Sure, I’d be happy to share.

I’ve only selected courses for semesters 1 & 2 for now. If there’s interest, I can update my list later on.

To give some context, my intention is to specialize in International Trade at the level of small to medium sized business. So while these first couple semesters are pretty standard business fundamentals, in semester 4 you’ll notice I start to choose courses based on developing specific skill sets that are applicable to my objectives.

I’ve ignored several courses which would be important for someone looking to get a complete and well rounded business education, but don’t seem critical for my goals.

Some courses I’ve skipped: Ethics (lol), Information Systems, Project Management, Calculus, Econometrics, Corporate Finance, Political Economics, Cyber Security, Human Resources.

Okay, on to the curriculum...


---

Academic Foundations (Optional Prep Courses)

I am about to embark on a lengthy 1-2yr education so for me it makes sense to brush up on academics skills as force multipliers for my efforts later on. This section is totally optional though and not part of any business school curriculum.

Academic Foundations - Memory & Effective Learning

Courses:

• Learning How to Learn @ UC San Diego or…
  
  
• Mindshift @ McMaster University
  
  Books:
  
  
• The Memory Book - Harry Lorayne, Jerry Lucas
  
  
• The Four Hour Chef - Tim Ferriss
  
  
• How to Read a Book - Mortimer Adler
  
  Other Resources:
  
  
• Anki (spaced repetition software)
  
  

  Academic Foundations - Productivity
  

  
  Books
  
  

• Getting Things Done - David Allen
  
  Other Resources:
  
  
• Pomodoro Technique
  
• How To Read A Book In A Single Day (short article w/ actionable speed reading tips)
  
  

  Academic Foundations - Writing
  

  Book
  
  

• Elements Of Style - Strunk & White
  
  ---
  
  

  Semester 1
  

  
  

  Business 101
  

• Business Foundations @ UBC
  
  

  Math - Algebra
  

• Kahn Academy Math Tutorials
  
• Maths Essentials for MBA Success @ Imperial College London
  
  

  Accounting
  

  
  

• Financial Accounting Made Fun @ Babson
  
• The prof has had a long and impressive career and he truly does make the subject more engaging through telling the story of a fictional business in little movies
  
  
• Alternative 1: Accounting: Principles of Financial Accounting @ IESE Business School
  
• The prof is engaging and likeable and also teaches through the story of a fictional business. I like this one too.
  
  
• Alternative 2: Introduction to Financial Accounting @ Wharton
  
• This seems to be the most comprehensive of the accounting courses but not as engaging. I figured a more comprehensive course is not going to benefit me if my enthusiasm and retention of information suffers so I skipped this one. If you are naturally smarter than me or have a longer attention span, this is probably the best introduction to accounting course for you.
  
  

  MicroEconomics
  

• [Principles of Microeconomics @ MIT] (https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/economics/14-01sc-principles-of-microeconomics-fall-2011/)
  
• This introductory microeconomics class is one of the most popular that MIT has made available, and is taught by Prof. Jonathan Gruber. He’s been teaching there for 20 years and is an extremely prominent economist who helped design Massachusetts’ groundbreaking health-care reform.
  
  ---
  
  

  Semester 2
  

  
  

  Marketing
  

• An Introduction To Marketing @ Wharton
  
• Taught by three of Wharton's top faculty in the marketing department, consistently ranked as the #1 marketing department in the world, this course covers three core topics in customer loyalty: branding, customer centricity, and practical, go-to-market strategies.
  
  

  MacroEconomics
  

• Principles of Macroeconomics @ MIT
  
  

  Finance
  

• Finance for Everyone: Smart Tools for Decision-Making @ MIT
  
• Not sure this course is going to be sufficient for business school but I really wanted to learn from Prof. Gautam Kaul and since his Introduction To Finance course seems to have been discontinued at Coursera I am going to roll the dice on this one. Look for something else if you want to make sure you’re prepared with a solid finance background for business.
  
  

  Math - Statistics
  

• Analytics For Decision Making @ Babson
  
• I chose Statistics instead of Calculus after watching this TED talk and reading this article
  
  ---
  
  

  Semester 3
  

  
  

  Operations Management
  

  
  

  Supply Chain Management
  

  
  

  International Business
  

  
  

  Game Theory
  

• Game Theory @ Yale
  
  

  Strategic Thinking/Decision Making
  

• Effective Problem-Solving and Decision-Making @ UC Irvine
  
  ---
  
  

  Semester 4
  

  E-commerce
  

  
  

  Product Design
  

  
  

  Opportunities in Developing Economies
  

  
  

  Management/Leadership
  

  
  ---
  
  

  Semester 5
  

  Negotiations
  

  
  

  Entrepreneurship
  

  
  

  Global Supply Chain Management
  

  
  

  Pricing
  

  
  

  International Business Law
  

  
  

I don’t come from a liberal arts background but I majored in a STEM field that wasn’t CS or econ. I’ve been working in business environments since undergrad despite not having any sort of formal finance / econ / business education (though I admit having a STEM major is a convenient signal to employers that I can do math). Many entry-level jobs don’t require you to be a subject matter expert straight out of undergrad. I spent a lot of my first year in consulting taking notes, tracking items on spreadsheets, and scheduling meetings. Can’t speak for banks but there are certainly corporate jobs out there that don’t require a ton of specialized knowledge. (The big secret is those 17 years of formal education don’t always directly translate into what real jobs are - even my engineer friends only use 5% of what they learned in school while on the job, by their estimation)

You may have to do some work to spin your experiences (and you’ll have to hustle to network bc many companies will only recruit college seniors since it’s easier / cheaper to grab a bunch at once) but it’s possible.

If your local library has this book, I’d recommend checking it out. I skimmed it once and it seemed like it had good advice for how to communicate your skills in a way that will resonate with companies

PowerPrep Software from GMAC for Practice Tests. These are older official tests that are the best representation of taking an actual test. The software comes with two tests for free, and you can purchase up to four more tests in their shop.

The Official Guide for practice questions. You can also purchase the Official Verbal Guide and Official Quant Guide for more questions later if you need it.

chineseburned's guide to the AWA on GMAT Club. If you follow this format and practice 2-3 essays you will score a perfect 6 on the AWA. If you make an account on GMAT Club, you can also use the built in timer function to test yourself on Official Guide questions (using tags to filter them) which gives you a huge database of additional questions for Problem Solving, Data Sufficiency, Critical Reasoning, and Sentence Correction. I linked the forums already filtered for only official questions if you click any of the categories in the previous sentence.

Manhattan Prep for Quant study and the PowerScore Bible Trilogy for Verbal study. You will need the Official Guide to make proper use of the Manhattan Prep books. The Manhattan books also give you access codes to their online resources which include questions sets for the Official Guides and unofficial practice tests which are useful for practicing the testing environment. The caveat is that their tests are probably only accurate to within plus/minus 60 points. Also, the Manhattan Prep Sentence Correction book has a much better list of idioms than PowerScore, but I preferred PowerScore more overall.

I studied using those materials over the course of about 4 months and scored a 750 (48Q, 45V, 8IR, 6 AWA) on the first sttempt. Start by taking a practice test (preferably unofficial) to get a benchmark, and then begin with the Manhattan prep books and follow the strategy that is laid out by them. As a reference, I studied (roughly) 1-2 hours each weekday and 3-5 hours each Saturday and Sunday. Best of luck to you.

Status:
Admitted: HBS
Dinged w/o Interview : Stanford, MIT, Berkeley

Background: Hispanic Male, 3.7 GPA (Top 25 public univ), 166V/165Q, PhD drop out in engineering
2.5 yrs at graduate program, 1.5 yrs in industry at the leading company in my field.

Multiple NSF Fellowships, first author research papers, awards at current company, president of outreach org.

Strategy: Only applied to schools I would be more than excited to go to. Figured I either had a terrible shot or a great shot given my background. Sold myself as an expert in science and tech that wanted to branch out into leading my own start up or VC depending on the timing.

During my reflection, when I started realizing I was going to be dinged at most schools, I realized that the essays didn't really let me get my message across. I knew going in to stick to my message and just mold it to the schools prompts, but really answering the question for MIT was impossible to convey my message outside of my resume. Overall applying to MIT sucks I do not recommend their school if the admissions office is a reflection of the career support they give students. Also, Stanford is just a crap shoot. Berkeley is doable but honestly I didn't put enough effort forward to fit my message into a measly 500 words.

The Harvard essay was the only one that let me properly sell myself, and I believe that is why I was successful there. ~800 words just introducing who I am and how I can provide value. It's the only essay I think works to sell myself. That is what the application process is about, how can you add value to the class in a unique way.

The fact that schools are slashing essays and word counts so heavily really tells me they are just playing a numbers game and looking for bullet points on your resume / how much you will donate based on your career path. It's all random once you meet the cut offs, so quantity is king. Sell sell sell your value add to the class.

I didn't use a consultant, this is really the only book you need:
http://www.amazon.com/MBA-Admissions-Strategy-Profile-Building/dp/0335241174

Feel free to ask me any other questions.

• A Concise Guide to Macroeconomics - As concise as it promises & super accessible, I can't imagine a better primer to macro. this is required reading at HBS (where the author teaches)
  
  
• The Productivity Project - I'm working thru this now in audio book form. The guy took a year off after college to experiment w/ diff't productivity systems. it's a nice overview of lots of different productivity gurus/techniques
  
  
• Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller - the perfect read for the aspiring tycoon about the greatest CEO of them all, the man for whom anti-trust laws were first written.
  
  
• House of Morgan - or for the financially inclined, the original rainmaker, James Pierpont Morgan. My favorite part of this one is that it's actually a pretty thorough history of investment banking from 1900 - ~1990.
  
  But really, I think 'just relax' is best here, so:
  
  
• Diversify your interests
  
• Read some books you've always wanted to that have no obvious connections to self-improvement
  
• learn to code, build something dope, then start a company (okay, not 'relaxing,' but still great)
  
• whittle something (maybe also start a company with that, somehow)
  
• date someone out of your league
  
• volunteer somewhere unglamorous doing something hard & thankless
  
  etc etc etc
  

As far as trying to figure out what different parts of an MBA program do, you might be interested in The Ten Day MBA, by Steven Silbiger. It breaks down the skills that you learn in classes on, say, marketing each day and provides a pretty good overview of how those skills are applied. If you're looking for help making a decision on your concentration, this might be helpful for you.

Assuming your GPA and GMAT are in line with the schools you're targeting, the problem is probably your essays. Your essays need to assert some good qualities about yourself, use stories to prove that those assertions are true, and tieback how those qualities will help you perform at [school] and do your part to make it better.

I highly recommend this book to get inside the heads of the admissions committees. You have to put yourself in their shoes and show how you'll help the school, not the other way around.

Currently going through the Manhattan series which I can't recommend enough which also comes with six practice CAT exams. Plan 3-5 practice exams including the two free ones from MBA.com before the actual exam.



IMO the OG guide isn't enough if you need to re-learn/practice subject matter. The Manhattan guide is also SUPER helpful when it comes to test taking strategy.

There is a lot you could do with an MBA in biotech, but even so, it also helps to have a solid technical background to go along with it. I mention it all the time, but I would suggest checking out this book. It goes into each of the various areas of biotech/drug development, what background you need for each one, what the day to day is like, etc. The author is a former Genentech employee and is very experienced in the field.

Cracking the PM Interview here: https://www.amazon.com/Cracking-PM-Interview-Product-Technology/dp/0984782818/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1535773043&sr=8-1&keywords=cracking+the+pm+interview would be a good place to start :)

https://www.amazon.com/Valuation-Measuring-Managing-Companies-Finance/dp/111887370X/ref=pd_cp_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=78812C9EYCT5SWFMY51W

i'm assuming this? link if any other readers are interested.
thanks!

It is worth investing into your quant skills. If you don't have quant skills (lets say you had a BA/MA in English or something) it is really worth it.

Second, there is a reading list in the wiki I believe. You can read stuff such as :

Barbarians at the Gate
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Barbarians-The-Gate-Bryan-Burrough/dp/0099545837

I recommend this book as a guide http://www.amazon.com/30-Day-GMAT-Success-Days/dp/0615326277 you can probably get the ebook somewhere I believe they sell it on their own site or something.

You'll also need the official study books as well probably. And as others have said try to get as fast as possible because even if you're doing well you will run out of time as the computer gives you harder and harder problems in the math section.

I used that and studied about 5-6 weeks and got a 740 on my first try.

Sloan sends signed books whose authors are member of its faculty. I received this one:

https://www.amazon.com/Hedge-Funds-Perspective-Financial-Engineering/dp/0691145989

See also: http://twitter.com/MITSloanAdcom/status/811692797937983488

Booth sends a scarf and a keyholder for Significant Others.

Just buy the 6th edition on amazon, you can probably get it used for <10 bucks. Economics hasn't changed much in the last few years.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0136040047/ref=olp_prime_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used&shipPromoFilter=1

this https://www.amazon.com/Successful-Harvard-Business-School-Application/dp/0312550073

https://www.amazon.com/Everyone-Advanced-Analytics-Graphics-Addison-Wesley/dp/013454692X

I just ordered this ASUS

I didn't feel like I really needed a touchscreen or 2-in-1.