Full-Time MBA Student Profile Meet Samantha Steiny, ’18

For Samantha Steiny, that means balancing classwork, a summer internship at a top tech company, and being active in student life on campus. Hear more about the personalized MBA experience she’s had so far at Chicago Booth.

Why did you decide to come to Booth?
SS: Given my background in psychology, Booth has a really good combination of being very data-centric, as well as including the more organizational behavior sides. I wanted to focus on stretching myself and working with more data and becoming more familiar with that side of business, so that I could combine the two and be an effective product marketer.

You interned at Salesforce this summer. What was the recruiting process like for you?
SS: I did some on-campus recruiting with a couple of big tech companies, but most of my recruiting was off-campus. I spent a lot of time networking with second year students to better understand the process and learn from those who also applied to off-campus companies. My approach was to apply to companies where I had a referral. So using the Booth network, using alumni, LinkedIn, however I could find that referral… that was my strategy going in.

How are tech and innovation incorporated into the Booth experience?
SS: I think innovation is a big part of business today, so that bleeds into business school very directly. For instance, for Booth Tech Club, we have many events, both student panels and social events to bring what’s new and cutting edge to the rest of the community. Technology is everything now and making innovative changes is easy to do, but you have to go out of the general norm to do it. People at Booth are really open to that, which is hard to find, I would say.

What is a typical Booth class like?
SS: There isn't really a quintessential Boothie classroom. Every class I've taken has been very different, both the experience and structurally what you do during the three hours. It really depends on the teacher. I like that the faculty have a lot of say over the class organization because you can tell when a professor is interested in what they're teaching and in the structure of their class.

So classes and recruiting must take up a lot of your time. What’s your involvement with student groups?
SS: The student groups at Booth can be what you make of them, and I'm very involved. I really enjoy spending my time facilitating these activities and shaping Booth from the backend. I'm Tech Club co-chair and in GBC, which is the student government group on campus. Both of these groups have given me opportunities to plan events, to work with groups, and to take more ownership of things happening on campus, which has been surprisingly beneficial for me from a leadership perspective.

What has been one of your most unique Booth experiences?
SS: The Winter Formal Dance has a charity auction, so students submit items and professors submit items. Every year, Professor Shapiro offers a dinner and wine night at his apartment in Lincoln Park with his wife, because on the side he works in the wine industry. Me and five of my classmates bid on that and got to go to his apartment and have dinner, which was a really unique experience.

Following your time at Chicago Booth, how do you hope to shape the future?
SS: I want to manage people and I want to be a leader at a company. Since coming to Booth, I’ve found what's more impactful is making really small changes until you can actually transform something. To make a change on the whole world would obviously be great and that is the ideal goal, but on a smaller scale, I want to help people develop and help myself develop at the same time.