<p>I don’t believe MBA is worth only to redirect career, meaning changing the industry (if the above poster means “redirecting career” as in “moving into the business side of the same industry”, then s/he is correct. If you want to finish your career as an engineer, the value of MBA is negligible. </p>
<p>I am in high tech. Engineers rule, and many engineers move up in the management chain. However, if smart engineers also get a good MBA degree along the way, they are on an excellent path to blossom into the management/senior level executive path in the high tech industry. Undergrad technical degree combined with a high powder MBA is an elite course for senior executive career path in the high tech industry. Or, the candidate can go and join the VC firm or a consulting firm: dealing with the same industry as a subject matter/industry expert but with added business insight. This is very good.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, company sponsored MBA does not mean that the employee will be an indentured slave to that company. Often, they require X years of staying with the company after the program is over, and if not, they require the employee pay back all/part of the expense. In my case, there was no such stipulation, and I left the company within a year. In some cases, I have seen the company who wanted to recruit the candidate with that kind of obligation giving sign up bonuses that were meant to cover the pay back to the former employers who paid for the MBA education. </p>
<p>For the OP’s daughter, I cannot recommend strongly enough that she first launch her career in the tech field for a few years. Both to get into the top MBA program, and also to get the maximum bang for the bucks for the MBA. Employers really value engineers with real life work experience that is further fortified with business insight through MBA degree. If she get an MBA right after a undergraduate degree, she loses firepower both of her undergraduate tech degree (because she did not validate her education with real work experience) AND the MBA degree (since that business education has no real industry context to make it applicable). </p>
<p>If I were to hire a business manager in my high tech industry and see two resumes: one with only a tech degree with a few years of work experience and the other with MBA immediately following a tech under grad degree with no real work experience, I would go for the former since the latter is neither here nor there.</p>