How helpful are career management advisers at business schools?
For students and grads from top 15ish schools, how helpful were they? What can you expect when you meet them? If a career management adviser is from the industry, would they give you contacts of people from their personal networks?
Assuming you are talking about MBA programs, career services are definitely helpful at top schools (top 15 is good enough). They will provide with you with a lot of guidance and resources. If you go to a smaller school, you will likely get a lot of personal attention but even at larger schools careers has a lot of industry connections and knowledge. And yes sometimes they are from the industry. Regardless, they will always use their contacts for the benefit of their students. But you have to keep the following in mind. It's a two way street. To maintain their reputation with recruiters, careers needs to make sure they send quality students to recruiters. So in the end, they will provide you with a platform, but they are not going to give you a job on a plate.
Yes I'm talking about MBA programs. When I talked to mine, the only thing they give me is 1-2 names from the alumni database to contact, but I have access to the same thing and can find that out myself. Is this the extent of the help that I can expect?
That sounds extremely bad. Did you set up an appointment to go over your goals, resume, talk through your options, formulate a strategy, etc, etc? As mentioned, they are not there to hand you a job on a platter, but assuming this is a legit program, they should be able to do a hell of a lot more to help you get the ball rolling in the right direction and give you some focus. Can't really speak to your question about access to their personal networks though as that could have various implications. I'd think that would be pretty situation dependent.
@techie674 @Westcoastie I set up the appointments without knowing what to expect so I'm wondering whether what I experienced is typical. I basically went in there and tried to get advice in the past. I already know what I'm looking to do and they said it will be "hard work and lots of networking". During the meeting, one person gave me the contact info for one alum but I can easily find that information myself. I spoke to another person working there with industry experience hoping he can make an introduction from his personal network or something but he only sent me a screenshot from the alumni database. I expected more help but either they don't know how to help, they don't like me, or I had different expectations in terms of help I can receive from the career center. What type of guidance and resources do they provide?
What is the rank of your school, really?
@"finmodeler" Are you trolling? Which school is this? I cannot imagine a top 15 program treating its students like this. They don't tell you to contact alumni until you are prepared to make a good impression. And as @"Westcoastie" has said, they will first meet you to discuss a lot of details relating to your goals and options.
That doesn't sound like a top 15 school. I know both students and career advisors at many of the top 15 and have never heard of this sort of treatment. Sounds weird/unlucky.
You need to manage your expectations. First, for networking purposes, all alumni are in alumni database anyway. It's not like they can recreate new people for you. Connecting some random student at Stern to some random colleague who went to Darden when the bank recruits on campus anyway doesn't make any sense. You've to go thru your school's recruiting channel. Secondly, MBA networking is not like cold calling random people at every BB. If you are in a Top 15 school, most BBs come on campus and they have their own networking/recruiting process. If you are on over eager FY who wants to get a jump ahead of everyone else and go network on your own, Career Center is doing you a favor by not throwing you in front of them. All the banks will tell you to go through the actual process they have. If you are a SY who struck out last year, well the banks already know you, you already know them. There is no need for reintroduction for same bank. Obviously doesn't apply to random boutiques and stuff. But overall, even with ex-industry guys, you should expect guidance on what to do, insights, and if you are a SY who didn't recruit for banking last year, possibly some introduction or referrals since recruiting is more unstructured. If you are a first year, go through the on campus recruiting process like anyone else, and if you don't get much traction by November, then ask for contacts at other banks.
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