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Essay: The Mechanical Engineer

The document is an essay written by a male mechanical engineer from the United States applying to an MBA program. It summarizes his professional experience in operations consulting and management, and explains how a personal trip motivated him to pursue an MBA to help companies innovate their supply chain operations and have a positive impact. He aims to gain leadership skills from business school to drive change in industries and communities.

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Tien Vo
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49 views4 pages

Essay: The Mechanical Engineer

The document is an essay written by a male mechanical engineer from the United States applying to an MBA program. It summarizes his professional experience in operations consulting and management, and explains how a personal trip motivated him to pursue an MBA to help companies innovate their supply chain operations and have a positive impact. He aims to gain leadership skills from business school to drive change in industries and communities.

Uploaded by

Tien Vo
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Essay: The Mechanical Engineer

Author’s home country: United States of America

Author’s previous industry/profession: Operations consulting,


operations management 

Author gender: Male

Analysis: 

The author focuses his essay on two themes – his professional experience as
an operations consultant and an experience which motivated him to go for an
MBA. Through the essay, the author is able to highlight his professional skills,
achievement as well as give a clear picture of his long-term career plans and
his reasons for doing an MBA.

I’m [APPLICANT’S FIRST NAME] and I have journeyed here from the
hallowed grounds of [APPLICANT’S U.S. NEW ENGLAND HOMETOWN],
where I spent my formative years amid wild dreams of achieving greatness by
setting world records and winning the Olympics. As I’ve hung up my
[OLYMPIC SPORT’S TRADITIONAL SHOES] in favor of business shoes,
those dreams have evolved into a desire to achieve greatness in a different
arena. Today, my dream centers on helping companies leverage technology
to propel their operations into the future, providing unparalleled customer
service and delivery, with an operational efficiency to match.

I graduated with a BS in Mechanical Engineering in [GRADUATION YEAR]


and spent my first 3 years out of college working as an operations consultant.
It was my job to walk into a manufacturing plant and drive significant
operational change – for example, I once spent 3 months walking the sticky
floors of a milk plant in [MID-SIZED U.S. SOUTHEASTERN CITY] helping
plant management boost throughput by 30% in order to take on a new
customer. We accomplished this goal with zero capital spend, a feat many
had believed was impossible. In our projects, the biggest challenge was
almost always convincing managers to reach for that extra tad of unseen
opportunity hiding within the operation, because oftentimes it was very difficult
to look beyond the daily struggles that plagued their operations. I worked
directly with 5-8 person “rapid results teams,” coaching them on how to think
about operational improvement, motivating them to sprint towards it, and
leading them through the analysis required to capture it. I left those milk, water
and oil sands plants with many enduring friendships and inspiring operational
victories borne from our journey from ambitious goals to concrete results.

<< READ: What is HBS Looking For? >>

I’ve spent the past two years working in supply chain management at a private
industrial goods supplier. I chose direct management because I wanted to
drive these same inspirational improvements in an operation I owned. My role
was to manage and improve the operation, and through my experience, I
learned the nuts and bolts of the supply chain industry. However, my dream of
innovating supply chain operations pushed me to consider transitioning to an
organization with an ambitious, transformative purpose. In fact, last year I had
a unique opportunity to reflect on what type of impact matters to me. This
opportunity was my first ever trip to [NORTHWEST AFRICAN REGION], the
place of my family’s origin.

On the second day of the trip, I journeyed to [LOCAL NORTHEASTERN


AFRICAN TOWN], a small town nestled next an enormous active volcano that
is surrounded by a wide expanse of rich volcanic soil, which is used to make
wine. This wine is sipped by adventure-seeking tourists relaxing after a long
day on the volcano, and thus the town’s two major industries, wine and
tourism, are sustained. When we arrived at the town, I was shocked to see it
buried by an avalanche of volcanic rock from an eruption [A FEW YEARS
PRIOR]. As our guide lamented on the dreary prospects of the Page 2 of 2
town, I was amazed to see just how important these two industries had been
to its development.

Through this real world example, I was able to clearly visualize the impact
businesses can have on their broader environment, an understanding that had
not been as evident to me while working in the larger, more complex
American economy. For example, I had spent hours walking among the
dilapidated buildings speckling the warehouse district in Cleveland, but only
after my trip did I connect them to the decline of the Midwestern
manufacturing industry. Upon my return, armed with this broader perspective,
I decided my next step would be to attend business school. There I would gain
the technical, operational and leadership skills to make my transition to an
organization whose goal was to drive change in its broader industry and
community, as those wine and tourism companies had done in [LOCAL
NORTHEASTERN AFRICAN TOWN OF FAMILY’S ORIGIN].
So, that is how I arrived in front of you today. My goal is to humbly learn as
much as I can from our section, our professors, and our experiences. I am
excited to get to know you, and will always do my best to support our section
intellectually and athletically (we will be the future section Olympics
champions!).

The given table illustrates the information about main sources for retirement income while the
bar chart details the percentage of people who work in two main sectors, public and private and
unemployment rate in 3 various countries UK, Japan, Thailand. 

Looking from an overall perspective, it is apparent that, public sector is a vital source of income
for seniors, except for Thailand. Meanwhile, a major percentage of adults are employed in
private sectors.

Firstly, in the UK almost a half of elder people (48%) receive retirement income from the
government, and this percentage is equal to 52 % in Japan. On the contrary, in Thailand, people
who are age of retirement, 41% of them receive financial support from their family members.
The following income level is from private pension and investment income, accounting for 23%
and 11% respectively. However, business income is the lowest percentage for Japan and the
UK, whereas in Thailand, it is the second largest (18%) retirement source of income.

As is observed from the bar chart, most were employed in all these countries, and this was
in the private sector. When over half of the total adult population got employed in this
sector, around a quarter depended on public sectors in both Japan and Thailand. In the
UK and Japan, the rate of unemployment stood higher (23%), whereas it was the lowest
in Thailand.

Supply Chain Management careers


Demand for Supply Chain Management graduates is high, and job placement is close to
100 percent. At the W. P. Carey School of Business, our majors are prepared for entry
level positions such as logistics planner, buyer, supply management analyst or
inventory specialist. Career-track progression leads to the vice president level in supply
chain-related areas with firms from around the world and in all sectors of the economy,
public and private.

Within the supply chain, your career choices are limitless. There are positions for those
who enjoy working with other people to negotiate deals, and positions for those who
crave analysis. And there is an even greater need for those who can do both.

Starting salaries generally range from $40,000 to $60,000. Frequent recruiters of


W. P. Carey graduates include:

 Exxon
 Intel
 Honeywell
 Hewlett-Packard
 Tektronix
 Dillards
 KLA Tencor
 Knight Transportation

 Conoco-Phillips
 General Electric
 Motorola
 Boeing
 Applied Materials
 Walmart
 Dell
 General Mills

Jobs in Supply Chain Management


SCM professionals hold a range of job titles and engage in a wide variety of activities,
including process improvements, tactical and strategic capacity planning, quality
management, vendor selection, price negotiation, forecasting, quality management,
strategy development for supply chain integrations following mergers, and developing
and using information systems to track and improve performance. These are just a few
of the job titles in the field:

 Supply chain manager


 Sourcing leader
 Procurement specialist
 Business analyst
 Commodity manager
 Supply chain consultant
 Logistics consultant
 Category manager
 Materials project manager
 Import/export agent

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