Chat with a current student of Duke

Few days back I had a chat with a current student of Duke. I sent out mails to many students with all my queries and got replies from almost all. One student out of them asked me if we can schedule this over phone that would be most appropriate hence I fixed a meeting with her. I wanted to speak with someone who is actively involved in the school activities and was planning a career in gen mgmt/marketing. Below are some of the things we discussed


Concentration: Marketing

Career Switch: She was previously working as an Investment Banker and her aim was to work in a marketing role (brand mgmt) post-MBA. She wanted to switch from Finance to Marketing. Frankly speaking I found it a bit confusing when she told me about her plans because generally i have seen people moving from other sectors to Finance and Consulting but not vice versa. I asked her about the support from career services in helping students to make such career transitions, to which she replied quite positively. She mentioned that 60%-70% people coming to DUKE plan to make a transition from their current industry or job type.

Club Activities: We discussed about the activities of the club like organizing speaker series, helping students find a job in their domain etc. I also asked her about the number of students that opt for gen mgmt role post-mba to which she confirmed the figures to be more than 50%. Also she suggested me to check out the websites of respective clubs/organisations.

Job opportunities: She told me that the job opportunities were much better than the previous year though still it was not very bright. People are still struggling to find a job in Finance and Consulting sector. About the job prospects for International applicants she told that it's more bleak (again dominantly in finance and consulting industries). She told that people have to use their network to find jobs. In the end she was optimistic that the situation would improve in couple of years.

Alumni: Alumni of the school is very active and easily approachable. Infact many have helped the students with their job search.

Experience at DUKE so far: One thing that she kept on mentioning about the school was its congenial environment. She mention that the fellow students were very helpful and supportive and she learned many things from them.

We talked about a few other things and she encouraged me to give her a call incase of any doubts or queries.
It was a really nice chat session with her that further strengthened my decision to apply for DUKE.