New York City and Speakers

Dear Members,

We hope your experience at the National Black MBA Conference was successful and that you made great connections.

We need speakers for our next sessions. This is a great opportunity for you to moderate the call and sharpen your communication and leadership skills. Please let us know as soon as possible if you have a potential speaker that you would like us to meet.

Many of our members schools will be visiting New York City and we would like to coordinate a networking dinner with the Consortium Alums on Wall Street. Please write to us and let us know when you will be visting the city and what your areas of interest are so that we can plan accordingly.

Lastly, we are excited that our group will be featured in an article in the Consortium's IN Magazine, so keep your eyes open.

Our Start

We are Consortium Fellows of the class of 2010 and founders of The Consortium Finance and Bankers Group (CFBG). The CFBG is an organization comprised of MBA students from various schools who are interested in pursuing careers in Finance. José Calunga is a first-year MBA student at the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University and Ryan Brown is a first-year MBA student at the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas. We are concentrating in Finance and are interested in pursuing careers in Investment Banking.

We met during the 2008 Consortium Orientation Program (OP) held in Dallas, Texas. During the OP, we experienced the powerful network of people we met and wished to keep the momentum going. We first discussed ways to ensure that all of us who were interested in Finance remain in touch. To start, we emailed all of the students regarding the CFBG and created a page on facebook so others could join the group. Then, we created a free-conference call account so we could host our presentations.

We founded the CFBG with the intention of providing members with an opportunity to interact with one another and learn from second-year students from other Consortium schools and from Consortium Alumni working in Finance. This format benefits both the students and the professionals in the field. In fact, there are many benefits to being a member of the CFBG. First, members foster and develop an active and far-reaching network. The CFBG brings together a group of individuals with a common interest in Finance, but the organization strongly values the unique experiences of its members—including previous work experience, MBA curriculum, and recruiting information.

The CFBG offers members the opportunity to sharpen their leadership skills. For example, during each meeting, which is facilitated by a conference call, the CFBG invites a second-year Consortium Fellow or Alum to impart upon the group several tools to pursuing careers in Finance successfully. Each member is expected to bring a guest who works in the member's chosen field of Finance to speak to the group. That same member leads and moderates that conference call.

The CFBG also offers members the opportunity to be a part of an exciting network that albeit new has the potential to grow. In addition, the CFBG leverages the diversity of schools represented in the group with respect to curricula and recruiting process. For example, if Company XYZ recruits for Corporate Finance positions at McCombs and not at Kelley, then CFBG members from McCombs will share a summary of XYZ’s on-campus presentation with all other members. We believe that this form of support is critical to the success of the graduating class of 2010, particularly because of the hypercompetitive job market we are in.

We believe that guest speakers benefit in that they expand their own network, and play a role in transforming the next generation of business leaders by sharing lessons that they have learned throughout their careers. For example, we invited Mr. Camilo Sandoval, a Consortium Fellow at Kelley, to talk about his experience in Investment Banking. Mr. Brian Woods, an MBA student at McCombs was the speaker on the second call, which was about Corporate Finance. In both calls, members gained insights on the questions to expect and on how to prepare for and give analytical answers during finance interviews. Undoubtedly, in terms of networking and interviewing, CFBG members had a noted competitive advantage over many non-members at the National Black MBA career fair held in D.C.

The CFBG has 25-30 members and the only prerequisites to membership are commitment and contribution. Members show commitment by suggesting ideas for improving the group and by attending the conference calls. During speaker sessions, members contribute by asking intelligent questions and stimulating meaningful conversations. These prerequisites allow us to provide all members with an enriching platform for success in their career path.

For future meetings, we scheduled further discussions on career options, business communication and etiquette, interviewing techniques, and negotiation skills to name a few. We look forward to securing speakers like Mr. Kenneth Chenault, the Chairman and CEO of American Express and Mr. Antonio M. Perez, the CEO of Kodak, to inspire us to dream big about our careers. Our vision is to become a conduit for top-performing corporations to tap into the pool of talented individuals that we attract. We invite all students interested in Finance and professionals in the Finance field to join us in our efforts to change the face of Wall Street. Interested individuals should email us at CFBG.INFO@GMAIL.COM for further information on how to become a part of the CFBG.

Conference Call 3 Recordings.

Missed last call? Click on the link below to hear Ms. Chakana Fowler speak about how to successfully secure a Finance Job in this economy.

http://67.55.209.228/fcc/cgi-bin/listen.pl?type=rp&id=NzEyNDMyMTYyMDoyMjM2ODg=