from bench to board

There's a lot of debate about the value and nature of an MBA program. Skepticism about initial investments and ROI is certainly warranted on a broad scale, but I'm still in the camp that firmly agrees with the assertion that the benefits of an MBA often outweigh the risks or negatives.

Unfortunately, for potential students who are asking themselves questions about this topic, making the decision of whether an MBA is worth the investment is only the first hurdle.

There was a post in Forbes that asserted the MBA is a waste of time (OK, I can't find it anymore since this post was written a few weeks ago). Sure, I can agree with some of its points. However, there was one that I strongly disagreed with. It said that MBAs were trained to think big picture and this hampered their executional skills. This is bogus.

A company will never pay big bucks to hire MBA talent because they can execute at the entry or middle management level. A company pays for MBA talent to fill future leadership roles – and for that, big picture, strategic thinking is a must. In fact, it’s important to always have this big picture in mind even early on, as without it, you wouldn’t understand how your work is impactful.

Every leading MBA is talking about its entrepreneurship initiatives right now. It’s a new area of post-MBA opportunity as you start seeing more and more MBAs start companies themselves or join companies that are starting to scale after graduation. I’ve been involved in startups in both years during my MBA at Duke Fuqua, but that’s not what I’m talking about when I mean leaders are entrepreneurial.

I’ll start off with a quote from another blog post I’ve written: “not all great communicators are great leaders, but all great leaders are great communicators.” Being able to clearly articulate what’s on your mind is necessary for – in the most simple of words – getting people to agree to do things. But how does the Duke MBA prepare its future leaders for communication in the business world, and what is it looking for in its applicants? 

A Duke MBA alum – this is a new title that is going to take some time getting used to. I’m happy to be finally back in the workforce and it’s been interesting seeing how the Duke MBA has changed my approach to things. With the MBA application season starting up soon – Fuqua’s early admission round interviews should be starting – I wanted to get back to blogging and supporting the MBA applicant community.