Describe your short-term and long-term career goals, and how the MBA will help you achieve those goals. Why is now the appropriate time to pursue an MBA, and why are you interested in obtaining a Rice MBA?
Sample One
Entering the classical music industry just before the economic downturn has opened my eyes to disconcerting financial weaknesses in professional symphonies. As lucky as I was to be a working musician, I saw signs of economic instability in orchestras around America. As a committee member of the Santa Barbara Symphony, I see firsthand how orchestras are financed from year to year and the room for improvement is tremendous. Almost immediately after the housing bubble burst and the market crashed in 2008, orchestras began to show signs of financial insecurity. Due to the recent economic downturn, symphonies across the country are shortening seasons, instituting hiring freezes, and even filing bankruptcy. Top ranked symphony orchestras, such as the New York Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic, have enacted hiring freezes for vacant positions, and highly regarded orchestras in Houston, Atlanta, Baltimore, and Philadelphia have enforced pay cuts after posting an average of $1.5M in budget deficits. Clearly, changes need to be made on how these primarily nonprofit organizations operate.
After working as a cellist in this economic climate and seeing the strain on my colleagues, I am moved to make a career change to the business side and revolutionize how symphony orchestras are managed. Over the past four years, I have witnessed my peers struggle to find work, soloist friends go weeks without concerts, and prominent symphony musicians show deep concern for their livelihoods. In spite of recent hardships, I believe there is incredible room for growth and revitalization within the classical music community, specifically in symphony orchestras. With the right guidance, I know that symphonies can not only become more financially secure, but also stir a renewed interest in orchestra concerts in their surrounding areas. Armed with an education in general management and exposure to nonprofit business models, I will be able to exact that change. With the skills gained from a Rice MBA, I will join a symphony in a general management role to improve operations and better manage endowment funds and revenue from ticket sales and donations. Long-term, I will transition my career to consulting, where I will help orchestras around the country operate more efficiently and profitably, thus enabling them to thrive both financially and artistically.
To be effective, I need both the strong educational foundation and practical application that Rice offers. At Rice, I will gain the knowledge and skills I need through its comprehensive general management core curriculum. Specifically, I intend to maximize my education through the Leadership Intensive Learning Experience, case-based coursework, public/nonprofit financial management elective, and real-world Action Learning Project. I believe that attacking real world issues and learning from real examples will be key in my transition from a leader as a cellist to a leader as an executive. Coming from a collaborative musical background, I believe that Rice’s well-rounded core curriculum, which emphasizes a healthy balance of class lectures by leading faculty and real world applications of concepts, will give me the tools I need to transform from musician to businessman. Moreover, the Leadership ILE courses will give me a chance to turn my leadership skills in music into strong leadership skills in business. Finally, participating in the Consulting, Net Impact, and Finance Clubs will further equip me to work with orchestras by learning from and being inspired by my diverse peers, all the while building lifelong friendships with like-minded colleagues.
I look forward to bringing my experience as a team player and leader from a unique background as a musician back to Rice and growing both professionally and personally within a culture where students challenge and encourage each other. I am confident that I will contribute to the overall culture, atmosphere, and education of the Jones School by working well with my classmates both inside and outside the classroom. With my unique background as a concert cellist and pedagogue, I also look forward to offering a different perspective in class discussions while having my eyes opened to many different perspectives drawn from equally diverse experiences. Furthermore, I look forward to being able to exercise the problem-solving skills I acquired as a teacher, an ensemble team member, and a section leader in my transition to a businessman at Rice. As my MBA classmates inspire me to constantly evolve and improve on my strengths and weaknesses, I know will do the same for my peers.
Sample Two
As a high school senior, I was given an interesting Christmas present from my parents. They opened up a brokerage account in my name and deposited few hundred dollars into it. It wasn't the stereo system or the new set of golf clubs that I had hoped for, but it would turn out to be the best present they could have given me. I did not realize it at the time, but this gift would ultimately have a great impact on my future. Sitting down at the computer with my father, he taught me the basics of investing in stocks and mutual funds. My interest in investing grew throughout that final year of high school and became even greater in college. The more I learned about finance and the capital markets, the greater my interest grew.
Not surprisingly, I chose to study economics and finance as an undergraduate student at SMU. The summer after my freshman year of college, I obtained an internship with Merrill Lynch, assisting a Senior Financial Advisor with the daily duties of his job. I continued my studies throughout college and upon graduation, accepted an Operations Associate position at Condera, a boutique asset management firm in Houston. Supporting several financial advisors in the management of around $200 million in assets, my duties include performing portfolio analysis, implementing our strategies by executing trades in client accounts, and interacting with clients on a daily basis. This role has enhanced my leadership and communication skills, two areas in which I can contribute in my endeavors at the Jones School. The autonomy of the position and the willingness of my supervisors to listen to my suggestions are extremely satisfying and for this experience, I am grateful.
Throughout my career at Company X, I have thoroughly enjoyed learning about the sophisticated investment strategies that we employ for our clients, institutions, and foundations. Working with two industry veterans, I make it a point to learn as much as possible from them. They allow me to undertake challenging tasks, such as explaining our investment philosophy to prospects and researching new products to use. As I have grown into a more proactive role in client service, the advisors have focused more on bringing in new assets, thereby increasing revenue for the firm. It is from these experiences that my passion for the analytical side of investing has emerged. I have a deep interest in modern portfolio theory and, after completing my MBA, plan to apply that theory in a role that focuses on market and securities analysis. I believe the Jones School curriculum and the environment fostered by the students and faculty will give me a more comprehensive understanding of modern portfolio theory and its application to institutional asset management.
Long-term, I plan to start a boutique asset management firm that services foundations, endowments, and institutions. Recent trends in the financial services industry indicate that the big box brokerage firms such as Merrill Lynch and UBS are losing favor with many investors. Independent advisors are leveraging the services of custodial firms like Fidelity and JP Morgan to run asset management shops that provide completely unbiased and independent financial advisory services. I see this trend continuing as the major investment houses go through drastic changes during the current financial crisis and intend to capitalize on the migration of assets to independent advisors.
The MBA program at the Jones School provides the best bridge for connecting my current career to the future career that I seek. I have gained a strong, core knowledge of investing and finance and need to build on this knowledge, acquiring a more in depth view of the capital markets. After visiting the campus, speaking with students at a partio, and sitting in on one of Professor Weston’s finance classes, I have concluded that the Jones School offers the curriculum and environment that will best prepare me for that career. The real-world asset management experience that the Wright Fund provides is also of particular interest. Another impressive aspect of the program is the wide array of finance courses available to students. I look forward to being a part of a diverse class that will allow me to learn as much from my peers as I will learn from my professors. It is this collaborative aspect of the Jones School that impresses me the most. I know that I will contribute to the Jones School community in a profound way while growing both personally and professionally from all that the program has to offer.