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Vault Message Board: Venture Capital

Topic Name: breaking into VC
Message Name: The worth of an MBA is the quality of the contacts
Date Posted: 05/02/2001
In Reply To: Sure, your salary will be higher. The question is how much higher. I'm sure you could go to a mid-tier MBA program and graduate making between $40-55K starting. However, if you go to one of the aforementioned schools, I would be highly surprised if you didn't make at least $100K to start. Also, if you're looking at getting into a top management consulting firm, investment banking, finanace on Wall Street (any position) you will have a hard, no, *impossible* time trying to come in with an MBA from a no-name/no-reputation school (I'm not banging on their programs; that's just the perception.) I would imagine this extends to part-time MBA's as well from non-top-ten programs. Like I said, the guy who told me this was a managing director (who does the hiring for the high-powered, high-paying positions) and seeing his position, what he says goes. I also take it to be pretty indicative of the street. Also, you will not make the contacts necessary to get into VC (or IB, or mgm't consulting) at a generic MBA program. You will also suffer from a complete lack of recruiting. I would even argue your comment about the opportunity cost of missing out on two years of work salary. The long and the short of it: I have never seen a graduate from any of those schools who suffered trying to find lucrative work. I *have* seen people who after investing about the same amount of time and money in a non-top-tier MBA program, end up only marginally better off than before.
Message: From what I understand the worth of an MBA(coming from the mouths of MBAs themselves) is whether you will have access to quality contacts, alumni and recruiters. I'm afraid I have to agree that if you're gonna go for a B-school try to get into one of the top 10 cause they're the ones who are going to give you the big three I mentioned which leads to lucrative offers! Good luck!

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