Profile Evaluation:Marketing / Strategy / Technology and Operations Management

[ThePhDAspirant]

Hello All,

I have been this forum for about a year now as an observer of the preparatory, anxious and exultant conversations during the admissions cycle. Now it is my turn - I am going all out on applications for the Fall 2018 session and will be seeking inputs from time to time from the Gurus here. I will start with my profile eval request and a few questions and concerns. Any input that will help me with my applications this year is most welcome.

Test Scores (GMAT/GRE): GMAT 700 (Q:50, V:34)

Undegrad GPA: 76.3 % (First Class with Distinction from a top 10 Engineering University in India. Consistently top 3 in my class)

Graduate GPA: 3.23 / 4.3 (MBA - Marketing)

Research Experience: Only academic projects that were requisite for earning the degree. (1) Effects of using Chilling Methods on Copper Molds on the Grain Structure of Aluminium Alloys. (2) MBA Capstone on B2B Key Account Management Practices in the United Arab Emirates.

Teaching Experience: None

Work experience: 12 years cumulative experience comprising 7 years in aftermarket consulting with focus on Aftermarket Parts, Service and Warranty. 3 years in Automotive industry, 2 years product management in products and services industry.

Concentration Applying to: Yet to decide. I need some guidance on finalizing because I have a few topics in mind that pertain to different concentrations. These are

(1) B2B Pricing Strategies

(2) Aftermarket Parts Supply Chain - Global sourcing and fulfillment strategy

(3) Study on the pace of Technology Changes and adoption in the manufacturing industry - Leader/Laggard Story

(4) Information technology organization dynamics

(5) Impact on business Operations in Mergers, Acquisitions and Divestitures.

Number of programs planned to apply to: Total 20 max.

T10: 2 (Ross and INSEAD are my dream programs).

T11 - T20: 3 (Robert H Smith, Fisher, Carlson)

T21 - T30: 5 (Michael G Foster, Kelley, HKUST, CUHK, WP Carey)

T31 - T50: 5 (Berkley, Carnegie Mellon, Mich State, NUS, Yale)

(Ranking refence: UTD rankings April 2017)

In addition, I would also be applying to ISB, IIMA and IIMB FPM programs

Dream Schools: Ross and INSEAD

Other Questions:

What made you want to pursue a PhD?

Desire to specialize in a specific domain and get into an academic role where I can freely dive into research that intrigues me. While the consulting role aims at solving business problems with technology or process enablers, in reality business situations are dynamic and these enablers and solutions mostly cannot be permanent fixes. Through my engagements I have observed that businesses often overlook scientific approaches in designing solutions to their problems and thus end up with a transactional means to effect an improvement in operations. This is all very fine for business needs but my curiosity does not end there. while I wish to pursue deeper understanding of why things work the way they do, a corporate role does not give me the liberty to do so.

Questions or concerns you have about your profile?

1. Lack of academic research experience :dejected:

2. About 10 years since I am away from a academic program by the next fall and thus a challenge in getting LOR's. I did get in touch with the Dean from my MBA program few months ago and expressed my desire to join a Business PhD degree next fall. While he did pose a few alternates considering my "middle age and familial responsibilities", I will be writing to him for his letter of recommendation. However this still puts me short by 2 LORs. Is it fine if I am able to get a LOR from the Professor who mentored my Undergrad Engineering project? And how do I arrange the third - do programs accept LORs from work supervisors?

3. How to get LORs from the professors for 15 different applications? How do I make my professors provide the LOR for all my applications.

Any additional specific questions you may have:

Any recommendation on sites that I can access to read research papers and align my interests to narrow down my applications to a single concentration will be greatly appreciated.

 

Regards,

TPA

[BrazilianPhD]

Many programs explicitly state that recommendations should be from people like professors/researchers. They want people who can evaluate your potential to become a researcher, and usually work supervisors are not able to do that. But I think the undergrad professor is fine.

 

From what I've talked with professors who recommended me, they just write a letter once. Then, when a school sends them an email asking for a letter of recommendation, they just copy and paste it. So, the work they have for 5 schools is not much different from 15 schools. Also, professors are used to this kind of thing. My thesis advisor was quite happy when I told him about the list of schools I was applying to.

 

You should find out what are the main journals for each field. For Marketing, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, for example. Then, you have to find a place where that stuff is available (a library, for example), if you can't find in sites like Google Academic.

[XanthusARES]

First of all welcome to the board. Good luck with the coming application cycle. Your ranking (although based on UTD) is way way way off. Literally every program you mention is top 15, with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions. Particularly your Top 31-50. Berkeley, Yale and CMU are all top 10 (likely top 5) programs. This is where the UTD rankings fail miserably. Start with UTD, but when a school doesn't seem to make sense (i.e. CMU has multiple faculty who are very close to winning Nobel Prizes) trust your gut.

 

I'm going to go at this review as if you are going to apply to marketing PhD programs since that is my field. Your lack of research experience will likely keep you out of most of the schools you mention. When it comes to T10 programs great scores, excellent LOR's and some kind of academic research is a given. Nothing about your application package says T10. Definitely apply to 1 or 2 of these programs, it's always in your best interest to do so, but focus the majority of your applications on T75 programs.

 

I don't know how to translate your grad GPA, but I'm going to assume that you were top 10% of your class. Your GMAT made the cut-off for T25 programs and would likely be on the edge for T15 if you had strong LORs and research experience.

 

This is where you'll have some problems. Your lack of research experience can't really be fixed before applications are due in a few months. If you can't wait for a year to apply there isn't really anything you can do about that. LOR's can be difficult. Most programs in the T25 will be perfectly fine with 2 academic references and one industry. Don't let anyone on here tell you differently. The quality of the 2 academics is much more important. If you can only get an LOR from an undergrad prof that is still better than having to industry rec's.

 

My advice is to apply widely this year. 1-2 from your list is a good start. Then the majority of your applications from schools in the T75, and if you're having a difficult time discerning whether a school is T75 or not, please come back here and ask us. I'm going to write a quick post about this. Good luck!

[ThePhDAspirant]

You should find out what are the main journals for each field. For Marketing, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, for example. Then, you have to find a place where that stuff is available (a library, for example), if you can't find in sites like Google Academic.

 

Thanks for the guidance. I did start looking at select papers from Industrial Marketing Management to align my understanding of the topic I was keen about. So far I feel the path I followed is giving me decent results: Topic keywords search on EbscoHost / Google scholar --> get Journal name --> read articles on my interest area --> Browse other topics in the same journal. I am yet to start making notes for reference in my SOP.

 

Am I on the right path?

 

Regards,

TPA

[ThePhDAspirant]

First of all welcome to the board. Good luck with the coming application cycle. Your ranking (although based on UTD) is way way way off. Literally every program you mention is top 15, with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions. Particularly your Top 31-50. Berkeley, Yale and CMU are all top 10 (likely top 5) programs. This is where the UTD rankings fail miserably. Start with UTD, but when a school doesn't seem to make sense (i.e. CMU has multiple faculty who are very close to winning Nobel Prizes) trust your gut.

 

Thanks for this valuable input. Could you please recommend any other institution / organization that has a similar ranking?

 

I don't know how to translate your grad GPA, but I'm going to assume that you were top 10% of your class

 

Yes, that is correct and also the reason why I plan to reach out to my undergrad professor.

 

My advice is to apply widely this year. 1-2 from your list is a good start. Then the majority of your applications from schools in the T75, and if you're having a difficult time discerning whether a school is T75 or not, please come back here and ask us. I'm going to write a quick post about this. Good luck!

Thanks for the advice, I will rework my list and be back soon.

 

Regards,

TPA

[BrazilianPhD]

Thanks for the guidance. I did start looking at select papers from Industrial Marketing Management to align my understanding of the topic I was keen about. So far I feel the path I followed is giving me decent results: Topic keywords search on EbscoHost / Google scholar --> get Journal name --> read articles on my interest area --> Browse other topics in the same journal. I am yet to start making notes for reference in my SOP.

 

Am I on the right path?

 

Regards,

TPA

 

My only concern here is what kind of journals you're getting. Ebsco, Google Scholar, or any other source will probably give you access to many, many journals. Good ones, and bad ones. Of course, you should prefer the most relevant ones.

 

There are measurements, rankings, impact factors, things like that which can give you an idea about the relevance of a journal. I don't remember right now a place to check that. But you should be able to find them online, so that you can stick with high quality journals.

[XanthusARES]

My only concern here is what kind of journals you're getting. Ebsco, Google Scholar, or any other source will probably give you access to many, many journals. Good ones, and bad ones. Of course, you should prefer the most relevant ones.

 

This is a really really good point. Google Scholar is one of the greatest things ever invented. It is also a huge stumbling block for people just getting into academic research. Until you know more about research you will have a hard time discerning what is good research. As Brazilian mentioned, knowing what the top journals are will at least give you an heuristic to deciding which articles are worth you time to read.

 

http://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php

 

This is a good source for you to start with. Just choose your concentration and sort by H index.

 

 

 

Now for a quick side bar before people start jumping down my throat. H index has flaws to it. Every measurement system will have inherent and explicit flaws. I'm not advocating for using it as the end all and be all of scientific impact or knowledge. I'm attempting to provide the OP with a good heuristic they can use to quickly find the top journals. We all have our own idiosyncratic distinctions about the publishing process. Most of these are valid criticisms that I hope we, as academics, will change. I stand by my point to the OP, though, that using H index is a fair measure of determining top journals in your chosen field.