Mihnea Moldoveanu is a big name in Integrative thinking @ Rotman. He just published an article in Business Week that might be of interest to many of you. Excerpts:
The MBA is a much-needed selection machine which comes on top of the selection machines called high school, college, and a two- or three-year work assignment. Like all selection machines, the MBA works best because it is based on a clearly defined selection criterion, which is twofold. It selects for general intelligence and conscientiousness, not for lateral or divergent thinking, moral development, or epistemological sophistication, as we do yet know how to measure these.
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So the critics are right, the MBA is in crisis—because it selects for and cultivates traits and skills that are increasingly vacuous and superfluous. The markets are right in that the dominance-hierarchies and markets of today need one more selection engine. Out of this tension arises the opportunity for designing the thinker of the future. Let the design work begin.
Have you read this?
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/04/nobs_the_end_of.html
Some truth to that but certainly it still cuts a lot of what you gain in the MBA short (from my experience). Few random thoughts:
1. The curriculum is perhaps “getting old” but there are a lot of refreshers in there (IT for example). It’s also very useful stuff–I certainly used a lot of what I learned at RIM. In addition, it’s not even funny how many times I’ve seen people try to use something like 5-forces analysis (after reading a HBR paper etc.) and getting no where because they haven’t gone through the rigors applying this tool to many industries to really learn how to use it. (Almost) Nothing in the MBA program is a plug-and-chug equation. They are all heuristics or tools that you can use but only if you spend the time to learn/experience how.
2. There aren’t a lot of people sitting in Banking jobs already looking to make the leap up the ladder at Rotman. In actuality I found there were a lot of people with a very non-business background trying to mash their past with the MBA. It gives you a lot of people to learn from from varying backgrounds.
3. I don’t like the statement “the best people aren’t prepared to leave their life behind for two years” mainly because it’s a personal attack against people like me (IMO). Allow me to provide a counter point: People are different and Seth’s dfn of the “best” is different that others may provide. I think he seems to tie “best” to entrepreneurial or risk loving (from the article it seems fair to say that). You can take the route of “go-go-go” and just work hard until you (hopefully) make the breakthrough and move up the ladder, however, the probability of this can be quite low. Then there are others who are perhaps more risk adverse who, with the mba, are largely guaranteed to double their salary in 2 years and have no future limits on how high they can climb (some organizations require an MBA for director level or higher). In addition, taking the MBA provides a lot of freedom to move jobs and companies. Two different types of people with different risk-reward tolerances and assessments. Just because you think the cost of the MBA is worth mitigating the risk to gain the reward, doesn’t make you any less of “the best.”
4. I found the entire experience has changed the way I look at problems. My mindset has changed. What I consider important has changed. How I interact with others with differing opinions is changed. Changes like these can’t be accomplished in a short time or in sporadic burst but must come through breathing in experiences every day that will eventually shape natural behavior. I think it was impossible to get these experiences while coding 8-hours a day in a cube in the back corner. I’d have to be “risk loving” to do a whole lot more with my background so the MBA presented a great opportunity to jump ahead and learn.
I think Rotman realized these criticisms a while ago and have worked on adding new and useful classes to the program. I still see these criticisms as being a bit extreme though. From my (insider and perhaps drinking the kool-aid) view, there is still a lot of value in the MBA but not all graduates are equal. I can say the same for my Engineering degree–and probably any degree out there.