Managing great MBA expectations
MBA recruiters are very conscious of the need to deliver the results their students expect. It's been a major theme of discussion at every international MBA Career Services conference Maria Sophocleous has attended -and she's been to all of them for the past decade.
"If you look at tuition rates, they were around $6,000 in the early 1990s because it was government-funded, but it has been privatized since," says Ms. Sophocleous, director of MBA recruiting and admissions at the Richard Ivey School of Business.
"So as the tuition escalates, so do student expectations in terms of what the school can deliver in support. Schools around the world are consistently struggling with how to bring in the best students but not over-promise them a fantastic career will be given to them."
The reality is that while an MBA in Canada today costs anywhere between some $30,000 and $80,000, it doesn't guarantee a career or even just a job.
"The students who think they're going to get a job just because they have an MBA, think they're a customer of the school," says Ms. Sophocleous.
"But what they really are is a product of the school. If you're a customer, the message is we're going to make you successful, whereas if we say you're a product, we're saying we're going to help you be successful and work in partnership with you and we're going to do this together."
Moreover, in these shifting times of an increasingly complex and competitive global business landscape, it takes a lot more than a degree or even the skills and knowledge students can acquire from their academic studies to achieve a successful career.
"An MBA is not a ticket," says Marie-José Beaudin, executive director of career services at McGill University's Desautels Faculty of Management.
"Ultimately, corporations are not only looking for the brightest, they're also looking for well-rounded individuals who understand their value proposition and what it is they can bring to the corporation that's real and concrete.
"Also extremely relevant to corporations is emotional intelligence. You can be the best and the brightest, the most analytical, but if you don't have emotional intelligence, you are not going to be able to move along in your career."
As a result, around the world, business schools are responding to student expectations by providing them with a stronger component of career preparation in the curriculum, says Ms. Beaudin. MBA students at Ivey, for example, take five mandatory career management classes with Ms. Sophocleous.
"We also have three days in Toronto; that's the mandatory part. On top of that, we have the professional staff members who are aligned with the different industries and the students are expected to pick a counsellor to work with."
At Desautels, MBA students are required to take some 50 hours in career management education. Students also work with professional consultants, coaches and mentors.
"We do an intensive personal assessment tool evaluation to help them understand their blind spots or think about things they may not have been aware that they're doing," says Ms. Beaudin.
"For me, if I have a graduate who comes to me and they are into their career and they tell me the toolkit we provided made a difference in their life -that's exactly what I'm trying to do. I want to make sure they have a long-term vision for their career, where they're going, how they're going to get there and what they need to do to get there."
While most MBA students seem to understand that career success is ultimately their responsibility, there are still some who view an MBA as if they were purchasing a job opportunity.
"It amazes me that some people still think, 'well, career management is going to get me a job.' No. We're going to help you get a job but you have to have goals, commitment, you have to be accountable for your own success," says Ms. Sophocleous.
In fact, Ivey has taken steps in recent years through its admission process to ensure its MBA students have that drive to manage their career success and don't enter the program with an unrealistic sense of entitlement.
"We're the only school in Canada and one of the very few in the world where career-management services interviews the candidates coming in," says Ms. Sophocleous.
"And career management services at Ivey is part of all three pieces of the MBA supply chain -which is admissions, curriculum and alumni engagement."
Read full article: Financial Post, March 29, 2011