What are they most powerful alumni networks? Not limited to universities but also outside?
I have heard that McKinsey is supposed to be a very stron network for example. Any others?
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Military and Mormons
Nailed it.
The Italian mafia, aka Bocconi.
Lehman Brothers.
There's nothing like shared mayhem to bring people together for life. Unfortunately, I am one of the very few who is informally excluded from this network.
damn, that's rough
Rhodes Scholars HBS Yale Law McKinsey Donaldson, Lufkin, Jenrette (their alums occupy powerful positions in finance)
Also Standford.
Porcellian Club Skull & Bones
This isn't 1970 bro
It depends on what you want the network for and where you are. For example, we did a deal in Mississippi a few years ago and if you were in the right fraternity at Ole Miss, you could be the king of Jackson, if that's something you want... The "fancy Ivy degrees from the Northeast" (real quote) actually worked against us. Other than that I'd say the regular cast of characters-Harvard/HBS & Wharton for finance, Stanford for tech, etc.
I am always surprised at how tight the McKinsey alumni network is though. A few years ago we moved to a new area and I became pretty good friends with a few ex-McKinsey guys, and since I'm 40 the guys were around my age or older. They still go on annual McK alumni trips to the Bahamas/Caribbean even though some hadn't worked at McK since their first job out of undergrad or out of Bschool. I was introduced to a guy in his 50's/60's with whom I've since done some business, he hadn't worked at McK for over 20 years but he was still pretty close to friends my age, and that's how we were introduced.
Yup. In the South, being in the right SEC frat or being ex-military gives one more respect than a fancy degree. Prestige is all about context.
MBB is pretty tight in general. A buddy from college did Wharton MBA and then MBB, and he said the alumni response rate for Wharton was like 40% while for his MBB firm, it was around 90%.
Kinkaid High School in Houston. Srs.
Association for Renaissance Martial Arts. It may be illegal to exclude all non-white men from your group but it is not yet a crime to create something only they would go to.
West Point
Bilderberg
True, but getting invited is already a networking event in itself
You have to have accomplished getting to $1bln plus typically to get invited.
@Matrick: Influence is just as hard to achieve. If you're someone they can use, but you don't have money, you can get in i.e high level politicians, authors, media.
MS13 buddies
I think it depends on what your criterion are, because IMO there are ~3 important features to a network: the caliber of the people in it, the number of people in it, and the strength of the connection between people in it.
A University network is very large, and at a place like Wharton/HBS, the caliber of the people is very high. But the connection between people isn't very strong unless you have many shared activities/experiences.
My guess is the strongest network most of us will have, in terms of balancing those three factors, will be your banking analyst class and to a slightly lesser extent, group alumni. You form a very strong connection with fellow analysts, they're likely to be a successful group of people, and it's a pretty sizable network.
Others: Texas A&M Tuck Hotchkiss / Choate / Avon Old Farms / etc. USMC UT Austin (hook 'em)
Anything Texas - "Some folks look at me and see a certain swagger. In Texas, we call it walkin'."
I think these are the vastly overlooked networks. Albeit I didn't go to a New England prep school for high school, from the many friends I have that did the networks at schools like Andover, Exeter, Choate, Deerfield, etc seem powerful. Additionally, I've heard that Tuck alums will literally stick their neck out for any other Tuck people.
Sports teams are also extremely loyal networks (even at top LACs). If you manage to connect with someone from your school who played the same sport as you it will generally get you an interview somewhere or they'll do your best to connect you to the right people.
The most powerful alumni network is the one that ejects from by balls.
Penn State
Masonry
What about ucla anderson for IB / PE / VC? I live in southern cal and plan on staying here.
UCLA is good for socal jobs but even there it gets its butt kicked by Stanford. And USC actually has a more loyal well-connected socal network than USC.
Typo?
By its own admission, UCLA has a long way to go in supporting its own alums.
I would definitely say military. I have had a roughly 90% response rate when contacting other Post 9/11 veterans. I have been able to visit with a ton of them and already have 2 superdays lined up for sophomore IBD internships, just waiting almost as a formality for offers to 3 more BB sophomore superdays. I have honestly been shocked and grateful by how willing these individuals have been to meet with me and refer my resume to HR.
There's a reason why IB is dominated by fraternity alumni.
Amongst the Ivies - definitely Dartmouth. Globally. The key is not the number of big alumni or whatever (Wharon, Harvard etc will have more of those...), but its the ability for a current student or alum to reach out to other alums cold and get a response or for them to want to help you out/give advice, which happens a lot.
Committee of 300
I'll second Kincaid, Texas A&M and military. I'm an alumn of the second, have friends and family in the first and third.
As someone else mentioned, context matters for almost all of these.
If you plan to live and work in Texas you absolutely cannot do better than an undergraduate degree from Texas A&M University as far as network is concerned. That diminishes fairly significantly the further out of state you get.
Gig 'em.
I can also echo Kinkaid as well as a few other Houston and Dallas private schools. At the University of Texas Austin, FIJI, SAE and to a lesser extent SigEp, have amazingly good connections. The majority of these kids come from the same demographic and social circles, are part of the old money crowd, parents are well connected in Texas, etc. For example, Greenhill in Houston takes primarily only SAEs from UT every year. Barclays is also filled with ex-fraternity guys from UT.
For MBAs: Tuck. Just an insane network.
USC!
Dartmouth and the Military will generally take care of their own, on the regional level USC and Texas schools do the same.
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