Rob Self (MBA 2021): Why HBS?

The following is an computer-generated summary of the video transcript.

I'm a second year E. C student at the Harvard Business School. In this video, I want to talk a little bit about why I chose HBs and potentially why HBs could be a good fit for you, too. So one of the main reasons I chose HBs was because of the case method. If you haven't had the chance yet to get to campus, I would highly recommend that you come and visit a class and understand what the magic of the case method really is. I think there's something pretty cool about digging into a case the night before, reading through, understanding the exhibits, digging into the numbers a little bit and then coming into class with hypothesis of what you think the issue might be for the case protagonist. Through the our 20 minute discussion in Class 94 other students have the opportunity to share the hypothesis that they came up with and support their opinion with quantitative data in the case or qualitative experience that they've had in their work experience. I think it's really magical that at HBs, it really isn't the faculty that's teaching the students. It's the students that air, teaching each other from their experiences and unique perspectives when they look through a case. That excitement and thrill in the classroom is one of the things that really drew me to HBs. The fact that Ah, large majority of the cases in business curriculum today are written by HBs faculty. The opportunity to work with these faculty on projects to pick their brains when I have questions outside of class and and really just the case method experience off facilitating discussion and participation in the class. To me, I was not very excited about going to a program where people could sit, you know, in the back of the classroom and not actively participate in class because I felt like I was missing out on the opportunity to engage with that person and understand more of their opinion or perspective. So I think the case method at HBs really draws out phenomenal insight from classmates in the classroom, and I think it gives me the opportunity to not only share my background and experience in relevant cases, but but learn from the diverse perspectives of all these different students from all over the world in my classroom. So I would say that was one of the biggest things that drew me to HBs. I think the second eyes the section experience at HBs somewhat unique to HBs is the 90 person section that that is built on the incoming class of each of each incoming class at HBs. So students in a class of approximately 900 are divided into 10 sections of somewhere around 90 students, and in that section intentionally is a balanced diversity of backgrounds, industry experience, nationalities. A testament to that is on our flag day, where at HBs we celebrate the backgrounds and flags that people bring to the classroom. I believe we had somewhere upwards of over 37 different countries represented in our classroom of 94 people, so that that section inclusion and section experiences something really exciting for me. I found that being together with that same group of 94 for the entire first year in every class, sitting next to the same section mates everyday allowed me to really build deep friendships with these people, and now I have kind of this foundation. After the first year at HBs of 94 students that I know extremely well. Then going into my second year, the EEC year at HBs, I'm able to kind of branch out, meet other people. I always have this section of 94 that I fall back to as kind of my first friends I made at HBs. I think a third aspect about HBs that really drew me waas the inclusion of partners in the system. I know I've mentioned this before on some of my other videos, but I really do feel like HBs goes above and beyond to include partners in the section experience in the entire HBs experience. So registered partners at the school are allowed to get Harvard identification badges. They're allowed to use the gym on the HBs campus. They're allowed to use the facilities, the library, the Spangler dining hall areas. So in many ways, partners are as much of the experience as students. I find that especially for people who bring, you know, partners to the experience, this is an opportunity to again ADM or friendships and ADM or diverse perspectives in the classroom, because you have not only all these students coming to the school, but all the phenomenal partners that have come with them potentially to Boston or maybe are doing a long distance relationship still. We get to see them at from time to time in the section events that we hold. So I really feel like this was a big selling factor for me. I'm married and I really wanted my wife to be as much a part of the experiences I was because I know that in N B. A could be a lot of time commitment. So I wanted her to feel like she was a much of a part of the opportunity as myself and would be comfortable having the opportunity to make friends and build relationships with other people throughout the HBs community. I think another aspect that that brought me to HBs was the field global immersion. So in the end of the first year, the RC year at HBs, there's the opportunity to travel abroad and work with a foreign company in international area and work with them to basically implement some type of change, your solution in their company that is based on the curriculum that we've learned in the first year. So for me that was a really exciting opportunity that not only would I have travel opportunities outside of the HBs curriculum, but within the HBs curriculum there's the opportunity to get this diverse international exposure and understand how business is done in a different country. So I think that was a really big draw for me as well. Having this international experience was was a really important part of the curriculum for me. So I would say that was another big aspect that drew me to HBs. So overall I would say there's many different things that you need to think about when you're choosing an MBA program. The community, the section experience, the case method, the partner, inclusion and just all of the phenomenal people here, every person I've met at HBs really looks to change the world in their own way, and I found everyone truly in pursuit of making a difference in a place within their community or within the world. To me, that's really inspiring, especially when you're around all these great people that I see all these people doing wonderful things in the world and with these grand plans for the future of their careers, and that motivates me to be that much better and push myself that much harder to be someone who keeps myself accountable, thio what my goals in my career are and to making an impact, you know, somewhere in the communities that I live in. I'm planning on creating a couple more videos. I want to show you guys a little bit around the HBs campus of my favorite places to maybe get a coffee or where we actually have class and show you a bit of what that looks like. I hope you guys stick around for another video as well, where I'm planning to talk about some surprises that came along with the HBs experience.