On a chilly Saturday in early Spring, a
group of dedicated South Asian MBA students from the Greater Toronto area gathered to reflect on the world of the MBA,
their education and their future.
The setting was Prego, a beautiful Italian
restaurant in Toronto, which the owner,
Aditya Jha, had generously provided for
the event.
I had the privilege of moderating a
panel of eminent business leaders,
mostly of South Asian origin, who
volunteered their time to provide
their perspectives and advice to the
students. The panelists included rep-
resentatives of business schools and
self-made entrepreneurs: Bob Dhillon,
president, Mainstreet Equity Corporation;
Professor Mitali De, associate dean,
Wilfrid Laurier School of Business and
Economics; Peter Sutherland, former
Canadian high commissioner to India;
Aditya Jha, president, Karma Candy; Hari
Panday, president, ICICI Wealth
Management; John Palumbo, executive
director, Schulich School of Business, York
University; Kasi Rao, consultant with sev-
eral Canadian universities; and Ajit Jain,
managing editor, Canada, of IndiaAbroad,
which organized the seminar.
As a professor at the Rotman School of
Management, I advise students on a daily
basis and I was curious to see how the panelists would deal with the burning questions that I know were on their mind.
The tension in the room was palpable.
The students had rolled the dice on a high-cost educational gamble: Spending tens of
thousands of dollars for a business education with no assurance of work at the other
end. The MBA is one of the most expensive
degrees one can take, and many had taken
out large loans to pay their tuition and living expenses and moved far from home.
Yet, the environment was far from
encouraging. Television, the Web and
news reports were screaming of economic
disaster and warning of job losses
throughout the economy. The students in
the room, like business students everywhere, were, to say the least, nervous.
The panelists, with the benefit of experience and maturity, took the issue head-on.
Take the long view, was their advice: The
MBA is a wonderful investment in the
future, one that will give students skills for
a lifetime. While concerns about the job
market for MBAs were understandable,
the investment the students were making
could be expected to pay back many times
over — if one takes a longer-term perspective.
Yet, to take advantage of their investment, MBAs needed to be nimble, flexible
and conscientious. While the economic
news looked grim, there were still many
areas of opportunity. While the dynamic
economies of China and India were
expected to slow down, there was still a
great deal of momentum and, with that
momentum, opportunities.
The students were encouraged by one
panelist to “follow the money”: Not by
looking for the highest salary, but by looking to see where the greatest investments
in technology and jobs could provide them
with opportunities. Other panelists disagreed on this point: One suggested that
graduates should anticipate where the
money was going to be, rather than go
where the money is now; others felt that
Canada remained a good place to make
money — but all emphasized the importance of building a career over time, rather
than looking for the short term financial
‘score’.
Panelists acknowledged that, in the short
term, MBAs may not get exactly the job
they want when they emerge from their
studies. It was likely, one panelist suggested, that they would have to take a lower
salary to begin with than they might be
hoping for. But the skills they were learning in their degree program would serve
them well.
What specific skills? Interestingly, many
of the skills panelists emphasized are not
usually mentioned on the MBA curricu-
lum: Hard work, focus, ingenuity, risk tak-
ing. These are real-world skills that MBA
students learn these through the project
work they do and through the pressure of
meeting deadlines.
Professor David Dunne teaches at the
Rotman School of Management,
University of Toronto.
