The New Battle for M.B.A. Grads

I guess we should keep this blog going.

There was a great article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday about the new battle for M.B.A. students. Because there is such a shortage of grads, companies are using new digital tools, such as blogs, to attract recruits.

“They are mining for résumés online, arranging video interviews and using instant messaging to cast a wider net and connect more effectively with today's tech-savvy students,” says Alsop.

Other Interesting Points from the Article

• "We cannot afford to recruit only from our core schools because other schools, including some small schools, have amazing students."


• "The company is setting up meeting spaces and islands in a virtual community called Second Life, where it plans to hold events such as recruiter question-and-answer sessions. . ."


• "About 69% of recruiters in the Journal survey said their companies increased starting pay this year. Nearly a third of the survey respondents said they offered salaries of more than $100,000, up from about 24% last year and 17% in 2005."


• "Some companies are using work-life flexibility to attract M.B.A. recruits."

- Brian

Blogging in the Corporate World

I have to admit that I never really thought of blogging as a means of communication in the business world. I too just saw it as a way to state your opinions about celebrities, music, politics, and so forth. However, after hearing George Howard's presentation on Monday evening, he definitely gave me a new perspective on blogs. I was amazed that authors were actually doing book tours through blogs and selling their books through them as well. In addition, I never really thought of blogs as a free medium of advertising. I think this is great too.

Meeting Purpose: Make a Decision

Guy Kawasaki’s fundamentals for conducting a meeting really hit home. All meetings should be conducted with an end in mind. Prior to last class, I (shamefully) had conducted many ill-fated meetings which got nothing accomplished. I now realized that my meetings were victimized by a lack of understanding the basic purpose for having meetings: to make a decision.

The thing that really stuck for me was an inference I made from: for a meeting to be truly effective, the majority of the work must be done before the meeting actually starts. In order to make an informed decision in 30 minutes, all parties attending must have received a detailed agenda, and have enough time to gather their thoughts on the topics to be discussed. Without the full cooperation of all participants, the proverbial wheel will have to be re-invented and time is wasted.

This actually works! Last week, I limited my weekly 60 minute meeting to 30, sent out a detailed agenda with talking points assigned to the relevant parties, and informed all those to attend of the single purpose of the meeting: To make a decision on XXXX. The decision was made within the first 10 minutes of the meeting. Needless to say, I found Guy Kawasaki’s insight extremely helpful.

An Extension of Self

Last week was a very interesting class for me. Although Professor Howard opened up his presentation making fun of his undergraduate students for their preconceived notions about blogs and bloggers- I secretly identified with undergrads who believed that people engaged in blogging were somehow very socially inept and greatly lacking interpersonal skills.

There are two major themes that “stuck” with me from Monday’s class. The first was complete awe in the power of a persuasive and effective presentation. In what seemed to be no less than 20 minutes, Professor Howard absolutely changed my mind about not only the usefulness and necessity of blogs, yet also about what “type” of person uses them. Professor Howard altered a few years worth of my negative attitude about blogging and social networking websites in less than an hour. Now that's effective communication! Wow.

The second aspect that turned out to be quite profound for me is when Dr. Howard called blogging an “extension of self”. That resonated with me as I never thought of blogging as a form of self expression. It dawned on me that whenever someone is sharing something about their thoughts and feelings-- it is very personal regardless of the subject matter being discussed. While I may prefer another form of communication, blogging is often times used no differently than putting a pen to paper and writing a letter. It is simply conveying a particular message to a certain audience.

Now, blogs have definitely become personified in my mind, and not some abstract tool that only introverted people use. I now look at it like a photograph, or even a journal entry; meaning it captures a specific moment and is reflective of how a person thought and felt at that time. Blogging is something that could be fun and useful for everyone.

Quite humbly, I learned a lot about how incorrect I was!


--A. Harris

blogs in the workplace

Professor Howard’s presentation on blogs brought up many interesting topics. I agree with his notion that blogging will grow as a more prevalent form of communication in the near future. A blog offers insight into the mind of its author in ways that a more formal form of communication cannot. I believe that a blog’s casual nature allows the writer to feel freer to express himself, and makes the reader more comfortable with the subject matter. Reading a person’s blog, whether the tone is playful or serious, makes a connection from the reader to the author’s true ethos. I have found that, in my office, if coworkers read each others blogs, we find it much easier to communicate with each other. The postings help me to know what really pushes the buttons of my other employees and helps me engage them in lighthearted conversation. Blogs have really helped us to make interpersonal bonds beyond what we talk about at work every day.

Out of the loop...

About 5 months ago, someone told me that if I didn't "MySpace," I was out of the loop. Well, I guess I AM out of the loop, because I had no idea that Blogs had become such a common business tool (or that MySpace was already on the way out the door). To me, "blogging" was just another online tool that people used to express their opinions about politics, current events or entertainment(music, movies, etc.), not anymore important or useful than another tool. I haven't found much personal use for them in the past. Plus, the law firm I worked for was not exactly the type to request or use feedback, so blogs were definitely not a part of my job requirement.

It was interesting not only to find out how useful blogs can be for businesses, large and small, to get feedback and communicate with customers, but also to see how many people were obviously "in the loop" with blogs, or at least new a lot more than me. I had to watch E! this weekend just to find out who Perez Hilton was! So, aside from being happy I never got involved in MySpace (since it's apparently outdated), I also now realize that I need to know about and pay attention to the blog world. As a growing outlet for companies and consumers, blogs have a new position in business that can't be ignored.

Missy Phillips

Value of Blogs

I have to admit I was a little ignorant about blogs before Prof. Howard’s presentation. I knew the basic information and I regularly read a few of them, but I would have never considered creating one myself. The blogs I subscribe to are all written by professionals who are experts in their fields and unfortunately I can not yet call myself an expert in any capacity. After seeing Prof. Howard’s presentation I realized that I too could create a blog and talk about my profession without being an expert as long as I am honest with myself and the readers. I also have to admit that I never thought about blogs as a networking tool. The presentation served as an excellent introduction to the value of blogs and opened my eyes to the importance of them in the world today.

-- Meghan DeCuir