<p>I think that if your pursuing a business major as a undergraduate its more important to look around you and see the college your graduating from and if it isn't a top school, a top 30 or less than I think that working to gain expereince in the hopes for a MBA is not as worthwhile as getting a masters and then gaining experience. </p>
<p>I think that you have to assess your ability to get into business school and see whether or not your going to get into a good program, because a mba from a mediocre school is a waste of money.</p>
<p>Do you want to be stuck with a bachlors and a mediocre MBA?</p>
<p>When you graduate from Undergrad, if your comming out of columbia or NYU or an ivy etc.... then you have a good chance for getting accepted into a worthwhile mba program.</p>
<p>I dont feel like its wise to work for experience when instead you could be getting a graduate degree if your not comming from a good school.</p>
if it isn't a top school, a top 30 or less than I think that working to gain expereince in the hopes for a MBA is not as worthwhile as getting a masters and then gaining experience.
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Well, the reason your working experience is not going to be as easy to obtain as someone coming out from a top 20 school is that big name firms and corporations don't recruit out of those schools.</p>
<p>If you want comparable working experience to someone coming from an Ivy-level school, then you're going to have to maximize your opportunities. Double major and get great internships.</p>
<p>First of all, even people who graduate from Ivy League schools still go out and work before going to business school. Don't think just because someone has a degree from Yale or Princeton that they can just bypass the system and go right to the MBA.</p>
<p>And there are a lot of people who didn't go to top 30 schools that go to top 10 MBA programs. I don't agree with most of what you're saying.</p>
<p>So unless you have a high Gpa and gmat and your comming out of a good top 20 undergrad school, you shouldnt even be thinking of wasting your time to get a mba but to instead get a Masters in another field that can help you further your career.</p>
<p>If you want an MBA from a top school, you had better plan on getting some solid work experience. Just as an example, here are some statistics (I apologize because I know this is redundant of my last post on another thread) from the Wharton MBA class of 2005:</p>
<p>Average age at matriculation: 29
Average years of work experience: 7</p>
<p>There's an explanation to the common stats of MBA students that's often overlooked. One of the most identifiable measures of the prestige of a b-school is the placement/starting salary of its MBA graduates. When companies pay +100K plus bonuses to MBA students, it's usually because these students had great prior work experience and also attended a top b-school. There's a good chance that companies will not pay MBA students from top b-schools +100K if they don't have any full-time work experience. MBA grads with no work experience from top b-schools are often placed in positions lower than other MBA grads who have solid work experience. Some MBA grads with no work experience are even placed in positions similar to the entry level analyst positions that recent undergrads fill. However, they usually follow an accelerated track.</p>
<p>The point is that top b-schools are aware of this occurence, so it makes much more sense to accept applicants who have great work experience and will potentially attract a high starting salary. This is not to say that top b-schools completely ignore applicants with no work experience. Top b-schools will sometimes accept people with no work experience, but these people usually accomplished a great deal during their undergrad years. They may have run their own business as an undergrad or was the leader of organizations/efforts that actually had a great deal of impact.</p>
<p>So the basic idea after graduating is to find jobs where you can build up solid work experience. This doesn't necessarily mean you have to work at an ibank, consulting firm, or Fortune 500 company (although it does help a lot). It's mostly important to get a job where you can excel, make an impact, and build up leadership skills. To get a better idea, check out the profiles of MBA students at top b-schools: </p>
<p>I'm sorry, but being completely honest, I would much rather get my MBA from a school that requires work experience for ALL of its students than attend somewhere that half the students have never experienced the "real world". To me that type of MBA would not provide all the networking, and actual situational discussions that an MBA should. I would feel cheated if I were to be in an MBA class and began discussing the big dillemma I was facing as a project manager at work, and the response I got was..."one time I read, in a textbook..."</p>