B-Schools: Do MBA'S add value

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Do MBA'S add value

Printed From: The Equity Desk
Category: Careers
Forum Name: B-Schools
Forum Discription: Review talk, discuss about your favourite B-School, Discuss what better systems could be put into specific B-schools so as to make them better from the student's point of view.
URL: http://www.theequitydesk.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=11
Printed Date: 07/May/2025 at 9:52am

Topic: Do MBA'S add value

Posted By: Ambarish
Subject: Do MBA'S add value
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 3:54pm

well it started as a discussion on MBA & risk and transformed into wether MBA's add value or not so i'm starting a new topic with it here i'm adding few name's of the people who are mba's who have affected the lives of large numbers of people and ofcourse added value this might help you to look at a bigger picture

1.fred Smith, chairman and founder, Federal Express. 
 Smith is alegend The company now has more than 200,000
employees and revenues of $21 billion:
2.Arthur Rock, along with Laurence Rockefeller, virtually founded 
theventure capital business.Rock also helped with appel comuter
Rock's MBA is from Harvard, 1951.
3.Steve Ballmer, president and CEO of Microsoft, MBA from StanfordUniversity.
 Ballmer was the first professional manager hired by BillGates in 1980 
and is Gates' most-trusted manager 
 4.      Robert McNamara, Harvard MBA, 1940.  Joined Ford Motor after
 WorldWar II; rose to be president as the car company recovered from itswoes
 of the early 1950s; was Secretary of Defense under Kennedy andJohnson and is 
best known for measuring the wrong things during theVietnam War; then 
served 13 years a respected leader of the WorldBank.  At the
 World Bank he focused on ameliorating the shock of the1970s oil 
price hikes and inflation, as well as curbing corruption ingovernment
5. Charles Schwab, Stanford MBA, 1961.  Schwab pioneered the 
discountbrokerage industry after the liberalization of the U.S. 
financialindustry, then was able to take early advantage of the 
Internet tobuild the leading on-line trading company.  Thank him 
that you're notpaying 1% of the purchase price for stock transactions any
 longer spending: 
6. Meg Whitman, Harvard MBA, the CEO of e-Bay, which is 
changinge-commerce 
7.Michael Bloomberg, Harvard MBA, 1966.  Current occupation:
 Mayorof New York City.  Real accomplishment: starting a
 real-time newsservice for investors that now employs 
8,000 people worldwide.  Giventhat Reuters and Dow-Jones had a 
100-year headstart, that's quite an accomplishment
Knight, chairman of Nike, Stanford University MBA, 1962. Knight
 put an American company back at the forefront of the shoeindustry,
9. Scott Adams, theDilbert cartoonist and member of the Cynic Hall
 of Fame, has an MBAfrom UC Berkeley
10. Peter Lynch, Wharton MBA, who managed Fidelity's Magellan Fund 
for13 years, making it the world's largest mutual fund by following
 a growth strategy

And  did you know 
Bill Gatesincluded -- have attended short-course "Executive MBA"
 programs. Though Gates never graduated from Harvard because of 
the opportunitythat he saw in the personal computer industry,
 Gates did attend aHarvard Excecutive MBA program during the 1980s

the list isn't bad is it and if you look around a bit more you'll find plenty of fish
 in the pond. and these are just people from U.S. There are plenty in India also
and why do you ppl have such a grudge against MBA's lighten up a bit

.

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www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Replies:

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 4:24pm

Great!!! I thought MBA's always added value but the way you have represented the thesis is mind boggling. The argument that I can give as a devil's advocate is that over the past 50 years or so you have provided a list of about 10 odd great souls of mother earth. I always argue that this list could have gone longer with a lot of such names. If you see one Bill Gates would be employing thousands of other MBA's. I agree with the views of another participant who said that if all of these were to start their own little businesses (taken more risk) then the sum total of value added would have exceeded the value lost (people not working for Gates). This is only a thought I have no emperical evidence to prove my thesis. ANother point is that most of the MBA's that you quote are from the top notch B -Schools. Do you have any evidence on how the management grads from the second rung B schools performed?

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'The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market Investing' - A Book on Equity Investing especially for Indian Investors. Book your copy now: www.thethoughtfulinvestor.in

Posted By: dummy
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 5:50pm

MBA's do add value but mostly for themselves. You know an MBA grad is the person who displays highest turnover he switches jobs very fast and thus the employer is unable to decide whether to depend upon them.Some employers prefer MBA's from the slighly lower down B schools coz they are not sure when their new recruit will say that he does not like the job and move ahead seeking areas that suit his liking.SO we have to judge a management grad with also his ability to stay on jobs - ALL in all he does add value I would say.

Posted By: Ambarish
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 5:54pm

well further i'm giving three more names which i hope will quench your thrust

1. Deep Kalra, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Make my trip
Deep holds an MBA (PGDM) from IIM Ahmedabad (1990-92) and a Bachelor's degree in Economics from St. Stephen's College, Delhi (1987-90).
2.Keyur Joshi, Co-Founder & Chief Operating Officer, Make My trip
A graduate in Chemistry with an MBA from City University of New York, Keyur has been associated with Travel and the Internet since the early days.
3. Sachin Bhatia, Co-Founder & Chief Marketing OfficerSachin holds an MBA from Strathclyde Graduate Business School, Scotland.

i should keep up with this might make a good book some day and for others YAAR do some reaserch yourself also before u write any comment

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www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Posted By: dummy
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 6:24pm

Right but you are missing the point. I never said MBA;s cannot do anything I said that they can but most of them prefer to work under others because they are too risk averse. Out of so many thousand MBA's u r quoting a few but most of them prefer to remain under some one else and that is bad coz as ppl who have learnt how to run business they shud start one of their own.

Posted By: Ambarish
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 6:44pm

i'm not here to right a book with the title names of mba's who added value and if anyone wants to find more people he only need to use is head and try searching secondly most of the people who havebeen named here did work for someone before they started their own work its a wise strategy to get some Experience rather than plunging into the unknow end up loosing your confidence and ultimately working rest of your life for someone else. Experience arms just against that so i would'nt say that they are risk averse they are minimzing risk this way

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www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Posted By: maag
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 6:50pm

I like the passion in which you defend your statements and yes obviously MBA's are a much better breed of people as far as smartness goes. By the way how dfo you rate mgmt grads vis-a-vis accounting profs ca/cs etc etc

Posted By: Ambarish
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 9:40pm

a sword can't do a needle's job each of them are important people in their respective field their is no comparison and definetly no one can say that one come in top of the others

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www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 9:47pm

Absolutely by the way what would you advise some body to do a profesional accountant's degree or an MBA.What would you ask him to be a sword or a needle???

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'The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market Investing' - A Book on Equity Investing especially for Indian Investors. Book your copy now: www.thethoughtfulinvestor.in

Posted By: Ambarish
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 9:55pm

they can do what ever they want to do

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www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Posted By: Ambarish
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 10:01pm

you can be the needle the sword or both so which one do you want to be

-------------
www.halwasiya.uni.cc
“Wining is not everything, it is the only thing”

Posted By: vinay
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 10:59pm

hi, for a hi-growth investor what are the basic criteria to pick the stocks keeping aside -book value,price to sales,dividend yield,etc.(like dod and graham).

Posted By: basant
Date Posted: 18/Jul/2006 at 11:19pm

Graham and Dodd is for ppl who are patient and willing to invest once in a decade. High growth investors have tended to lose money over the longer term. The trick is to sell when the going is good and that is the toughest part.But for a High growth investor he should look at the folowing:

Great business idea with high sector growth pref a new sector

Good RoE

Pe less then 35 times frwd (max)

High quality management

Operating margins in the higher stage of the industry level.

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