Professionals of all ages are asking is: "Do I need to get an MBA Degree to get ahead in the business world?"
This question has been asked of me by at least 5 individuals from a wide range of ages over the past 6 months. This is a big decision, given the amount of time and money it will take to receive an MBA.
My answer in all four cases is "It depends." It depends on the answers to the following two questions:
- Is getting an MBA degree consistent with your career plan?
- Is an MBA degree required to advance in your given career?
The answer to the first question is usually "I don't have a career plan", and my short answer is, you need a career plan, because life is too short and without one you will end up living someone else's life. Once you have a career plan, I then ask if the MBA degree is required to succeed in your given career. If it is required, then get that ticket punched so you can remove this as a barrier to your career success. This was the case early in my career, when having an MBA in Health Administration at that time was required to get ahead.
But in reality, I believe an MBA degree is not always required to succeed. As I recommended to the 5 individuals who asked me this question, make the lack of an advanced degree irrelevant by producing outstanding results throughout your career. Having a MBA becomes less important the higher you go in your career. In fact, in a November 2015 Harvard Business Review article titled "What Makes a Great Leader", of the 101 top worldwide CEO's mentioned, only 26 have MBA's. For example, Warren Buffett (Berkshire Hathaway), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), and Robert Iger (Disney) do not have MBA's.
As part of my own career plan, I set a goal to become a hospital CEO by the age of 40. I found that an MBA gave me strong "knowledge" of the healthcare business world, but it did not teach me how to use that knowledge and to "think" differently. The ability to "think differently" came through on the job experience and benefitting from strong mentors throughout my entire career. The last two points were the main reason why I was promoted to a hospital CEO at the age of 39.
What I have also found as I have studied others is that it is more important to produce consistent strong results to advance in your career. For example, if you produced 3 big achievements per year over a 5 year period, you would in that period have 15 "successes" to highlight on your resume or during an interview. Results like that will far outweigh whether or not you have a MBA. Case in point is a friend of mine who is a very successful hospital CEO, and in confidence told me he does not have a MBA, even though it was "required" for all CEO candidates. When asked how he handled this during the interview process, he said, "It never came up, because the Board was much more interested in how I would be able to bring my past successes and skills to help make the hospital successful in the future".
My advice for all individuals who are considering an MBA is to stop and answer the questions above before making a decision. If you do not have a career plan, then take the time to develop one, because it will pay huge future dividends. Having a career plan will also help determine whether an MBA is required for where you want to go. With or without a MBA, it will be more important to produce strong, consistent results in order to advance in your career.
Daniel J. Sinnott brings 35 years of diverse leadership experience to his role as CEO of Sinnott Executive Consulting. Sinnott Executive Consulting is a leadership development company that specializes in developing the business and leadership skills of leaders preparing for or already in the C- Suite.
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