Economic Chill May Open New Employment Doors
By David Feldman at 7 January, 2009, 5:08 am
Directly testing the chill economic waters, more than 150 MIT School of Management MBA students embark on their annual “Tech Treks” this week, heading for Silicon Valley, Seattle and Boston in search of jobs, contacts, and new doors to open.
In what may be a sign of the times, some larger companies, such as Google, eBay and Yahoo that have typically participated in the Trek are not hosting the students this year. But for some students, the economic stress on such big players creates new opportunities. “It has placed some budget constraints on many of the companies we originally intended to visit, but it has also allowed us to look at a different set of companies,” said Pedro Santos, a native of Santo Domingo who is joining the San Francisco and Silicon Valley Tech Trek, which will visit a range of companies, from Apple to small startups. “I think that startups will be hiring a significant number of talented individuals who would have been taken by larger corporations, which means that the infusion of energy and talent from MBAs could really lead to a significant amount of value going into the startups.”
Amanda Symonds, a native of the United Kingdom who worked in investment banking before coming to MIT Sloan, said that she is actually “even more excited about this tour than I would have been if the economy was booming. Given the current state of the economy, I believe it is even more important to focus on growing your professional network and to accept every opportunity to educate yourself about business.”
MBAs are of course wary about current job prospects, said Tripti Thapa, a first-year MBA from Nepal. “It is a tough time for MBA students. As a first year, I am definitely worried about summer internship.” Thapa is joining the Massachusetts Tech Trek “to get exposure to start-up companies in Boston,” including Vlingo, a Cambridge-based Microsoft start-up lab. “Vlingo appeals to me because I am interested in bringing voice recognition technology to developing countries.”
Rajiv Bhatia, who worked for IBM in Austin, TX, before coming to Sloan, agreed that the MBAs might do best to focus on such smaller, newer and hungrier operations. “Because the startups only work on new ideas and are clawing to gain a footing, they are our big hope for real innovation over the coming years,” said Bhatia, who is also a Silicon Valley and San Francisco Tech Trekker. “I believe this is one of the best times for the startup company model to thrive. Large corporations typically cut their budgets and go into ‘survival mode’ during times of economic crisis.”
In addition to company tours and visits, the Trekkers will meet and socialize with members of MIT’s vast network of alumni, many of whom hold top positions in sectors and companies targeted by the Tech Trekkers.
I am the former chair of the Wharton School’s worldwide alumni association. I remember a similar time in 2001, when the school contacted many alums and strongly urged them to step up their hiring of Wharton graduates in the then struggling economy and stock market. Many students chose interesting, alternative paths then that they would not have otherwise considered – non-profits, manufacturing businesses, early stage companies, and the like. It is nice to see the enthusiasm of the young even in such difficult times. It’s time for everyone to not only think outside the box, but to kick the darn box a mile down the street….
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