SOM Review

Experience during the program

Folks here are exceptionally smart, driven, and diverse. This is obviously the case with many other top programs as well, but the student body here truly resonates with SOM's mission of educating leaders "for business and society". From a career perspective, SOM is particularly strong at sending folks to consulting careers. The much-allured MBB has solidified its presence on campus, and SOM is now considered a core target school for these firms as well as many other consulting firms (Deloitte, Monitor, Parthenon, etc.). The consulting club in particular is especially helpful (it is run like another class) and is structured in a way to maximize success during case interviews.

For other careers (finance, general management, IB), SOM isn't quite as strong yet - as the school continues to build out its reputation though this should change over time. Recruiting within these industries isn't quite as structured and will require a bit more elbow grease on your part. If you put in the effort to network (and take advantage of Yale's brand), you should be okay.

From a curriculum perspective, SOM's integrated curriculum is honestly a hyped-up version of the typical core curriculum offered by other top programs. The big difference here is the "raw case" approach (where we are given ALL of the data rather than a subset of case data) , but I'm not sure how valuable this difference is. Electives so far have been good - SOM does have a solid list of professors (John Kerry, Tim Geithner, Jim Chanos, etc.) so the electives can be good.

For future applicants, I'd suggest reaching out to current students and getting to know what makes them tick - SOM really does a good job of building a class of folks who are driven by similar values, and the best way to get a sense of these values is to get to know current students.

Overall BSchool experience (5.0)
Schools contribution (4.0)
Classmates rating (5.0)

Strengths of the program:

Student body, diversity
Brand/Ranking
Culture & Student Support
Specialization in a particular area (e.g. Finance, Consulting, Healthcare, etc)

Best fit at this program:

Consulting
Investment Banking
Tech

Can be improved:

Curriculum, Classes, Professors
Alumni Network