Self-Help

"When I do something, I like to see results that are not two miles, two years and ten levels away," says Bertram Wyle, 35, Harvard Business School '59, and since July i assistant to the president of Kalart Manufacturing Co. (audiovisual aids) of Plainville, Conn.

Though big U.S. corporations sent their recruiting teams as usual to Harvard Business School this year, Enterpriser Wyle waved off the big firms' offers. Along with 130 other members of the graduating class, who were impatient for "earlier responsibilities'' and "more interested in starting opportunities than starting salaries," he decided early in the year to organize a class-run hunt for jobs in business--small business. Eager second-year students put up $15 apiece to help pay the expenses of six classmates, whom they dispatched during the Christmas holiday on prospecting tours of California, the Middle West, the Southwest, the New York City area, upper New York State and southern New England.

The scouts, dropping their classmates' dossiers at doors never before darkened by a Harvard Business School man, returned with copious notes and lists of job possibilities that have produced 700 offers, many at salaries 10% to 20% higher than big firms would give. Student Association President William Schulz, 28, a West Pointer who got 50 offers, wound up starting his own small business (Homesmith Inc.--home repairs) in Palo Alto, Calif. "It was a reaction to the Organization Man idea," he says. So far, at least 30 others have taken small-business jobs, and Harvard officials, sensing a trend, are preparing to help new classes expand their own job-hunting programs.

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