Why should I study an MBA?

Undertaking an MBA is personal. There can be many reasons why someone would decide to do an MBA. From personal development, wanting to build a professional network or increasing career opportunities.

6 Reasons To Study Your MBA

Below are some of the top reasons why someone would choose to do an MBA. These are the more popular reasons about why someone would want to complete an MBA. Even if some of the choices below sound like they align with your own goals, make sure that they are your own goals. An MBA is hard work but very rewarding.

1. Advance your career

Employers regard employees with MBAs to be of high value. MBA programs offer areas of study that give insight into the internal workings of a company. Traditionally, they focused primarily on the value of revenue, understanding that revenue and how to maximise revenue. Modern MBAs now offer subjects such as strategy, organisational behaviour, mindfulness, design thinking and leadership. Giving a student a wide variety of skills to add to their repertoire and improve the company as whole. These modern subjects are now considered equally important in a society that demands businesses become more ethical and socially responsible.

2. Earn more

Research has shown that employees with an MBA earn more than their respective counterparts without an MBA. It could be those negotiation skills you picked up from the MBA program, or tips from a networking event. Either way, statistics indicate you could expect to a pay bump as a result of studying your MBA. If you’re after a bigger pay cheque each month, this could be one reason to study. It is prudent to note, there is no guarantee of a pay rise purely because of your additional qualification.

3. Start your own business

In the world of startups, there are more known entrepreneurs than ever. Undertaking an MBA gives you a good start in your career to understand business basics, execute strategy, create profit and loss statements as well as knowing what’s needed to be an effective owner. Who knows? You could be using the skills learnt through your studies and build the next Uber, Atlassian or Apple.

4. Learn from the best

The lecturers who deliver the core topics in an MBA are at the top of their game. The experience from a single lecturer alone is enough to make you feel like you’ve done very little with your career (for those who aren’t as still new in a senior position or starting out) and question what you’ve achieved (for those who have been in the game for a while or are nearing the top of the food chain). Listen and learn from these people, the gamut of knowledge that they’ll share with you from what they’ve done and how they’ve applied the concepts you’re there to learn is enough to make you go back to the office and think you can really make an impact.

5. Transferrable skills

The core subjects in an MBA, from Finance and Economics to Marketing and Strategy will give you a good all-round approach on how to deal with all types of verticals. You won’t need to be stuck in a finance-oriented role if you want to move to marketing, or from strategy to a more operational hands-on role. The use cases of the material will give you a feel on how to apply the knowledge to a range of different environments. If you’re a person who likes to test different waters or is feeling a bit stagnant in your current role, pick up the skills learned in an MBA and go do what you want where you want.

6. Grow your network

This is one of the big factors of an MBA for some people. They want to network, and studying an MBA will give you one of the more varied groups of people that you’ll come across, from seasoned professionals to new entrepreneurs. You’re all there to learn but you’re not going to learn how to better business person on your own in an MBA. Shared experience is key, tell people what you’ve achieved or what you want to achieve, you’re highly likely to find a lot of like-minded people that you want to keep in touch with or they can introduce you to key people to help you achieve your goals. You might even be able to help them achieve theirs.