How did you choose your most recent job/internship and how did this experience influence your future goals? What about the Chicago Booth MBA makes you feel it is the next best step on your career at this time?

Sample One

When I interview an inventor about filing a patent application, I get all of the legal information that I need, but I also always ask about the story behind the invention. It is the story that fascinates me. An innovation can originate in many different places: a laboratory, a cafeteria, or a garage. It can start in many ways: from a sketch, a simple conversation over lunch, or from the frustration of using a poorly designed product. Innovation can take years, or can happen in a moment. But however the process of innovation starts, it is exciting to me that this process often ends with a new product that can improve people’s lives. Hence, I chose my current position, as an intellectual property lawyer at Apple, largely to be closer to this innovative process. Joining Apple was the logical next step in my career as a technology lawyer. A year out of college, I left a great consulting position with IBM to attend law school at Yale. After law school, I was selected to the pinnacle position for a young technology lawyer: a clerkship for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, whose specialty in patent law shapes U.S. innovation policy. That incredible experience led me to private practice in patent law, later moving firms to gain greater responsibility. After writing many legal briefs telling the innovation stories behind many patents, I realized that I wanted to be closer to those stories. When a legal recruiter contacted me about the Apple position, it seemed like a great fit: friendly people, the opportunity for more global legal exposure, and the chance to work more closely with innovative engineers and research scientists. At Apple, I review inventions for patenting, set a worldwide patent filing strategy, and manage law firm attorneys in countries around the world who help us execute our strategies.

This position has solidified my career goals, and indeed led me to seek an MBA from Chicago Booth. My work at Apple has fueled my desire to be a part of the innovation story. In my time as a patent attorney, I have dealt with many technologies, including medical devices, telecommunications equipment, chemicals, and software. But on my personal time I have developed a passion for one industry in particular: energy.

My interest in energy was sparked when, one day five years ago, I read a book review discussing the energy industry. Before then, I had flicked thousands of light switches, and pumped thousands of gallons of gas, without ever thinking about where the energy came from. But, as I pondered this particular article, I realized the role that energy had played in every important memory in my life: deep-sea fishing with my father, exploring Asia with my fantastic future wife, and flying from New York to India in less than 24 hours to attend my host father’s funeral. Every day, for the last five years, I have made it a point to read about energy.

I need to earn my MBA to unite my professional experiences with my personal enthusiasm for energy, to commercialize new energy technologies. In the short-term, I will gain energy industry knowledge, including how to finance clean energy projects. An MBA is the logical step at this time because growing in my present position will not develop the important skills I need for my intended career path. After earning my MBA, a consultant position with energy-focused practice group of a major consulting company, such as McKinsey, Booz & Co., or Accenture would be a good fit to provide me with broad industry exposure. Another viable post-MBA position would be in corporate finance for a clean energy company. These positions would provide me with industry knowledge and the finance skills to reach my longer-term goal: to be a business developer and project manager for a company that manages clean energy-producing assets. This could be an electric utility or, even more ideally, an entrepreneurial company that invests in and manages clean energy resources. A great example is Chicago-based Invenergy, which counts Booth graduates among its ranks. Although I am already building a network of people in this field, an MBA from Chicago Booth is the natural next step to gain the skills that I need. My engineering and legal background will help with the technical and regulatory aspects of this career. However, to be successful, I need training in finance, management, and project planning.

I am confident that Booth is the ideal place for me to earn my MBA. Booth’s flexible curriculum will allow me to pull from the different disciplines that I need to pursue my career goals. At Booth, I plan to concentrate in General Management and Finance. Booth’s well-known strength in finance will help me to acquire skills in valuing clean energy producing assets, in order to make efficient decisions regarding building, managing, and acquiring new installations. I am particularly interested in how to put a monetary value on a new energy project, taking into account the changing electricity marketplace. As energy installations are developed, and bought and sold much like real estate, I want to gain the skills to properly assess when there is good value in a particular energy installation. Booth’s experiential learning opportunities such as the New Venture and Small Enterprise Lab are also ideal places to learn hands-on skills relevant to growing a company. Outside of the formal curriculum, I will bring tremendous enthusiasm to Booth’s entry in the Energy Finance Competition. I also look forward to contributing to the Energy Group, Giving Something Back, and the Milton Friedman Group.

My wife, Alice, and I are also eager to return to Chicago. If accepted, we plan to live in Hyde Park to be near other Booth students and immerse ourselves with the greater University of Chicago community. Overall, I feel that the curriculum, experiential learning opportunities, extracurricular activities, and location make Chicago Booth the perfect fit for me.

Sample Two

According to Ernst & Young, investments in cleantech reached a record $4.7 billion in 2008, up 68% percent over 2007, and up over an astonishing 2,000% since 2002. Green energy and cleantech will define my generation, and I am committed to becoming a leader in the global energy revolution.

When I completed my combat tour and returned from Iraq in November of 2008, I resumed my strategy consulting job at Bain, intending to work at the firm until starting an MBA program in the fall of 2010. A contraction of business in July 2009 forced Bain to lay off all pre-MBA consultants. As a combat commander in Afghanistan, I learned that I couldn’t always expect to control events, but I did have control over how I responded to them. I immediately reached out to colleagues and was hired 1 week later by Acme Corp, a venture capital firm focused on sustainable innovation. I had viewed the MBA as my stepping stone from strategy consulting to cleantech venture capital, but this interim step has proven valuable, as it has both strengthened my goal of becoming a leader in cleantech venture capital and revealed areas that I wish to build upon during my MBA in order to prepare to achieve my ultimate goal of becoming a partner at a cleantech venture capital firm.

An MBA from Booth will enable me to make a definitive transition from strategy consulting to cleantech venture capital. As a consultant, I sized markets, analyzed SWOTs, and developed quantitative and qualitative research techniques. As early as 2007, I was leading projects on my own. Though the Bain experience has been valuable in the development of my analytical skill sets and exposed me to a variety of management styles and personality types, our work was limited to that of advisor. My experiences as a combat commander, on the other hand, have provided excellent leadership development experience in an environment where my decisions made an immediate and decisive impact on the welfare of those around me. All told, my five years of consulting experience, my leadership training in the military, and my current job with a venture capital firm have provided me with a solid foundation from which to begin my MBA at Booth. I am committed to cleantech venture capital for three reasons. First, I’ve inherited my parents’ passion for protecting the environment. As entrepreneurs and scientists, my parents, both Chinese immigrants, built their lives around a laboratory dedicated to environmental testing. In 2005, I joined forces with my father to form Pacific Biodiesel; my involvement with biofuels gave me a firsthand view of the promise and potential of cleantech. Second, finance has been a passion of mine since childhood, when I tracked equities in Los Angeles Times and opened my first digital trading account with allowance money. My childhood love of the market led me to study International Relations and focus on International Finance, adding an academic and professional dimension to my lifelong interest. Third, as a combat veteran, I am motivated to ensure that energy resources are abundant and sustainable, giving nations one less reason to go to war and to ask their men and women to make the ultimate sacrifice.

Booth will prepare me to be a leader in this industry because of its demonstrated commitment to cleantech as evidenced by its Cleantech Forum and courses such as Innovation in Energy Markets and Opportunities in Renewable Energy. Booth’s student run energy club has a noteworthy focus on alternative energy and draws industry experts to speak and meet with students like me who are interested in pursuing cleantech ventures. Booth is a center of innovation and is in step with the latest developments in the field of sustainable energy. For someone interested in cleantech there is no better place than Booth to pursue an MBA.

As a venture capital professional I will need an understanding of business across disciplines. The Booth MBA will give me the freedom to tailor my curriculum and to study business functions that I have had limited exposure to in my professional career. In my case, I have learned a great deal about strategy from my consulting experience as a consultant and much about people management from my military experience. On the other hand I lack formal training in subjects like managerial accounting and venture finance, both required of a leader in venture capital. A Booth MBA will allow me to integrate the lessons I’ve learned professionally as well as provide me with the managerial knowledge, cross-functional business knowledge, and formal leadership training required of a successful venture capital professional.

Booth’s finance concentration will be my focus. As a finance major, I will learn from the best finance faculty of any of the top MBA programs. Only at Booth will I have the chance to study the intersection of finance and cleantech with the guidance of thought leaders such as Professor Travis Bradford, a renowned academic icon and cleantech industry leader. I would also love to take part in the Elfman-Wareham Private Equity & Venture Capital Lab allowing me to take what I have learned in the classroom and apply it to real world problems. The opportunity to meet and chat with several Booth alumni at a recent Los Angeles reception has provided me with an appreciation for Booth’s diverse and dynamic student community. Booth is the right place for me to build the relationships that I will need to champion future cleantech investments. I look forward to playing a leadership role in the Energy Group and participating in cleantech treks, thereby laying the foundation for a successful career in cleantech.

I am very excited about Chicago’s culture of deep questioning and debate, and I believe that Chicago empowers students to mold their own destinies. Chicago Booth is the critical enabler to achieving my career aims because the program will give me the financial tools, cross-functional business knowledge, and global network I need to forge my own path in the cleantech industry.

Sample Three (Excerpt)

While searching for a career that would combine economics, business, and technology, I discovered Quantitative Finance and immediately knew it was what I’ve been looking for. Practitioners use their understanding of macroeconomic trends to spot the right markets and then build financial models and write software to isolate and exploit those opportunities. The scope of the field is broad, the problems are deep, and the financial rewards for being right are generous.

When I tried to enter the field, I found that my resume wasn’t opening the right doors. The top companies hire two types of people: MBAs with the finance training necessary to see the big picture, and PhDs in the hard sciences who are adept at modeling. I could enter the field as a software engineer, but without the finance background, I would be limited to implementing others’ ideas. To reach a leadership position and be able to design my own trading strategies, I need further training in finance and statistics. As I searched for the right program, the Chicago MBA moved to the top of the list. The school I attend needs to be a leader in finance and economics, and Chicago’s departments are arguably the best in the world. I would need the freedom to specialize, and Chicago offers the most flexible MBA program of any top school. Above all, I want a rigorous, demanding education with other students who want the same; Chicago prides itself on providing exactly that kind of environment.

I looked at masters in financial engineering program, but found the curricula too narrow. They would focus on the hard skills while ignoring the soft skills. It would be impossible for me to compliment my finance training with courses in strategy, negotiation, and writing. At Chicago, I will enjoy a well-rounded experience. Without sacrificing the analytical rigor of a financial engineering program, I will graduate prepared not only to “run the numbers” but to run a company.