MBA. He only put the 3 month position, in additon to previous internships, on his resume. When I questioned him on what he'd done during the year after graduation he explained that his career goal is to work in the hospitality industry, specifically food and beverage so he thought working at Startbucks would give him a good insight in to a very strong value-branded company. I said he should put that on his resume and the first task statement should be "Wanting to gain experience in the food and beverage industry, I decided that working for a high value brand would give me excellent insights in to this industry.....etc.

Hope this helps.

LH

Dear. Ms. Hallberg,

Hope all is well,
I once again want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to help me, and it is greatly appreciated.

The advice you have given me is great, these are some important points that I did not know and I will work on correcting them in my resume as soon as possible. If you have any more advice that you would like to share I would really appreciate that.

Once again I thank you very much for all your help.

Regards
Pooja Shamdasani

Ms. Hallberg,

I am also VERY interested in Suffolk. I currently work in the energy business as an analyst, but the business/finance/math realm is very new to me. I can model energy projects in the basic sense, and am still learning all the math again... working very hard- 3-4 hours per day and plan to do so for the next few years. My question is... how quantitative heavy is Suffolk University... and do you tend to help students who struggle through statistics/data analysis? Is it a statistics for managers class with real-world applications, or does it function more like an college stats class? I come more from a public policy background... with a communications/PR major in college and a religion minor from a small liberal arts school (Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisconsin)... Do you have any advice on how to get prepared for Suffolk? I hope to attend your school within the next 2-3 years. Thanks!

How very interesting that you went to Carthage College in Kenosha! I know it well. I am originally from Waukegan, Illinois. My family used to (many many years ago) attended bicycle races and then went to a wonderful German restaurant in Kenosha!

Thinking about the quantitative part of any MBA:
1. You will undoubtedly have to take MBA core courses that will be on the quantitative side -- this is true for any AACSB accredited MBA Program. IE the core classes in accounting and finance will require quantitative skills. In the Suffolk MBA and Global MBA, we also have a core course called Operations and Data Analysis -- this is our stats course and it does teach some straight stats but it mainly relates it to operations --- so you "hang the stats" on an application, if that makes sense. All MBAs will have a core class in stats: it may go under the name of Data Analysis or Quantitative Analysis etc.

Outside of the core classes, in any MBA, you will be choosing electives and most likely, a concentration. IE in the Suffolk Global MBA you concentrate in either international finance or international marketing --- gaining a functional expertise in finance or marketing that can be applied in a domestic corporation or a global one. The finance concentration here, as in any MBA, will be very focused on quantitative skills. An accounting concentration in an MBA would be similar. If you concentrated in the Suffolk Global MBA on international marketing.......or in our MBA on marketing, an excellent and must-have elective is Marketing Research for Managers. This is a course that does use your quantitative skills. The other marketing courses would not emphasize the quant side.

So, if quantitative is not your best skill set, my advice is to find a concentration you are extremely interested in that is not heavily focused on the quant. IE in the Suffolk MBA we have 10 concentrations to choose from: marketing, org behavior, strategic management, finance, accounting, entrepreneurship, health admin, non profit management, etc.

One additional hint: any MBA program will require you to use Excel......not just read excel worksheets, but you'll need to create them, use the formulas etc. So this would be something else to brush up on.

Also, at Suffolk, we have the Ballotti Learning Center which provides tutorial sessions, free of charge, to our MBAs and GMBAs in some of the more challenging courses....and these are mainly the accounting, finance and stats! So you are not alone! I'm certain many MBA programs provide assistance, and in some cases, brush up courses prior to beginning the program, in the quant area.

I do hope your interest in an MBA or Global MBA continues!
Your background is an interesting one and adding an MBA or Global MBA will really enhance your resume and portfolio of skills......and your understanding of the business world!

Best wishes.
LH

Ms. Hallberg,

Thanks so much for your prompt reply. Kenosha is a good city, and was great for where my head was at during that time-although it is very post-industrial. I think my interest primarily aligns with global finance, as that is my big hole being in the energy business. I don't want to run from my quant background, but would rather improve it. I work with a multitude of ivy leaguers and University of Virginia alums with finance backgrounds... So I am still a bit new to the world of development returns and capital structure financing and strike prices (in merchant power markets). I am pretty good with excel, but my issue is that while in high school, I was never forced to take a high math class due to me being a late bloomer of sorts, I was cast with adhd at age 4, and for some reason, was cast into a room with a bunch of children who had learning disablities, and needless to say, the classes were not of a difficult nature- and then I took the required math in college, and while I can do basic stats- variance, std deviation, my math background feels a bit disjointed-even though my state tests at the time were in the 90th percentile in math-. As a result, I've started taking the classes online through rapid learning center, taking classes from alg 1, alg 2, and am taking both college alg. And trig in the next few months, followed by stats and calc 1. My father runs a large investment boutique in the energy business, and with my chosen career path, the pressure to take over is there. I love finance, and so spending 4 hours per day on math is of no consequence to me. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, right? My verbal has always been off the charts, but I think with the right financial training, as well as improved quant, I won't feel so far behind the ivy leaguers! In DC, I worked for a 501-3c focused on renewable energy, then interned for a canadian hydro developer. Needless to say, I am committed, and I'm not adverse to sleepless nights to get where I need to be. I come from a family of late bloomers, as my father was a wrestler at clev. State who ended up with a Univ. Of Chicago MBA, and my uncle failed out of U of Cincinatti to end up getting through Cornell. How much of these classes are using excel. I've taught myself regression and project modeling using excel, but I guess my question to you is if I get a finance concentration, will calculus be something I run into often, or is this something that with knowing the math the way I will in a few years and figuring out how to do the problems in Excel using Solver that I can do? Suffolk caught my eye both because of the Beacon Hill location, the global nature of the program and the ability to study overseas, and the practical nature of its cirriculum. Also, the reference in "the Departed" didn't hurt either! I also like the specific finance classes offered, such as venture capital finance.. Which is oine of the blocks that needs to be filled in during my budding energy career. Thanks very much for the prompt reply, and dealing with me typing this off my Blackberry. I hope to meet you at my eventual admissions interview!

Good "talking" with you!

You might want to go to www.globalmba.typepad.com
This is a blog from our Global MBA interns this summer in 10 countries. The one you might be particularly interested in is Tomas who is with Schott Solar AG world headquarters in Mainz, Germany. He too is very interested in the energy scene....although he went with the international marketing concentration.

We do have a Global MBA with 8 years of experience - but more in engineering -- no finance background. She is in the finance concentration and doing her internship at State Street Global Advisors. She is doing incredibly well with the finance and her internship....in fact, it is looking like it will turn in to a position offer for her!

Do hope to see your application to the Suffolk Global MBA some day! In the meantime, and for whichever program you do apply to, you are doing the right thing in terms of preparation.

LH

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