HBS Students

Sarah Curtis-Bey
	HBS Class: 2006 SVMP Class: 1997 College/degree: Spelman College, B.A., 1998 Major: Economics Previous occupation: Vice President, Marketing, JPMorgan Chase Interests: Community service, running, traveling, all art forms (especially music and dance)

How did you get interested in the SVMP program?

At that time I was in the Inroads Program, which helps young minority youth interested in business to get internships. I was interning at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York , and ended up there for three summers. My last summer they invited me to apply for the Summer Venture Management Program at Harvard Business School .

How was the SVMP experience?

After the week, I had my eyes set on going to business school, and to Harvard Business School in particular, because it was such a powerful learning experience. What I was learning in the classrooms through reading cases and applying my analytical mind, creativity, and entrepreneurial drive to actual business situations just resonated with me. Working in such productive teams was great, and the professors were dynamic. Hearing more about what you can actually do with a business school degree and the places you can go from here was what really stuck with me.

Describe the week

You're grouped with people who you don't know, so you don't have the luxury of coming with your group of friends and going off into cliques. You're networking and you're meeting students that are interning in other companies, going to other schools, so it was very cool to meet all those different people. I remember the week being action-packed from beginning to end. We were really living the life of a business school student, so we had cases to read every night. We actually had study groups that we met with every night to go through cases and discuss ideas and debate on different issues prior to our classes. We were called upon to discuss the cases during the day. In the evenings we had guest speakers come in. We had a number of receptions, including one with the dean, so it was a combination of networking, real classroom experience, seminars at the end of the day, and just sort of camaraderie building and learning formally about what business school is about, and what Harvard Business School is like.

Talk to me a little bit about the classes themselves, how were they different than what you were used to at an undergraduate level.

The learning environment in SVMP was very much about being engaged with your classmates. Although you had a professor facilitating the discussion, the professor was just one element in the room, not the driving force behind what was happening in the classroom. It quickly occurred to me that the students were running the discussion. We were the ones who were exchanging ideas and debating with each other. We were learning from each other. In the classroom in SVMP you were actually formulating the concepts in the class.

In what ways do you think you most personally developed during that week?

My strongest development was in building a plan for where I wanted to go from there. It motivated me to think about business school as part of where I wanted to be in the future. It inspired me to look at a range of opportunities and then pick one that I thought would be most challenging for me. The people I met inspired each other to get to those places and then stayed in touch along the way. It's a powerful network. We all inspired each other to go to these different jobs and careers and then to apply to the Harvard Business School and go through this process. And so, how powerful is that? You become a network like that in one week that is still lasting today.

What do you think prospective candidates should know about the program?

They should know that it will transform their way of thinking. They should expect this to be a condensed version of what it's like to be a student here at the Harvard Business School . They should expect to be motivated and inspired in ways that they haven't been before. And they should expect that it's an experience that will prepare you to be a better person at work, at your business, whatever it is that you're doing, and better prepares you for going through the entire business school application process.

How have you enjoyed HBS so far, and what's the experience been like?

The experience has been great. I love this school. I'm really happy that I'm here. I was ready for the “transformational” experience. I think the camaraderie in the section, the group of 90 people that you spend your entire year with in the same room is one of the most amazing pieces of this adventure.

What would you say is empowering about an MBA in terms of opening up opportunities?

I think it empowers you in a sense of exposure: the people that you're around from your classmates to your professors, to the companies that come to recruit, to the career coaches on campus, to the people that work at the school—everyone has their own network, their own experience. And so you're empowered by virtue of the people that you're connecting with on a daily basis in the MBA Program. It's not just the classroom and what you're learning in the general management tool set, it's all the resources in addition to what you learned in the classroom that are both traditional and nontraditional. It's also a degree that just allows you flexibility. It's a point in your life where you can transform or you can move to another career if you want to.

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