Articles by MBA Association

I went to Sears Holding case presentation session last Thursday. Jamie Brooks, who is an associate of senior leadership program from Sears, discussed the case about the acquisition of Sears by ESL and passed along some information about MBA opportunities with Sears Holding. It was a wonderful event, especially the case discussion. When discussing the case in class, I always felt like discussing something very far from my life. However, this time, Jamie talked about the company and the real situation at that time, which made me feel that I had experienced the same situation. Therefore, I could really put my feet in their shoes. In addition to the case study, Jamie also shared with us his experience and insight about Sears. Therefore, after the session, I got a better idea about Sears. I liked this case presentation session and look forward to more such opportunities.

-Yi Zhu
Yi is the 2008 Vice President of Investment Management & Portfolio Analysis (IMPA) for the MBA Finance Association. Prior to Smeal, Yi did futures trading for three years in Shanghai. At Smeal, Yi will be focusing on Investment Management and Portfolio Analysis with a secondary portfolio in Corporate Financial Analysis and Planning.

To give back to the community, several MBAs volunteered at The Second Mile Fall Harvest Festival. The Second Mile is a non-profit organization for children who need additional support and positive adult role models. The Second Mile was founded right here in State College by Jerry Sandusky, a former Penn State Football Defensive Coordinator.

At the Fall Harvest Festival, the MBAA held two booths – pumpkin cookie decorating and bean bag toss. More than 60 kids showed up in Halloween costumes and smiles on their faces! I had tons of fun helping the kids decorate cookies with icing, sprinkles, and candy corn. Actually, I think I had as much fun at the event as the kids did. It truly was a rewarding experience to help provide the kids with such a wonderful time. Our Holiday Party with The Second Mile will be here soon and I can’t wait for the event.

-Melissa Matson
Originally from Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Melissa is in Penn State’s integrated five-year Science BS/MBA program. Here at Smeal, Melissa is focusing on Corporate Financial Analysis and Planning.

Students from the US probably had experience of pumpkin carving, however, for most of the international students, it’s a whole new experience.

One week before Halloween, Women MBA Association hosted one pumpkin carving session at Krithiga’s home. It’s a great opportunity to find how creative people are! Originally from China, I don’t know anything about pumpkin carving, neither do I know the tools or designs for carving the pumpkin! With everyone holding a small saw in hand, we started the first step– make a creative cap. The saw was very efficient and easy to control, much better than a sharp knife. After finishing the cap, we tried to clean up the inside. It’s a messy job, haha, but look at how people do this kind of job is a lot of fun.

I knew only one kind of pumpkin design, the classic happy faces. When Marcela brought the design book, I got a big problem because I don’t know which one should be on my pumpkin and how well I could carve it. Fortunately, we all selected different designs. We had classic pumpkin face, cat, naughty face, and a lot of amazing designs. To make a better performance, we put candles inside our work. On the moment of shutting down all the lights, all the girls cheered! It was amazing.

Besides pumpkin carving, we also enjoyed some cakes, apple cider, and toasted pumpkin seeds. It’s a satisfaction both for eyes and for tongue.

-Yao Wang
Originally from China, Yao joined Smeal in 2006. Prior to MBA, She was a marketer for SNICKERS chocolate bar in China. Her concentration is marketing and corporate finance.

The past week saw me through a hectic 2nd week of MOD II. As promised, we are being served a whole lot of quantitative heavy courses during this seven-week Module. Just as many of us first years were getting concerned that we were not devoting much time into researching the companies and industries that we were trying to target for our internships, the MBAA’s Corporate and Alumni Affairs office along with Smeal’s Career Services team organizes the 1st Company Explo’ 2007. The 2nd year MBA students volunteered to set up career booths representing the companies where they had spent their summer internships earlier this year. They were there to field our questions - the insider’s view of organizational cultures, specific projects that they had worked on, the selection process for the internship positions, the internships themselves and much more. Representations included among many others - Dell, Ford Motor Company, Apple, Target, GE, Pfizer, GE, Dupont, Air Products and Chemicals, JPMorgan Chase, Target and PGA Tour.

The event helped me understand the job profiles for the summer internships that were offered at the companies that I am targeting. Students from both years’ classes were actively involved in this event. I got some great insights from Andy Pezalla (MBA Class of 2008) on supply chain management in the retail industry in the context of his internship at a major US retail chain’s corporate office. The recommendations that he had provided to the company through his project were being implemented and were visible in the advertising strategy on their website. Smeal MBA candidates were making a strong difference during their internships!

Similar conversations with others who had interned in various functions of Supply Chain Management at Ford, Apple and Dell provided me with valuable inputs too. A comprehensive project report on the high market potential of the healthcare services (especially rural) industry in India. Medical equipment and healthcare services were completely outside my scope of interest in this event. What started as an aside into the booth due to its attention-grabbing presentation on India, eventually transformed into a long conversation with Alessandro Gubbini (MBA Class of 2008), who had interned at Siemens, India earlier this summer. It was interesting to observe the value added to the company due to Alessandro’s fresh perspective (as a non-Indian) and diligent research on the Indian health services market for the feasibility of Siemens’ new products in the area of medical equipment and health care services.

Thus, the week ended with great takeaways on some of my target companies and the SCM industry in general. In spite of the heavy workload being sent our way over our current MOD, the week ended on an energetic note, thanks to the efforts of the MBAA Corporate and Alumni Relations office, Smeal Career Services and the host of volunteers from the Classes of 2008 and 2009!

-Johny Paul

Hailing from India, Johny had been working as a Software Designer over the past nine years, spending equal amount of time with Hewlett-Packard Co., India and earlier to that with PricewatershouseCoopers, India. He has a Bachelors Degree in Engineering from IIT Kharagpur, India. At Smeal, he intends to pursue the Supply Chain Management and Strategic Leadership Portfolios.

Hardly had we been a month into the first year of the MBA program, when we were introduced to the much dreaded “MBA interview”, as we faced our seniors in the mock interview sessions.

The mock interviews did not neglect any aspect of the actual interviews that MBAs have to face at Smeal. The process of signing up for the interview introduced us to the career services web tool – Simplicity. The interviews were conducted by 2nd year students, who represented actual companies like Pfizer, Dell, J&J, based on the internships that the 2nd year students had just completed and thus allowed us to focus on a particular role or job opportunity that each of us aspired. Furthermore, the interview process was carried out in a strictly professional manner, to make us comfortable with the anxiety in an actual interview. It was the first time I saw all my classmates, dressed up in their business suits.

I clearly remember my meeting with Jenee, the vice president of the MBA Association, for my mock interview. It started with a greeting and shake of hands and proceeded with the behavioral questions that we knew we had to be prepared for. A few minutes into the session and the interview transitioned to work and resume related questions and I had to relate the stories that I felt my mock employer would be interested in. A few more minutes and then new questions started coming up pertaining to my answers to previous questions. I answered all questions trying to provide as much detail as possible to make my profile interesting for the target position.

What happened after the interview was the most interesting part. I got feedback about my performance. I was totally enthralled by the articulateness in Jenee’s observation. After the feedback I knew what the more traditional shirt – tie combination was, what the STAR(Situation Task Action Result) model of relating stories was, what changes in my resume would bring out my success stories more evidently and also how I could make my answers more complete and crisp. This helped me change my perception of how employers would review my resume. I could identify potential weaknesses within my profile that I needed to work on immediately, while I also realized what strengths I must showcase more, in order to succeed in an actual interview. Jenee was also considerate enough to do another review of my resume, later, and thus give me more feedback to work on.

I realized how the mock interview helped me improve when I went for my SIP interview with a Smeal alumnus, who works for a company that I aspired to be in. I had worked on all areas of improvements that were evident in my mock interview and thus had a confident demeanor in the SIP. I ended up having a great recommendation from my interviewer, with negligible areas to improve on. I still remember him saying that he was impressed by the way I had carried myself through the interview.

Therefore, the mock interview is a great endeavor of our seniors and helps us get a taste of the real world interviews to follow. I am sure I have saved myself some failures by my learnings from the mock interviews.

-Gourav Banerjee

Prior to Smeal, I was working as a Software Engineer in Bangalore, India, developing software for Accenture and Oracle. I aspire to focus on Strategic Leadership and Corporate Finance in Smeal, to begin a career in Strategy Consulting after my MBA.

One of the things that initially attracted me to the Smeal MBA program was the wide array of associations that existed within the school. Before the start of school I had read a little bit online about each of the organizations and was looking forward to getting involved as early as possible. Luckily, the program held an association night early in the semester where first year students could go and learn more about all of the MBA associations. It was a great opportunity to meet with the leaders of the different organizations and see what sparked your interest.

The only negative was that I left association night interested in more organizations than my schedule can accommodate…

–Andy Duffett
Before coming back to Smeal, Andy was an analyst at Merrill Lynch, in New York City. At Smeal, he plans on concentrating on Finance and Entrepreneurship.