Tuck Creates Its Own Facebook For Alums

It was only a matter of time before a prominent business school decided to do its own version of Facebook to better connect alumni around the world. Not surprisingly, the school that will launch its Facebook-like network is Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business.

Next month, the school will take the wraps off of an impressive and innovative effort to use a private social network to more effectively link its 9,100 alumni—already the most loyal and generous of any business school in the world—with each other as well as the Tuck’s faculty and current students.

“Facebook has shown people the value of reconnecting with dear people in your life,” says Gina des Cognets, Tuck’s director of alumni services. “Facebook makes it easy to have these quick touches with people. That’s what we’re trying to do with myTUCK.”

MY TUCK FEATURES A CLEAN AND SIMPLE FACEBOOK-LIKE INTERFACE

The network, which has been in open beta since early March, boasts a clean and simple Facebook-like interface with features that personalize a user’s experience. Alums are asked a battery of questions, from which areas of interest and faculty they would like to follow. They can select content by geographic region, by the school’s eight academic centers, by a dozen disciplines, from entrepreneurship and marketing to finance and strategy, and by individual professors.

“We can use what we know to customize your experience,” says des Cognets. “You don’t have to wade through a lot of information. What you see is what’s relevant to you and it’s served up. You don’t have to look for it. It helps makes your experience rich and meaningful.”

When alumni enter the home page of myTUCK, for example, they will view a live feed of the latest ideas and essays from faculty based on their personal preferences (See a view of the full homepage for a logged-in visitor.)

AN ATTEMPT TO RECREATE THE INTELLECTUAL HOTBED OF A CAMPUS VIA THE INTERNET

“Alumni always tell us that they loved being in this hotbed of intelligence when they were MBA students,” says des Cognets. “We’re going to bring them back here by delivering Tuck expertise to them on a regular basis.”

In the right rail, they’ll see “Jobs You May Be Interested In,” “Tuckies Who Work With You,” and “Tuckies You May Know”—all customized for the person entering the site. If an alum targets Boston or San Francisco for jobs, only the MBA jobs in those metro areas that are relevant to the alum will pop up on the screen.

On the left side of the homepage, there are details culled from “My Profile” and “Notes from Amos Tuck,” topical tidbits, polls and trivia on the school. Then there is an event calendar, again customized to an alum’s location and interests—and all clickable to gain more information on each event and to RSVP online.

ALUMS CAN JOIN CLUBS, ACCESS CLASS NOTES, COMMENT ON FACULTY OPINIONS AND CHAT

Like Facebook, myTUCK users can join clubs and discussion groups, access class notes and news, events and reunions, comment on faculty opinion pieces, and chat with a shared alumni group. There are short video tutorials by Tuck professors on such topics as running your first press conference as well as travel tips from a road warrior alum who typically flies 80,000 miles a month.

Tuck also plans to run frequent webinars with faculty for alumni on the site. Videos of guest speakers at Tuck also appear on the site, allowing alumni to essentially join the classroom to see and hear what current MBA students are experiencing. Recent videos include addresses by venture capitalist Roger McNamee and Morgan Stanley managing director Risana Zitha. There’s even one-click access to research in the school’s library.

“The special sauce of the Tuck experience is the nature of our community,” says des Cognets. “This tool will be that much richer because it will allow alumni to share their professional and personal experiences with each other and create that special sense of community.”