Top Law Schools

Attending a top law school and b school, go for it.

Borg wrote:Attending a top law school and b school, go for it.

Did you MBA to JD or JD to MBA?

TheThriller wrote:

Borg wrote:Attending a top law school and b school, go for it.

Did you MBA to JD or JD to MBA?

I'm not sure I understand this question, but I will try. If the question is whether I started one or the other first, I applied to both simultaneously. If the question is whether I plan on doing law or business, the answer is business.

Borg wrote:

TheThriller wrote:

Borg wrote:Attending a top law school and b school, go for it.

Did you MBA to JD or JD to MBA?

I'm not sure I understand this question, but I will try. If the question is whether I started one or the other first, I applied to both simultaneously. If the question is whether I plan on doing law or business, the answer is business.

Answered both my questions!

TheThriller wrote:

Borg wrote:

TheThriller wrote:

Borg wrote:Attending a top law school and b school, go for it.

Did you MBA to JD or JD to MBA?

I'm not sure I understand this question, but I will try. If the question is whether I started one or the other first, I applied to both simultaneously. If the question is whether I plan on doing law or business, the answer is business.

Answered both my questions!

I used all my JD and MBA knowledge to ascertain the meaning of the question.

I wrote it fast without thinking or forming a readable sentence (in class atm).

Not to butt in, but I am also a JD/MBA (at CCN) and would be happy to chime in if Borg doesn't mind.

Do you guys/gals feel like you are benefiting from the dual degree more than the average MBA student and JD student?

Just started at HYS. On the fence between just taking a couple classes at the B school and actually applying for an MBA. Thoughts? Why'd you want to get both? Pros/ cons?

Borg, what type of business are you planning on getting into? Why do you thing the combo will help you?

Chuck, do you feel like you are getting a significant advantage in job prospect with big law firms?

Thanks.

Do either of you find it necessary to juggle the workload of both law school and an MBA? Is this even an issue? If so, is it difficult to manage both?

I'm really interested in seeing where this thread goes.

I'm applying to law school this year, but was accepted to b-school as a senior in college (think along the lines of 2+2). I'm applying to law school this year and if I can get into the law school I'm strongly considering doing the JD/MBA. I'm in my first year of management consulting, but not really loving it and would rather go to law school; however I worked my butt off to get in and the idea of a JD/MBA sounds crazy cool.

Lawprospie, a JD MBA sounds like the best possible combo, I agree. I am curious as to what the posters have to say about it.

What type of work experience did you have? Are you covering the entire cost of the program yourself, or is your former employer or scholarship covering a portion of the cost? How would you describe the backgrounds of your fellow JD/MBAs as compared to the JDs?

Are any of you going into law with it?

I'm in a full time MBA right now (starting 2nd year next week), and am looking to do law school next year. I'm hoping to use my MBA to help me do corporate law. Any of you going this track? And if so how much of a boost does it seem to be?

puppylaw wrote:Just started at HYS. On the fence between just taking a couple classes at the B school and actually applying for an MBA. Thoughts? Why'd you want to get both? Pros/ cons?

Depends what your goal is. Basically, whether to do an MBA depends on whether the benefits (varies depending on what you want to do) outweigh the costs (primarily, $50k plus a year of lost earnings, assuming you're doing a 4-year).

-If you want to practice law and think an MBA will enhance your ability to do certain types of corporate practice, I would say it's probably not worth it. At best, you can take a couple of business school classes to pick some concepts up. Even if you don't, most people have no problem picking it up on the job. A lot of stuff you learn in business school has remarkably little direct applicability to the actual practice of corporate law, aside from having a slightly better understanding of context on conference calls (there are select exceptions, such as bankruptcy, where you might actually gain substantive knowledge).

-If you want to actually do a business job, and the types of jobs you're interested in largely don't recruit out of law schools (e.g., investment banking, investment management, many corporate jobs) it may be worth it to do an MBA. A counterexample would be consulting, where they actually do recruit out of most top law schools, so you don't really have to get an MBA to have access to those opportunities.

-The final case, which probably applies to very few people, is if you're either independently wealthy, or care so much about the learning experience and long term benefits that you are willing to take the short term financial hit for the "lifelong value" and learning experience, whatever that means. Don't get me wrong - it is indeed a great program where you learn a lot, and I feel like I'm getting a lot more out of it than doing either degree separately, but I'm just skeptical it's worth it purely for it's own sake.

Hope that sort of answers your question.

milanproda wrote:Do you guys/gals feel like you are benefiting from the dual degree more than the average MBA student and JD student?

Intellectually / in terms of the learning experience? Yes.

Job-wise on the MBA side? Yes.

Job-wise on the law side? Probably not. I certainly don't think it's a disadvantage, but it's not a huge boost.

RobMD wrote: Chuck, do you feel like you are getting a significant advantage in job prospect with big law firms?

Significant? Probably not. In my anecdotal experience JD/MBAs tend to outperform what their grade level would predict, but it's not by a huge margin, and it probably has to have more to do with the fact that JD/MBAs tend to have prior work experience and tend to be better at interviewing (you have to interview to get into b-school!) than the average law student.

lawprospie wrote:I'm really interested in seeing where this thread goes.

I'm applying to law school this year, but was accepted to b-school as a senior in college (think along the lines of 2+2). I'm applying to law school this year and if I can get into the law school I'm strongly considering doing the JD/MBA. I'm in my first year of management consulting, but not really loving it and would rather go to law school; however I worked my butt off to get in and the idea of a JD/MBA sounds crazy cool.

It really depends what you want to do. If you want to do a business job, just forget about the JD, get an MBA, be set, and save yourself loads of money and time.

If you want to practice law, you have to think long and hard about whether the extra year (and time, assuming you're doing a 4-year), is worth it. I think there are two circumstances where it's useful to get a JD/MBA even though you're coming in thinking you'll practice law:
-You're very uncertain about whether you actually want to practice law and want the optionality (even this isn't a great reason - it's much cheaper and easier to just decide what you want to do and save yourself the trouble)
-You value the academic experience / interdisciplinary perspective / nebulous long-term benefits / dual networks so much that you're willing to pay that much extra to get them.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is a JD/MBA is never worth it vs. either degree individually from a short-term ROI perspective. You're not going to make more money because you're a JD/MBA early in your career. So the only way to really justify it is (1) if you'll value the experience itself, (2) if it has value because it gives you optionality, or (3) if you think there are long term benefits (network, dual perspective, etc.) that will help you further along in your career. I personally think the last one is the case, at least for me, but it's a very hard thing to measure definitively.

Whatever you do, don't do a JD/MBA just because you're already into both schools. Sunk cost fallacy (or sunk benefit, in this case) - do the best thing for you regardless of your present situation.

RCinDNA wrote:Do either of you find it necessary to juggle the workload of both law school and an MBA? Is this even an issue? If so, is it difficult to manage both?

It's not an issue. The way it works at most schools you're not actually cramming more classes into less time, it's rather that they lop off about 1/4 of both programs. So if anything it's actually easier than a regular JD, since business classes are generally less time consuming than law classes.

One thing that is difficult to manage is recruiting and/or extracurriculars. Business school recruiting and extracurriculars, if you choose to take part in them, can be very time consuming.

radar714 wrote:What type of work experience did you have? Are you covering the entire cost of the program yourself, or is your former employer or scholarship covering a portion of the cost? How would you describe the backgrounds of your fellow JD/MBAs as compared to the JDs?

I came from consulting. Because of a combination of factors, including some of the ones you mentioned, the JD is essentially free for me. I am paying for the MBA portion.

mrizza wrote:Are any of you going into law with it?

I'm in a full time MBA right now (starting 2nd year next week), and am looking to do law school next year. I'm hoping to use my MBA to help me do corporate law. Any of you going this track? And if so how much of a boost does it seem to be?

I am probably not. To give you an idea, I'd say about half of JD/MBAs go into law straight out. About 5-7 years out, I'd estimate upwards of 75% are in business (or at least not practicing law).

As for your other question:

imchuckbass58 wrote:

RobMD wrote: Chuck, do you feel like you are getting a significant advantage in job prospect with big law firms?

Significant? Probably not. In my anecdotal experience JD/MBAs tend to outperform what their grade level would predict, but it's not by a huge margin, and it probably has to have more to do with the fact that JD/MBAs tend to have prior work experience and tend to be better at interviewing (you have to interview to get into b-school!) than the average law student.

If you're talking about "boost" in the sense of being better at the practice of law, I have limited firsthand experience. I would say yes there's a boost, but it's probably not enough to justify doing a JD/MBA just for that alone.

Sorry for the delay, should have probably tried to figure out how to quote multiple people in a single post prior to doing this. Please forgive the unattributed quotes, but I'm answering everything below.

1. Do you guys/gals feel like you are benefiting from the dual degree more than the average MBA student and JD student?

Yes, definitely. On the law side, I found it very easy to get firm jobs for the summer, and I got a lot of offers that probably would have been out of reach based on grades alone. Having a solid base in finance, economics, and general business strategy is really helpful, and it's a good selling point for firms.

On the business side, it varies a little more. Recruiters tend to be interested in what your prior experience is much more than grades. While I can definitely say that it has helped me out in interviews and gotten a foot in the door, I still had to really show people what I could do when I was in banking/consulting interviews. A lot of bankers I interviewed with said they wished they had the law degree etc., so I think it was helpful but I don't think it was the dispositive factor.

2. Just started at HYS. On the fence between just taking a couple classes at the B school and actually applying for an MBA. Thoughts? Why'd you want to get both? Pros/ cons?

Understandable. I think actually jumping in and doing it has three major advantages: (a) you get access to all the classes you could want without having to fight to get in or being frozen out entirely, (b) you get the additional branding advantage that can help you differentiate yourself if you want to transition out of law or something down the road, and (c) you really get to know the other students, and the business school network is incredibly valuable to have. It's a very social place with a lot of alumni pride, and you gain automatic access to people who might be good to know down the road.

3. Borg, what type of business are you planning on getting into? Why do you thing the combo will help you?

I'm going into banking (or what's left of it). It's a highly regulated industry and there are a lot of antitrust and contract concerns in M&A deals, so it's helpful. However, I don't see this as my ultimate end goal at all. I really just want to get good exposure to financial analysis, and then move on to an operating role at a company. I created and sold a startup prior to school, so I'm just trying to get some more of the hard skills that I think might be helpful to get to a higher level as an executive in an actual business that makes something.

4. Do either of you find it necessary to juggle the workload of both law school and an MBA? Is this even an issue? If so, is it difficult to manage both?

Can't speak for the other guy, but I have definitely had to juggle at times. The two move in very different ways academically. In law school, I've found that I can get ahead quickly just by blocking out a weekend and doing a lot of reading a couple times per semester. Otherwise, there are no deliverables. In business school, the pace is much more hectic and projects will come out of nowhere that will eat whole days. You don't have to read nearly as much, but getting a major assignment in a finance class can take up a ton of time.

It can be difficult to negotiate what to do between the two, but I think if you create a good schedule for yourself it is possible. Also be warned, most of b school revolves around drinking and being social, so sometimes that temptation can creep into law school study plans.

5. I'm really interested in seeing where this thread goes.

I'm applying to law school this year, but was accepted to b-school as a senior in college (think along the lines of 2+2). I'm applying to law school this year and if I can get into the law school I'm strongly considering doing the JD/MBA. I'm in my first year of management consulting, but not really loving it and would rather go to law school; however I worked my butt off to get in and the idea of a JD/MBA sounds crazy cool.

Law school is an awesome thing to do, but that's really nice that you've already been admitted to the business school as well. How strong is your background in business? If you have significant finance and accounting experience academically, b school is not going to be as enlightening as it was for me. However, the combination of the two at a top school can lead to certain "right place/right time" kind of situations that might result in an amazing career. I think if you're serious about it, just jump in and do it. I've loved it and it has opened doors.

6. What type of work experience did you have? Are you covering the entire cost of the program yourself, or is your former employer or scholarship covering a portion of the cost? How would you describe the backgrounds of your fellow JD/MBAs as compared to the JDs?

I started, operated, and sold a startup. In general the JD/MBAs tend to have a bit more work experience than the average entering JD, but we do have some with less experience than the average MBA and even one guy who has never been out of school. I'm covering the cost myself.

7. Are any of you going into law with it?

I'm in a full time MBA right now (starting 2nd year next week), and am looking to do law school next year. I'm hoping to use my MBA to help me do corporate law. Any of you going this track? And if so how much of a boost does it seem to be?

I decided not to, but I know others who are. I worked at a firm for a summer though, and I found that the knowledge I gained in the b school gave me an absolutely massive boost on the transactional side in the firm. It can help you to dive into deals much more easily, and it also gives you a credential to use and network of people to call if you get sick of law and want to switch later.

imchuckbass58 wrote: I am probably not. To give you an idea, I'd say about half of JD/MBAs go into law straight out. About 5-7 years out, I'd estimate upwards of 75% are in business (or at least not practicing law).

That's exactly what I want to do. 5-8 years biglaw ---> general counsel. Unless you don't count that as "business".

Borg wrote:5. I'm really interested in seeing where this thread goes.

I'm applying to law school this year, but was accepted to b-school as a senior in college (think along the lines of 2+2). I'm applying to law school this year and if I can get into the law school I'm strongly considering doing the JD/MBA. I'm in my first year of management consulting, but not really loving it and would rather go to law school; however I worked my butt off to get in and the idea of a JD/MBA sounds crazy cool.

Law school is an awesome thing to do, but that's really nice that you've already been admitted to the business school as well. How strong is your background in business? If you have significant finance and accounting experience academically, b school is not going to be as enlightening as it was for me. However, the combination of the two at a top school can lead to certain "right place/right time" kind of situations that might result in an amazing career. I think if you're serious about it, just jump in and do it. I've loved it and it has opened doors.

I don't have significant business experience. I was a humanities / non quant social sciences person in undergrad. The only business experience I have is working in consulting. Therefore, I really want the business education and professional grooming, but I seriously don't want a career in consulting.

I went to an undergrad that swore by the whole "education for the sake of education" philosophy (Whatever that means; I might be drinking the kool-aid) so the idea of JD/MBA is like an intellectual dream come true.