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Monday, September 26, 2005

BYU MBA

On the first day of orientation last year, BYU’s MBA director Jim Stice said the he didn’t think we came back to graduate school just for an MBA; but believed that there were three other letters that were probably equally important to us: “BYU”. Before coming back to school I visited a number of other schools and started to appreciate how different each school can be. BYU’s MBA program is especially unique because of its Christ-centered mission, and small community feel. However, the quality that most surprised me about the Marriott School is how supportive it is for budding entrepreneurs.

Perhaps the most striking quality of BYU is that the Marriott School has a number of faculty who basically donate their time. Typically, these are alums that have built and harvested successful businesses and now are seeking a way to give back. Without giving names, I can think of eight off the top of my head that I’ve been fortunate to associate with or take classes from. These teachers are fantastic and they genuinely care about their students. Some of them are members of local Angel networks and they have a history of investing in student-run businesses. I’ve found them to be very free with their contacts and very blunt with their counsel.

In addition to their time, some of these faculty members also provide scholarships to students to encourage them to start their own business. I felt pretty fortunate to receive a full-tuition scholarship my first year, but I almost felt guilty about receiving an entrepreneurial scholarship my second year because the tuition was already so affordable. I was chosen to participate in the Entrepreneurship Center’s “Mind Your Own Business” scholarship program. About 10 students were selected and paid to build their business over the summer in lieu of an internship. One of the requirements was to meet weekly with a mentor who provided terrific feedback. The center’s philosophy is “Learn, Earn, Return” and they have several alumni who have done just that and lend continued support to the center.

BYU has other programs like the annual Business Plan Competition and the Student Entrepreneur of the Year competition that encourage those of us with entrepreneurial leanings to take the plunge. The school was – literally speaking – built by entrepreneurship. The legend is that when BYU’s President Rex Lee was approached about constructing a building for business education he responded ‘you’re entrepreneurs, you figure out how to raise the money and then we’ll build it.’ Not surprisingly, its one of the nicest buildings on campus.

Another advantage of BYU’s MBA program is that it is located in a small, but vibrant technology center. Last year I did a demo of my technology to a seasoned startup executive in Silicon Valley to ask him questions about how best to proceed. He commented that I was very fortunate to be in Utah where the market was less mature. He told me that nowadays it is virtually impossible for an entrepreneur to build a business now in Silicon Valley unless he or she is already well-connected. Gone are the days, he said, when an entrepreneur with a great idea get something off the ground; now it’s all about who you know. Contrastingly, here at BYU everyone seems supportive a good idea and are happy to make helpful introductions. Even if I decided to discontinue working on my business, my network of contacts has grown considerably through the process enough to make effort worthwhile.

Another major advantage of BYU’s MBA program is the low-cost tuition. When I was preparing to attend the Wharton School I was anticipating a debt load of $150,000. Just thinking about that expense makes me nervous. Now that I’m approaching the end of my MBA experience, I feel very grateful to have a modest debt load. I’ve been able to do things I never would have considered with a student-loan mortgage to pay off.

This summer I decided to forgo a traditional internship and opted instead to work on a business (Evolving Web) with three other MBA students: Mike Reall, Eric Nicholson, and David McKnight. Boy, did the summer go fast. We sequestered the MBA lounge as our unofficial office space, hired an intern to help us out, and dined prospective business partners at the “corporate cafeteria” outside – otherwise known as the Marketplace Café. We worked really hard, played a lot of foosball, and decided that being in business for ourselves was as much fun as it is work.

As I already mentioned, the highlight of my summer was taking a trip to South Korea to pitch our software to giant SK Telecom. Peter Yoo is another 2nd MBA student who will return to SK after graduation and made the trip arrangements and company introductions. Despite my sincerest desire to learn some Korean before our trip, I never even mastered a simple “Thank you”. I had a fabulous time, but felt a bit like a little child walking around a big city with my escort father. Apparently, the feeling was mutual as some locals went out of their way to help the dumb American survive. For instance, one evening when Peter and I went out to a movie I had a headset for translation. I didn’t really feel like hanging the translation box around my neck, but as I began to unhook the connecting strap the gentleman next to me concluded I couldn’t figure out how to use the contraption and promptly reconnected the strap for me.
Another fun memory was touring the Presidential Palace (the “blue house”) with some little children and being the only one in the group who couldn’t follow directions. It was amusing most of the time, but in the middle of presenting to a room of 20 Korean managers I wished I had spent more time learning the language and culture. Once, for instance, I was chided for not presenting my business card with both hands; I was too busy trying to remember to bow to everyone. Before the trip I had read that it was very important to stop and read each person’s business card. I was very conscientious of this and made a point to stare at the unintelligible Korean characters before me – it wasn’t until after our most important visits that Peter showed me that on the other side of each card was an English translation. I just hope I didn’t look too stupid pretending to read the Korean names and titles. Peter was an absolutely fabulous host (couldn’t have been better) and showed me enough of Seoul that – given the opportunity – I would absolutely love to return. We presented to a couple of other organizations, piqued some interest, and began – what we hope – will lead to some business going forward.

Tuesday, September 20, 2005

GMAT strategy

Last week’s first MBA class went pretty well. Since it was the first time I had ever taught the class, I felt a little rough around the edges, but I think overall it was a success. The organizers had asked me to explain different test-taking strategies such as back-solving and number picking. However, the idea of using strategies seemed so new to some of the students that we spent most of the time just explaining that there are strategies, and gave examples of each. Here are a few of the things that I talked about.

For instance, when I was an undergrad at BYU I lived in the same apartment complex as Jeopardy phenom Ken Jennings. I knew he was active in BYU’s college bowl team and was over at his apartment one evening when he and some friends were going through some random facts in preparation for an upcoming meet. It was something he really worked at. So when I found out he was winning on Jeopardy I tuned in to watch the show pretty regularly. Ken is undeniably smart, but more than that, I think he is great at playing the game of Jeopardy. He knows what type of questions (or answers in the case of Jeopardy) to anticipate and is fast at the buzzer. I read somewhere that before he appeared on jeopardy he would even practice buzzing in at home.

As I watched jeopardy and started playing online I noticed some patterns that I had been unaware of before. For instance, one of the questions (er, answers) I remember hearing went something like this: “This Central American country has its national anthem in English” – the correct response was “What is Belize?” As I played the game online I ran into this very similar question/answer: “This Latin American country has English as its official language.” The correct response was “What is Belize?” It was the same question – just put a different way. I began to realize that the questions Ken was studying years before in our apartment complex were probably used over and over again in different ways. They can’t ask something so obscure that nobody will know the answer, but they also need new and fresh questions each year. So, when writing “new” questions, they often just repackage old ones. It’s the same with the GMAT.

I think that there are really smart people out there who can simply walk in to take the GMAT cold and ace it. For the rest of us, I think it’s possible to get familiar enough with the types of test questions that you know what to expect. There are only so many ways that they can ask a Venn diagram question, for instance. Be familiar with the limited ways to complicate a Venn diagram and you’re ready to move onto another category of questions. Master them all, and you’re well-prepared for the test.

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

First day of GMAT prep

Tonight is the first day of class, I’ve been invited to teach āce’s first ever GMAT course with a friend of mine, Jeff Jensen. In the past, āce (www.acetestprep.com) has garnered a terrific reputation for its LSAT course and they’ve decided to expand into new markets. I’m really excited for this, its going to be a lot of fun. So, here’s a little bit about my GMAT and MBA credentials.

Currently, I’m a 2nd year MBA student at BYU’s Marriott School of Management. I absolutely love this place. Ironically, when I first considered where I wanted to go to MBA School I didn’t even look at BYU. Perhaps it was because I came here as an undergrad (and worked and studied in the Marriott School) that I was looking for a new experience elsewhere.

After graduating from BYU in 2000 (Computer Science), I worked for (at the time) Utah’s technology darling TenFold Corporation (www.Tenfold.com). After things started to go south I went to a startup called Attensity (www.Attensity.com) where I helped develop their Natural Language Processing technology. The core technology was pretty amazing, and I spent 2½ years developing solutions for Whirlpool and In-Q-Tel (a CIA-backed Venture Capital Firm). It was while working at Attensity that I started seriously looking into B-Schools and prepared for the GMAT.

I took the GMAT in November of 2001 and was both pleased and grateful to have scored very well. People who knew how I had done unknowingly assured me that I could go anywhere I wanted to go, and I began to visit schools from Cambridge to Palo Alto. I was very flattered to receive invitations to visit a few other schools and took advantage of some of them. I was having a lot of fun and getting very excited to think about where in the world I might continue my education. Along the way I discovered the Business Week message boards (forums.businessweek.com/bw-bschools/start/) and Wharton’s Student-2-Student message boards which provided a wealth of information about schools.

For the next two years I visited and research several schools, and by the time summer of 2003 rolled around decided to apply to Wharton’s Lauder program. I was so excited about Wharton (and optimistic that I would be accepted) that it was actually the only school I applied to at the time. I don’t know for sure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I wasn’t the first applicant that year. Much to my disappointment, I was put on the waitlist and sort of had to scramble to get in applications at some other schools, including BYU. Because I had invested so much time and energy into my application, I felt a bit of resentment that I had – in effect – put my future into the hands of an admissions committee. I wanted to feel like I had more control over my destiny and began looking for an entrepreneurial opportunity.

A few months later, I quit my job at MyFamily.com to start my own business. Since May of 2004 I have been working on this company, Evolving Web (www.EvolvingWeb.com) developing some really cool Internet technology. My partners and I think our platform has tremendous potential and are really excited about the opportunity. We’re just getting off the ground, but have had a great run so far. Instead of doing an internship this year, we worked on our business full-time. My summer highlight was traveling to South Korea to pitch our product to some potential business partners. This is something I never would have dared doing if I was racking up the student debt. I couldn’t think of a better place to experiment with a real business than here at BYU. It’s the ultimate case study. My only complaint with the MBA program is that I can’t absorb the information fast enough. The faculty support has been amazing and I’m continually impressed by the quality of the faculty and other students. I feel that the friends I’m making here will be close for years to come.

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