Advantage Program Helps MBA Students Develop Competitive Edge

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- When it comes to job placement and career advancement, MBA students in the University at Buffalo School of Management don't rely solely on their credentials. A new program gives them the corporate polish needed for career success.

The school's MBA Advantage component is an example of a movement among business schools to provide students with not only with the latest business theory, but with the savvy needed to climb the corporate ladder and make business theories work in a corporate setting.

"In today's competitive business environment, corporate recruiters expect MBA graduates to possess a level of sophistication that adds strategic value to a firm's initiatives," says Frederick Winter, dean of the UB School of Management. "MBA students need to know how to communicate that ability in a job interview and how to apply that ability in the corporate world."

The MBA Advantage program began in the fall during student orientation and continues through the students' first and second years at the management school. It provides seminars and group exercises in problem-solving and decision-making, team-building, business etiquette, conflict-management, effective meetings, interviewing, sartorial advice, and realistic job expectations, among other activities. At the completion of the seminars, students receive a certificate in team performance.

The next MBA Advantage session for new and continuing students will be held Jan. 15-17. Session highlights will include a business-etiquette luncheon in the Marriott Hotel at which students receive lessons in social graces and proper decorum, and an interview competition in which teams of students assume the identity of "Pat Smith" and compete for a fictitious summer internship at Xerox.

According to Winter, the program was developed to give UB MBA graduates an edge in a job market made increasingly competitive by the MBA boom of the '90s. "On average, our students possess slightly less prior work experience than MBA grads at other top business schools," says Winter. "We wanted our students to develop skills usually obtained only through years of corporate experience, so that they can compete for the best positions anywhere in the country."

Cynthia Shore, director of the management school's Career Resource Center, says the advantage sessions are beginning to pay off. Several corporate recruiters who visited the campus recently commented on how impressed they were with the students' professional demeanor, interviewing skills and qualifications, she says. And 35 students were selected for interviews at a consortia of corporate recruiters to be held in Chicago this month.

The Advantage program is part of a larger effort within the management school to increase the average starting salaries and job placement rates of its MBA graduates -- criteria that influence the rating of business schools by U.S. News & World Report, Business Week and other publications.