4 ms·

It is easy to hate on "prestige" MBAs, but I think it has more to do with there being little to no empirical evidence that it prepares students for business suc

It is easy to hate on "prestige" MBAs, but I think it has more to do with there being little to no empirical evidence that it prepares students for business success in the real world. Also, a lot of people have endured "elite" MBA's entering the workplace into positions of seniority with no prior experience and exactly the results you might expect under the circumstances.

airstrike 7y ago
> little to no empirical evidence that it prepares students for business success in the real world. I haven't seen much evidence to the contrary, either. All I see is anecdotes from both sides, so I'll give MBAs the benefit of the doubt. Speaking for myself, I am an entirely different person after completing my MBA. I've become an analytical thinker to a fault and maintain my soft skills. Learned a metric shit ton of corporate finance, business strategy and decent macroeconomics. > Also, a lot of people have endured "elite" MBA's entering the workplace into positions of seniority with no prior experience and exactly the results you might expect under the circumstances. Shitty people exist everywhere. You don't have the counterfactual to know if those bosses would be even worse without an MBA. Seems to me like that's more of an issue with HR hiring processes than with the intrinsic values of a rigorous MBA program.
- iamasoftwaredev 7y ago
  > so I'll give MBAs the benefit of the doubt Why, that seems like a rather silly thing to give the benefit of the doubt on. Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... > I am an entirely different person after completing my MBA ah.
  - airstrike 7y ago
    Dude. Honestly feels like you're being purposefully hard to engage with for the sake of pushing your agenda. It's tiring, really. > Why, that seems like a rather silly thing to give the benefit of the doubt on. Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... Who said they are hired on education _rather than_ experience and proven ability? It's not like MBAs are 18-year-olds with no experience. As I've said elsewhere, you need to have at least 3-5 years of _great_ work experience to land a spot at top MBAs. I was promoted every year for 3 years in a row in one of my homecountry's top 5 largest firms and was about to be promoted to manager when I went to my MBA. The same is true of a lot of MBA graduates. And those who were not managers in the traditional sense displayed their leadership abilities elsewhere, such as the many veterans that join MBA programs. > ah. Great ad hominem. Go read up on HN's guidelines, please: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  - mcrad 7y ago
    > Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... What does that have to do with MBA's? The tech industry is littered with folks that look good on paper and can be plugged into some technocratic niche but have little real-world experience.
  - BeetleB 7y ago
    > Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. You mean like almost all other jobs out there?
- headmelted 7y ago
  "Shitty people exist everywhere. You don't have the counterfactual to know if those bosses would be even worse without an MBA" Not at all what I was saying, but since you brought it up: MBA or not, I'd expect the outcome of someone with zero real-world experience being elevated to a position of making executive decisions would be universally shite. Yes, it's entirely to do with HR processes, but nonetheless the reason MBA programs exist at all is because they offer students the outcomes that they do - outcomes that are entirely unwarranted based on any evidence that currently exists.
  - airstrike 7y ago
    > Not at all what I was saying, but since you brought it up: MBA or not, I'd expect the outcome of someone with zero real-world experience being elevated to a position of making executive decisions would be universally shite. Where do you get the notion that MBAs have zero real world experience? That is factually incorrect.
    - headmelted 7y ago
      https://www.businessinsider.com/the-mba-effectively-does-nothing-it-has-no-impact-2010-10?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/the-mba-effectively-does-not... "Actually, 40 Years Of Data Show The MBA Effectively Does Nothing -- It Has No Impact" - Business Insider https://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-are-no-longer-prized-employers https://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-are-... MBAs are no longer prized by employers - The Economist There's a lot more links like that on Google, I'll leave it to the reader to find them. That said, I found this one interesting: Https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/19/why-the-mba-is-still-a-gamechanging-qualification&ved=2ahUKEwiDy5qC7J7lAhWUoFwKHTNdAHYQFjAKegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw2TzCAdTnN7jVNuG8tnV659&ampcf=1 https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/19/why-the-mb... It's an article in the Guardian that, to give the tldr version, suggests that MBAs retain usefulness for getting jobs, but with no evidence of impact on capability.
      - airstrike 7y ago

airstrike 7y ago

> little to no empirical evidence that it prepares students for business success in the real world. I haven't seen much evidence to the contrary, either. All I see is anecdotes from both sides, so I'll give MBAs the benefit of the doubt. Speaking for myself, I am an entirely different person after completing my MBA. I've become an analytical thinker to a fault and maintain my soft skills. Learned a metric shit ton of corporate finance, business strategy and decent macroeconomics. > Also, a lot of people have endured "elite" MBA's entering the workplace into positions of seniority with no prior experience and exactly the results you might expect under the circumstances. Shitty people exist everywhere. You don't have the counterfactual to know if those bosses would be even worse without an MBA. Seems to me like that's more of an issue with HR hiring processes than with the intrinsic values of a rigorous MBA program.

iamasoftwaredev 7y ago
> so I'll give MBAs the benefit of the doubt Why, that seems like a rather silly thing to give the benefit of the doubt on. Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... > I am an entirely different person after completing my MBA ah.
- airstrike 7y ago
  Dude. Honestly feels like you're being purposefully hard to engage with for the sake of pushing your agenda. It's tiring, really. > Why, that seems like a rather silly thing to give the benefit of the doubt on. Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... Who said they are hired on education _rather than_ experience and proven ability? It's not like MBAs are 18-year-olds with no experience. As I've said elsewhere, you need to have at least 3-5 years of _great_ work experience to land a spot at top MBAs. I was promoted every year for 3 years in a row in one of my homecountry's top 5 largest firms and was about to be promoted to manager when I went to my MBA. The same is true of a lot of MBA graduates. And those who were not managers in the traditional sense displayed their leadership abilities elsewhere, such as the many veterans that join MBA programs. > ah. Great ad hominem. Go read up on HN's guidelines, please: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- mcrad 7y ago
  > Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. I don't see why you would do that... What does that have to do with MBA's? The tech industry is littered with folks that look good on paper and can be plugged into some technocratic niche but have little real-world experience.
- BeetleB 7y ago
  > Hiring someone into a high responsibility role based on education rather than experience and proven ability. You mean like almost all other jobs out there?
headmelted 7y ago
"Shitty people exist everywhere. You don't have the counterfactual to know if those bosses would be even worse without an MBA" Not at all what I was saying, but since you brought it up: MBA or not, I'd expect the outcome of someone with zero real-world experience being elevated to a position of making executive decisions would be universally shite. Yes, it's entirely to do with HR processes, but nonetheless the reason MBA programs exist at all is because they offer students the outcomes that they do - outcomes that are entirely unwarranted based on any evidence that currently exists.
- airstrike 7y ago
  > Not at all what I was saying, but since you brought it up: MBA or not, I'd expect the outcome of someone with zero real-world experience being elevated to a position of making executive decisions would be universally shite. Where do you get the notion that MBAs have zero real world experience? That is factually incorrect.
  - headmelted 7y ago
    https://www.businessinsider.com/the-mba-effectively-does-nothing-it-has-no-impact-2010-10?r=US&IR=T https://www.businessinsider.com/the-mba-effectively-does-not... "Actually, 40 Years Of Data Show The MBA Effectively Does Nothing -- It Has No Impact" - Business Insider https://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-are-no-longer-prized-employers https://www.economist.com/whichmba/nothing-special-mbas-are-... MBAs are no longer prized by employers - The Economist There's a lot more links like that on Google, I'll leave it to the reader to find them. That said, I found this one interesting: Https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/19/why-the-mba-is-still-a-gamechanging-qualification&ved=2ahUKEwiDy5qC7J7lAhWUoFwKHTNdAHYQFjAKegQIBBAB&usg=AOvVaw2TzCAdTnN7jVNuG8tnV659&ampcf=1 https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/19/why-the-mb... It's an article in the Guardian that, to give the tldr version, suggests that MBAs retain usefulness for getting jobs, but with no evidence of impact on capability.
    - airstrike 7y ago