I’ll just come right out and say it: the perceived value of an MBA is probably lower today than it has been at any time since universities starting offering the degree in the late 1800s.
I was catching up with an B-school professor friend of mine I’d met in school a few months ago. He was telling me about the newly-concluded summer session of classes and mentioned that he’d seen a major uptick in the number of student protesting when they got any grade other than “A”.
We discussed this for a time, considering the possible causes. Could it be a Gen Y/Millenial thing? Could it simply be the fact that the economy is bad and they don’t want to “slip up” by getting less than perfect grades, thus jeopardizing their ability to get quality employment? We supposed it could be both, plus maybe a few other factors unknown to us, and left it at that.
But a few weeks later, the conversation resurfaced in my mind, and I realized that these students are probably just naive. They actually think it’s worthwhile to protest getting a B in B-school. More significantly, they actually consider getting a grade to be an end rather than merely a means to an end.
Grades are little more than an imperfect measure of a student’s ability to go through the motions of learning – i.e., read articles, take tests, write papers, etc. [full disclosure: I got mostly A's, but I know a lot of people more successful than me who didn't.] Actual learning is something that typically requires doing these things, but is in fact a separate outcome.
So who does care about grades? Well, in an abstract, impersonal way, the school does – they have to measure you somehow, after all. Who else? Hopefully, the student. That’s it. No one else.
Why should the student care? Because their future success depends on it? No. They should care because getting to the real value of an MBA starts with handling the material, and that’s measured by grades. But that’s not the endgame; it’s only the first step. The whole value proposition might look something like this:
H + A + R + D = Real Value
Where:
H = Handling the material
Attending class, reading the assignments, taking tests, writing papers, etc. – in other words, the stuff that affects your grade.
A = Absorbing it
Thinking, discussing, making connections with content from other classes, comparing and contrasting learnings with real-world experience, etc.
R = Retaining it
Holding enough of the material near enough to your consciousness to retrieve it when it’s needed.
D = Doing/using it
Applying what you’re learned in school to real-life work challenges in an appropriate and effective way.
The only reason to care about grades is they measure your ability to do H in the equation above. To get to D, the endgame, you also have to do A and R, which are difficult. A lot of students don’t get to D, because getting there is HARD. Thus the acronym.
So grades should really only matter to the students and the school. If you got a B, you should only care because of what getting a B says about your likely ability to also do A, R, and D down the road.
Your thoughts?
