A worn out topic? Probably. However, it’s an ever growing topic at the forefront of my mind daily. I’m going back to school to complete my Master of Business Administration (MBA) this fall, and in the wake of the wait to begin, I find myself increasingly researching forums, articles and discussions of the overall return on my investment once I finish. I have been searching for confirmation of my decision to make sure it will make me the most money and the most successful.
Now, since I'm about to start and not finished and back in the work force, I can’t speak objectively on the topic of how worthwhile it is, but I can speak on why someone might want to do it and what I know I will get from it.
While doing my stint in retail banking I brought the topic up with one of my colleagues in business banking. At the time, I was weighing my options between certifications, designations, and degrees that I might go for.
To be honest, the most pressing reason that originally sparked my thoughts on the topic of additional education after my undergraduate degree in finance, was a feeling of a theoretical glass ceiling that was ever closing in to, what I felt to be, a regimented pathway along a career I was not interested in pursuing. Additionally, my degree was from a school that I loved, but even 30 kilometers away in the big city of Vancouver, Canada, and I was sick of continually explaining which one it was. I knew I needed to make a change professionally and I’ll admit, I still don’t know exactly what I want to be when I grow up, but I want to be passionate about it or its cause if I am to look at it long term to any degree, but I digress.
My colleague said one line to me that resonated with me more than all of the internet threads I filtered through. He said to me:
Whatever you do, whether an MBA or anything, the reasoning behind it needs to be for your own personal achievement and not for the status, or paycheck it brings”.
Maybe to you it’s a given, or maybe not. But at that moment it almost gave me a small sense of clarity. Almost immediately it allowed some choices to just melt away and it gave me some perspective of who I wanted to be as a person, and not as an employee.
I chose the MBA, I didn't let a title choose me. Again, a seemingly menial statement, but one I am proud of. I understand that I haven’t even begun the program but at the very least, I know this choice was mine and it helps keep me accountable. I chose it for the leadership aspect, but also for the variety of learning. The saying “a jack of all trades but a master of none” comes to mind, where mastering something probably gets you paid, but knowing a little about a lot is more fun in my own opinion.
I know many of you will be putting pieces together and notice that I am doing an MBA after completing an undergraduate degree in business also. Well, I will say this, I am passionate about commerce. Many people take business courses or degrees in order to be versatile in the marketplace and have skills in multiple facets of business. At first this was the definition of myself too. I came fresh out of an unsuccessful go at civil engineering, only to find that I really do have a love for business; any business. It could be energy, medical, services, or widgets. The strategy of building a business internally or as an entrepreneur entices me. So yes, I will continue to do what I love instead of diversifying because I don’t want to hedge on my life.
I also don’t want to come off as an MBA advocate. For many people it isn't even close to the best option. Everyone has their own path. And maybe it won’t financially benefit me as much as the CFA or the CPA or CIM or any of the other million-and-one acronyms behind your name, but what it will do is fulfill my personal satisfaction. I know in my mind, I want to get the most out of this program. I want to let this be my “professional spirit journey” per say. For this, I think that I’ll be successful. I don’t just want an education, I want an experience. I don’t want a series of modules to complete, I want to meet other aspiring people daily, I want to get involved, I want to be challenged in multiple topics.
Maybe this is a “feel-good article” but my suggestion is if you are making that big choice to go back and get more education, to look up from your daily life and see where you are personally in addition to professionally. Stop and ask yourself are you happy where you are, and are you still passionate about the goals you have set for your life or do you want a change? I could sit here and ramble off figures and statistics on MBA post grads, and overall earnings comparisons of different higher education designations and from which schools. But I think in many cases there may be a disconnect among people of what they want to achieve in their lives instead of what their work wants. It took one simple line from a co-worker to instill a new set of educational values in my choices. I can only hope that this is my way of paying it forward to even one other person.
So no matter your path, science, medicine, community, politics, or non-profit, just take that simple moment to stop. To take that moment of contemplation, in your own goal set of educational pursuits to determine who you want to be. From a business perspective, you are your own brand in whatever career you pursue and how you build that brand should be a representation of you the person, not you the employee.
Good luck in your pursuit!
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