Know-How Exchange : Career/Training

Don't (yet) focus on the degrees. Do informational interviews with people doing the type of work you're interested, and ask them your question. Each company hires differently and hearing tips "from the inside" will be immensely valuable (and you may even get an opportunity for an internship, even before/if you decide to try going back to school).

Dear Suhridk

The qualification one has, or that one obtains, is merely that: a qualification. With five years under your belt you are way more qualified than you may realize.

I'll wager that in your first six months of full time work you learned more than you did during your entire degree course. What did this teach you?

Probably that it's how you'll apply the things you've learned that will be of greater benefit to you in the long term, not the piece of paper you might have earned at college.

Many incredibly successful people in the world of marketing lack an MBA. In fact, they might lack any kind of advanced degree. And although many minds reading this might be sharper than those who might appear to be less well educated than someone with an MBA, and therefore more familiar with the deeper formulas, impenetrable algebra, and the more complex theories of economic supply, it's their thinking and ideas that have got them where they are today, not the qualifications they've acquired along the way.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't apply for a masters program if that's your true calling. But what I am advocating is that you slow down a little and take more time in figuring out just what it is that you want out of your life and your career.

I appreciate how much of a hurry you might be in, but if you're in your late twenties (I'm thinking you're probably 28), six to twelve months spent reviewing, planning, and truly figuring out what you want to do now—which is all essential career reconnaissance— time invested NOW will stand you in far greater stead than making what might be, for you, instant, snap decisions.

You say you're worried that you're being naive in assuming that you do not need to know the breadth that the MBA offers. The only way you can answer this question (and it must be you that answers it because you must be the one to live with your decision), is, as Jay advises, to talk to other people whose footsteps you intend to follow in.

It's an awful cliché I know, but clichés become such because they are rooted in truth, that the best "school" for you might be that of hard knocks and harder work.

You might find you'll gain the best of both worlds if you opt to do your Masters while working full time, thereby giving you the chance to apply what you're learning while you're learning it.

You might also have the option of changing from one masters program to another if you find you've made the less desirable choice (but be sure to check each program's credit transfer rules) if the one you choose does not fit your expectations, or ... and don't take this the wrong way ... or if you find or are informed that your current levels of skill, ability, and maturity indicate that you're not quite ready to make the move to a masters program.

By this I'm advising that although you may believe you are ready for
a masters, your professors might think or believe otherwise.

A master's program is a huge amount of work to take on and generally, maturer students do astonishingly well (far better than graduates that have gone directly from undergraduate classes and straight into post grad work with no break, with no real experience of the outside world), so I'm sure your five years in the "real world" will set you in good stead.

You'd do well to contact as many companies and schools as possible
and ask straight forward, no BS questions as to what they offer, what they expect, and what they advise and then decide on your options, outcomes, and career prospects from there.

The more ammunition you can gather now, the better. I hope this opinion has helped and I regret that there are no easy answers.

Fourteen years ago, a Bulgarian mountain guide taught me that to reach the peak, one has to tread one's own path, that one must stop looking
at the peak ... for there are many, many false peaks along the way.

He went on to say that the secret to getting to the top is to take one
step at a time, and to breathe (or act) normally.

I wish there was an easier answer. Alas, I don't think there is.

Good luck to you.

Gary Bloomer
Wilmington, DE, USA

Given the binary choice you've defined for us, I'd go for the MBA. You will probably find that product management taps into just about every discipline covered in most good MBA programs.

The things you don't like as much (e.g., accounting, finance, etc.) are critically important to a successful product manager. In fact, they are what set the really good product managers apart from the wanna-be good product managers.

I'm not saying I recommend getting a master's degree. I'm simply reacting to the "which is better" question you asked.

Good luck.