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They say, you learn more from your mistakes. My 'gyan' on why one should do an MBA comes from my 'no gyan' when I decided to do it, or even when I did it!

Ask me and I would say don't do an MBA if you don't know what it means to you, if you don't know how it adds value to your self / career, if you think it's just a big bait to fish out a well paying job.

No, that's not it! Why do you think companies would want to hire MBAs? They want your ability to see the bigger picture in aspects concerning the company. They want you to analyze where they stand, what they are capable of, where they can get to, how soon they can get there, why certain things do not happen the way they should, and what is to be done to make them happen. In short, they want you to lead the way.

Now you may think that this is not a real world situation and all jobs don't throw this kind of experience.

Like, when I was handling retail banking operations in ICICI, I was responsible to handle teams that processed checks and opened accounts. I never saw the big picture when I started off. I was frustrated. Was that why I did an MBA? Slowly I realized, the catch was in visualizing the large scenario in smaller ones, and relate it to other scenarios, and then think from the company's point of view. It was fun, real fun, because then you started realizing that you, of course, could make a difference to your company. Then I knew why those case studies were a relevant part of my course!

You need to go in there with a perspective. Well, this applies to anything you do. But your ability to see the big picture is the very crux of this two year rigorous course. It's not just your content, but how you present it, how you can make people relate to it; not just about numbers, but how you apprehend them; not about selling products or services, but selling yourself.

Now what I just said may have many counter arguments. I myself can think of at least seven of them. But my point is not whether or not you should do an MBA, but if you are doing it, you better know why you should do so, and then do it well. And this again holds true for anything you do.

Concluded.

* Contributed by: -
Suvarna V. is an alumnus (Batch 2003-05) of Amrita School of Business, Coimbatore, and is currently working as Resource Manager in an IT Staffing Firm in USA.