"A Smart Investor Would Skip the M.B.A."转贴

passme

Imagine that you have been accepted to Harvard Business School. The ivy-covered buildings and high-powered faculty whisper that all you need to do is listen to your teachers, get good grades and work well with your peers. After two years, you'll emerge ready to take the business world by storm. Once you have that degree, you'll have it made.
Brian Stauffer
Whom would you hire: the candidate who built a profitable business in two years, or the candidate who sat in lectures?


But don't kid yourself. What matters exponentially more than that M.B.A. is the set of skills and accomplishments that got you into business school in the first place. What if those same students, instead of spending two years and $174,400 at Harvard Business School, took the same amount of money and invested it in themselves? How would they compare after two years?
If you want a business education, the odds aren't with you, unfortunately, in business school. Professors are rewarded for publishing journal articles, not for being good teachers. The other students are trying to get ahead of you. The development office is already assessing you for future donations. Administrators care about the metrics that will improve your school's national ranking. None of these things actually helps you learn about business.
Consider what you could do instead with that $174,400. The first step should be to move to a part of the country that supports your interests. If that's film, move to Los Angeles. Technology, San Francisco. Oil, Houston. You could live decently in these cities for $3,000 per month. Over the course of two years, that still leaves you $100,000 to invest in yourself.
To decide how to do that, start unpacking the value of an M.B.A. Good business schools deliver two main values: educational content and a network. Acquiring the content is easy: Go online and take the classes using OpenCourseWare or Coursera. You'll get to watch the same lectures, but for free.
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Soaring tuition costs, a weak labor market and a glut of recent graduates are upending the notion that M.B.A.s and other professional degrees are a sure ticket to financial success. WSJ's Ruth Simon reports on the News Hub. Photo: AP Images.



With total student-loan debt approaching the trillion-dollar mark, WSJ's Jason Bellini deconstructs how we got here and what it all means. Image: Getty


Finding and building a network will be more valuable to you than an M.B.A. You cannot buy a network. Your network is built on relationships with people, founded on trust. You also cannot buy trust—it's something built over time. Invest in buying coffee, drinks and dinner for people you want to get to know. This may be deeply uncomfortable, and that's good. It means that building relationships will be easier in the future. Ask people how they got to their current job, what resources they recommend, and what books they think you should read.
Building an army of people who trust you and think you're talented will be invaluable when you look for jobs.
Consider investing in hard skills such as programming. Dev Bootcamp, a 10-week training course in programming, costs only $12,200. It takes people with no experience and teaches them how to code. In 2012, 88% of its graduates got job offers at an average starting salary of $79,000.
Those outcomes are far better than for students fresh out of M.B.A. programs. According to Payscale.com, the average starting salary for M.B.A. graduates with less than one year of experience was $46,630 in 2012. Dev Bootcamp offers a much better return on investment.
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Reuters
Harvard Business School students during 2009 graduation ceremonies.



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If you aren't accepted to Harvard, the argument against going to business school becomes even stronger. At least with their Harvard M.B.A.s, less than 5% of the class of 2012 was unemployed three months after graduating. But at the University of Southern California, 23% of 2012 M.B.A. grads were still unemployed three months after graduation. And that's at USC, a fairly well-known school. The return on investment of going to Harvard or another top-10 business school has remained relatively high, but the return on going to lesser schools is very questionable.
The prospect of forgoing business school in favor of real-world accomplishments is scary for many new college graduates. Youth employment is the lowest since the 1950s, and for the first time more unemployed people have college experience than not. Competition for new jobs is fierce, with 50% of the world's population under 30. When you are competing against 3.5 billion people, it pays to be different. But getting another university degree doesn't make you different.
Instead of relying on business school to succeed, deliberately practice the skills necessary to become a master in your chosen field. Build a network that supports your professional aspirations. Work on projects that show you can have an impact in the real world, dealing with practical problems.
Most of all, put yourself in the shoes of your future boss and imagine whom you would rather hire: the candidate who built a profitable business over the course of two years, or the candidate who sat in lectures and reviewed case studies to get a degree?
—Mr. Stephens is the author of "Hacking Your Education," to be published by Perigee on Tuesday.A version of this article appeared March 2, 2013, on page C3 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: A Smart Investor Would Skip the M.B.A..

passme

虽然申请都交了，一部分也resulted in面试消息和offer。 但是每过一天， 读mba的信念和激情就少一点点。 其实本来就没有太多激情。。。只是过去几年的努力就是为了break into asset management， CFA考得差不多了，现在只是希望读mba能完成这几年的心愿, 但是毕业了之后又有多少胜券？
梦想到底值多少钱，值得么。

在北美这个地方，成功的下水道工人都有车有房有老婆， 小日子过得相当滋润，年薪6，7万没问题。
entry level Equity research analyst年薪也就4,5万, senior .
6~7万。父母和朋友所说的"稳定“的工作其实也是有裁员的风险的尤其是金融。把这些风险算进去的话，这些收入也就直接被discounted.
当然金融的最终收入是没有上限的，但是又有多少人能爬到那么高？


与其挤破头往金融圈子里钻，我觉得我更愿意去做一名出色的，与世无争的管道包工头儿， 找个好老婆，然后生一堆super mario.


我骄傲！

lelechen1107

读还是不读......................

也有朋友说我这个想换换环境来读mba的成本真的很高！！！

ericxin

写的很现实，经过考G，选学校，写essay，面试以及痛苦的等待消息。想上MBA的激情已经被一点一点的耗尽了。这条路真的是正确的吗？只有天知道了。

oldfashion

虽然申请都交了，一部分也resulted in面试消息和offer。 但是每过一天， 读mba的信念和激情就少一点点。 其实本来就没有太多激情。。。只是过去几年的努力就是为了break into asset management， CFA考得差不多了，现在只是希望读mba能完成这几年的心愿, 但是毕业了之后又有多少胜券？
梦想到底值多少钱，值得么。

在北美这个地方，成功的下水道工人都有车有房有老婆， 小日子过得相当滋润，年薪6，7万没问题。
entry level Equity research analyst年薪也就4,5万, senior .
6~7万。父母和朋友所说的"稳定“的工作其实也是有裁员的风险的尤其是金融。把这些风险算进去的话，这些收入也就直接被discounted.
当然金融的最终收入是没有上限的，但是又有多少人能爬到那么高？


与其挤破头往金融圈子里钻，我觉得我更愿意去做一名出色的，与世无争的管道包工头儿， 找个好老婆，然后生一堆super mario.


我骄傲！

-- by 会员 passme (2013/3/14 10:40:18)

想做包工头儿，现在马上就去做好了。那之前就不要交MBA申请了，还花了申请费好几百刀呢

leodondon

MBA带来的真的只是educational content和network吗？brandname，career opportunity，analytical and presentation skills, teamwork and leadership skills, 自信心的提高，对不同背景的人不同类型的商业的exposure，甚至虚一点life experience，都是mba能带来的

即使educational content和network这两样，不读mba又真的能够得到吗，即使能得到，quality一样吗？这么说大学都不用读，更不用追求清华北大哈佛斯坦福，在家自学就可以了。如果building relationship就是喝咖啡请吃饭，那商业社会真的是太简单了。不是同乡不是校友的，有多少人会睬你。

能进harvard的都是商业社会里摸爬滚打了好几年在所在行业最顶尖的一群人，在他们决定读mba之前，难道连这些分析都做不出来吗。不是说mba是必须，或者读了mba就能保证有好的前途，但原文的argument实在太weak

The bottom line is, 不读MBA，你有多少动力对现状作出改变？

dorothyyy

我出生于中小城市。城里的工作分为两种：最高年薪十几万的，从基层做起的各类，各级别工作；最低年薪十几万的，外调到这里的高级管理人员。在这两种工作之间，有一道无形的墙。我个人认为，MBA是我打开这道墙的工具。

文中说的不无道理，但是他忽视了一个现实：What if those same students, instead of spending two years and $174,400 at Harvard Business School, took the same amount of money and invested it in themselves?   这个情形，是在自己投资商业后成功 VS 接受MBA教育后未收到理想的效果 这种情境下才能够成为质疑MBA的条件。 那要是自己投资失败，而念书学到了自己想要的东西呢？

念MBA不是轻松的决定，但它绝不是轻率的决定。

炽默燚

困难和彷徨只是为了挡住那些意志不够坚定的人....飘过

riverwind91

这是Dev Bootcamp的软文吗

三昧

MBA带来的真的只是educational content和network吗？brandname，career opportunity，analytical and presentation skills, teamwork and leadership skills, 自信心的提高，对不同背景的人不同类型的商业的exposure，甚至虚一点life experience，都是mba能带来的

即使educational content和network这两样，不读mba又真的能够得到吗，即使能得到，quality一样吗？这么说大学都不用读，更不用追求清华北大哈佛斯坦福，在家自学就可以了。如果building relationship就是喝咖啡请吃饭，那商业社会真的是太简单了。不是同乡不是校友的，有多少人会睬你。

能进harvard的都是商业社会里摸爬滚打了好几年在所在行业最顶尖的一群人，在他们决定读mba之前，难道连这些分析都做不出来吗。不是说mba是必须，或者读了mba就能保证有好的前途，但原文的argument实在太weak

The bottom line is, 不读MBA，你有多少动力对现状作出改变？

-- by 会员 leodondon (2013/3/14 16:20:32)

比较同意这位同学的看法。另外仅从讨论这篇文章的角度来看，首先这篇文章针对的读者是谁？工作经验少于一两年的申请者？还是已经在行业内有一定经验的申请者？从内容来看，我倾向于认为他更针对刚出校门无甚工作经验的人，尤其是后面的就业数字的来源；其次，他的假设是你已经有了这十几万刀的资金在手怎么将它投资收益最大化的问题。可是大部分人还是凭入学通知贷款拿到这十几万刀吧？尤其在美帝，银行里能一次拿出几万刀的人都属比较成功的人了，有储蓄习惯的华人好一点，鬼佬都是习惯挣多少花多少甚至透支享受生活先；第三，正如这位同学讲的，networking之类的有那么好拿吗？你凭什么去和那些你想靠近的人networking？人家凭什么睬你？正如当年老毛在北大，你是个旁听生胡适会正眼看你么？你也可以追着先生说我其实自学了很多，读了很多书，听过你的课，...可是你就是个社会人员，教授们校友们凭什么热情的和你networking？第四，投资有风险。作者自己都说了经济不景气。那么他如何得出结论在同样不景气的经济下，拿钱去做生意两年内就能赚钱呢？如果事实是如此，大家不是傻子，尤其申请都哈弗的更不是，需要他写文章来讲吗？第五，高度怀疑此文是广告软体。最后其实想说，读与不读都有一万个理由，自己衡量自己的情况，每个人的道路都不相同，最重要的要学会不要偏听偏信。相信自己的分析判断。美国每年出这样的人生之道类（self-help)书太多了，不是所有的都是好书。作者也一样。一点想法。