Quite often, I get a call from an MBA aspirant who wants to make a change from their current job. And that’s the sole reason they want to invest tens of lakhs into a year or two of “business education” — so that they can “transition” to a more “strategy-oriented”, “high-impact” role in a fad-of-the-moment domain. The words in quotes are the bread and butter of the ‘Why MBA?’ section of any admissions essay I come across.
Having been through the post-MBA grind for the last 5 years, I consider myself to have a more mature, if not jaded, view of post-MBA jobs and post-MBA life. Here are the 5 things nobody tells you when you complete an MBA program:
Job titles and descriptions can deceive
Don’t be fooled by the titles “consultant”, “product manager”, “program manager” or “CEO’s Office”. Companies want to be able to use you for whatever need they have, not just what you think you’re suited to do, or even what you were hired to do in the first place!
An MBA is the Swiss Knife of the middle-to-upper management world. You’ll be expected to perform roles that you might have no interest in. As a consultant in 2019, I beautified presentation decks without ever talking to a client myself. As a Product Marketing Manager today, I design business cards and brochures. There’s no difference between the way I was deployed before and the way I am now. The companies I’ve worked for have the same needs and limitations. But there is a massive difference in my attitude. Today, I understand that there’s no Arjun-shaped job waiting to be claimed after trying out seven jobs.
Sometimes, you just have to thrive where you’re planted.
Your degree doesn’t make you a better employee
An MBA isn’t going to make you any better suited to set realistic business goals, please your bosses, handle stakeholders, negotiate effectively or navigate workplace politics. All those skills are learnt by actually being on the job. Paradoxically, an MBA takes you out of “real life” and deprives you of a year of practical experience. You get to study new subjects, meet new people, develop new ways of thinking and a brand-new educational qualification. But it doesn’t make you better at actually building a career day-by-day, brick-by-brick.
An MBA won’t transform you suddenly into a high-performing employee that consistently meets and exceeds targets.
You’re probably underprepared for your first role
As an engineer, the only tools I used for the first three years of my career were engineering design software and Outlook. My first day as a consultant was a rude shock when I was expected to come up with an excel model for resource planning and staffing. I didn’t understand excel, let alone the other two words. I was dressed down, quite unfairly, by the partner on the project for giving him an output he didn’t expect from an analyst, let alone a Deloitte consultant.
You’re probably wondering why I didn’t prepare in advance if I knew I’d need data analytics skills. I did prepare. But like learning a language, you either use a skill you learn, or you lose it.
So fully expect to be embarassed and underperform in your first year(s).
You will probably hate your first job
There’s no other way to put this. Nobody has patience or empathy for your learning curve, least of all your reporting managers. People need work done. You can enable them at best and get in their way at worst. If its the latter, you’re going to hate every waking minute behind the desk and feel like a failure. You might even feel more like a loser in your high-prestige, high-paying MBA job than you ever did before it. I know I did.
Agonizing self-doubt and soul-searching are the unfortunate outcomes of any life change; you WILL learn to embrace it one day.
You will end up feeling left behind your peers
Everyone’s equal in an MBA classroom. We are {insert college name}-ians.
Then your roomie walks out of placements with a Product Management job at 3x your pay. The inherent inequity of life hits you like a stack of bricks after a year feeling like you belonged with your social circle. For the first few years after the MBA, every LinkedIn post, promotion, award and achievement of your friends is going to make you feel like you’re falling behind someone. How could both of you have studied in the same college but they can afford three trips to Bali every quarter while you struggle to pay your EMI?
Well its because you’re both very different people in completely different jobs, skills and circumstances. And the one common factor of a degree isn’t going to level the playing field. Thankfully, as time passes, you learn not to peg your identity to your batchmates and you start to focus on what you would like to be.
The day you stop comparing is the day you start working on actually getting to a better place.
I am a product marketer and an alum of the Indian School of Business. I provide admissions consulting services and guidance to MBA aspirants. I write on LinkedIn and Medium about life, education, career development and anything else that interests 20+ year-olds taking their first steps to living independently.
