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- Herausgeber: GRIN Verlag
- Sprache: Englisch
Document from the year 2005 in the subject Sociology - Work, Education, Organisation, , language: English, abstract: This is what an unemployed MBA graduates life was like after graduating in July 2005. Today, after having worked for 2 years at a Fortune 100 company I shall leave to become CEO for another company. I wrote this diary in 2005 after graduating and hope that this three month diary helps other MBA graduates to remain motivated and stay focused.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2010
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
1. Introduction
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it, Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948)
I graduated on July 7 2005 from the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in Belgium, ranked 1stin Belgium, 5thin Europe and 12thin the World according to the Economist Intelligence Unit ranking of b-schools. It has been exactly 3 months, as of today, and I am currently unemployed. In exactly a month I shall turn 31 years of age, it is stressful.
A little bit of history is important to understand where I am coming from and where I was planning to go hence the steps that I have taken in my life. This may read like a resume, as this is the only structured format to use when trying to explain in as little words a lot about oneself. Born-7.11.1974, Madras, India
From 1974 to 1992, I had a great time being a child, passing through adolescence, learning to mature and going to school. 1992, Senior Secondary high school-Delhi Public School, Mathura Road, New Delhi, India
1997, Indian Law Society College, Bachelor of Science of Law and Bachelor of Law, BSL, LLB, Pune University , Pune, India
1997-1998- worked for a corporate law firm specializing in arbitration in New Delhi India
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
1999, Duke Law School, Duke University, Master of Law, LLM, North Carolina, USA
1999-2000, worked, for a German corporate law firm, specializing in mergers and acquisition and Indian German bilateral trade and business agreements, 2000-2004, joined, a start up Software Company in Germany, specializing in business development and mergers and acquisitions 2004-2005, set up my own, niche boutique-consulting firm in Stuttgart, specializing in maturing Indian and European business relations through legal and business strategy advice
2005, Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School, Master of Business Administration, MBA, Leuven, Belgium
I also studied in many summer school programs that included visits to beautiful countries like Spain, where I did a strategy course at EADE business school in 2005. France where I was the given the chance to take part in strategy session on value innovation at CEDEP, associated with INSEAD at Fontainebleau in 2004. Hong Kong, I did a summer program on international law at the Hong Kong law school in 1998 and Israel where I learnt to do manual labor as a volunteer on a kibbutz in 1995.
I believe that I have finally matured into an adult after my MBA as in these 30 years I have learned a lot, seen a lot, honed my instincts and understand my value better. The MBA has allowed to carefully making the transition, from being a corporate lawyer to becoming a businessperson who understands business
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
with all its underlying challenges in all functionality. Not to say that I don’t know anything about everything but I know something about a little and a lot more about other functionalities like strategy and finance to make a difference to an organization. I also know what I want to do since I started the MBA and today when I am unemployed.
My working experience started out as a lawyer in a leading law firm in India with a great mentor who guided me in the finer skills of arbitration and negotiations and in choosing my law school finally lead me to work in Germany for another leading law firm. Probably my immaturity, learning curiosity and entrepreneurial risk taking appetite led me to join a software company afterwards, to work in a multi cultural German environment in the good old days of the internet bubble and to live through the bubble bursting in 2001. Survival would be one of my strengths along with determination and process orientation that have helped me in overcoming barriers that I have faced in my career and in my life. Overcoming obstacles through sheer determination to persevere when everything seems lost could also be the reasons why I have never looked away from a gift-horse holding opportunities. Could be a Trojan horse! To be also read as my weakness along with arrogance in trying to know everything. Taking onestep at a time but thinking of the next step in the near future and planning exit strategies probably were my triggers to setting up my own consulting business prior to completing my MBA.
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
The MBA itself is a machine, before I even entered the program I brainwashed myself into believing how I was going to understand the big picture better. Something like the advertisement from DHL where a woman leads this young man to a photocopying machine and gives him a huge stack of paper to photocopy and he looks at her with consternation saying “but I am an MBA I have to be running this company”. Two of my engineer friends took me back to school and taught me math hour after hour, day after day. You have to be lucky, quick with numbers, fast with estimations and good at guessing if you truly would like to sound intelligent let alone be intelligent, is what I believe makes a difference at the end of the day, maybe personality also helps.
How did I choose my MBA program?
In my opinion, B-schools are businesses that have a responsibility to their customers (students), their employees and the objective to create stakeholder value, which includes society at large. Students play an important role in enhancing this value by working efficiently with the management of the school and learning how to add real and intrinsic worth to themselves, the school and society.
Students arrive at business school searching for knowledge, better career choices and diverse international understanding of cultures and businesses. At the same time, obtaining good value for money.
This translates into class composition (smaller the class size the more interactive it is), students to professor ratios (you do want your professors to have time for
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
you), a good alumni network (networking is nearly everything!), partnerships (corporate and foundation partners of the school: possible future employers), great career services (you want the guarantee that these people care for you). All of this for the right present value as this is your investment today for a pretty uncertain future.
In return, the schools expect that you meet the cut off (GMAT), are entrepreneurially minded (confident, determined, self confident, self aware, ready to accept challenges and have vision), adaptable to change (flexibility in times of adversity), have a good IQ, CQ (cultural intelligence) and EQ, have superior social skills (empathy, good listener) and ready to learn and work with diverse cultures and in various roles.
When B-schools and students share the same goals, real value is created by the close nexus between the schools success and your success. Schools spend quality time in honing soft skills in future managers, teaching them the art of leadership, respecting fellow international students, working in diverse cultural groups, understanding international business, and creating a sense of empathy, trust and fellowship between the students and professors. Another way in which value is created is when schools develop strong partnerships with leading companies and institutions so that students get to work at and solve real problems. This gives the school credibility and the student the security and confidence prior to starting their post MBA career.
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An Unemployed MBA Graduates’ Diary
I think that a value innovator school is one that can differentiate itself in terms of providing a positive experience and at the same time maintain low costs. This is the real value proposition that a student is looking for - a MBA program as good as the best, only at a lower price!
So I turn to school pricing. Is this the real value of a MBA or is this the value of international brand recognition? If you had to discount the brand name then what is the value of your MBA?
I found that a good school distinguishes itself by being innovative and creating a market within an existing saturated market by making the competition irrelevant. This can be achieved by lowering their cost entry barriers due to their credibility with their partners and other organizations that shall pay the difference. My decision to choose Vlerick over INSEAD or Rotterdam was based on making comparisons between the schools offerings, pricing of program, its position and history, the class composition, sex ratio, teaching methods, specialisation courses, in company placement programs, faculty and lastly alumni. I visited the three schools, met with last years students, compared prospectus and came to my conclusion that for what I wanted from my MBA, Vlerick had the best offering. It can also be argued that maybe that is the reason why I am still unemployed but that is a what if scenario.
