Online MBA Forum

It's Saturday, and I'm in no mood to talk about online MBAs, executive MBAs, GMAT or any of that stuff. I'm spending the morning talking to my new kitten - the first I've owned for around 15 years, as I have been travelling so much. Today it's much more important to think about my cat - one has to have a sense of proportion about these things.

She seems to like playing on my kitchen units although she has fallen off a couple of times - but she didn't hurt herself. However, what she likes most of all is to see if she can avoid the spray from the kitchen tap when I'm running water to do some washing up. We played this game for around 30 minutes this morning, which is why I haven't thought much about what I should be writing for this blog.

But some days are just not made for work, and one simply goes with the flow.

Holding an MBA is not the answer to all career questions. I have been called in to see if I can advise some people about getting back to work - not my usual field, but I'm a part of a panel of people who offer advice about trying new things. One particular person was in a junior management position, and never seemed to be able to gain promotion, or even to be able to get through the interview stage when they went for new jobs.

He decided to study an online MBA. He had gained good GMAT scores, and had opportunities to study in several institutions. One of the reasons that he gave for his decision to study online was that he was not good at interpersonal skills, so he thought that this was a good way to study. He did well on the MBA in terms of general assessment, but not as well when he did group exercises.

Now he is looking for the next new job, and again, although he is getting to interviews, he is failing to secure the jobs. We talked, and I have to say I understand why he is failing interviews - he is shy, inarticulate and does himself no justice at all. I'm recommending some councelling, which he is resisting. I pointed out that an MBA is a great asset, but not a cure-all.

I'm not sure that management is something that can be taught. I think it's possible to communicate some ideas, and to put forward theories, and even, in the light of the last posting and comment, some experiences. But management is essentially about people, and their interactions, and so simply teaching how to manage is not necessarily effective. As a manager, I have to use my personal actions and interactions to get other people to do the things I want them to do.

However, I think you can learn about management, and how to use tools as part of your arsenal. This kind of learning does fit in with the idea of the MBA degree; a way of taking tools and learning how to use them and where they might fit in with your ideas, responsibilities and personality.

One of the aspects of studying for a graduate degree as professional development is the fact that you are working with people who are doing research into your areas of interest. I've had a long correspondence with Professor in a good management school, who tells me that he is in the process of forming a Leadership Center, to attract managers who are mid career and have evolved successful management styles.

He would like to encourage them to study for a PhD, so that they can turn their experience (in the light of other management theory) into theory that other people can learn from. He maintains that a major problem for management is the fact that for many years it was not perceived as a subject that could be taught, so that handing on styles became the province of popularist books.

Studying an MBA where this kind of research is being actively pursued means that you can take advantage of some real cutting edge ideas, that are promulgated by people who have real experience.

Hmmm, Monday morning for me, and it's sunny and frosty - yes, I know it's July, but I'm in New Zealand and this is the middle of winter. This is one of the reasons that I'm particularly busy, as this is also the middle of our academic year - it runs from February through to December.

This entry for once is not about MBAs, I deserve a day when I can write about anything other than GMAT and MBA, and I'll be able to write with a fresh eye tomorrow. Especially as I need to do something about one of my staff who is studying an online MBA from the UK at the moment, and needs staff development time to do a project - easy if you are in the UK or the USA and it is vacation, difficult if it's the beginning of the second semester of the academic year, and there's little room to give people time away from teaching.