P&Q’s Must Reads: 100 Best & Brightest MBAs Class Of 2022

Kristy Bleizeffer:
Hello, everyone. Welcome back to Poets&Quants’ Must Reads, a quick digestible recap of the top business school news, sponsored by Centre Court, P&Q’s virtual admission events. I’m your host Kristy Bleizeffer and today we’re talking with our own private workhorse, Jeff Schmitt, a writer with Poets&Quants from the very beginning. Jeff is going to tell us about one of our most popular features, Best & Brightest MBAs for the class of 2022. Hello, Jeff, and welcome.

Jeff Schmitt:
Hello Kristy.

Kristy Bleizeffer:
So Jeff, I know the best and brightest is a massive undertaking, but it’s also one of our most popular features of the year. Can you tell us a little bit about the process of how you pull it all together?

Jeff Schmitt:
Absolutely. Thank you for having me. In early January, I reached out to the media relations departments of roughly 75 business schools. And I asked them to select two to four candidates to be considered. We look for a variety of things such as academic achievement, extracurricular activities, and just really interesting stories. This is more of a project management than a journalism enterprise. And so, a lot of my work involves collecting materials, making sure the pictures work, that the forms are completed and very interesting. And from there, John and I judge, this year, we did 232 and we evaluate students on criteria, such as the quality of their professional and academic achievements. We look at how interesting they were as far as filling out questions about the school. And of course, we look very heavily on extracurricular activities, as well as the recommendations for faculty.

Kristy Bleizeffer:
I know that you’ve been just reading a lot about these outstanding candidates. Are there a few that stand out for you? Can you tell us about some that really come to top of mind?

Jeff Schmitt:
Sure. For one, there’s very creative people, Annabel Reeves from Southern Methodist University. She helped create the school’s accelerator. Now there’s Daniel Bu at Oxford. He was bringing together the entire community of Oxford on entrepreneurial enterprises. Sam Buck, he created the first student led climate change fund. And so they’re very creative. They also are very award-winning. Rick Williamson joined Services Commendation Medal for helping over 300,000 Syrians during the refugee crisis. Suhani Jolata, she was a finalist for the Cisco Global Citizen Prize for her work with the poor and with women in India. Sam Deason, just a great, interesting story, a PhD in music from Northwestern. He goes to HTC Paris, now he’s going to be a Boston consulting group consultant. And so you have people like that. And just some really interesting stories as well.

Jeff Schmitt:
There’s a woman, I’m going to just read it off here. I don’t have the great pronunciation, Maram Albutairi at ESADE. She was honored by the king of Saudi Arabia, the house of Saud, for her work in developing women’s soccer. In fact, she is so well versed in soccer that she coached the men’s team at ESADE. And another lady, Nikita Acharya at Warwick Business School, she has basically created the Amazon of Nepal where online, she is selling everything from cakes to electronic equipment in her own neighborhood, and she actually was named a Forbes 30 under 30 a year or two ago for her work. Just a really impressive class.

Kristy Bleizeffer:
Yeah, those are sure, what a way to get inspired just to flip through some of those profiles. Amazing. Can you tell us then a little bit about the purpose behind best and brightest? Why do you think it’s so popular with our readers?

Jeff Schmitt:
I think a couple things, let me start with the purpose behind it. I wanted to give students a real strong social media footprint to be able for them to share their achievements and their vision, what they hope to do. It really gives them a heads up as I’ve learned with potential employers. It’s a way for them to really be honored for a lot of their hard work. A lot of which sometimes gets forgotten just with how crazy busy that business school is.

Jeff Schmitt:
Why it’s popular? It honors people for the right things. And obviously, people love to see their friends and the people that they believe deserve recommendations and attention. And I think it really brings us a real, I’m trying to think of the word, I think puts a microscope, maybe on some students on what they’re doing that maybe people don’t realize, whether it is a lot of their work with volunteerism. A lot of their student government work, things that sometimes go by the wayside. Everyone thinks maybe they just go out to class or in some quarters, maybe they just all go out to the bar and it’s far, far different, the reality, and I wanted to really put a spotlight on that.

Kristy Bleizeffer:
Well, that’s great, Jeff. I know you got a lot on your plate, so we’ll let you get back to it, but thank you for that very fascinating conversation. And listeners, you can find the best and brightest MBAs now at poetsandquants.com and just start reading through all of those really fascinating and inspiring profiles. And before I go, I want to alert all the school seekers out there to Centre Court’s upcoming MBA Festival events. These events connect prospective students with admission experts, alumni, and career development teams at the top MBA programs around the country and around the world.

Kristy Bleizeffer:
Our next series, MBA Voices is happening June 7th to 8th, and you can register for free on our events tab at poetsandquants.com. There’s still a little bit of time left to register. For new MBA admits, in our virtual networking festival coming up May 19th and 20. Get a jump start on your beastful journey by forging new connections, becoming more savvy about internship and career options and making the most of your B school pivot. Learn more on our event page. And that’s it for us today. Thank you for listening. As always, I’m Kristy Bleizeffer with Poets&Quants and we’ll join you next week right here for Must Reads. Stay informed.

 

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