Yet another MBA crazy guy

When I look around in office, over 95% of my colleagues are MBA's. I have still to enrol for this so called "transformational" course. I dunno if I will or will destinity choose another/equivalent something or just keep me a plain engineer. People around me represent a significant randomand large sample of different MBA grads and thhis has given me some notional insights into some real life differentiators among these guys.

Most of my colllegues fall into the largest pool of Indian urban population who swear by the following

• I need to do am MBA after graduation or I will not get a decent job
  
• It is criminal to waste a year trying to look for a job or prepare for an entrance exam again so, let me take admission to which-ever college in get into

Then there is the next lot of guys who managed to get placed with Rs. 10,000-22,000 salaries and they suddenly get bold and speak the language of the Americans that "It is better to get some work experience before an MBA as a person can relate better to what is taught". Make no mistake almost 99.99% of this set have taken CAT (Common Admission Test) and would not even think twice before duming their job should an admit from the hallowed IIM's came calling. A major portion of this population are the IT techies. Many newly turned professionals from this category become tremendously depressed after two years of coding, testing or allied IT jobs and move to the first group of "Let me take what-ever I get" category. I have personnaly met 2 yr experienced techies who compromised on a systems specialization because a Finance specialization was not granted to him.

The last category of individuals are those who have either made steady career progressions in the first two years of their work life or are comfortable settled in their current job. Most of these guys/gals fall into the 25-28 yrs category and are constantly pushed by friends, family and wel-wishers to complete their studies and get married. These people mostly represent personnels from banking, KPO's, investment research houses, SAP consulting, and like. The focus for this group shifts from Indian B-schools to U.S or U.K schools. The invincibility of IIM's seems foolish to this group as they start finding faults with a system which admits over 60% freshers and almost negligeable foreign nationals. Also the aura of a Wharton, London Business School, INSEAD and like seem within some reach. In my opinion, this group is the most suited as well as the most likely benefitiary of the MBA program due to their experience of atleast 2-3 years.

Coming back to some particular traits of people from different business school, my observations are as follows.

• Third and lower rung business schools in India do not really impart that much needed business education. Most of us would agree that a top notch engineering grad from India (IIT's, DCE, NSIT, VJTI, Jadavpur, Anna univ, PICT Pune, COEP Pune, SPCE Mumbai, etc) can match and even exceed the quality of the MBA grads
• People from the second rung schools (India, US included) like SIBM, Thunderbird, IMT, IIT MBA's, etc turn out a good show but occasionally turn out disastrous output. Many individuals from this group, get bogged down by competition and office politics.
• Top notch MBA grads (IIM's, Carnegie mellon, Wharton) show a rare combination of studiousness and "me know all the answer" attitude. I have observed these guys to get tremendously offended if any remarks regarding their capability is made. But, MBA or not MBA even these guys need atleat 6 months of warming up before showing their true potential.