My Visit to Harvard Business School

I made my trip to the undisputed number 1 business school on the planet, the Harvard Business School in March of 2006 – almost a year ago from now. I took a Chinatown bus to Boston on Sunday afternoon. I had signed up to attend classes at HBS and MIT on the following Monday.

I reached Boston at about 3 in the afternoon. It was my first time there. I took the subway (which was far less crowded than the ones in NYC) from the bus station and reached my hotel. It was a pretty cold day, with high winds. After checking in, I decided to check out Boston. Walked to the Harvard square, and was appropriately impressed. After seeing a few sights and grabbing a quick bite, I headed back to my hotel – a cold Boston with an annoying constant downpour did not make for a day of tourism.

The next morning, I took a cab to Harvard Business School. When I had signed-up for the class, I could not help noticing HBS’s policy that you can only attend a HBS class once. Not surprising as there are several thousand people visiting HBS every year and they certainly do not want to inundate classes with visitors.

The HBS campus was, in one word, spectacular. Even on an overcast day, you could feel the history of the place. There was a certain something in air. The place was sacrosanct – you could feel it in the walls. Unlike most other schools, HBS has a campus of its own, a couple of miles away from the Harvard University campus. It was old school architecture, with several small buildings scattered across a lush green campus. Reminded me of my college campus.

I was attending an 8:30 AM class, and we had been advised to get there at least 15 minutes in advance. When I reached Dillon, where the Admissions Office is housed, at 5 minutes past 8, several prospective students were already there. We said quick hellos, and each of us was handed a description of the class we were attending. I was sitting in on a General Management Strategy class.

At 8:20, our escort came to guide us to the class. I forget her name, but she was a first student at HBS. After college, she had worked for Deutsche Bank for a year in Real Estate Investment Banking, and then moved to a Real Estate Private Equity firm, where she had spent a year as well. Nothing too impressive, I thought to myself. I had been working on Wall Street for close to two years, and at a bank that was easily better than Deutsche.

She took us to the class. When I entered the building that housed the classrooms, I could almost feel the money. By now, I had seen my share of state of the art classrooms. However, HBS was certainly amongst the best I had ever seen. The classroom had stadium style seating, and the furniture just shone. Almost as if it had been built a few months back.

The class of 900 at HBS is divided into 10 sections of 90 each and those 90 students take all their classes together in their first year. The section becomes their family. Everything is very structured – there is no testing out of classes or anything of that sort. Every student is assigned a seat on the first day of the class, and that is where they sit. If I remember correct, they sit in one classroom all year round. A little too rigid for my taste, I remember thinking. I really am not a big fan of having to take all classes – I don’t know what I am going to learn in derivatives, having worked the field for over a year.

I sat next to a guy who was a doctor. He informed me that in the class of 900, there were about 40 doctors. Not PhDs but MDs. I knew that HBS took in people from all walks of life, but I certainly did not expect such a high percentage of doctors.

The class started at 8:30 sharp. The case study in class was on an Argentinean chocolate company, Arcor. There were no laptops, and no people coming in late. At 8:30 you were expected to ready to go and no exceptions. The professor kicked off the class, and true to the HBS style, suddenly the whole class was engaged in a discussion. Every point was countered, and everything challenged. Everyone brought their experiences to the school and enhanced the experience of other students. It was interesting, but at the same time a little fluffy. It was just opinions floating around, and there was no right or wrong answer.

Working in banking, I am used to right and wrong answers. Either the economics make sense, or they don’t. I knew that case studies were, to some extent, a lot of about BSing, but seeing it in reality certainly brought a different perspective.

However, the class was on the whole interesting. There were some students from Argentina, who brought first hand information, and provided the local perspective. This was the HBS strength at its best – bring in people from so many different backgrounds, that for every case study you have an individual who has been there, done that.

After the class, I killed some time in Spangler, their hang out place, and then joined some current students for lunch. The discussion was interesting, but once again, it was the unique backgrounds of the people that set HBS apart. One guy was from Canada and after working at Procter and Gamble for a couple of years, had opened a Quizno franchise, and sold it at a substantial profit a year later. Another guy used to work in the Dutch government. A guy had been a teacher for Teach for America for five years, and the last guy used to work at Apple, in the iTunes department. Take this with a grain of salt – I am sure this group was structured to represent diversity, but nonetheless, it showcased the breadth of the experience that students bring at HBS.

I am not so sold on any Teach for America teacher making it big in the business world, and this guy’s personality was anything but impressive. He may have devoted the past five years to his life to a nobler cause, but that in no way qualifies him to be a business leader. It was my first taste that not everyone at HBS is a superstar.

All in all, the discussions were interesting. Usual HBS themes – no books, only case studies, you are encouraged to challenge everything, and all that good stuff. The guy from Canada said something very interesting. Replying to a prospective who had asked him about theory in classes, he said that you don’t learn theory from just books. He said that at HBS, you had the opportunity to learn from guys who are formulating the theories of tomorrow. What can be better than learning the theories from the horse’s mouth? It made sense.

After lunch, my visit was over. I would have certainly liked to sit in on another class, but HBS would not allow that. I walked around the campus once more, mesmerized by the hallowed grounds of the Harvard Business School. I left the campus with one thought in mind – how wonderful it would be to be a student there for two years?