Business School Correspondence

Ok so I just completed the Michigan post, and now I’m going to write another post since I have another hour until I get to the city.  BTW to people who live in the Tri-State area, “The City” refers to NYC.  It is truly THE CITY and that is not to be debated!  When I ran into that guy at Michigan who I went to school with he asked what I was up to, and I said “I work in the city” and he immediately turned to his friends and said “See what I’m talking about?  It’s THE CITY!”  So I guess at some point in time they had some debate over that, and I’m sure his friends lost.

Anyway this post is not about that.  I want to address something that I’ve noticed this fall and that is Business School correspondance with students.  As I’m sure everyone has noticed, our email inboxes are flooded with memos, interview requests, deadline reminders, and other information from business schools.  Some are welcome and useful, while others, would be considered spam had we not opted to share our email information!  There are two topics I would like to speak about during this post.

The first topic - School Events

As you know I’ve applied to my fair share of “specialty” conferences.  There are minority events, women events, lgbt events, and I’m sure many others.  Many of these conferences have deadlines and we all clamor to get our applications in by the deadlines and then participate in the waiting game.  For me, it has literally been the waiting game, since I was waitlisted to two conferences.  Technically, I’m still on the waitlist even though the conferences have ceased to notify me that they would not have space.  I’m not sure if that’s a function of me not following up with them or not.  It’s not something I’ve had to do in the past and didn’t have an guidance on.

At a certain point, I wanted to see how the story would end.  Maybe I’m naive in thinking that schools would say “Hey sorry, we will not be able to accomodate you.”  The reason I think its important for schools to take this action is simple.  Since my experience has been that schools do not do this, it would distinguish them from their peer schools who do not.  

I know from my end it’s tough to sit there and wonder if you’ve been accepted to one of these events, especially when one has to think about taking off from work and making travel plans.  As much as I think schools think that people can just put their lives on pause in an instant, many people cannot.  What if someone has a child and needs to find childcare for that weekend or something?

I’m not saying that schools should cater to everyone but I think a courtesy email saying “Hey, we won’t be able to accomodate you,” would suffice.  ESPECIALLY if the school says that you should hear a response by X deadline.  My friend was waiting to hear back from a school and finally heard from the school 3 days after the deadline.  It’s not like the event was 3 months away, but it was like 2 weeks away!  Mind boggling to me...

So to that end, I take notice of the way schools manage their communications with prospective students.  If they take note of all of our correspondance and expect us to adhere to deadlines, is it ludicrous for us to expect the same?  I don’t think so, although I wouldn’t totally write off a school for this reason, but it would leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Second Topic - “Random” School prospecting

I receive about 10 emails from “random” schools every day.  I don’t mind it because I spent my life in my inbox, so I just delete them when they come through if I don’t think they’re pertinent at all.  Now I know that when I sign up on MBA.com or attend MBA fairs, I’m usually opting into all of these email lists, which is fine because I know how to opt out. 

BUT... I find it comical when in the last week in November I receive emails from schools saying “Hey... school X deadline is near!”  or “Hey...come visit school X!”  I just say to myself - “Does this school think that I’ll be able to honestly prepare an application, find recommenders, and visit the school in a 2 week period, while I have all of my other schools to do?”  I know that schools usually don’t care if one has other applications to do, but I feel like if you’ve had no contact with a school and they’re essentially prospecting, then they should take that into account otherwise they’re waiting money emailing to their listserv.  If anything I think those emails should be sent out in September/October saying “Hey research our program!”  At least then maybe the email open rates would be higher because you’re catching people when they’re high up in the funnel and in the research state.

If I’m not applying to School X and the first thing I get in my inbox about School X is about their deadlines, I don’t feel compelled to open it.  But, in September, when I was researching schools, if I got an email about School X suggesting that I look into their school, I would be more inclined to open the email.  

Just some things I’ve noticed on this journey!  ;-)  I’m still on the bus, but am going to stop writing this post now. I have about 20 minutes left and it’s my turn in playing WordsWithFriends!