Whether a leader is born or made is a question as old as the question which came first the hen or the egg, and just like the latter, there is still no definite answer for the former question. What difference will an MBA make to a leader is also in lines of those. MBA is considered to be a degree which creates leaders and inculcates leadership qualities.
To get a better perspective about MBA and non- MBA leadership, let’s look at a study conducted by Jung and Shin which analyzed data regarding 640 large U.S.A. corporations and 2031 CEOs heading them. This study has considered data from 1985 to 2015. The results of the study are very interesting.
According to the study in the 1980s only 20% of the CEOs of the large corporations were MBA graduates. Well, it is an obvious conclusion to make that those figures would have gone up in the subsequent year. However, the improvement may not be that drastic as we might expect it to be. The percentage of the CEOs with an MBA has grown to 33% in the 1990s and remained decently at that percentage in the next decades.
These figures are vital to prove the fact that MBA may not actually be a commandment of success and leadership in business institutions. With only 33% of CEOs holding an MBA degree, they are certainly many more who have driven their careers in other ways.
Though it is not practically possible to clearly identify and quantify the impact of an MBA on a leader, let’s try to deduce and understand the key areas where an MBA would make a considerable difference and the difference between a leader with MBA and one without an MBA.
Let us look at the difference between leaders with an MBA and without an MBA through a few critical aspects of organizational leadership.
- Numbers versus People: An MBA necessarily builds and nurtures various managerial and technical skills which are very useful in making well-informed and well-rounded long term and short term decisions for the business. Especially in today’s world analytics is widely used to make business decisions at every level of the business.
Whereas, non-MBA leaders who are not necessarily systematically trained to used numbers and analytics, might focus on the human aspects of the business too and may trust more in people than just in numbers and trends.
- Education versus Experience: MBA provides specialized management skills in various areas with the advent of customized and diversified MBA specializations. Candidates are able to learn about the specific industry and its special management patterns in their curriculum. This focused learning helps MBA students to identify problems and take decisions which are unique and innovative to the industry and the situation they are faced.
Whereas, leaders who lack this specialized management training would have to depend more on their experience and team work in managing day to day operations and making crucial decisions. They would understand the business and bigger picture of the organization through their own or others experiences.
At the end of the day, the attitude, vision, decision making and interpersonal skills of the leader are crucial to his/her leadership. An MBA is beneficial to an extent, where it automatically opens up many avenues, the degree is widely recognized and would definitely carry out weightage in career progression, However, we also have ample examples to prove that MBA is not the only road to business leadership and many good business leaders without an MBA degree have been instrumental in discovering new ways of doing business.