Should I do a top 10 MBA?
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Date: April 17th, 2015 10:02 PM Author: jet stage
Nowadays I can't seem to get the "go to a top MBA and do finance after" idea out of my mind. Especially after observing several friends of mine from college who work in front office finance, making double, or sometimes triple my salary with same years of work experience...
After graduating from a law school (worst mistake of my life), I now work in data analytics team at a F500 making low six fig. 4 week vacation, 45-50 hr weeks with minimal overtime here and there, no weekends worked so far. Minimal bonus. Not too bad of a lifestyle.
To describe the work I do briefly... my typical work involves data extraction / manipulation, and running analytics reports to the firm's partners for brainstorming business strategy or validating their business decisions, regarding sales strategy, product management, marketing, etc. The work I do is pretty technical - involving very heavy use of SQL and Excel, yet not engineer-level technical.
I like my job in the sense that it gives me an opportunity to work on both technical and soft -type of projects, such as meeting with "business side" people, doing presentations, running reports, etc but I am very aware of the fact that in this career, there is a very HARSH salary ceiling.
After 6-7 years into this career track, if I play my cards right, I MIGHT make anywhere from 160k to 200k provided that I get promoted and keep building strong reputation / skills at my firm. But, after that, it would be very flat raise each year...unless by some divine miracle I make a partner somewhere. (highly unlikely... especially from my department)
Given this, do you guys think that I should go for a top 10 MBA and go for a front-office finance role? Or maybe MBB consulting? Or equity research at an IB or a small hedge fund? These are 'true' elite jobs where - provided I have what it takes - I can potentially end up making way more dough compared to my current career path. Not to mention, arguably the work you'd do in a front office finance job could be way more interesting than what I do now. The only major concerns I have with doing an MBA are: 1. financial & opportunity costs are way too high, 2. there is no guarantee that I will become more successful career-wise or financially after doing an MBA compared to before.
I would welcome any of your thoughts, feedbacks, or insults.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27710633) |
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Date: April 18th, 2015 9:53 PM Author: obsidian range
You have to slave away in MBB for a good 5 years.
Typical progression is as follows:
graduate undergrad, become an associate (2 years), get an MBA (2 years), work as a consultant (2 years), become project leader (1-2 years), then go client side.
For the OP, he'd likely spend 2 years in an MBA and then 3 years to make project leader before jumping ship
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715395) |
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Date: April 18th, 2015 9:57 PM Author: obsidian range
i'm in the bay area. good luck getting into a successful pre-ipo company coming out of MBB and making bank. Shit like dropbox is heavily heavily diluted. Majority of emerging companies are a complete gamble.
The best bet is to go to somewhere like google as a director, but competition is fierce. More and more of these companies are looking towards organic growth.
At present, the exit opportunities are to get into a 9 to 5 making slightly less than MBB in client side. The upside is you likely would get paid more than if you had started with the client side company post MBA
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715416) |
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Date: April 18th, 2015 11:17 PM Author: Slate vibrant principal's office
work for a vendor (software is the easiest to get right now) as an account manager--this is the best entry-level job.
then decide whether you are more of a business/operations person or a salesperson. the latter is more lucrative (you could make hundreds of thousands of dollars if you're successful), but the operations track is more stable.
if you're good at sales you should just stay in sales. if you're an ops person, you should use your experience as an "operations associate" or whatever at one of these vendors to move to a second-tier consulting firm in their vendor-management practice.
then, move to procurement at a megacorp or to ops at a better-funded startup, where, if you are in nyc or sf, you can make $110k working 9-5 or 10-6 with a 401k match.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715861) |
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Date: April 18th, 2015 11:01 PM Author: obsidian range
I;m not arguing that top MBAs are not incestuous and are not filled with elite undergrads - i just think students who went to shit undergrads are the ones that actually need it.
The elite undergrad dumbasses who now want to completely switch industries for $200k which they likely had access to during undergrad deserve the debt.
I know many who have switched into McKinsey, Bain etc. from simply calling friends from Princeton, Stanford etc. An MBA is not always necessary in many cases - but some will strive to add another line to their CV. This is what makes me question the value proposition.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715775) |
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Date: April 18th, 2015 10:17 PM Author: Slate vibrant principal's office
none of this credentialing shit is worth the risk, especially if he already has an advanced degree.
paying for an mba only makes sense if you've done private equity pre-mba but are getting pushed out, and need to use the mba to get back into private equity and continue to collect $400k/year for 2-3 more years.
it does not make sense for f500 wage slaves that are not sponsored.
op is already in an incredibly privileged position despite having made serious errors early in life and should not fuck it up so he can say he works at mbb for a few years. instead, he should cut expenses drastically, save money, and invest.
don't buy into the prestige-whore scam.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715514) |
Date: April 18th, 2015 10:37 PM Author: shivering thriller forum useless brakes
only read some of the posts in this thread. a few thoughts.
1. although i agree that it's super expensive, if one hates their job and trajectory and badly wants banking or consulting, an MBA is pretty much the only way to get there.
2. MBB consulting gets a lot of bashing on xo, but it's one of the best jobs you can get starting out. i never looked into it since i would hate consulting, but it pays well, awesome name brand, transferable skillset, great network, and tons of exit opportunities.
3. Fanatic is right on most things, but his placement numbers are off. Most people from M7 going into MBB are NOT sponsored. Not sure where he gets that info from.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27715617) |
Date: April 20th, 2015 11:07 PM Author: jet stage
thanks for your thoughtful insights, fellas. The consensus here seems to be that I should just stick with my gig and MBA, even a top 10-15 one, isn't worth it at sticker price.
It just sucks to be working hard yet to see a very harsh salary potential in this career track.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27727592) |
Date: April 20th, 2015 11:13 PM Author: jet stage
@ Fanatic
thanks for your inputs so far. Do you enjoy your work at BCG? Do you feel challenged, feel like you are learning valuable skills, etc?
What are typical salary range for post MBA MBB associates who do MBB for 3-4 years and go industry? Do you happen to know the career trajectory / comp potential for post-MBA MBB consultants who go in-house after several years in consulting?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27727643) |
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Date: April 20th, 2015 11:50 PM Author: obsidian range
It's a love/hate relationship because my peers are awesome and smart - i definitely feel challenged in this regard. Imagine working with fellow STEM Ph.D.s from Stanford, MIT, Princeton, etc etc. You definitely get challenged by your peers. But sometimes we get bitch work and shitty clients - they are demanding with unreasonable work at times due to the high bill rates and short stints.
Sometimes we do boring as shit cost optimization projects in which we review sales compensations and operating cost statements for inputs into cost reduction models.
Sometimes we do Mergers and Acquisitions strategy in which we see if there are redundancies after merger, another boring as shit area. But other times, I do analysis on market share capture and strategic pricing initiatives based on consumer trend inferences and product offerings which is cool.
People from MBB who go in-house typically become product managers in good tech companies like facebook/google or directors/senior strategy directors at more average clients (HP, Ross, Levis, Nike, random shit). They might also do shit like Venture Capitalism or another industry.
From my friends at MBB who have stayed for 3-4 years post MBA and have made it to the project leader/ case lead/ engagement manager levels, they usually take a paycut for a more stable job for around $200k to $250k + bonus (around $80k to $100k) or $150k for companies with stock options. They definitely have more of a straight forward shot to the C suite however.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2857734&forum_id=2#27727902) |
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