Small business: MBA road not taken (BusinessWeek)

For many students and their schools, an MBA student to Master of Business Administration during the program, and then for McKinsey, Bain and Accenture as soon as the job search begins. So much is made of return on investment when the object of MBAs that it seems to be an undeniable truth that these programs naturally lead to positions with large public companies.

In this context, a MBA program of Veterans to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) of channels probably see as ambition unsuccessful or non-existent. The same point of view is likely to be taken of students who choose to take the path of SMEs.

Small businesses are rarely the kind of household name employers generally related to the MBAs and are likely to evolve in sectors whose managers were getting their hands dirty. However, there is an example to follow for SMEs is the best fit for an MBA graduate.

A classic, high-quality MBA program is a general management program designed to equip participants with the skills to operate a business. While the structure is based on specific topics such as finance, strategy and leadership, the overall logic is melt these blocks of knowledge as a whole. In the vast majority of cases, the timid MBA students far too much specialization, preferring to focus on a well-rounded education.

Limited >

Despite the courting of high visibility, multinational recruiters, MBA programs, their emphasis on the preparation of graduates for jobs in high management level does not always resonate with the largest employers. While a large company can offer a wide range of positions, they are often limited to specific functions which are particularly well adapted to junior MBA graduates. In this way, the old become directors of marketing, buying or perhaps human resources. Little in a multinational would begin career post-MBA in general management positions.

The same is not true in SMEs, where only size makes it a high level position encompassing. This is not to say that the former MBA cannot work in roles specific conventional Department, but that SMEs provide opportunities to put all these skills and a management role, more together.

Management jobs are created in the Western world, in particular, from rarely to well-known corporations for which the MBAs would like to work. Today, schools and students must recognize that it is small businesses looking to find the right people to help make able to compete in a world of ever-more-international company. It is no longer the case that only employers with a massive international presence can provide a truly international career. SMEs are looking more and go beyond their borders and do not always have management teams to make this change. This is where MBA programs could meet the need and time using even elders are very satisfactory careers to companies that they could never looked in the past.

If there is a level of misunderstanding between the providers of MBA graduates and students regarding SMEs, there is also a general misunderstanding of MBAs by the SMEs themselves. Small businesses that appear to be perfectly adapted to the coming general-management MBAs to schools of commerce also play a role of often unconscious with the idea alive that no holder of an MBA would like to work for nothing less than a huge group. With regard to the recruitment of former MBA students, it seems to be a strong dose of self-censorship at work.

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It appears that many SMEs, a MBA graduate is likely to be more blurred than he or it may be useful. The image is likely to be a handler superbly paid with bags of confidence and the very high standards. Such a mixture would be considered as an explosive by most small businesses. They seem to feel that the cost and the cultural clash involved in the recruitment of someone with an MBA would create a multitude of problems.

Salary, is also an aspect that could easily scare off the coast of the SMEs. In terms of cost, it is undeniable that an MBA on a CV means higher wage expectations. This must be balanced with deep leadership and strategic advantages that such a manager can add to a more compact society. The additional value that can be brought by a MBA graduate is potentially enormous.

A Manager with a background MBA can offer the kind of vision long term more common in the largest groups, allied to the latest management knowledge - vision that most small businesses do not have the time or resources to implement. As globalization markets, labor and production puts SMEs increasingly compete with larger firms and those in distant markets, this kind of 360-degree approach can make all the difference. In short, the rules of competition for SMEs are much like those of big business. They must play by the same rules. Here, the MBA graduates can prove themselves.

For business schools and their students, more big recruiters will always be a key objective. The prestige and the certainty of an increase in salary big logically in the traditional terms of career, program marketing and in some cases, the classification. It could, however, be the case that certain assumptions old world must evolve. May is the time for SMEs and the MBAs to recognize that they could be made for each other.