Education
What's it like growing a startup during business school? [Show summary] Stephen Cognetta had already co-founded his tech startup, Exponent, by the time he entered the Stanford GSB class of 2020. Today, he shares how his MBA experience shaped his approach to growing Exponent and what the business is doing to help job applicants land their next tech position. Combining a Stanford MBA with a tech startup career [Show notes] Are you thinking you'd like your next job to be in software engineering, product management, data analysis, or a host of other high-tech fields? Interested in learning about the Stanford MBA experience? This Admissions Straight Talk episode is going to discuss both how Exponent can help you land that next high-tech job, as well as how Stanford helped our guest run his startup, Exponent. Stephen Cognetta earned his bachelor's at Princeton in computer science before taking a position at Google in product management, where he did work on Google search features and then Android. In 2017, he founded Exponent and joined the Stanford MBA class of 2020 a little while later. Let's hear about his business, his MBA experience, and where he's headed. Can you tell us a little bit about your background, where you grew up, and what you like to do for fun (when you can leave your house)? [2:07] I grew up in the Bay Area; my life always keeps pulling me back here, to the San Francisco Bay Area. I worked at Google, as you mentioned, for a couple of years. Then when I was founding Exponent, I took a big cross-country road trip where I went to 44 different states over a year and a half. I was doing a little bit of the digital nomad life, sort of starting a company, traveling, trying to explore and get out of the Bay Area. But of course, it took me back. My life took me back there, and I came back to Stanford for a great opportunity. So I'm back in the Bay Area. Some things I like to do for fun: Obviously, I love road trips, exploring and seeing things. I'm a huge fan of puzzles and riddles and things like that. I go crazy for twisting plots of TV shows and movies and stuff like that, which is probably what got me to be a computer science major in the first place. What was the most interesting place you visited when you took that 44-state road trip? [3:11] I really loved the natural beauty of West Virginia. It was just super beautiful. I was staying in a town called Lewisburg, and it was near a bunch of natural beauty. I also felt like there was a lot of an appreciation for the land there that felt really special. It was on my list because it was one of those places that I didn't know much about or had much of an expectation about, but I was just blown away by the forest and the natural beauty and all the local types of flowers and plants that were there in the region. I think we in California have this idea that we're the most beautiful place in the US. California is certainly beautiful, but there's just so much beauty in other parts of the US also that I was not exposed to or knew about. Why did you decide you wanted an MBA? [4:58] My story is actually a little different. I applied to a deferred admin program. Actually, while I was at Princeton, I applied to get into Stanford. The deferred admit program, for those that don't know, is where you get admitted, and then you can choose to go to the MBA school two to four years after your graduation date from undergrad. At the time, I knew I really valued higher education. I knew that there would be a path for me where I could potentially get an MBA and it was an option that I thought was really helpful, especially as a STEM major, since I was majoring in computer science. And I thought that it would really balance out my skillset of having both the technical background and then also, the business acumen to help me succeed in that entrepreneurial world that I was hoping to get into. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgzr3D1xTVM