George F. Baker at the 1927 dedication of the library at Harvard that bears his name. In 1924, Baker had given $5 million to help build the Harvard Business School campus, becoming one of the first — and one of the greatest — benefactors of the school. Harvard photo
At the 2018 Harvard Business School commencement last month, 915 newly minted MBAs packed the lawn in front of Baker Library to receive their diplomas. Friends and family were on hand to witness the ceremony, the 108th HBS commencement, which included speeches by Dean Nitin Nohria and a series of noteworthy alumni. The sun made it a warm event; the collective achievement of the degree-earners made it a felicitous one.
Not only degrees but special recognitions were announced: 179 garnered second-year honors, while 81 were named graduates “with distinction.” But the cream of the crop, the top 5% of the Class of 2018 — graduates with “high distinction” — were given another level of laurel. They were named Baker Scholars, the highest award for academic achievement given by HBS.
One of those 47 Baker Scholars was Kiernan Schmitt. When the Wallingford, Connecticut native started his MBA journey in 2016, he knew what a Baker Scholar was, but he didn’t know much beyond that — including whether he would be vying for one at the end of two years.
“It’s a tremendous honor,” Schmitt tells Poets&Quants. “I knew that I was potentially in the running for it, but the only information that HBS really gives out about it is that it’s relative to each class — that it’s the top 5% of each class. So it’s actually quite a shifting target. Depending on where your grades fall, you may just make the cut, you may not make the cut depending on the year.”
‘THE SPHINX OF WALL STREET’
Schmitt made the cut, something he learned about a week and a half before commencement. There would be a reception and luncheon, he was told by phone, and he could bring four guests. At the luncheon, Dean Nohria gave a speech welcomed for its “pithiness,” and each Baker Scholar was given a certificate and pin. The entire event was a “speedy affair” lasting no more than an hour-and-a-half, Schmitt says.
Though brief, it was through Nohria’s speech that many in attendance learned about the award’s namesake. Like HBS’ Baker Library, where each year’s HBS commencement is held, the Baker Scholar honor is named for George F. Baker, a major early donor to HBS. Baker was a titan of the banking industry in the latter half of the 19th century and early part of the 20th, known as the “Sphinx of Wall Street,” an original shareholder in the First National Bank of New York — now known to the world as Citibank. By the time Harvard Business School was founded in 1908, Baker had already become a legend; in the ensuing decade-and-a-half, his esteem only grew, even if it was confined to the world of banking and finance.
“Dean Nohria described the award by saying that Baker, the donor himself, had been approached early on in the history of people trying to establish Harvard Business School, and he had been asked for a certain amount of money and gave way more than he had been asked,” Schmitt recalls. “And that’s were the library naming and the award came from afterward.”
‘A NEW START TO BETTER BUSINESS STANDARDS’
George Fisher Baker. Harvard photo
George F. Baker was not a Harvard man — in fact, he never graduated college. (His son, George Baker Jr., graduated Harvard College in 1899.) So how did he leave such a lasting imprint on the school, such that nearly a century later, it still remembers him in honoring its most academically successful MBAs?
Harvard’s reticence regarding the Baker Scholar award is a reflection, however incidental, of the man for whom it is named. Even as he became one of the nation’s most successful financiers and philanthropists, Baker jealously protected his near-anonymity, refusing all requests for interviews and eschewing most public engagements. But in 1924, when he was in his mid-80s, Baker finally stepped into the limelight with an act of unexpected and unparalleled generosity.
As recounted in Sheriden A. Logan’s 1981 biography “George F. Baker and His Bank, 1840 to 1955” — copies of which are given annually to each Baker Scholar — Baker was approached by Bishop William Lawrence, chair of the Harvard Fellows, about giving a “pace-setting” gift for the $5 million campaign then underway to erect the first Harvard Business School buildings. Lawrence asked Baker for $1 million; Baker countered, offering to give the entire $5 million. The aging tycoon reasoned that “my life has been given to business, and I should like to found the first Graduate School to give a new start to better business standards.”
Baker continued: “It may not be the right kind of pride, but I should like to feel that my descendants could point to the Harvard Graduate School of Business, the first of the them, and know that I had done it.” A year later, Baker gave HBS another $1 million.
A MEMORIAL TO THE SCHOOL’S ‘FIRST MAJOR BENEFACTOR’
A few years after that in 1927, Baker, already in his late 80s, would be photographed attending the dedication of the library that still bears his name. He would not live long enough to see the academic honor that also memorializes him. Baker died in 1931 at the age of 91.
Eight years after his death, HBS bestowed a final honor on Baker. Up to that point the school’s honorary group had been comprised of Harvard Business Review editors, but in October 1939, acting on a recommendation from the dean, the faculty formed the Baker Scholars. According to information from a 1950-51 school catalogue, the move was made in recognition of “a distinct need for some type of honorary scholarship for the students” — and with a belief that those with “the highest scholastic achievement in the School should bear the name of the School’s first major benefactor.”
Over the years, some Baker Scholars have gone on to high achievement—and also embarrassing failure. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon was a Baker Scholar and so was Presidential candidate Mitt Romney. On the other hand, Rajat Gupta, who won the accolade in 1973 and went on to serve three consecutive terms as managing director of McKinsey & Co., had been convicted of securities fraud in 2012 and was sentenced to two years in prison and required to pay a $5 million fine.
What separates the scholars from everyone else in a Harvard MBA class? Tim Johnson, who graduated from HBS in 1985, notes that he might have spent three hours working one of the school’s famous case studies. “A Baker Scholar might spend three hours on a case also,” he writes on Quora. “But their analysis will be more complete, more big picture, and more nuanced.”
Construction of Baker Library began in 1925; the library was dedicated in 1927. Years later, in 1939, HBS would begin calling the top students in each graduating class “Baker Scholars.” Harvard photo
Twenty of the 22 women Baker Scholars, including Anca Haraga, back row, fourth from left, and Laura Carpenter, front row, far left. The 2018 group of Baker Scholars had the largest-ever proportion of women, about 47% of the total. Sara Gallegos photo
A CHANCE TO MEET GEORGE BAKER’S DESCENDANT
These days, not much is said about Baker during the two years of the MBA program, Kiernan Schmitt tells P&Q. But as they leave, Baker Scholars depart with George Baker’s name forever attached to theirs, and his words in their hands. Wrapped around the copy of Baker’s biography that each receives was an embossed band emblazoned with a quote: “To conduct themselves as to gain the respect of their fellows and to keep up their standards of integrity,” Baker once said, “thereby they may gain for themselves the greatest happiness that life can bestow.”
The 2018 group of HBS Baker Scholars numbered 47 students, roughly the same size as the 2017 group (48) and the 2016 group (45) — which, of course, is simply a reflection of the size of the MBA graduating class. But in one major respect, 2018’s batch of Baker Scholars was extraordinary: It contained the most-ever women, 22, or about 47%. To put that number in perspective, nine years ago, in the Class of 2009, only 11% of the school’s Baker Scholars were female, though women accounted for 36% of that class (see Why Men Outperform Women At HBS). In fact, for the first 24 years that HBS handed out the honor, there were no women at all among the school’s graduating MBAs.
One of this year’s winning women was Anca Haraga, a London School of Economics grad who worked as a project manager for a London real estate development, construction, and property management firm before coming HBS in 2016. Haraga, like the others, learned about a week before graduation that she had been named a Baker Scholar. “The Baker Scholars and students who finished in the top 10% (graduating with distinction) were named on boards displayed around campus,” she tells Poets&Quants.
‘I NEVER THOUGHT THAT I WOULD BE ONE WHEN I STARTED MY JOURNEY AT HBS’
Haraga says she’ll remember the reception and luncheon, where she met George F. Baker’s great-grandson, George Baker IV. “There was a special award ceremony and lunch for us and our families the day before graduation. At this event, we got a chance to learn more about George Baker, the significance of this achievement, and meet George Baker IV,” she says. “We also received certificates and an engraved pendant as part of the ceremony.”
Haraga knew about the Baker Scholar award from before she started her MBA, but “I never thought that I would be one when I started my journey at HBS,” she says. “I really enjoy learning and solving problems and wanted to take in as much as possible during my time at HBS, which was my main goal. I realized I might become a Baker Scholar if I kept up the good work after the first-year grades came in, but I did not specifically tailor my second year experience to achieve this objective.” Haraga has returned to London to work in management consulting.
Courtesy Anca Haraga
HIGHER PERCENTAGE OF BAKER SCHOLARS THAN WOMEN IN MBA PROGRAM
That 47% of 2018 Baker Scholars were women is especially notable given that women made up a smaller percentage — about 42% — of the entire MBA Class of 2018. It’s a point of pride for Laura Carpenter, another of the 2018 Baker Scholars, who was a Deloitte strategy and operations consultant before embarking on her MBA journey and who plans to return to Deloitte in early 2019. Carpenter recalls that early in her first year, the head of the first-year curriculum spoke to each section and explained the process for obtaining academic honors. “Each course (finance, operations, etc.) is graded on a curve and students receive 1’s (top 15% – 20% of students), 2’s (next 70% – 75% of students), or 3’s (lowest 10% of students),” she tells P&Q by email. “To qualify as a Baker Scholar this year, a student had to receive over 69% Net Category 1 grades. (‘Net Category 1’ means that any Category 3 grades cancel out an equal number of Category 1 grades.)”
Like most MBA students at HBS (or any school), Carpenter aimed to do well in her studies. She was motivated more by a desire to get the most out of the case method “rather than a desire to get top honors,” but because grades at HBS are based on class participation and end-of-course exams, “It was easy for me to enthusiastically participate in case discussions because I found the classroom environment at HBS to be engaging and exciting.”
Carpenter, who attended Georgia Tech as an undergraduate Stamps Leadership Scholar, says she didn’t bury her nose in the books for the duration of her MBA. “I was not willing to give up other aspects of the MBA experience (social events, my startup, etc.) just to receive top grades in a class,” she says. “I wanted a well-rounded experience. I’d say I spent an average amount of time preparing for each case discussion. Most of my time outside of class was spent launching my digital media startup, Abridge News.” But, she adds, “I got a lot of support from HBS for my entrepreneurial journey, especially from the HBS Rock Center for Entrepreneurship and the Harvard Innovation Labs.”
‘I GOT TO HEAR THAT MY DAD WAS TRULY PROUD OF ME AND I FELT PROUD OF MYSELF’
What about the long-term impact of getting the honor? It’s certainly one of those proud, nice-to-have moments but may not make that big a difference to a winner over the years. “For what it’s worth, I can tell you that while it’s nice on occasion to recall that I was a Baker Scholar, that I scored enough “Category I’s” to be in the top 5%, I certainly don’t get to, nor would I ever, claim that I was smarter than my peers,” writes Steve Murch, named a Baker Scholar in 1991, on Quora. “It’s douchebaggy-enough to even mention (especially without being asked) that I attended HBS, let alone explain the Baker Scholar part to the person-who-honestly-couldn’t-care-less-what-that-is. The universe of people who really care about this beyond you is infinitesimally small.
“Sure, the graduation handshake from the Dean was firm, and the coffee-table-book was nice, and I got to hear that my dad was truly proud of me and I felt proud myself of the work that was in the rear-view mirror… but it’s honestly had zero impact on my life from either a monetary or recognition standpoint.”
The 2018 Baker Scholars luncheon. Courtesy Anca Haraga
DON’T MISS MEET HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL’S MBA CLASS OF 2019 and HARVARD KILLS AN MBA ADMISSIONS ROUND
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