The MBA Student Voice

Over Already? Looking Back on My Two Awesome Years at UCLA Anderson

I am amazed (and a bit embarrassed!) to realize that my last post about my goings-on at UCLA Anderson was almost a year ago! But as graduation looms (what? where did the time go?!?) in a mere five weeks, it seemed a final wrap-up post about my time here at this awesome school was in order.  To get you up to speed, when I last wrote I was one quarter into my tenure as president of the High Tech Business Association and about to head off to Seattle for a summer interning as a Product Manager in the Kindle division at Amazon.com. For a look back at all my old posts, you can click here.

So much has happened since then, it’s hard to know where to begin, but I will start by saying my experience at Amazon was fantastic this summer, and I am delighted to report that I will be returning there after graduation full-time as a Senior Product Manager! Over 12 other Andersonians will be heading there too, joining the many others already at Amazon, Microsoft, T-Mobile and Nordstrom, and continuing our Seattle reach!

Josh Stark, me and Brad Lyman had awesome summers at Amazon and will be returning after graduation.

I was lucky enough to work with the Kindle team in the months preceding the launch of the next generation (Kindle Paperwhite, Kindle Fire HD) on September 6, 2012. Because the team was so busy, I ended up with some pretty cool assignments, the coolest being building out a product that I got to present to Jeff Bezos. Yes, that Jeff Bezos.

"Bezos"? "War Room"? So yeah, pretty much the coolest thing ever.

Back at school, the High Tech Business Association (HTBA) continued on the upward trajectory started by the board preceding me and launching into high gear since last spring. A good overview of some of our activites and other opportunities in Tech that Anderson offers can be found in my fellow blogger Alejandra Rodriguez's post Let's Talk High Tech. One awesome event we added this year was Anderson's first ever High Tech Case Competition, sponsored by Amazon. Among the prizes winners received was guaranteed interviews with the company for summer internships or full-time positions!

Of course we promoted the case competition using social media!

Our annual Silicon Valley and Seattle Tech Treks took us to some of the most sought-after tech companies in the world - for example, over 20 in the Bay Area including Adobe, eBay/PayPal, Facebook, Google, Medallia, Salesforce, SanDisk, Twitter and YouTube.

HTBA inside the Zynga light tube!

HTBA "likes" Facebook!

We teamed with sister club the Entrepreneur Association to get more involved in the LA start-up scene, also known as "Silicon Beach." We incorporated company and incubator visits and events on campus like our Mobile in LA panel with start-up founders.

Founders from start-ups ParkMe, Shipmate, Mogreet, GonnaBe and Gumiyo

There's lots more great stuff to say about HTBA but I will let that thread continue with fellow blogger Ashley Mallinson, who is the newly elected president for the 2013-14 school year! (Unless of course she gets so busy with that position she doesn't find time to blog anymore. Not that I know anyone this has happened to.)

There were lots of awesome events at school and around Los Angeles, as always. Just this weekend was the annual Tour de Strand, a day-long pub crawl on bikes from Santa Monica to Hermosa Beach along the beach paths. Things get pretty crazy by the end of the long, sunny, fun day, but here are two SFW pictures to give you an idea:

Biking from bar three to four along The Strand.

James Vogl, Kiara Barrett, and Kevin Hofstee were the "whistleblowers" or coordinators of this year's event, and they did a fabulous job!

Also this spring, the annual AnderGLAM Fashion show completely rocked the house. Students moonlighted as models, walking the catwalk in hot fashions sourced by the Retail Management Association (RMA), to the delight of their classmates. Several administrators and professors participated in this popular event, including the school dean, Dean Judy Olian! 

Kelsey Doorey, Dean Olian, Natalie Velasco, Al Osborne (Director of the Price Center for Entrepreneurship), Sarah Alexander, Angie Lin and Kavi Kapadia pose on the red carpet.

A few other events from the year, in pictures:

The Women's Business Connection (WBC) Game Night, which included Board of Visitors member and school donor Marion Anderson (right) on the guest list!

My AMR Team made our final presentation in March after working on this project, the Anderson capstone experience, for six months. As professional and poised as we appear here, we were sooo excited to finally be done! (From left: Rob Michlovich, Jesse Pemstein, Matt Cautero, me, Uros Pajic)

Halloween has always been a favorite holiday at Anderson.

Street fair in Venice on yet another gorgeous Los Angeles day

On top of HTBA presidency, WBC vice presidency, classes, and all the rest, I still managed to run a few marathons in my free time, including Seattle in June, Santa Barbara in November (after going to New York only to have the NYC Marathon be cancelled in the wake of devastating Hurricane Sandy), Los Angeles in March, and Boston in April. My friend Dave Masterson and I took this picture at the finish line the day before the race - so chilling to think of what happened there under 24 hours later. I was so grateful to my wonderful Anderson classmates for all the support and love they showed me in the aftermath of this scary event.

Sending support and healing thoughts to everyone affected by the tragic events on marathon day.

And that is an extremely high level overview of my second year of business school. Anderson has been a wonderful experience for me - well worth the time and money involved. That said, now it's time to start making some money again so I can pay off those loans! Next stop: SEATTLE!

Enjoying a beautiful summer day in Seattle with my husband Stanton.

Thanks for joining me for the last two years, I hope I've helped more than a few of you realize that UCLA Anderson is definitely the place to be. And now it's off to the real world again, this time as an officially MBA'ed professional:

Wouldn't you hire me?

-Charlotte Baxter Maines, Full-time MBA Class of 2013

Twitter: @CharlotteK

Winter has come and gone!

It was perhaps not a long time ago when the air nipped, leaves began to fall, Anderson Afternoons became Anderson nights and the rare hoodie-covered soul who'd be found roaming the Anderson compound had but one thing to say with a grim stare, "Winter is coming..". Just the thought of a winter quarter with the heavy recruiting, interviews, sitting in classes with suits and the wretched Operations Management course haunted almost everyone, except ofcourse the above-mentioned bravehearts. My absence from this blog, therefore, is pardonable. Hibernating seemed to be the safest thing to do.

Alas, hibernate I did not. As we slowly began to ease into the rigorous MBA program, a lot more began to be piled up on our frail shoulders. Here are some of the highlights, from my perspective, of the war that ensued.

Recruiting

The quarter sort of began with days on the job for finance, tech, entertainment, sports and retail industries. My sweet but short Florida winter vacation was cut even shorter by the "Tech trek" organized by HTBA. The allocation of companies was done through a bidding system where you bid 1000 points across the 9-10 companies chosen for the trek. I was somehow allotted companies I had bid only 1 point for and thus had no motivation at all to travel to the bay area. Frankly, being from the tech industry I already had contacts in most of my target companies who I could've contacted and arranged a meeting at a bit more convenient time. So the tech trek was a bit of a dampener in that sense for me. However, a lot of my classmates had a good experience because they could've never arranged to visit these companies on their own, so I guess it definitely has more value for people with non-tech backgrounds. 

As soon as school started in January, most of the big tech companie started pouring in and people like me recruting for tech were left gasping for breath. We were under the impression that the early recruiting is usually for consulting and finance but tech started real early this time.  I applied for about 20 jobs in January alone and interviewed with atleast 10 over the next 2 months. Almost everyone underestimated the time it takes to drop resume and cover letter into the Parker posting for on-campus opportunities! Interviewing itself was ofcourse time consuming because of the unique way one needs to prepare for different companies. All in all, it was hectic, but not stressful. So many companies come on campus at UCLA Anderson that it tremendously reduces your travel needs and time. Interviewing at Parker (with the friendly staff, Emily Taylor with the usual coffee and your friends offering you comfort) makes it much more relaxed. All through I was in touch with my friends from other schools and it was obvious that Anderson had the lead in the quality of companies to campus (atleast for tech, not sure whats the scene for other industries). Product Management, Product Marketing, Corp. Strategy, Finance and Buss. Development were the usual roles  in the offing. I ended up riding high on the first wave of recruting, got three offers and will be spending the summer in Seattle! My classmates recruting for rech have also reported some amazing offers, proving Anderson's reputation in tech.

Academics

While the coursework, as usual, was great and the professors awesome, it was hard to maintain focus while you're waiting to leave the class midway for an interview. You're physically in class, but in all other respects all you care about is the job you're interviewing for. Naturally, academics tend to suffer. It is worth mentioning, then, that the professors here make it really easy for students by bringing in a ton of energy to the classroom. I'm lucky to have been taught by Anderson's own Dougie Houser, Bruce Carlin, who has a way of spicing up Finance classes through Pink Floyd quotes and Philip Leslie, who got in his son's entire second grade class to participate in the Disney case discussion for the Strategy course. Yes, classroom continued to be a lot of fun!

Ander-fun

The recruiting stress couldn't keep the future business leaders here from partying fridays and being hungover Saturdays. While I'm bound by the Ander-honour code for partying, I can't really talk about all the crazy things that happened. What I can talk about are fun things we did on campus. A case in point being the Harlem Shake, where a bunch of MBA students-gone-crazy wore the most preposterous costumes and danced awkwardly to the meme of our times. Oh, and we even did one on the beach!
The song and dance continued into the Anderson Talent Showcase organized by Anderson Creative, a show where Anderson students perform to raise money for Challenge4Charity.  It was overwhelming to see the kind of talent we have in our class. We're surely gonna kick some butt in the upcoming Stanford C4C weekend!

Ander-families

This was the quarter that saw the first of Ander-babies, as some of my classmates became proud fathers/mothers. Our section put up a baby shower for four to-be dads, all at once! We're one big family and we're only growing. Sig-O's of Anderson students are a pretty active bunch as well! Never to miss the social scene, some of them are even making the most of their stint in LA. If you're a sig-o reading this or someone who has a sig-O, check out Sunny's blog to explore the possibilities.

Thats it for now. They say in the game of MBA, you either win or you die. That makes us a 360-strong class of survivors!

By the way, If you're a new admit still making a decision about Anderson, feel free to hit up any of us who post here and we'll be happy to talk! I've already spoken to a few people in the last few weeks and looks like we have amazing class starting this fall!

~Ayushman Jain, MBA '14

Follow UCLA on Twitter @UCLAMBA

TED at UCLA Anderson!

 

 

Hello everyone. Last week we had a very exciting event at UCLA Anderson, the second annual TED Live Streaming! TED (Technology, Entertainment, and Design) is an annual set of global conferences about "ideas worth spreading". The topic can be anything as long as it is an innovative idea and they last at most 18 minutes so it is a fast and fun way to learn something very interesting. For example I got to listen to a talk about how music should be free and another about how the best experiences and products are those that stimulate more than one of your five senses. 

UCLA Anderson has an agreement to live stream these conferences at the campus and they designed an amazing room so students could sit and enjoy the talks. Take a look here:

 

 

Doesn't it look awesome? Those bean bag chairs were very comfy! If you want to see how they set it all up you can see that in a video here. It looks much better there; my pictures don't do it justice. 

After the live stream three or four panelist comprised of alumni, students, faculty, and industry specialists would go up on stage and discuss the TED talk to provide more insight on the subject and allow guests to ask questions. 

 

Second year Ana Peña (on the left) was moderating the panel I attended.

 

There was also a campfire at the end of the event on the third day where students and faculty would go and present their own TED inspired talks. I was not able to attend but fellow blogger Ashley Mallison did and here is what she had to say:

 

 

"The campfire was a great event. The photo is of Bhavna from our year who gave an inspiring talk about changing the way we design our cities to inside healthier lifestyles! It was a fabulous event that spoke to the power of TED and the UCLA Anderson community with great drinks and food, and black light chalk wall for people to write “What would you name your own TED Talk” and truly inspiring presentations from students and professors!"

I hope this inspires you to attend the TED Live Streaming event at UCLA Anderson next year and if you are planning to visit campus make sure to ask a current student if there are going to be any events on the dates of your visit. There is always something interesting going on at UCLA Anderson! 

 

-Alejandra Rodriguez '14
Follow UCLA Anderson at @UCLAMBA

Lets talk High Tech!

It is that time of the year where a lot of you must be deciding which MBA school to go to (of course you should choose UCLA Anderson!). For those of you interested in technology or those who have not decided what they want to do after their MBAs, I want to share with you why Anderson is such a great place for transitioning to a job in the high tech industry. 

 

Location!

Anderson is located very close to Silicon Valley, the San Francisco bay area, and Seattle. You can find the headquarters of all the major high tech companies in these areas. For example Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Ebay, etc. All just a drive or a short plane ride away.

Los Angeles is also home of many startups, including those in the high tech industry, but you don't have to take my word for it, click here to read a great article from Forbes about why Los Angeles is becoming the new tech startup capital. 

Lastly, we are very close to Las Vegas which is home of the annual CES convention. Fellow blogger Kyle Forest just wrote an awesome post telling you all about it which you can find here. If you haven't read it yet I highly recommend you do so! 

 

Parker CMC!

We just talked about the awesome location but how can you really leverage it? The Parker CMC , which is Anderson's Career Management Center, has a great relationship with all the high tech companies.  Most of them recruit on campus and post positions through Parker CMC. 

You can follow Parker CMC on facebook here. They do a splendid job coaching and preparing us for networking and interviews. They have a class just for this on your first quarter, they do workshops, and you can book an appointment with any of the advisors every week. Actually one of the greatest advices I can give you when you start your MBA is to meet with an advisor every week. They will do mock interviews with you, review your resume and cover letters, address your concerns, guide you on how to get your dream job, and so much more. I usually meet with Emily Taylor or Regina Regazzi, who have done an amazing job coaching me and I highly recommend both of them.  Needless to say you can't go wrong with any advisor you decide to work with, they are all great! 

This is Emily teaching us about Parker CMC during our first days of class! 

 

Alumni!

We have Alumni in almost any company you might be interested in and they are all happy to talk to you about their experience. It is actually one of my favorite things about Anderson, we have a great community where everyone helps each other out and that does not stop upon graduation. Contacting an Alumni is very easy, we have an ever growing database where you can search for them and obtain their e-mails. 

 

We have ACT Coaches!

You must be wondering what ACT Coaches are, they are second years who meet with a group of first years for an hour every week to guide and mentor them on their job search. ACT groups can be by industry or function, for example I am in an ACT group for high tech and in another one for finance. Let's discuss the high tech ACT group since this is a post about high tech. These are my Act Coaches: 

Meet Joshua Stark and Bradford Lyman from class 2013! 

Can we talk about how awesome Josh and Brad are? They keep us up to date with tech news, practice interview questions with us, and guide us all the way from how to decide what companies to target to how to get the most out of your internship. It is so nice to have a fellow second year to talk to about these things and their advice has been so helpful! I am amazed by how they know so much! 

 

We have Mentors!

If Parker CMC and ACT Coaches are not enough for you we also have mentorship programs in many of Anderson's clubs. I have a mentor from the HTBA (High Tech Business Association) and from the WBC (Women's Business Connection). When looking for a mentor in the high tech industry don't just look in the HTBA, many other clubs, like the WBC, will offer you mentors that match your function, country of origin, gender, etc. but that doesn't mean they can't also match your target industry! My mentors Daisy Chen and Shiva Ramesh from class 2012 have been providing me invaluable advice and connecting me with many other alumni. I highly recommend that you sign up for mentorship programs when you are at Anderson. 

 

HTBA and Tech Treks!

The HTBA (High Tech Business Association) organizes events throughout the year to help you meet and talk to representatives from high tech companies. Some of these events are:

-Career nights:  They are kind of like speed dating. You sit at a table with representatives from a certain company and after some time the organizer indicates that it is time to switch tables. It is really fun!

-Tech treks: The HTBA assigns companies for you to visit or you bid for them in a raffle system. You get to visit one or two companies per day and there is always an alumni networking event too. There is one for Seattle and one for the Sillicon Valley area and they usually happen during winter. 

Anderson students at Microsoft's campus in Seattle 

-Brunches: As the name implies it is a brunch with company representatives. There is going to be one this Sunday organized by the HTBA and the WBC (Women's Business Connection).

 

If all this did not convince you, I encourage you to visit our campus and talk to some current students. That played a big role for me when deciding what MBA to go to. If you can't come to campus contact some students by e-mail or phone, they are all very friendly and happy to help!

 

-Alejandra Rodriguez '14
Follow UCLA Anderson at @UCLAMBA

First Club Trip: A Visit to Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES)

 About two weeks ago I went on my first Anderson-related trip. The Hight Tech Business Association (HTBA) organized a group to visit the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. It was an opportunity for HTBA'ers to see first hand many of the exciting new products that will either be available in the market within the near future or prototypes of products that are still years away from being commercially produced. 

(The group consisted of mostly 1st and 2nd year full-time MBA students, but a few FEMBA's were along for the fun as well.)

As students, we had free access to CES, but were only able to enter on the last day of the expo. This prevented us from attending any speaker sessions, but granted us free reign to visit as many exhibits as possible without distraction. 

(One of the major benefits of being a student - free access to tons of events.)

The main convention hall featured mostly TV's, audio, computers, cell phones, and similar types of products; the north hall was primarily automotive technology and accessories; and the south hall had a variety of items, including fitness technology. 

Here's a series of photos of products that impressed me or I thought were interesting to see: 

OLED TV - graphics were incredible! Easily the best image colors I saw. 

Dual layer screen TV - two screens are laid on top of each other, and by wearing glasses, you can see one image or another on the screen. Much better than split screens or Picture in Picture!

Here's another shot of a dual layer screen - you can see the two different programs mixed together, as it appears to someone without glasses on. 

Fitbit's product environment was impressive - having a scale and fitness device linked to each other provides a wealth of data that can be analyzed for trends.  

A lot of people might not purchase a Hapifork (vibrates if you have less than 10 seconds between bites), but it's fascinating to see the areas that fitness technology is expanding into. 

Audi has easily the coolest looking car at the expo. 

According to Behringer, the world's biggest boombox! I heard them put it on level 40 (out of 100), and it was a very impressive amount of sound produced. Too bad I can't carry it on my shoulder like a true boombox. 

One of the few booths with give aways was Wicked Audio. You could either play Rock, Paper, Scissors or High Card, and if you won best two out of three, you got a free set of head phones. Out of the five of us who went through the line together, three won and two lost. Not bad!

(Group shot of room 30-725 getting ready for a night out.)

Last but not least - the weekend wasn't only about technology. The HTBA organized two outings to clubs (Tao and Tryst) and a group brunch at the Wicked Spoon. It was a fantastic weekend that allowed us to indulge our interests in technology and get to know each other better while having fun in Vegas. 

Next up for trips - heading to Boston at the end of February for the Sloan Sports Conference!

Until next time, 

~Kyle Forrest, follow on Twitter and follow UCLAMBA 

Spring Quarter Wrap-up @ UCLA Anderson & Disbelief that First Year is Over!

How is it possible that half of my MBA is over?!? I looked back at the first blog post I wrote on the MBA Student Voice just under a year ago and it was bittersweet - in some ways, it felt like a month ago, and in others, like forever. So much has happened in the last year! Almost all of it amazing.

But first, a wrap-up of the spring, as I have been delinquent in posting this quarter. I will start by blaming my new position as President of the High Tech Business Association (HTBA), a role I am honored to hold for the year starting this Spring through next Winter. My amazing board of Vice Presidents and I are taking an already great club and making it even better. Special events next year include Career Nights, Tech Trek company visits, and I am so excited to announce our inaugural Case Competition next fall! I can't tell you the sponsor yet, but it's a fantastic company. Some advice for the class of 2014: start thinking about applying to be a First Year Director and also forming a team for this special event. This will give you a great jump on a successful year!

Yes! Membership does include a T-shirt featuring this amazing logo!

Classes were as tough as ever this quarter, but it was hard to get mad at our strategy teacher Prof. Florian Ederer when he taught an incredibly interesting class by day and joined us at night for karaoke (or as it was also known, Eder-Oke). Other fun things included the marquee event of the spring, AnderProm at the luxurious Biltmore Hotel in Downtown LA. This featured everyone at Anderson dressing up to the nines, taking limos, and dancing around like a bunch of idiots. In short, it was a blast.

Guess which one is my husband. Bonus points if you guessed "Neither!" 

Unless you know what a Canadian tuxedo is, I don't even know where to begin explaining what is going on in this picture. 

Before you start to wonder what happened to said husband, he and I were able to sneak away for a few nights after our March 31st wedding (wrap-up here, you know - the one where we got married Saturday night in Atlanta and I was in class on Monday in LA!). That's right, we sailed away from the beautiful Port of Long Beach on an exotic 3-night cruise to Enseneda, Mexico. 

I thought it would be a fun surprise for Stanton if I had our stateroom festively decorated for our arrival. He wasn't sure whether to be horrified or relieved that I might have confused this trip with our actual (TBD) Honeymoon.

Just getting away was nice, even if this was one of the few moments on the trip I was actually awake. Much of my time was spent catching up on much-needed rest, much like the Mexican seal in the right of this picture.

I also got to do my first sight-seeing in LA (at least, that didn't occur as part of a run) when my parents came to visit us for the long Memorial Day weekend. Having been meaning to go to the Getty Center for approximately five years since I first came out to LA on business, it was a real treat to actually go. And it didn't disappoint! This is a must-do activity, if for nothing but the amazing views.

My father Jeff, who spent a summer in Compton in the '70s, finds Los Angeles much more to his liking this time around!

One of the most exciting things I participated in this spring was the TED TOMS Shoes Case Challenge. My amazing team of fellow first-years Alisa Sommer, Lauren Logan, Remy Monteko and I made it to the finals, where we had the chance to present in front of an esteemed group of judges from the TED organization, TOMS Shoes, and Anderson. Coming up with our own product idea that combined TOMS core values of companies engaging in sustainable giving with the ideals of TED was an extremely exciting and gratifying experience. Another tip to future students: jump on any case competition opportunities you get! They are great ways to improve your public speaking, work hard under pressure, and get to know your amazing classmates on a more intimate level.

Lauren Logan, Remy Monteko, me, and Alisa Sommer ready to present, wearing our TOMS shoes of course!

Our blockbuster idea, "Products Worth Sharing"

So after an insanely busy, exciting, fulfilling, fast-paced year, school is over and I am leaving for Seattle, WA for my summer intership as a Product Manager in Kindle at Amazon. I am really looking forward to it! It's going to be fantastic and I am so excited and grateful to have the opportunity.

Two of the best things about Seattle!

Naturally, the first thing I am doing in my new city is running the Rock 'N Roll Seattle Marathon on June 23rd. I like to consider it a great way of sightseeing, although I realize that might make me sound insane. Either way, it's going to be an amazing summer! I'll see you guys in the fall as I share my continuing adventures as an MBA student at the best business school in the country, UCLA Anderson School of Management!

It seemed like a good idea at the time...

Have a great summer!

-Charlotte Baxter Maines

Follow me on Twitter: @CharlotteK

Global Trips, One Wedding, No Funerals: Spring Break @ UCLA Anderson

Spring Break! When was the last time you had 1 1/2 weeks off? No work, no school, no responsibilities, no kidding? Well, for me, it was just this Christmas (wrap-up post here), but you can have all these breaks too if you come back to b-school! I'm going to hit a few of the spring break highlights and what's happened since we got back. 

My fellow blogger Connie reported on her trip to Cabo, and a few other large groups of Anderson students dispersed around the globe to create havoc and get ideas for their next great business venture (depending on who you ask). Costa Rica got rave reviews for gorgeous weather and amazing scenery like the famous waterfalls:

Cloud forest vs. Cloud storage. (Photo by Marshall Mawson.)

And every picture I've seen from the legendary Japan trip that almost 100 students went on makes me either wildly jealous or hugely relieved I didn't go!

Luiz, Heloisa, and Camila prove that what happens in Japan should probably stay in Japan. (Photo courtesy Aspan Dahmubed.)

You may be wondering why I didn't get to partake in any of these amazing trips. That is, unless you are an avid reader of this blog, in which case you have been following along for the past 9 months and already know why (no, not THAT!). Stanton and I finally tied the knot!

Stanton manages to hold up his left hand in a salud despite the ball and chain beautiful ring he now sports.

Having been working on planning the wedding behind the scenes during all the craziness of moving across country, surviving fall quarter, and recruiting and doing four high-profile races this winter, it is definitely a relief that the big event has happened. That's easy to say though because it was such a huge success and my husband is so amazing! Really, to all bridezillas out there, it turns out you don't have to micromanage everything to have a fabulous wedding. Have good food, a crowd-friendly venue, an awesome band, and a guest list of people that love to dance, and you can't go wrong. We partied deep into the night and still no one wanted to leave when it was over!

It's my wedding and I will jump awkwardly higher than anyone else on the dance floor and otherwise show off my two left feet if I want to!

The big day was March 31st in Atlanta, GA, where spring had officially sprung. I'm always going on and on about the amazing weather here in LA, and I guess my hometown was getting a bit of a complex because the flowers were in bloom and it couldn't have been more perfect.

Although this pic was included to show off the illustriously blooming azaleas, I suppose it bears explaining that one of the activities at my bachelorette party involved puffy painting matching hoodies. What can I say, my bridesmaids and I are children of the 80s. (L to R: Kara, me, Lucy. Don't get any ideas Gentlemen, we're all spoken for.)

My beautiful family! I couldn't have done it without their support, especially my lovely mother Gaylen. Just in case you weren't sure, she's the one on the left. My sisters Jordan and Allie are next, then my Dad. He was really relieved I finally dragged another man into the family! 

So now it's back to the grind (yes, we got married on Saturday and I was in class on Monday), and the last week has been filled with getting up to speed on my new duties as president of the HTBA, starting my first TA position, and getting used to all the new classes. We had ASA Transition day on Friday, a 7-hour haul where we learned all the ins and outs of being presidents. It was a long day, but I am so impressed by all the leaders of the student council (ASA), the associations and clubs. The class of 2013 is pretty amazing! 

Finally, just because I spent so much time making this collage-style picture and in another plug for LA weather, here is a shot of me smiling with relief after finishing the LA Marathon in 3:29 on March 18th. I loved getting to tour my new city on foot with no traffic, but I did not love the fierce headwind for the entire race. I'll definitely do it again next year and recommend it to my readers!

Next blog post, I'll have more info on the events the HTBA is planning, as well as an update from the Knapp Business Plan Competition, where Sarah Fixler, Aviva Altmann and I are pitching our business plan Yogameo in the semifinals on Thursday. As always, we never stop here at Anderson!

-Charlotte Baxter Maines

Follow me on Twitter: @CharlotteK

The Sky is the Limit at UCLA Anderson!

Wow, so much going on at Anderson as always! This month is especially exciting for me, not because it is my birthday (which it is, but at my age you try to ignore them not acknowledge them), but because it is my WEDDING! That's right, while many of my classmates including Rikin Mantri and Rob Michlovich are headed off on the awesome-sounding Japan trip sponsored by the Japanese American Business Association (JABA), or to Hawaii, a mere 5-hour flight away, like my friend Sarah Fixler, Stanton and I are headed back east to my hometown of Atlanta for the Society Event of the Year. Just kidding, but it is going to be wonderful and I can't wait! (Less wonderful will be getting married Saturday night EST and being in class on Monday PST, but what are honeymoons if not opportunities for learning and stress?)

Stanton and I actually met because we discovered we both enjoy long walks on the beach.

For those of who you who totally freak out reading about something like a wedding, fear not, most of my fellow students are single and living the swingin' LA life. There are about 1,000 fun options to choose from any night you can possibly go out,and the always-amazing In-N-Out burger stays open late for your post-party hunger cravings.

There are many other activities besides nightlife- just this weekend was a fun visit to a winery up in Malibu that members of the Anderson Wine Club took advantage of a beautiful Saturday to enjoy. Check out that attire, yes it was 78 degrees!

Alan Druckman (far left) apparently mistook the theme of "wine party" for "pool party" but other than that it's a pretty solid group! (Thanks to James Vogl for photo.)

In other news, I know I mentioned in my last blog post that I was still conducting interviews with various companies to lock down my internship for this summer. I am pleased to say that I have now accepted an offer and will be headed to Seattle, WA to be a Product Manager at Amazon!

I couldn't be more thrilled, as I have been incredibly impressed by the company, its people, and a philosophy that really clicks for me. Plus they are doing some amazing things in the tech space and it seems like they are only getting started! I'm pretty psyched about spending a summer in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, where we get to live in downtown Seattle in South Lake Union near the brand new Amazon HQs and take the light rail to work!

It's pretty cool of Amazon to put its interns up in the Space Needle for our summer housing!

TED's Takeover of Our Campus

Today marks the final day of TED's four-day Takeover of UCLA Anderson.  This partnership was TED's first with an institution of higher education.  The "takeover" was designed to immerse the UCLA Anderson community in the TED experience, and I must say this event has to be one of the most memorable on-campus events of the quarter.  I'm sad to see the splashes of TED's signature velvet red go, but it's been quite a run.  Bold ideas, lively discussions, insightful panelists, challenging calls to action -- we students were treated to a highly concentrated dose all of these things as we wandered into the brightly decorated student lounge in between classes to see live recordings of various TED speakers from the 2012 conference in Long Beach.

One of the featured speakers was Jim Stengel, former Global Marketing Officer at Procter & Gamble and current adjunct professor at UCLA Anderson.  He made the case that we are entering an era where the narrative of business must change.  Companies must be driven by higher-order brand ideals in order to achieve truly sustainable growth.  These companies will attract the best talent and innovate in ways that make life better for the people they serve.  Without an ideal to guide an organization, people lose their passion to create and do meaningful work.  And without passion, your organization may be relegated to a future of mediocrity and underachievement.

The capstone event for the TED Takeover was an afternoon "campfire" with TED-inspired talks with some of our fellows classmates and professors.  Prof. Rakesh Sarin proposed his equation for the science of happiness, Prof. Bhagwan Chowdhry discussed his Financial Access @ Birth campaign, and fellow classmate Stephen Lehtonen challenged us to join the fight to design education around children's passions rather than standardized testing.  Class of 2013 students Stuti Goswami and Guy Holzman delivered inspired talks about the Dream Act and the need for corporations to pay their fair share of taxes.  Prof. Benartzi proposed a strategy for saving in the future by keeping a lid on your lifestyle while increasing earning potential.  The energy in the crowd was electric.  Standing ovations and loud cheering rumbled through the alumni plaza.  Great food and drinks + being surrounded by good company + bold innovative ideas = a night to remember.

Wish you all could have seen it for yourselves.

-- Jesse Ferlianto '12
Twitter: @jferlianto

 

 Stephen Lehtonen - my friend, classamate, and founder of Breakaway, giving his talk about education reform that had the entire room engrossed from beginning to end.  No joke.  That's tough to do these days, and this just gives you a sense of how gifted this guy truly is.

Recruiting, Races, Amazing Weather: Winter Quarter at UCLA Anderson!

It's hard to believe winter quarter is already halfway done! If I thought that things were going to slow down a bit after the craziness of Fall (full disclosure: I did.), well, I was wrong! But, at the risk of sounding like a broken record in all my posts, I am still loving all of it.

Where to begin: it's been a crazy quarter, full of RECRUITING and schoolwork and RECRUITING and wedding planning and Marathons and RECRUITING. That's right, first-years are allowed to attend company presentations and network in the Fall, but companies can't actually solicit applications from us until the Winter. So they do! Before we were even back to class, I was in Seattle for the great Days on the Job event put on by the High Tech Business Association (HTBA), visiting the offices of Amazon, Microsoft, Expedia, and T-Mobile. Resumes and cover letters were due en masse all throughout January, and interviews are still being conducted as I type. I have been lucky enough to interview with some truly excellent companies; a sampling of them includes:

Awesome companies that came to UCLA Anderson to recruit it's even awesomer students!

The process has treated me well with all my hard work this Fall and Winter paying off in the form of second round interviews and even an offer so far. You'll have to stay tuned to this blog to find out where I decide to spend my summer! But I do want to offer faith for those career and function switchers out there: if I can go from being a real estate developer to a product manager at a top-tier technology firm, anyone can do it!

In between recruiting I have managed to squeeze in two big races, qualifying for the 2012 New York City Marathon by running a 1:35 at the 13.1 Los Angeles Half Marathon in January, and qualifying for the 2013 Boston Marathon by running a 3:32 at the Huntington Beach Marathon last weekend. I bring this up here because I was talking to a prospective member of the class of 2014 over coffee the other day, and he told me he had heard that there isn't time for exercise because you are so busy in school. Well, he obviously asked the right (wrong??) person, because I set him straight. Continuing to run during all the insanity has kept me centered and provided me with some coveted "me time." In addition, I'm exploiting the fact that we don't have to look neat and polished like in a work setting at school, as I will go running around campus at lunch and then return just in time for class. This might explain why no one ever sits next to me, but hey, at least I'm staying sane. (Just kidding, I do have friends - honest!- and with SoCal's dry weather, I sweat about 1/16th as much as I did in humid Florida.)

This begs the question, was it me... or was it those amazing pink socks???

I should clarify that I did not photoshop myself into a beautiful beach background in the above photo, this is actually what I ran along for 26.2 miles. Yeah, it's pretty nice here. The weather has been downright amazing for the last two months. Temperatures hover around 78 degrees every day, the sun is shining, the air has a light breeze, people are wearing shorts- I feel like I need to pinch myself to be sure it's really January and February. Having experienced the fantastic weather out here, I think YOU would have to pay ME to go to business school in New England at this point!