The Executive MBA — DIY Edition
My mind was spinning last night! I couldn’t get this out of my head so I had to get it down on paper.
The traditional MBA is tremendously valuable for a wide variety of reasons but the most straightforward of those reasons might be the most debated. It costs a couple years worth of time, a ton of money and an immense amount of work to get a master’s degree at most schools. These are facts.
The question is: does anyone actually gain real, true, applicable knowledge from this education? Additionally, is the investment of the time and money to do it actually worth it? In other words, is there a positive ROI attached?
I believe an MBA can offer a huge upside in the form of networking opportunities, a leg up in finding a career in some of the most competitive industries around (consulting, finance, large corporations, etc.) and a great deal of applicable knowledge if pushed out by the right professor and received by the right student at the right school.
I think, the debate primarily surrounds the group of career-students, delaying their real life, frustrated with mediocre job prospects, hoping for something better but really (for the most part) just hoping the world will start being nicer to them.
My challenge? If you’re considering jumping into an MBA program and taking on a mountain of debt to play that song called ‘Senior Year’ on repeat for another couple years, start with a 12-month intensive course that I’ll refer to as: ‘The Executive MBA — DIY Edition.’ The course offers classes taught by (literally) the best business minds of the last 100 years and an opportunity to apply those learned concepts in (literally) real world business situations.
The cost = approximately $50 / month
The time = approximately 20 hours / week
The opportunity = exponential growth
The program works like this …
1) Learn: You must immerse yourself in an environment to gain the knowledge out there in the world. The primary areas to consider are below.
READ Books — Buy ten books on Amazon written by or (at least) written about the great minds of the last 100 years. Think of the top business minds, most highly regarded political leaders and those carrying massive influence and learn their stories.
Here’s a list of people to get you started:
Nelson Rockefeller
Dale Carnegie
Henry Ford
Bill Gates
Steve Jobs
Warren Buffett
Richard Branson
Pres. Teddy Roosevelt
Pres. Kennedy
Pres. Reagan
Pres. Clinton
Pres. Obama
Mother Theresa
Nelson Mandela
And the list goes on and on and on …
READ News — read every piece of business news you can get your hands on.
Here’s a list of publications to get you started:
The Wall Street Journal (http://www.wsj.com)
Forbes (http://www.forbes.com)
Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com)
Inc. (http://www.inc.com)
Fortune (http://fortune.com)
Watch & Listen — to Ted Talks, to Video and/or Podcast Interviews of influential people, attend conferences/panels/networking events
2) Test: Apply Your Learning — More importantly, you must apply this knowledge to your life.
For me, a true gauge of if I’ve actually absorbed the information is to apply it to my business. If you aren’t successful with applying it or don’t know how to apply it, you likely don’t fully understand it. Go back and spend some more time on it.
The list of resources to help you build your skills and develop your weak areas is nearly endless. Learn from these resources, listen to the people, understand their theories the best you can, apply them in your life and your business and come back to the ‘real’ MBA in a year.
The secret: If you actually make it through the ten books, learn something, improve your business knowledge and still think the MBA is worth it, then it will be.
The other secret: If you really want to be at the top, which the MBA suggests, you’ll get so laser-focused on this, that you’ll be done with it in six months and looking for more to do.
Start here … http://www.amazon.com.
Start now.
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