DELAYED START? RECESSION IMPACT ON EDUCATION

By M h Ahssan & Swati Reddy

WITH THE FINANCIAL CRUNCH HITTING EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES HARD,AN INCREASING NUMBER OF YOUNG GRADUATES ARE FLOCKING TOWARDS BSCHOOLS TO BIDE THEIR TIME AND GET THE BEST OPPORTUNITIES ONCE THE GLOBAL ECONOMY RECOVERS. HOWEVER, EXPERTS STILL MAINTAIN THAT AN MBA IS BEST DONE AFTER GAINING A FEW YEARS OF WORK EXPERIENCE.

Anumber of internationally well-known Bschools are increasingly admitting students with fewer years of work experience and even fresh graduates to their MBA programmes. Young students these days too, want to pursue their MBAs earlier on, so as to accelerate their career advancement. However, the key question here is: which is the right time to enroll for an MBA abroad? Is it wise to invest huge sums of money in an international education when the employment scenario is uncertain or is it wiser to gain a few years of work experience and then pursue an MBA?

AN INDIVIDUAL CHOICE
Says Rosemaria Martinelli, Associate Dean for Student Recruitment and Admissions at the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business, “The right time to pursue an MBA may vary according to a person’s characteristics and development. Having said that, it’s extremely important for students to gain some years of full-time work experience, that may be as little as a year and a half or as long as 14 years, so as to test drive their skills. But the value proposition of a full-time MBA is to capitalise enough work experience not only so that you know where you’re headed but also so that you can make maximum contribution to the classroom and select the right courses and can effectively navigate through the flexible curriculum.” A few years of work experience not only makes you more focused but also helps you to make the best of the classroom atmosphere.

Dustin Cornwell, Director of Admissions and Recruiting, Kellstadt Graduate School of Business, De-Paul University, corroborates, “People pursue an MBA to gain professional advancement, make more money and achieve greater heights of success. A person who waits to pursue his/ her management studies after gaining say five years of work experience, can expect to benefit more not only in terms of being offered a higher salary packet but also in terms of being offered more opportunities, as compared to someone who is a fresh graduate.

A few years of work experience can prove to be advantageous in terms of sharpening one’s focus, exposing one to his/ her likes and dislikes and getting a clearer picture of one’s future goal, that can eventually help one maximise his/ her classroom experience. Yet, some fresh graduates do make it to some coveted Bschools because their reasons for pursuing an MBA at that particular point in time are clear. They have a clear picture of their career goals in mind and obviously gain a right to admission.”

TALENT TRIUMPHS
Freshers do not only have to convince the admissions authority of their decision but also need to have displayed exceptional adcademic as well as leadership skills during their college days in order to make it to a good Bschool. Confirms, Tim Westerbeck, Managing Director and Principal at Lipman Hearne and a foremost authority in the field of higher education, “Unlike earlier, a number of elite Bschools do accept a certain per cent of students with less work experience to their programmes now. But these students are academically brilliant.”

Martinelli agrees that a typical applicant who is admitted straight after his/ her undergraduate studies will be very different from most applicants. She elaborates, “He/ she will have been enormously successful in his/ her academic endeavours, be it in terms of GPA, GMAT and TOEFL scores, or in terms of displaying leadership qualities and being closely involved with clubs or student government sororities. They will have had undertaken significant internships and will demonstrate high intellectual curiosity much beyond their years. They will also be direct and clear about ‘why an MBA now’ versus the ‘future’.”

PARTING SHOT
Says Martinelli, “One of the most crucial prerequisites of pursuing an MBA is to have a strong awareness of yourself, of who you really are, and what your future plans are. You also need to know for sure as to why you wish to pursue an MBA at a particular time and not later? However, all this is hard to do at 22.” This does not mean that pursuing an MBA early on does not have any advantages. Says Sameer Tejani, who attended the MBA programme at Fisher Business School, Ohio State University, after working for a year and a half with a boutique consultancy in Mumbai, “As a fresh graduate you get used to the classroom setting more easily than those who have worked for a long period of time. Academicallyspeaking too, some of the content, especially analysis or math related, may be similar to the content you studied at your undergraduate degree.”

But when other students with longer years of work experience talk about real life instances, where the concepts being discussed are applicable, fresh graduates may not have that much to offer. So, try and gain some experience before taking the plunge!