Internship or Prom Date?

Do you remember that time in the spring of your senior year of high school when you were trying to figure out who you were going to Prom with? Whether you were a guy or girl, you were continually listening to the rumors floating through the halls, trying to figure out who was taken, who was available, or who might ask/say yes to you. If you were lucky enough, you were already in a relationship or you knew early on exactly who you wanted to take and they wanted to go with you. Boom, problem solved. If you were like some of my less-moralistic friends, you asked someone early so you had a guaranteed date, and then went looking for the girl you really wanted to take. And as word got out that somebody wanted to go with you, more and more people suddenly became interested. And if you were really screwed, all the people you thought you might go with got their own dates early on. At this point you settled for whatever you could get, asking everyone you could and saying yes the first invitation you got. Basically, you just hoped you could still get into the “cool” After Party and get drunk enough to salvage the night.

By now you’ve probably figured out (or at least you should have if you looked at the title), the entire process described above essentially applies to getting an MBA internship. Beginning this week and going on for the next month, Darden essentially turns into High School. First year students walk the Grounds all hours of the day and night begging (well, it hopefully hasn’t come to begging yet) for a job and companies try to figure out who they want to go with. And the rumors swirl about whose got jobs, final rounds, blah blah blah (by the way don’t get me wrong, I’m not above any of this, I’m totally involved). If you could hear the hallways, they would be silent. But if you listen more closely, there is plenty to hear. Just like High School Prom, it’s easy for some, exciting for others, challenging for many, and hopefully, just like a classic 80s John Hughes movies, everyone ends up happy. (Note: not everyone will end up happy).

Just to prove the awesomeness of the metaphor (is it a metaphor?), I will redo the first paragraph replacing types to high schoolers with the MBA students:

Do you remember that time in the winter of your first year of B-school when you were trying to figure out who you were going to intern with? Whether you were a guy or girl, you were continually listening to the rumors floating through the halls, trying to figure out what companies had already made offers, who hadn’t made decisions yet, or who might give you an offer. If you were lucky enough, you were already sure where you were going, either because you interviewed in the fall or you were going back to your previous job. Boom, problem solved. If you were like all of my classmates, you interviewed somewhere early so you had a guaranteed internship, and then went looking for the job you really wanted to take. And as word got out that somebody made you an offer, more and more companies suddenly became interested. And if you were really screwed, all the companies you thought you might get offers from took others instead. At this point you settled for whatever you could get, asking every company you could and saying yes the first offer you got. Basically, you just hoped you could still get into the “cool” jobs next year and get drunk enough to salvage that week’s TNDC.

Hmm, that worked pretty well. I should add as a caveat, however, that the above does not apply to those going after “nontraditional” internships or others that are recruiting off-grounds. These people are instead the high school kids that either dated a guy/girl that went to a different school or those hippy, hacky-sack-playing types that were too cool to actually go to Prom.

And I should add that amidst all this madness, we start classes and three cases a day again next week. Wowzer. In the words of Kristen Dunst, Bring It On.

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

The Best of 2010

So I swore I would never become one of "those guys" and now look at me: I'm a deadbeat blogger. I swear that over the past month I have thought about writing many a posting. The only problem is that I like to write things that are fun. Or interesting. Or inspiring. I promise you that nothing I have done in the last 30+ days have been anywhere close to any of those things (well, except for the Santa Stumble, but that’s a topic for another forum).

Instead, the past month has been a barrage of networking, cover letters, job applications, exams, late nights, early mornings, and one awesomely bombed mock interview. I mean, it was bad. I’m not a complainer, so that’s not the point of writing this. No no, you see, I’m an excuse-maker. And I’m really good at it.

Therefore, here are my nine best things from 2010, in order and including Darden & non-Darden stuff.

9. Getting to have another “first day” of school
You might think it sounds dumb, but there is nothing quite like the first day of school for me. Then again, I am a nerdy loser. But nonetheless, nothing beats figuring out who is in your classes, meeting your professors, diving into the material, the whole atmosphere. Nothing was different about Darden, even if it is a much different environment and learning experience. At the end of the day it is still school. The only thing that could make it better would be if my mom could have packed me a brown bag lunch with a little note in it. Also, I haven’t really figured out who the cool kids are yet, but I know that I’m not one of them.

8. Vegas Trip
I would like to tell you more about this, but you know what they say about what happens in Vegas . . .

7. Back in the Valley for the Fall
I wrote about this earlier, but to reiterate, there is no more beautiful place to spend fall then in the Shenandoah Valley. From September to November the weather is perfect, the leaves are beautiful, and for the first time ever, I had D1 college football in my backyard. Even though the Cavs were just plain turrrrible, it was still an awesome experience.

6. Winning the Darden Brand Challenge


Given the brains of my fellow classmates, I really didn’t think I’d win anything academic at Darden except maybe Most Likely to be Voted Off an Island. But low and behold, my team won Darden’s annual brand challenge, a pretty big school event that pits first year students representing different brands in a competition to see who can create the most engaging, interesting, and insightful data survey and product exhibition. My team deserves more credit than I do, but I will still treasure my picture with Mr. Doughboy and will have the pink shirt for years to come.

5. Section E Darden Cup Domination
Another thing I wrote about earlier. Since the softball competition, however, Section E has rolled through several others and holds a comfortable lead going into the spring semester. Also, my play in flag football earned me the curious nicknames “Little Ball of Hate” and “Bret Michaels”. Not really if those are good, but considering my college nickname was Cupcake I’m going to take them as a complement.

4. Snowmageddon in D.C.
Well it was awesome for some reasons and horrible for others. But the back to back blizzards led to the following things: Three days of living in Glover Park (even though my apartment wasn’t there), Two awesome Georgetown basketball games at Verizon Center, One amazing 90s themed birthday party for myself, a 4:00a.m walk home from Logan Circle to Tenleytown (4+ miles), and exactly zero days off work (for me). Loved the snow, except that it didn’t go away until like April and D.C. gave up trying to plow it. Other than that, it was great.
   
3. Having myself as a roommate
If you’ve never lived alone, try it. It’s the best thing about moving to Charlottesville to me. I have people over when I feel like it, clean when I feel like it, watch whatever T.V. channel I feel like, pretty much do whatever I feel like. For those that know me, you know how incredible this is to me. I really hope I don’t have another roommate until I get married.

2. Doubling my # of Facebook Friends

You meet tons of people in business school. I mean the whole point of going to network. I never actually imagined that I would like so many of them though. It’s been the single most surprising thing about school and I’m really lucky to have met and connected with so many people.

1. Cruising Europe for 6 weeks


If you’re considering going back to school or even if you’re not, do some extended travelling at least once. I mean, 6 weeks wasn’t even that long, I wish I had done longer. But get out on the road, push your comfort zone and get a different experience. You will never regret it. The time I spent travelling this summer was definitely my best experience of 2010, maybe my life.


If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

Two Steps Up, One Step Back

I was talking with a recruiter last night about career development and he told me something interesting: Every time he has an amazing breakthrough, crushes a presentation, or excels in any other way which otherwise makes him love his job, he writes it down on a scrap of paper and places it in a jar in his office. At the same time, whenever he is grinding through a spreadsheet at 2am, making the 1,000th revision to the same slide deck, or otherwise doing something that makes him want to run into oncoming traffic, he also writes it down on a piece of paper and places it in a different jar. He tells me that whenever he goes back and looks in the jars, that the number of pieces of paper in the happy jar far outweighs the other one. And, he concluded, if that ever changes, then he’ll quit.

The point is this: in all phases of life, you need to have perspective. There are going to be huge highs where you think everything is set and life can’t get better. And there are moments where you are pretty sure no one has it worse in life than you. Well, if you thought either one of the above two sentences applies to you, you are wrong. Life is never going to be perfect but it should never totally suck either. You need to step back, take everything in, and figure out if you’re happy. And if you’re not, then don’t complain. Complainers are terrible. If you don’t like your life, then figure out why and change it. It’s as simple as that. But why should I care that you’re unhappy if you don’t intend to do something about it?

Right now, I’m happy. I can truly say that I’m happier now then at almost any point in my life. Yet, in business school, on any given day, I will have a trillion setbacks. And it will suck. But why should I complain or be in a crummy mood? At the end of the day I can look at my life, know how lucky I am and feel truly blessed.

For me it’s like two steps up, one step back. Make a good comment in class, get a nice thank you note from a recruiter, bomb a networking call. Do good on one test, do good on another, look like an idiot on the last one. Get invited to two company events, get left out of another. Sometimes I think I am literally the master of MBAs one day, a real “hitter” (for you wall streeters), and the next day I wonder if I can get a job tending bar or if I’m not the right “fit” for that either.

But at the end of the day, I can always look in my two jars and know that I am happy. What do your two jars look like?

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

The Little Bears

When I first arrived at Darden three months ago, there was one thing I was more anxious about than any other aspect of B-school. It wasn’t my career prospects (although I probably should have been more nervous about this). It wasn’t the demanding class schedule and curriculum. And it definitely wasn’t the fact that I was going to be sans paycheck for the next two years. Nope, it was whether or not I would have a good Learning Team.

For those not familiar with Darden, Learning Team is kind of like a study group that you are assigned to at the beginning of your first year. I say “like” because in reality it is so much more. Essentially it’s an otherwise random group of six first-year students from different backgrounds, genders, and nationalities that spend two or three hours a night sitting around a table in a tiny room talking through the case for each and every class. Needless to say I had two questions about the people I would be hanging out with every night for the next year: 1) Will I like them? ; and 2) Will they like me? It really never crossed my mind that this could be a positive experience; I was just hoping it wouldn’t turn out to be miserable.

 

We like to spend most of time messing around, as you can see

Well, that is a long-forgotten memory. I’m going to make a bold statement: my Learning Team is the best in Darden’s first year class (I say “bold” because a lot of people would say the same thing about the LT, but they would be wrong). I don’t even think of my LT, which we named, by the way, The Little Bears, as a study group anymore. I could be a CPA with a background in marketing and investment banking and I would still show up to meet with them every night at 7pm sharp. Yes we crush cases all night and yes it is a lot of work but it never really feels like it. We always mix up the night with a healthy dose of jokes, gossip, and videos (like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmJcUlrkMNg ).  No one hesitates to stay late and help someone whose struggling with a particular case and everyone brings a unique perspective on each case.

In three months I’ve learned almost everything there is to know about them, including their families, relationships, future plans, and, most importantly, drink preferences. I’ve especially learned a lot of about the last point. You see, we are a social bunch of Little Bears (I know you’re making fun of me right now for referring to us as The Little Bears, but trust me, it’s awesome).  If there is a Darden social event, you can pretty much count on all six of us being there. Much like the rest of Darden, we work hard and play hard. We just happen to get after it a little harder, whether it is coordinating a sweet Breakfast Club costume ensemble for the 100 Case party (still waiting on the pics), taking on the dance floor at TNDC, or meeting on a Friday afternoon for LT “Happy Hour” where we can kill two birds with one stone (cases and drinks). This past Sunday is a great example: after a long weekend, “J”, who is originally from New Orleans, invited us over for homemade jambalaya and drinks so we didn’t have to meet at Darden to go through our cases.

I guess the thing that as surprised me most is how much (I think) my LT likes me. You see, I am a weird person. Like, sarcastic, corny, self-conscious, all-over-the-place, off-topic . . . just, weird. I was pretty worried that everyone would catch on and quickly write me off. Instead, my group knows I’m weird and still wants to hang out with me every night. And that, more than anything, is what helps get me through the long days.

Stay tuned for next week’s blog “Never Mind, They Didn’t Like Me and I Got Voted Off the Island”.

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

Oh Really, What Frat Are You In?

God I used to hate that question in undergrad (Well, unless I was talking to a co-ed who thought my fraternity was cool). The point is, though, that at Darden you really don’t have to worry about cliques and that is pretty great. Sure, everyone is in groups (your learning team, section, career focus) but in the end, we are all Darden students and that counts more than anything. I don’t think I realized that until the 100 Case Party this past weekend.

Let’s think about that for a second. Everyone in my first-year class has read, evaluated, and discussed 100 different business cases, 100 different companies, 100 different industries, 100 different unique problems in just over two months. And the cases weren’t different for anyone in our 300+ person class; we all looked at the same problems and thought about the same issues. That’s really different from almost any other type of school experience, and all you needed to do to understand the impact of that was attend Darden’s 100 Case Party this past Sunday night.

Let’s ignore the fact that it was an amazing 80’s party. Let’s ignore the fact that my Learning Team decided to dress at the original Breakfast Club + the Principal (Xinlei, you are the man). Let’s ignore the sheer amount of alcohol consumed in the name of being awesome. I’d rather focus on the fact that it was a class-wide party of over 300 people celebrating a single (and only initial) feat: completing the first test of one of the world’s most demanding business schools.

I had no idea how many people I knew or how close I had grown with them until Sunday night. Everyone I ran into either threw me a high-five (the wannabe entrepreneurs and marketers) or a celebratory hand-shake (the wannabe bankers and consultants). It didn’t matter if it was section mate who I had spent the past 2 months discussing business five hours a day with or a random classmate who I had sat through a career conference talking about where I see the job market going in the next five years. We all just partied like it was 2007 (when the economy was good). I can’t tell you what a fun and revealing night it was, although I admit I didn’t realize it until my mind finally cleared the next morning (ok more like 3pm).

Ok, that’s a lot of random thoughts, but seriously it’s amazing how much my outlook has changed since August. To summarize, business school (or at the very least Darden) is incredible in its ability to unite people of a common thread, those that like to work hard and play even harder. I couldn’t be happier with my decision to be here. It’s not the easiest thing, but the challenge is well worth the reward. And I don’t mean the work is worth the sick job/career you get when you leave. It’s worth it for the late nights (both studying, networking, and neither), the people, and the experience. College is the best.

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

Why the Fall is Awesome

Probably the greatest thing about being back in school for me is the chance to be in the Shenandoah Valley for this time of year. From late September to early November I can safely say there is nowhere else in the world I would rather be than rural Virginia. The weather is perfect for me: warm during the day, cool at night, always with a nice breeze. I'm not really one for nature (I hate, repeat, hate hiking) but I love to drive out of C'ville to the nearby country side and take in some of the views, which are absolutely amazing once the leaves change color.


This is what it's all about this time of year

But really, it's more than that. College football and the NFL are in full-swing which make the weekend days both busy (with tailgates, going out, watching your friends cry when their undergrad school loses) and relaxing (when you are a tired from said activities the day before). Everyone pretty much knows what is coming soon (winter) and is maximizing their activities. There are all sorts of festivals, weekends and events taking place. In fact, let’s just take a look at my schedule so far and upcoming this Fall:

Last weekend was the International Food Festival (which was a show; seriously check out the pictures on Darden’s flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/darden-uva/sets/72157625012385021/. I am still full from last weekend and was shocked to learn that Ireland actually has good food. This weekend is UVA’s homecoming, which I intend to treat no differently than I did my homecoming in undergrad (to summarize Andy Bernard-style: Bars, Beers, Buzzed, Wings, Shots, Drunk, Football: UVA-UNC, Slaughter, then back to my place for a quick nap before we hit the town). Then the next weekend we have exams before the 100 Case party. That’s 100 class cases, not 100 cases of beer. I’m sure the actual number of cases consumed will be much more than that. And then the next weekend is Darden’s Halloween party. Feel free to comment below on suggested costumes, as I’m having a hard time thinking of ways to top last year (I’ve included that picture as well).  

Wow, writing this just made me realize how awesome the next few weeks are going to be. Besides all that class, exam, and career stuff of course. Maybe it’s because the fall here also reminds me of being back in college, or because I am actually back in school, but I haven’t been this happy in a long time despite being busier than ever. Speak of which, I need to go; I’ve got another briefing in 10 minutes.


I'm the Tiger

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.

Winning the Cup

To say that I like competition is like saying that nerds like math. I am so competitive that if I can't win or be the best at something, then I pretty much don't want to do it at all (see golf, a.k.a. the worst game ever invented). Luckily for me, it seems that I was placed with the one group of students at Darden that pretty much feels exactly the same way I do. That would be, of course, Section E. We have a simple mission: to be the smartest, coolest, most amazing group of 65 students this school has ever seen. It doesn't matter if its a forecasting exercise in our Decision Analysis class, having the most students at TNDC, or even a basic simulations to learn operations. We want to be awesome at everything, and to be honest, so far we are.

Enter Darden Cup, the single best way for a section to demonstrate its awesomeness. Darden Cup tests a section's talent, teamwork, and dedication through a series of events between each of the five first-year sections. The events range from Trivia Night last week (we really dominated this one) to a charity 5k in April with pretty much every sport in between. Sections get points both for winning an event and having their members & faculty come out to watch. Did I mention Section E has won two years in a row and we are attempting to establish a dynasty with our third in a row?

Which brings me to softball.  As a former Division III baseball player with no chance of playing competitively again, Darden Cup softball somewhere between passing my classes and actually getting a job in terms of importance. This was my time to shine and I went all out. Eye black, cleats, new glove, bandana - all check. Insane desire to win: check mate.

I made some solid contact right here

There was only one problem, and their name was Section B. After cruising to the championship, we were pretty sure we had the event in hand until they decided to hit a couple of home runs and take a 6-0 lead in the top of the first. We tried our best to come back but fell just short, 9-8. It was a great game. Special shout out to S, our athletic rep and team captain, and D (guy), J (girl), and S (girl) for awesome performances. Also I would especially like to congratulate my buddy B on section B's team for letting a ground ball go right between his legs despite having played professional baseball prior to b-school. Stellar job man, stellar.

We also have crushed B in all events since Softball and are currently enjoying a comfortable lead in the overall Darden Cup standings. Many, many events still to come but I have no doubt that we will prevail. And yes, just to be petty, I'm going to tell you my stats from Darden Cup Softball: 6-8, 3 doubles, 5 runs, 5 RBI. Insane need for competition: fulfilled.

If you would like to contact the author, he can be reached at david.a.miller4@gmail.com.