2022 Best & Brightest Business Major: Rachel Jain
Rachel Jain
Emory University
Goizueta Business School
Describe yourself in 15 words or less: I’m a hardworking, personable, and adventurous individual that is very skilled at building meaningful relationships.
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
Fun Fact About Yourself: I will be graduating with my MBA from Goizueta Business School exactly 30 years after my dad graduated with his MBA from Goizueta.
Undergraduate School and Major: University of Georgia, Biology
Most Recent Employer and Job Title: Senior Implementation Manager at Privia Health
Aside from your classmates, what was the key part of the school’s MBA programming that led you to choose this business school and why was it so important to you? Having attended a large university for my undergraduate degree, I wanted a business school experience with a small class size to be able to make stronger connections with both my classmates and professors.
What excites you most about getting your MBA at Goizueta? What makes you most nervous?
I am very excited to have the opportunity to spend the next two years solely focused on developing myself professionally, expanding my network, and learning skills that I can directly apply to my future career. The only apprehension I have is how Covid-19 may impact the business school experience I had anticipated especially in regards to networking opportunities.
Describe your biggest accomplishment in your career so far: In 2019, I was chosen as the lead of a department-wide effort to create a new cost-effective approach for client implementations at athenahealth. A few months into the project, I relocated to Manila, Philippines for 9 months and partnered with a third party BPO that helped me recruit, interview, and hire a new team of project managers to act as our offshore counterparts. During my time there, I was responsible for training and managing the newly hired team as well as developing and rolling out multiple iterations of the workstream. Under my leadership, the Manila-based team grew from 12 to 22, and I’m proud to say that it is still a pivotal part of athenahealth’s larger implementation team.
What led you to pursue an MBA at this point in your career? After my time working abroad, I recognized my passion and interest in strategy and operations, and felt that consulting would be a better career path for me. To pivot from healthcare implementations to consulting, I knew it was crucial to pursue my MBA to help further develop my critical/forward thinking skills, all around business acumen, and grow my network in the consulting field. In Manila, I enjoyed my experience as a first time manager, but also felt that an MBA would help me hone in on leadership skills that required more refinement. The combination of wanting to change careers as well as knowing that I had growth potential from a management perspective aided my pursuit of a MBA degree at this time.
What other MBA programs did you apply to? Vanderbilt
What was the most challenging question you were asked during the admissions process?
“Where do you see yourself in ten years?”
How did you determine your fit at various schools?
It was most important to me to find a school that was strong in my post-grad career path. Goizueta is very well known for how successful it is at placing their students into all the top consulting firms which was evident from their employment statistics, faculty’s backgrounds, and the success stories of Goizueta students in consulting clubs, case competitions, and IMPACT projects. I then wanted to make sure it was a good fit for me geographically. I was born and raised in the southeast, and I knew that I wanted to work here after school. Forming connections in this region was very important to me which is why Goizueta being located in Atlanta was a major selling point. The last thing I evaluated was how I’d fit into Goizueta socially. To get a feel for that, I reached out to current and former Goizueta students to learn about their experiences during business school. Not only did each individual I spoke to rave about their classmates and professors and how close they were and still remain with both, but I thoroughly enjoyed my conversations with each of them.
What was your defining moment and how did it prepare you for business school?
When I moved to Manila in 2019, I was challenged more than I had ever been both professionally and personally. I was building and managing a team of people that did not share the same cultural background or first language as me. I was creating process decisions that affected the entire department. I was working at night due to the 12-hour time difference all while navigating the day to day technical challenges of living in a third world country. This experience ended up being the most unforgettable nine months and helped prepare me for business school in more ways than I could have imagined. Being able to work so well with my Manila team and use our various backgrounds as a strength helped me prepare for the collaborative nature of business school. Furthermore, working with a team that spoke English as their second language as well as working virtually with my team in America forced me to improve my written and verbal communication skills. The skill to communicate virtually will be crucial when working with my classmates this year while Covid-19 continues to create new ways of collaborating. Finally, creating all new implementation processes while navigating the obstacles thrown at me on a day to day basis prepared me for the forward thinking and adaptive mindset that you need to have in business school. Looking back, I am forever grateful that I had this work experience right before I begin my business school journey, and am very happy for the preparation it gave me.
What is the most important attribute that you are seeking in an MBA employer – and why is that important?
An employer that really values professional development for their employees. I have worked for companies in the past that have very little upward trajectory available, and I have realized that that work environment is not conducive to my work ethic. I want to work for a company that values professional growth of their employees and continuously challenges me to strive for more.
Interested in exploring Full-Time MBA opportunities? Learn more about Goizueta’s Full-Time MBA program.
