Grad's guide to graduate admissions essays - Colleen Reding 2015
Duke University - Fuqua school of business
Business
When asked by your family, friends, and colleagues why you want to go to Duke, what do you tell them? Share the reasons that are most meaningful to you.
Three years ago, when I left a for-profit company to work for a nonprofit organization, I heard many of the reactions that I now know are commonplace for those working in the social sector. I had friends declare, “Good for you!” as if I was pursuing some higher moral ground by taking a job with Teach For America. When I would catch up with former colleagues, the questions they would ask about my new job were more about how I liked the reduced hours than about the work I was doing. Overall, it seemed as if others perceived my career change as a personally beneficial decision, rather than a professionally driven one. To them, I looked like someone who couldn’t necessarily hack the 80-hour work week and who wanted to save the world rather than be successful.
Though frustrating, this experience ultimately cemented my commitment to working in the social sector, rather than discourage it. In the eyes of my former colleagues, many among them future business leaders, I saw a lack of respect for the work of solving social problems. The decision to make this work the focus of my career in spite of these challenges is not one I’ve taken lightly, nor is the decision to apply to Duke. I want to go to Duke because I believe that its faculty, students, and alumni think the same way I do about the social sector: that it needs and warrants the same level of talent as for-profit sectors in order for our global economy and society to thrive.
I first learned of Fuqua from a former manager at the consulting firm where I worked, who had collaborated with researchers at the Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship (CASE) for her recent book on high-performing nonprofits. At this point in my career I had just begun to discover my passion for helping nonprofit leaders make their organizations more effective, and when my manager mentioned the work of CASE, I realized that there were institutions out there dedicated to applying the same rigorous research and business methods to social issues as there were for consumer products or financial investments. As I explored Fuqua further, I saw that its students seemed particularly invested in integrating the work of social organizations and for-profit enterprises, judging by the fact that the MBA Net Impact Club is among the most popular on campus. Fuqua also seems deeply committed to developing socially conscious business leaders through its curriculum focus on ethical leadership and cross-cultural awareness. Finally, Fuqua’s dedication to reducing financial barriers for students pursuing nonprofit careers is unparalleled and sends a clear message that channeling business acumen to the social sector is a major priority for Duke.
I have learned through my experience working in and consulting for nonprofit organizations that an integrated approach to solving social problems is best accomplished through adapting rigorous business practices with knowledge of the social context. At Teach For America, our relentless focus on measurement and data is adopted from the data-driven processes of many successful companies. We consistently measure nearly everything, from the achievement of students in our corps members’ classrooms to donor satisfaction with our fundraising communications. However, I’ve seen that proposing a corporate top-down approach to implementing new initiatives does not sit well in our context, particularly because those who might technically be “low on the totem pole,” our corps members, are the ones making the actual impact in classrooms. For this reason, I know that I need to pursue my MBA at an institution that understands the complexity of adapting business practices in the nonprofit setting so that these practices contribute to, rather than hinder, social change.
I know that attending Duke and taking advantage of the many opportunities Fuqua offers would allow me to become the well-rounded social sector leader I need to be in order to really make an impact. Nonprofit success is undoubtedly tied to relationships with for-profit funders, government agencies, politicians, and high net worth individuals around the globe. Duke’s global reach and focus would allow me to learn as much as I can from my diverse classmates and to benefit from their experiences across industries. Given that my short-term goal is to better understand the perspectives of high net worth donors, I feel that my work with this audience could only be enhanced by better understanding the business language they speak and applying this lens to nonprofit work. I would relish the opportunity to add my own perspective and experience to Duke’s values-driven community, and in particular feel I would thrive in making connections with my classmates and Fuqua alumni that could prove beneficial to the organizations and social causes that I hope to eventually serve.