Meet Washington Olin’s MBA Class of 2018

Kelvin J. Taylor

Washington University in St. Louis, Olin Business School

Describe yourself in 15 words or less: Perpetually skeptical, ruthlessly logical, fully committed being my best self, and forever grateful

Hometown: St. Louis, Missouri

Fun Fact About Yourself:  Still to be determined…

Undergraduate School and Major: Morehouse College, Economics

Employers and Job Titles Since Graduation:

Edward Jones, Fixed Income Trader

Peace Corps, Business Development Volunteer

Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: My biggest accomplishment in my career so far was helping to build a tool that really helped with process efficiency for the Mortgage trading desk at my previous employer. The opportunity to aid in building something tangible really helped develop my problem-solving skills. The fact that our solution provided a significant improvement to day-to-day activities allowed me to leave something positive behind: a goal that I will have at every point along my future path.

Looking back on your experience, what advice would you give to future business school applicants? Start early! There is so much out there to help with research on graduate programs. There are dozens of ways to prepare for the GMAT and GRE. Writing essays and making sure your resume is on point takes time. Being able to approach each component of the application process with minimal deadline pressure gives you the opportunity to maximize each resource and the flexibility to deal with hiccups along the way.

What led you to choose this program for your full-time MBA? I chose Olin because it represented the total package for me. It goes beyond the fact that they have excellent faculty, and an incredible network of alumni and employers looking for its students. The smaller class sizes to me showed the commitment to bringing out the best in each and every student. Olin has a framework in place to prepare students for the demands of their post-graduate careers. To be sure, the faculty at Olin does it with finesse and precision. There is no brute force in the system that is in place to guide students. Each and every student has the opportunity to tailor their graduate education within each focus area. The ability to tailor fit my experience to the job I want while gaining an excellent set of baseline skills is invaluable.

Tell us about your dream job or dream employer at this point in your life? At this point in my life, I am looking for an employer that is large and stable but that still thinks like it’s a start up: a Saint Bernard that wants to move like a Jack Russell if you will. I want the best of both worlds in that they will consider the most original and creative ideas from their employees while also being able to leverage its resources to implement them. That type of environment, with the leadership in place that will invest in my growth, is exactly what I am looking for in an employer.

What would you like your business school peers to say about you after you graduate from this program? I would like my peers to say that I was fully invested. We’ve all shown a commitment to furthering our education by entering the full-time program but I want them to say that I took it a step further. I would like them to say that I turned over as many rocks as possible while still being 100% committed to putting forth the caliber of work worthy of being called their peer in the first place.