The Naked MBA

With such a large range of choices, deciding where to go to business school is a tough decision. On top of that, many people wrestle with the decision of whether to go full or part-time. Some employers will pay your tuition if you keep working for them while in school; though they often then require you to stay with the company for a certain amount of time after you finish business school. If you’re really lucky, like a friend of mine who works for McKinsey, your employer will ship you off to a full-time program for two years, but that doesn’t happen often!

If your company is not paying, then you need hard to look at what your goal is in getting an MBA: do you want to change tracks completely, or are you focused on advancing in the industry you're already in? If you want to stay in your current industry, then you are better off going part-time and chalking up more work experience as well as the MBA. This way you don’t miss out on promotions and will move up the ladder even faster. As a part-time student you also get to apply your classroom learning directly to your job, which helps seal in the benefit of the MBA. Imagine going over a case study in class one night and then applying what you learned at work the very next day--education doesn’t get much more practical than that! Part-time programs also tend to be more focused on the actual learning you’re doing, instead of the grades. Because let’s face it—if you’re going to school and also have a full-time job, you’re more focused on finishing the program then on getting A’s in all your classes.

There are also clear disadvantages to part-time MBA programs. The biggest drawback is that if you’re looking to switch jobs then you don’t have the same recruiting resources available to you as full-time students do. For example, Chicago GSB allows all MBA students (full and part-time) to use the career center's resources in looking for a job, but they don’t let part-time students participate in on-campus interviews. They see it as a conflict of interest; they don’t want to take tuition money from a company and then turn around and help that company’s employees find another job. Fordham, on the other hand, allows part-time student to go through on-campus recruitment as long as they sign a waiver stating that they have notified their employers that they are interviewing for jobs.

Another disadvantage is that the demands of interviewing and intense competition for the best jobs often require a full time investment, and the reputation of a full-time program at a top school. Part-time programs are often not as well-regarded.

Getting an MBA is an investment in yourself, so you should calculate about what the return on that investment will be. Will an MBA increase your salary and career prospects so much so that it merits a full-time investment, or will you be better off doing it part-time? Can you afford to take two years out of the job market? Can you afford financially to go full-time? Thinking about these questions will not only help you decide whether to go full or part-time, but it will help you define what your ultimate goal is in getting an MBA and how it fits into your long-term plan.

For those of you applying to business school in 2008, be warned that it’s shaping up to be one of the most competitive years ever. GMAT registration, a leading indicator of application volume, is way up. Worldwide, the number of people who registered to take the GMAT between the first of the year and February 29, 2008, was 47,592--nearly a 12% increase over the number of registrations recorded during the same period in 2007.So what can you do to stand out and land one of those prized spots at a top business school? In such a competitive time, you may want to consider an admissions consultant.

To that end, I recently got to have a conversation with Lou Chios, who has been an admissions consultant since the 1990s. I didn’t use a consultant when I applied, but Lou really opened my eyes do what these consultants do and how they can help you gain an edge. I’ve shared our conversation below.

CW: How did you get started as an admissions consultant?

I sort of stumbled into this in the 90’s in South America. I helped several candidates who were desperate and who entered HBS with my help, despite low GMATs. They recommended me to their friends, and then the business grew by word of mouth.

CW: Can you describe the services you offer?

First, I only work with around 40 people per year, to be sure that I can really focus 100% on them.

I help clients bring out their best in the admissions process from “theming” the essays, like you would do in an expository writing class, to making grammar suggestions to being able to present themselves clearly during the interview process. I also connect clients with previous ones--I have been doing this seriously since 1997 and I have nearly a hundred alumni from HBS alone--so that they know what each school is about beyond the brochure. For some universities, this personal contact with current students and alumni is critical in understanding one’s fit with the business school, and in conveying that message to key people. Every business school admissions office certainly has its own “culture.” Let me give two examples: In HBS, the wall between students and admissions officers is very high. The contact is minimal and the admissions office does not really care if you visit or lobby unless your mother is friends with the President of the university. In other universities such as NYU and Columbia, the admissions officers have regular contact with current students and alumni, and even seek their recommendations on candidates. If you call Kellogg or Chicago, you get a person on the other line. If you try to call HBS you will usually get a recording.

I also help people figure out what universities to apply to. I usually tell them to go take GMAT, multiple times if they need to, and then to come back to me when they’ve gotten the best score they can. Although the GMAT isn’t the only piece of the application, it’s an important filter for a lot of schools and gives me a sense of where they can realistically get in.  For example, Stanford has one the highest GMAT averages, around 730, so that tells me that they value a high GMAT. A 650 is not going to do it. I provide a reality check for people, but do encourage them to take some risks. I suggest applying to 3-4 schools in the right range for their GMAT and GPA, and 1-2 that are harder to get into. When picking these schools I also listen to what kind of environment they want, like do they want to be in a big city or at a smaller school. I try to match the experience they want with their GMAT score.

CW: What is the typical process for working with you?

During the initial interview, I try to define the strengths/weaknesses of the candidate and after they have taken the GMAT, I propose a group of universities to apply to. From there, we work on the resume, essay outlines, usually one university at a time. I push my clients to work with outlines that become more and more detailed before the writing begins. There is a lot of back and forth. After the applications are submitted, we work like hell on mock interviews. I do 7-8 mock interviews, based on the universities we’ve chosen. Accepted.com has a database of interview questions from different schools, so we work with a lot of those. The experience is really intense.

CW: What do people expect of you? Do they ever expect too much?

People have asked me for all kinds of help, and quite often in this process I evolve into some sort of psychologist. I draw the line very early in my initial talk and make it very clear that I am a consultant and NOT a ghost writer.

Moreover, as people in the industry know, admissions is a supply/demand situation and so Candidate X might enter the university of their choice in one given year, and Candidate X's friend with higher numbers and a similar background might find the same university more difficult in a different year. Such comparisons sometimes create problems. That is why I urge people to apply to a substantial group of universities because entering a top university means that everything has gone well, and that is tough.

CW: Is it really just about your GMAT and your GPA?

No. They are important, but schools are looking for people who have achieved leadership and growth in their current jobs, and who are well-rounded in their activities. They don’t want people who will just go home and study and will never contribute to the community. It’s important to show that you are this kind of person--in addition to being the next Bill Gates!

I often ask people, if they looked at two candidates side by side with identical work experience, but one of them already has a degree in finance and one has a degree in music, who they think would be better positioned to get into business school. From my experience it’s often the one with the music degree. I try to help people draw out what it is that differentiates them. For example, I had one client who was an opera singer on the side, but she was embarrassed by it. She hid it from me until well into the application process. When I found out, I said “That’s fantastic!” And in then end, it really helped her. When she talked with the Duke Admissions Director, it turned out that he loved classical music and they really connected on this.

CW: How do you think business schools feel about students using admissions consultants?

They don’t like it. But they have learned to live with us. Admissions directors could change the way they do things but they don’t.

CW: How do you think admissions directors could change the way the do things?

If they didn’t want admissions consultants to get involved then they could make you go to a writing center to do the essays, just like the GMAT. Or they could have a very extensive interview process, such as having 2-3 people ask you questions and keeping a transcript of interview to review. But they don’t change the process, which leads me to believe that they’re happy with the students they get, even though they know admissions consultants are often involved.

CW: If I'm a C student from an unknown college, can you get me into HBS?

Do you work at McKinsey, BCG or Goldman? HBS fawns over candidates from those companies even though HBS loves to act like they support “entrepreneurial risk-takers.” I think it has to do with the fact that candidates from companies such as these high-end ones are easy to place, and it also doesn’t hurt that these companies of course recruit tons of HBS people.

Having said that, I know it is tough for a C student to enter HBS given that the school loves high grades. But if you show outstanding leadership development in a certain area it is certainly worth a try! I am very realistic with my clients. If I think a client is completely unrealistic about his/her basket of choices I will not work with them. At the same time, I encourage them to go for those tough universities even if the chances might appear slim.

CW: Do you think it's necessary to use an admissions consultant?

I think so. It is a question of knowing your limits and employing someone who knows how to navigate in areas that you are not familiar with. This process involves many factors and if you are not familiar with ALL of them, then you will most likely suffer. That is not to say you do not have the person who wrote her HBS essays in only two hours the night before and got in….but I am talking in general terms.

One story I really like from a Harvard presentation in Miami. The Director of Admissions was there, as well as three HBS alumni. Someone asked if they recommended using an admissions consultant. The Director of Admissions response was that “you can tell your story the best”, but all three alumni said “Yes, use one!”.

In my mind it’s like planning a trip France for the first time. You could spend time reading 4 or 5 books and doing all the research on your own, or you could talk to people who have been there and know the country really well. You have to figure out your opportunity cost.

I think the value of admissions consultants is that they know a lot of things that take a lot of time to figure out, like what different schools look for. With editing, they do stuff that your friends don’t have time to do. An experienced consultant can also cut through the jargon of the admissions offices. For example, at Stanford and Columbia they value the GMAT enormously but they don’t emphasize this in their presentations. And Columbia has rolling admissions, but a consultant knows that if you apply in February, March or April, your chance of getting in is almost nothing--but admissions won’t tell you that. Or sometimes your interviewer will ask you where else you’re applying—this is a very strategic question since they are concerned about yield. So if you give a list of universities that people usually go to over that school, you might not get in. An admissions consultant can help you navigate all these pitfalls.

CW: What advice would you give someone in choosing an admissions consultant?

Ask for references!! I can’t stress that enough. Start with 3 or 4 possible consultants and get 3 references from each of them. Then use those to get other references. No one is going to say overtly bad things if they’re being used as a reference, so read the signs. You want someone who is truthful with you, so do a lot of listening to the references. Ask follow up questions—if someone says they were really good, ask why they were really good? Why did they like working with them?

Word of mouth is the best way to find your admissions consultant. There are companies that specialize in this kind of consulting, but the namebrand of the institution doesn’t mean anything—it all depends on the person helping you. An on this note, you also have to cultivate a relationship with your consultant so that they want to give 100% for you. Even though you’re paying them a lot of money, you have to make them want to work for you or you won’t get the best out of them.

Getting in to a top-tier business school is worth celebrating, and that’s exactly what I did when I found out I got into NYU. Then came the news that I received a full scholarship—a free ride to business school! There was just one small problem; the scholarship wasn’t from NYU. It was from the Carlson School at the University of Minnesota, my safety school. So now I had to decide: attend a top-tier school and graduate $100K in debt or attend a second-tier school and graduate debt-free?
 

The debt issue looms large and most potential bschool students don’t give it as much weight as they should. The assumption is that you’ll have a six-figure salary after your MBA and pay it off right away. This is true in a lot of cases. But in my case, working my way up the chain at an investment bank was never the goal. I wanted to use my MBA to help change the world for the better. And last time I checked, you don’t get paid six-figures for that kind of work. Some business schools have loan forgiveness programs for students who take government or non-profit jobs, but NYU doesn’t. If I went to New York, I’d be on my own for repayment, which was enough to keep me up at night—and I hadn’t even signed the loan agreement yet!
 

Staying in Minnesota didn’t feel right either. For me an MBA was about a change bigger than just switching careers. I grew up in a small town and always felt like there was so much happening in the world that I was missing. New York seemed like the center of it all.
 

I thought about how I would feel at each school. At the Carlson School my GMAT was above average and my work experience probably was too. It was clear they considered me a valuable asset to give me a full ride. I wouldn’t have to worry about finding a new apartment, making new friends or leaving my boyfriend behind. I could stay in my comfort zone. On the other hand, I had the feeling I’d gotten into NYU by the skin of my teeth. My GMAT was at the bottom of NYU’s average range and I’d be going to school with people who had already spent years at top investment banks and consulting firms. Not to mention moving to a city where I didn’t know a soul.

I slept on it for a few days. I called my parents, who still live in my small hometown. “I made my decision,” I said.

“Oh,” said my mom. “We didn’t know you still debating—we didn’t think there was anything to decide.”

“There wasn’t really,” I replied. “But you guys will come visit me in New York, right?”

The best thing to do once you’ve submitted all your applications is to forget about them. Don’t wake up everyday wondering if today is the day you’ll get your admissions decision. Don’t obsessively read blogs to see if other people who applied to the same school have gotten their decisions. And above all, don’t check your email 20 times a day to see if you have news.

I followed none of this advice. Patience may be someone’s virtue, but not mine. After I submitted my last application I went to dinner and a movie with the Boyfriend. By dessert the suspense was killing me. “Do you mind if we swing by my apartment on the way to the movie?” I asked. “I, uh, forgot my phone.” He wasn’t happy about it but we detoured to my place and I ran upstairs while he waited in the car. I waited for my ancient laptop to boot up. After a few minutes my phone rang.

“What are you doing? We’re going to miss the movie,” said the Boyfriend.
“On my way down,” I said, clicking on the email icon.
“You’ve got mail!” announced my computer.
“I KNEW IT!” yelled the Boyfriend. “You’re checking your email!”
“I just wanted to see if there was any news!” I whined.
“But you only applied two hours ago!”

The first problem is that the emails the schools send you don’t actually contain any news. They just tell you that “Your status has changed” with a link to another website for your update. The second problem is that your status is always changing. First they tell you that you’ve successfully submitted your application. Then that they are processing your application. Then that your application is complete. Now multiply all those emails by five—the number of schools I applied to. That’s a lot of heart-palpitation inducing emails popping up in your inbox every day. Especially if you check your email at work. My productivity took a serious nosedive from March to early April. All I could talk about were my status changes. My boss finally gave up and worked it into our staff meetings. “First order of new business,” he would say. “Any status change updates from Caitlin?”

Then came the humiliation. Rejection from Stanford. Rejection from Columbia. Oh god, was I even going to get in to business school? I immediately regretted making the process so public. Even the guy at the deli where I bought my lunch every day now asked me if I’d gotten in. Rejection from Haas.  My options were becoming limited. I couldn’t get my mind of fit so I did the only thing there was to do. I took a vacation.

Nothing cures a wandering mind like drinking fruity cocktails all night and sleeping on the beach all day. And that’s exactly what I did for five days with my best friend in Miami. The cold Minnesota weather and my bschool applications all seemed very far away. I checked my email only once when we forgot what time our return flight left. That’s when I saw the email from NYU staring back at me: “Your application status has changed.” It was our last night in Miami. If I clicked on the link and it wasn’t good news, there weren’t enough fruity cocktails in all of South Beach to console me. I clicked.

Status: Accepted.

Bienvenidos a business school.

You blew off your coworkers to work on your essays during lunch. You shunned your friends on Friday nights so you could wake up for your Saturday morning GMAT prep class. You had to break the news to your boss that you were planning to jump ship when you asked him for a letter of recommendation. And all you have to show for it is cold, hard REJECTION. You didn’t get in to business school. Now what?

First, call all the friends you ignored for the months and let them take you out for a stiff drink. Then, makeup with your boy/girlfriend whom you dumped (on my advice) because you were moving across the country in a few months anyway—you’re going to need a shoulder to cry on. Once you’ve dried your tears and slept off your hangover, it’s time to start over.

Starting over doesn’t mean charging right back in and signing up for $5,000 worth of private GMAT tutoring. First, take a good look at whether business school is right for you. Do you have a clear idea of what you want to do after business school? If not, bschool won’t help you to figure that out. If you do have a clear idea, is an MBA necessary or is there another path you can take that won’t cost $100K? Did you apply because you really want to go back to school or because you hate your job? It’s a lot less expensive to find a new job than to go to business school—someone actually pays you instead of the other way around!

If you are certain an MBA is what you want, get some feedback before trying again. Find out if the schools that rejected you offer feedback to rejected applicants. A lot of them do. Once you have a better idea of why they turned you down—low GMAT, weak essays, etc.—you can focus on addressing specific weaknesses when you reapply. This will also give you a sense of where you fell in the pack. If you missed being admitted by a hair then apply to the same school. If it wasn’t even close you may want to target a different school.

Use the time between now and next year’s application deadline to network. Get in contact with current students and start a dialog with them about the school. Join on-line admissions chats so that the admissions directors start to recognize your name. If you haven’t visited campus, schedule a tour and sit in on a class. And as you get to know the program better make sure you highlight this in your application.

Demonstrate that you’ve made progress from one year to the next—emphasize promotions or additional responsibilities at work. Take a class that will be relevant to your MBA and highlight this on your résumé. You want to prove that you’ve grown and changed—but not too much! If your first essays described your dream of becoming the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, then turning in new ones about how you want to a non-profit organization will raise eyebrows. Stay consistent.

Finally, don’t get discouraged. Your chances of getting accepted the second time around might actually be higher than the first time you applied. At Wharton, for example, acceptance rate is around 18%, but for reapplicants it’s 5-10 percentage points higher. If you don’t get admitted the second time, though, then you might want to reassess whether the universe is trying to tell you something.

In yesterday’s post I wrote about the advantages of going abroad to get your MBA. A lot of people, though, want an international experience but aren’t ready to give up the experience of an American MBA. So they do the next best thing—study abroad for a semester. A semester abroad is kind of like moving in with your boyfriend but still keeping your own place in case it doesn’t work out. It’s commitment-lite. It gives you the chance to experience another culture, spice up your résumé, learn about international markets and customs, and—from what I hear—learn to order a beer and ask for someone’s phone number in another language.

The decision to study abroad should depend on the reputation of the business school you go to and that of the international business school you would attend. If you go to Stanford, it may not be as attractive to spend part of your MBA at another school. If you go to Ole Miss and can spend a semester abroad at INSEAD or LBS then you just struck résumé paydirt.

How much research did you do when choosing where to go for your MBA? My guess is that you wracked up the hours, especially if you count the web-surfing to MBA sites you did at the office while you were supposed to be putting together Powerpoints. If you do a semester abroad you’ll spend 25% of your MBA at that school, so put at least 25% of the effort you spent researching your primary business school into researching your study abroad options. Put it through all the same tests—ranking, reputation, what it’s known for, caliber of faculty, etc. A word of caution: often only a limited selection of classes are available to exchange students, so make sure the classes you want to take are open to you.

Going abroad can also throw off the recruiting process. If you go abroad in your third semester, as most people do, it means a lot more is riding on your summer internship. If you don’t like it or don’t get an offer you will miss the fall recruiting cycle and be left on your own to job hunt when you get back. One of my classmates hated her internship and but was scheduled to head to a European school for fall semester. She got an offer at the end of the summer and ended up accepting because she was scared of going abroad with no job. Guess what? She ended up hating the job.

Finally, think about what it means to spend a semester away from family, friends, and from the MBA experience of your school. Two years fly by, and it’s not a lot of time to forge friendships and professional connections. A friend of mine spent first semester of our second year in Europe. She told me that “when I came back it felt like I didn’t have any friends anymore. During first year everyone hung out together, but in second year groups formed and I missed out on that.” You also have to choose your commitments—I thought about going abroad but when I was tapped to become co-president http://caitlinweaver.blog.com/2835117/ of one of the largest student organizations, I had to choose. I stayed.

Competition is fierce for entry into American MBA programs. Although the MBA originated in the U.S., it’s now one of the most internationally recognized degrees. There are MBA programs on six continents, many of them on par with top U.S.schools in quality and reputation. American students are taking note of this, and of the many other advantages of crossing the pond for their MBA.

There are no exact numbers on how many American students are going abroad for their MBAs, but the number of U.S.students attending business schools in the UK almost tripled during the last decade, from 235 in 1994-95 to 648 in 2004-05. One advantage of a British MBA is that the normally two-year curriculum is condensed into two semesters. As tuition skyrockets in the U.S., a compressed degree is more attractive. The average cost of an MBA in Britain is 16,000 pounds--about $32,000. In the U.S. an MBA will set you back around $100,000. Even with the higher living costs that result from today’s weak dollar, that’s a huge savings. And the opportunity cost of a one-year degree is also less since you’re only giving up one year of salary. 

I only applied to American business schools, but a friend of mine was much more savvy. She got into Columbia and into Cambridge, and chose to go to Cambridge. “I’m sure I would have had a great experience at Columbia, too,” she told me, “but I’d have a lot more debt and would have had to delay starting my career by one more year.” and into

Many students also find that they’re ready to go back to the real world after one year. Recruiting calendars mean that second-year MBA students often accept job offers as early as October, leaving them with little incentive to focus on school for the remainder of their second year. A classmate of mine got his Sales & Trading offer at the beginning of our second year. “After two weeks of celebrating and slacking off I was pretty much ready to start working,” he told me. “Instead I spent the next seven months drinking and blowing off class. I didn’t get much out of second year.”

Americans aren’t the only ones who have discovered international MBA programs. In the UK, 75-90% of MBA students come from other countries. This international makeup of classes gives a much broader international experience than you’ll find even at the most “international” of U.S. business schools. If you’re considering working in another country, getting your MBA abroad is a huge advantage. And as the American economy weakens, it might be time to think about a career in another country. Not to mention that London is now vying with New York for the role of financial capital of the world.

The UK isn’t the only country with great MBA programs. You can find Business Week’s top picks here. And for the most part you don’t have to worry about the language barrier, since most of the time classes are taught in the international language of business—English.

It’s that time of year when all you would-be MBAs receive your admissions decisions. Many of you have gotten in to multiple schools and have tough decisions to make. You’re about to invest two years of your life and a large chunk of cash in an MBA program and you want to make the most of it. So how do you begin to sort through the staggering volume of information and statistics to make the right decision?

Go visit. Making a decision without visiting the school is like agreeing to marry someone based on their Match.com profile. You need to know what you’re getting in to! Visiting the school will help you get a sense of the social atmosphere. But to do this, you have to make sure to step off the beaten path. Duck out of the standard admissions tour and strike up a conversation with real students. See if you can get invited to happy hour with them. Get them drunk and ask them what they really think about the school, what they don’t like, where they hang out, how they made friends, etc. Is the atmosphere collaborative or hyper-competitive? Is it a commuter school or do people go out together on the weekends? Your happiness for two years will depend a lot on the people you spend your time with and the environment you’re in.

Don’t depend on rankings alone. I don’t deny that they are important—my life would be a lot different if I’d gone to my hometown university instead of striking out to a top-ranked east coast school. But once you get inside the top 20 schools, stop and pay no more attention to rankings. Statistics rarely show the whole picture, and b-schools are often ranked on narrow criteria that don’t capture the true pros and cons of each school. The only “best” you should be concerned about is what is best for you.

Diversity is important. It’s important if you are a minority, because seeing successful people that look like you encourages your success. If you’re not a minority it’s still important, because diversity contributes to the business goals of an organization: being responsive to an increasingly diverse world of customers, improving relations with the surrounding community, increasing the organization's ability to cope with change, and expanding the creativity of the organization. In short, diversity makes organizations more successful because people learn new things from one another. This is especially important in business school because the most important learning doesn’t always come from your professors. It comes from your classmates who bring with them a wide range of experience and knowledge.

Reputation is important. Not just overall reputation, but how a school is viewed by specific industries. For example, Chicago is known for consulting and NYU is known for banking. Companies recruit accordingly, so if there is an industry you want to focus on then you should go to a school that’s strong in that area. Talk to students at the schools you’re considering to get an idea of what industries the school is known for.

There are a lot of things to consider when choosing a business school, and I’ve listed the ones I think are most important. But there is one last factor to consider above all else: the gut factor. If you visit a school and your gut tells you it’s the right place for you, it probably is. And if it tells you to run screaming in the opposite direction, then that’s what you should do. Because in the end, it doesn’t matter what the research, the rankings or the admissions websites say. Only you can know what’s best for you.

A friend of mine who works on Wall Street spent last Saturday interviewing undergraduate students for her bank’s summer internship program. At the end of the day she felt exhausted—and surprisingly unaccomplished compared to a bunch of 20 year-olds. “These kids are amazing,” she told me. “They’re only juniors but they’ve already had five internships at major companies, been to every continent, and founded a start-up company. I’m going to be working for them one day very soon!”

Today’s college students are more accomplished than ever before. Many have been working for years already, and we’re not talking about delivering papers or flipping burgers. They have landed internships at large companies, or enrolled in prestigious summer programs that send them to far-flung places on intensive study courses and internships. They have started websites, been club presidents and organized charity drives at their schools that would put the Red Cross to shame. Yet business schools are still telling them they can’t apply unless they go get four more years of work experience after college graduation.

In 1966 close to one-third of students went to Harvard Business School straight from undergrad. Now students straight from college make up less than 1% of the student body. In top MBA programs the average student has 4-6 years of work experience. It’s true that more work experience can give you a clearer idea of what you want to do for your career, and that having a clear goal is very important in deciding to apply to business school. On the other hand, when I started business school with nearly 4 years of work experience, I had a very fuzzy vision of what I wanted to do compared to the 20 year-olds my friend interviewed. And let’s not forget that the CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerman, is 23 years old. There are more and more Mark Zuckermans on the way, and business schools need to embrace them and the value the experience they’ve already had.

Some schools are taking steps to acknowledge the accomplishments and ambitions of a younger demographic: Stanford plans to make 100 college visits this year, and the percentage of students admitted to Wharton straight from undergrad has risen to 3%. These schools have recognized that people are developing the acumen it takes to succeed in business school at a younger age, and that they have the ambition to go along with it.

Business schools have been struggling for years to attract more women MBA candidates. No matter what strategies or marketing angles they try, female enrollment at business schools seems stuck at around 30%.  This week Harvard Business School finally got the message and rolled out the 2+2 Program. This is first targeted recruiting program with real potential to increase the number of women in business schools.

According to Associate Director for MBA Admissions Andrea Mitchell Kimmel, the 2+2 program is to reach out to students who are not on the typical “business path”—a group that includes scientists, humanities concentrators, and those interested in nonprofits.  Students admitted to the 2+2 program receive assistance from Harvard in finding a job for the two years between their college graduation and the start of the full-time MBA program at Harvard. The catch is that Harvard actually has to approve their choice of job, but they have partnered with as many as 100 organizations, including companies like Google, and non-profit organizations like Teach for America.

So where does it say anything about targeting women? You’ll need to read between the lines, but once you do it’s obvious who the program is directed at. First of all, HBS doesn’t need more applicants--in 2007 6,552 people applied. What they do need is more women applicants. So where are the women? Well, female liberal arts majors far outnumber male ones. However, liberal arts majors (read: women) are less likely to apply for business school. Also, women are more likely than men to seek a job with a non-profit organization. But going to business school after working at a non-profit is not a natural progression—most people don’t think their nonprofit or public sector experience will be valued in the application process. The fact that the 2+2 program includes non-profit organizations on its list of “approved” employers dispels this myth and captures a wider range of potential (female) applicants.

The fact is, then, that Harvard’s 2+2 program seeks to recruit candidates from two areas where women make up the majority: the humanities and non-profits. I also can’t resist pointing out that the 2+2 program also addresses another issue that keeps women from applying to business school: the biological clock. Top business schools have typically “highly recommended” that applicants have 3-5 years of work experience, pushing the average age of applicants to 27-30. As I’ve mentioned before, this conflicts with another important stage on women’s timelines: getting married and having a family. By only requiring two years of work experience, HBS is getting women in the door before they hit that stage in their life, instead of losing them along the way.

It’s high time business schools began to recruit women in ways that actually address their needs and fears—that they’re not qualified for business school, that they need more work experience to get in, and that they have to choose between spending two years in business school to start a career and having a family. Harvard, as in most things, is ahead of the curve here, but other business schools won’t be far behind.