How to leverage an HBS education: The story of LeverEdge [Show Summary]

Do you want to save money on your student loans? Interested in earning an MBA with entrepreneurship as your goal? Considering Harvard Business School as the place to earn that degree? Pull up a chair, or at least plug in your ear buds. Learn how two current Harvard Business School MBA students got into HBS and founded a company that can save you money on your student loans.

HBS students talk about business school and their exciting new company, LeverEdge [Show Notes]

We have two guests today and a lot of ground to cover. So I’m going to give them very brief intros and leave more time for the interview. My guests today are Chris Abkarians and Nikhil Agarwal, both members of the Harvard Business School Class of 2020 and co-founders of LeverEdge, which can help you reduce your student borrowing costs. And that’s true whether you are applying to law, medical, or business schools.

Nikhil earned his Bachelors of Science in Aerospace Engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2012 and worked for Boeing for six years before making the move to Boston in 2018. Chris earned his BA in Political Science and Public Policy from Duke in 2012 and then started his career at L.E.K. Consulting, where he worked for approximately three years before joining Netflix. He then worked for Netflix in Content Strategy & Analysis for another three years. Then he too made the move to Boston to begin his studies at HBS.

With that as background, let’s hear about their MBA experience at Harvard, the founding of LeverEdge, and the savings it can provide you.

Can you tell us a little about your background? Where you grew up? [2:55]

Chris: I was born and raised in Los Angeles in a large family. I am the biggest Lakers fan you could meet. I followed my love of basketball to Duke where there was no chance I could ever play for the team, but whenever I am not working I am always trying to catch a game or play if I have the chance.

Nikhil: I grew up and lived in India for my first 18 years. Then I moved to Urbana-Champaign where I was expecting skyscrapers but instead found cornfields. After graduation I went to work at Boeing in product development (and am particularly excited about the 777X coming out next year that I worked on), and then made my way to HBS.

What was hardest part for you in the MBA application process? How did you handle that element? [4:43]

Nikhil: For me it was wondering if I was even good enough to apply to HBS or the kind of person that could get in. It took a number of discussions with friends telling me that I was living in this bubble where I was surrounded by people like me doing cool things. The reality is there are very few people in the world who get to make airplanes, which gave me some confidence to get the ball rolling.

Chris: Figuring out how to weave a narrative that made sense, through all sections of the application. I went to Duke, I worked on political campaigns, then did consulting, then had a media career at Netflix. Sometimes you sit back and realize how difficult it can be to explain why you did what you did, and