Listen To P&Q Live, Our New Weekly Podcast

In the third edition of P&Q Live, our new weekly podcast on all things business school, Poets&Quants Founder John A. Byrne celebrates the 50th anniversary of The Consortium for Graduate Management Education, interviews Haas School of Business Dean Richard Lyons on the UC-Berkeley campus about the four defining principles of the school’s culture, and handicaps the MBA odds of a 25-year-old Hispanic woman who did a two-year stint in a management trainee program at Burger King.

Peter Aranda, executive director and CEO of The Consortium for Graduate Study in Management

Managing Editor Marc Ethier explores the early founding and the accomplishments of The Consortium 50 years after the organization sent its very first cohort of 21 African Americans — all men — into MBA programs at only three participating business schools. The Consortium, with its business school and corporate partners, encourages and guides underrepresented minorities into MBA programs. A half century after opening its doors, The Consortium will send a record 490 students into MBA programs at 18 schools this fall (see The Consortium, Born In A Turbulent Time, Marks 50 Years).

Haas Dean Richard Lyons

Haas School of Business Dean Rich Lyons, who has led the UC-Berkeley school for the past nine years, addresses the impact of the school’s culture-driven strategy centered on four defining principles: Question the Status Quo, Confidence Without Attitude, Students Always, and Beyond Yourself. In an interview with Byrne, he reveals the fifth considered principle that was dropped from the final list and explains why it didn’t pass muster. Lyons says the cultural emphasis has been embedded in all of the school’s processes in the past five years, from admissions to career management. Surveys of admitted students to Haas show that it is now the No. 1 reason they choose the school, given greater importance than the school’s location in the Bay Area or its stellar reputation.

Sandy Kreisberg, founder of HBSGuru.com

And finally, HBSGuru.com Founder Sandy Kreisberg is back to assess the chances of a 25-year-old Hispanic woman who now works as the marketing director of a tech startup after a two-year stint in Burger King’s management trainee program. At Burger King, she largely worked in marketing analytics in Latin America. The Duke undergraduate has a 3.87 grade-point average in international studies and Spanish and a 690 GMAT score. She hopes to use her MBA to transition into global brand management or international business strategy for a multinational company. Her target schools: Harvard, Wharton, Kellogg, MIT Sloan, UCLA Anderson, and Columbia Business School.