<p>Can someone share what their experiences have been and if they share/d a simalar situation. I am going to a university, not sure which one yet, I am still desiding. I am thinking of majoring in business w/ an emphasis on management or finance. I just graduated high school and havent had any real experience or have been exposed to either of these subjects or business in general. I dont know if I would love this major, or if I would hate it because it would be too hard and not hold my interest. But I dont want to end up in this major and find out that I hate. I feel that as i get into it more, I will like it more. I have been an A and B student through high school if that means anything. Has anyone gone into a business major being iffy about and either ended up loving it, working their butt off, but enjoying it. Or have they had to change their majors because they found it not fit for them. Thanks!</p>
<p>For what it's worth, I see a lot of kids go in and out of Wharton. Some kids transfer in, others transfer out...my friend transferred in then right back out...</p>
<p>For the most part, they are less happy with their majors than their peers doing liberal arts majors. They console themselves with making more money upon graduation, but it's not a trade-off I'd want to make.</p>
<p>Without courses in history, or the great books, or other courses that enrich the minds and souls of those who take them, the b-school kids are on the whole less cultured and less interesting to talk to.</p>
<p>Business should not be an end in and of itself. It should be a means to an end for something about which you have real passion. Do liberal arts, find your passion, and if business helps your passion, go get an MBA later.</p>
<p>The real justification for a business major is usually that you can get a well-paying banking job or what have you right after graduating.</p>
<p>But since you can still get a job doing banking/finance without a business major, I can't think of a good reason to major in business.</p>
<p>In short, you can major in business to be TRAINED
Or you can major in something else to be EDUCATED</p>
<p>Bagels, I'm not sure where your hatred for business majors is coming from (ie. some strange personal insecurity from being a UPenn student and not in Wharton), but you need to chill out.</p>
<p>A business major is just like any major. Some will like it, some will not. I personally liked econ and statistics in high school, and wanted to take courses that used these ideas in the context of real-world applications. I also was very interested in finance and wanted to learn more about the subject. I've been a business major for two years, and I'm enjoying it. </p>
<p>If you only major in business because you think it will get you a better job, and not because you are genuinely interested in the material, you probably won't enjoy it. As a major with high average starting salaries, naturally it will get a disproportionate number of people who choose it as their major for the wrong reasons -- thus decreasing the average satisfaction of the student body. That being said, the majority of people in business school, at least at my school, are happy being a business major.</p>
<p>As for being less interesting to talk to, that is your opinion bagels. I personally would be more interested in talking with someone about current events or the markets than something that happened 1000 years ago or in a piece of fiction. The extent to which a person is interesting to talk to is dependent on the individual making the judgment. </p>
<p>You are also assuming that business majors don't take any classes in the liberal arts. I can't speak for all schools, but for mine, and many of the other top business schools, business majors take almost half their courses in the liberal arts. As a business major, I still enjoy courses such as philosophy and psychology and might end up getting minors in them. </p>
<p>And to say business classes do nothing but train students for their jobs is just plain wrong. It is education, and just because it can sometimes instill more relevant knowledge for what you do after college, does not take away that distinction. To say that the label of education should be removed from anything taught within the context of how it could be applied in the real world is just foolish.</p>
<p>I never understood the point of an undergraduate degree in business (nor did I ever really understand the point of an MBA). Following on from someone's previous comment, nether of these things will give you an education, just some training. To succeed in business requires skills and qualities that can't be taught in a classroom and most of what they do teach is either common sense or the sort of thing any intelligent person can pick up quickly on their own (e.g. financial lingo and how to read a balance sheet). </p>
<p>Case in point, most of the major consulting firms (supposedly home to some of the best business minds in the country, otherwise companies wouldn't pay mega bucks for their services) now often hire more people trained in the sciences and engineering than they do with 'business' degrees. Why? Well, these firms generally cite the need for raw problem solving and brute intelligence to tackle tough challenges and, not to be blunt but it's probably true, that you're average PhD scientist has more brains than your average business school graduate. They can teach any intelligent person everything that they would have needed to know from 'business school' in a few weeks of training... considering that I don't quite understand what one does during 4 years of biz undergrad and 2 years of MBA?</p>
<p>To suggest that all is taught in business school is common sense, financial vocabulary, and day 1 of accounting 101, makes it clear you have no idea what a BBA or MBA actually entails. The main theme for BBA's and MBA's is learning how to solve business problems. </p>
<p>The top three consulting firms (M/B/B) are some of the most common destinations for BBA and MBA grads at top programs . And if a business degree was so useless, why would these three companies dish out massive amounts of money to pay for their young employees to get MBA's?</p>
<p>But don't ask me, go look and see how many people at the top consulting firms have MBAs. I'm done trying to deal with people making arguments about something for which they know nothing.</p>
<p>Tell that to all the MBA's hired by Bain etc. They probably outnumber science majors 5:1. It takes over a 700 on the GMAT to get into a good MBA program. Give it a shot and tell us how easy it is to do that.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Case in point, most of the major consulting firms (supposedly home to some of the best business minds in the country, otherwise companies wouldn't pay mega bucks for their services) now often hire more people trained in the sciences and engineering than they do with 'business' degrees.
[/quote]
Uhhh... if by "major" consulting firms you're referring to McKinsey, Bain, or BCG, you're just plain wrong. MBAs (especially from the top schools) dominate those firms by far. Even more so at the likes of smaller but stellar strategy consultng forms like Oliver Wyman, Parthenon, Monitor, Marakon, LEK, etc. Makes me wonder if you actually know what you're talking about or just pulling data out.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Why? Well, these firms generally cite the need for raw problem solving and brute intelligence to tackle tough challenges and, not to be blunt but it's probably true, that you're average PhD scientist has more brains than your average business school graduate.
[/quote]
PhDs are hired to provide industry expertise and to act as subject matter experts -- not because they necessarily have more "brute intelligence."</p>
<p>
[quote]
They can teach any intelligent person everything that they would have needed to know from 'business school' in a few weeks of training
[/quote]
Really? Since when has intellect equated to an ability to teach and communicate effectively?
Have you ever been to college? Ever encounter a professor who knew his stuff but couldn't teach?</p>
<p>Look comments re the pointlessness of MBAs and biz degrees was my opinion... I'm entitled to mine you're entitled to yours. Yes, those firms you cite do hire a lot of MBAs, but they're also hiring a lot of non-MBAs (in some cases at least half of their yearly intake of new hires if not much more). And no, they're not just hiring them solely as experts in their field, they're hiring them to perform at the same level as the MBAs (after some additional training to teach what one would learn in biz school). </p>
<p>I certainly stick to the comments that have been made previously... if you want some training then study business if you want a proper education then study a proper subject. I know plenty of people who have led fantastically successful business careers who've never set foot in an MBA course or undergrad biz course. I'd argue that those from other backgrounds are better rounded and, with a bit of supplemental training to learn the basics, are just as if not more likely to succeed than someone who's spent 6-7 years in 'business BA and MBA.' </p>
<p>If someone has a proper degree and then does an MBA for some additional training (if they think it will help in their career) then I don't have a problem with that so much... but an undergraduate degree in business? Totally pointless!</p>
<p>Anyway, just my opinion.</p>
<p>to the OP, major in business if that's what you want. Majors are not set in stone! I think many college students ends up changing their major once or twice anyway. Not all, to be sure, but its common. So if you like it you're on the right track, if not you'll switch to something else. This is assuming, of course, you're not going to a college that only offers business degrees.</p>
<p>You should start learning more about these careers right away, though. There's plenty of material online and at your library that talk about what people do in various careers. I have to say it seems quite premature to plan on majoring in something when you don't know jack about it. It's like someone saying "I'm going to be an engineer" without knowing much about the training or what the job entails. Maybe they'll like it, maybe they won't. But you only get 1 shot to go thru college; its worth spending a few nites or weeks reading up and finding out more before you start making firm plans.
[quote]
I personally would be more interested in talking with someone about current events or the markets than something that happened 1000 years ago or in a piece of fiction.
[/quote]
Well, preferences differ I suppose. But to understand current events you have to know history, including the things that happened 1000 years (or more) ago. The Middle East, for example, was conquered by Alexander the Great before the time of Christ, was a Roman province, and fought a series of wars with the West about 9 centuries back (that unpleasantness called the Crusades). Don't you think that has just a little influence on events of today?</p>
<p>Yes it shows the people in the Middle East need to get over things that happened 1000 years ago and get with the 21st Century and start updating some of their backward laws and customs.</p>
<p><a href="after%20some%20additional%20training%20to%20teach%20what%20one%20would%20learn%20in%20biz%20school">quote</a>
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</p>
<p>Are you implying that everything an MBA learns is taught on the job? Why don't you ask someone who has actually gotten an MBA if that is true. </p>
<p>
[quote]
If someone has a proper degree and then does an MBA for some additional training (if they think it will help in their career) then I don't have a problem with that so much... but an undergraduate degree in business? Totally pointless!</p>
<p>Anyway, just my opinion.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>See the difference between your opinion and mine, is that I actually know what a business degree entails, and you don't. So when we are talking about a business degree, which opinion carries more weight? As for counting the number of MBA's in consulting, that's not a opinion, that's a fact. </p>
<p>And "proper" major? Please. Go through the course descriptions at a top business school and get back to me on that. You'd pretty much have to call econ, math, and statistics "non-proper" majors as well. So what is your idea of a proper major, courses purely focusing on theory and never application? You probably aren't in college yet, and let me break it to you, there are a wealth of upper-level courses in those three departments that practically mirror business school courses.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The Middle East, for example, was conquered by Alexander the Great before the time of Christ, was a Roman province, and fought a series of wars with the West about 9 centuries back (that unpleasantness called the Crusades). Don't you think that has just a little influence on events of today?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Yep, but not nearly as much as western involvement in the area post-WWII. Most people don't carry grudges that long unless they are given reason to perpetuate them. While things that happened 1000 years ago can be applied to today, the fact of the matter is that usually they aren't necessary in understanding and discussing current events. Regardless, my point was that not everyone finds the same conversations interesting. So the extent to which an individual is "interesting to talk to" is always subjective. </p>
<p>
[quote]
You should start learning more about these careers right away, though. There's plenty of material online and at your library that talk about what people do in various careers. I have to say it seems quite premature to plan on majoring in something when you don't know jack about it. It's like someone saying "I'm going to be an engineer" without knowing much about the training or what the job entails. Maybe they'll like it, maybe they won't. But you only get 1 shot to go thru college; its worth spending a few nites or weeks reading up and finding out more before you start making firm plans.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Couldn't agree with you more on this. To the OP, you should definitely heed this advice.</p>
<p>Undergraduate Business Major=Wharton
Undergraduate Economics Major=Harvard, Yale, Princeton
All Roads Lead to Wall Street and Finance Industry.</p>
<p>This is only my opinion derived from what I have heard. While some may feel that the economics and business major of the colleges I have chosen are not as strong {I will be surprised of course} {There is UChicago and etc}, these are the best with on-campus recruiting and academic excellence recognition!</p>
<p>I love how any philosophical differences I must have with an undergraduate business education are attributed to somehow being insecure with my being in Penn's liberal arts school instead of its business school. That's classy.</p>
<p>For the record, I feel that an MBA is useful, and I'm probably going to get one myself. But there is no way I would want to spend my undergraduate years looking at spreadsheets and Starbucks case studies in lieu of all I have learned in history, rhetoric, philosophy--the arts and sciences--that enrich my life and make me a better citizen and human being. I think it's a pity other people think investment banking is more enriching than that.</p>
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I love how any philosophical differences I must have with an undergraduate business education are attributed to somehow being insecure with my being in Penn's liberal arts school instead of its business school. That's classy.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Who are you kidding, calling that previous post a mere philosophical difference. Thats like saying "people in the ivies are all snobs" (which they aren't) is a philosophical difference. </p>
<p>
[quote]
But there is no way I would want to spend my undergraduate years looking at spreadsheets and Starbucks case studies in lieu of all I have learned in history, rhetoric, philosophy--the arts and sciences--that enrich my life and make me a better citizen and human being.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>A better human being? You probably also think math majors are worse human beings as well. For all of you people not yet in college, it is sad but you are going to always find people like this who happen to take less marketable majors and thus have the need to justify themselves with stupid statements such as "it makes me a better human being".</p>
<p>I want to make this one thing clear: there is no "best" major in college. Study what you are interested in, and let the chips fall where they may.</p>
<p>
[quote]
For the most part, they are less happy withtheir majors than their peers doing liberal arts majors. They console themselves with making more money upon graduation, but it's not a trade-off I'd want to make.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Correlation is not causation. I would venture to say that perhaps unhappy people tend to major in business (because, like you said, at least they can console themselves with money), but if they were to major in the liberal arts, they would still be unhappy. In other words, the business major does not cause the unhappiness. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Without courses in history, or the great books, or other courses that enrich the minds and souls of those who take them, the b-school kids are on the whole less cultured and less interesting to talk to.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
In short, you can major in business to be TRAINED
Or you can major in something else to be EDUCATED
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
I never understood the point of an undergraduate degree in business (nor did I ever really understand the point of an MBA). Following on from someone's previous comment, nether of these things will give you an education, just some training. To succeed in business requires skills and qualities that can't be taught in a classroom and most of what they do teach is either common sense or the sort of thing any intelligent person can pick up quickly on their own (e.g. financial lingo and how to read a balance sheet).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Look, it's one thing to say that a business education has room for improvement and could stand to be broader. That I can heartily agree with.</p>
<p>But it is quite another to assert that other majors provide a better education. Let's face it. Plenty of other majors don't exactly provide the broadest education either. They may provide training, but not so much an education.</p>
<p>As a case in point, it was pointed out that business students don't read the 'Great Books' or otherwise don't take courses that provide cultural knowledge. Well, the truth of the matter is, plenty of other students in other majors don't do that either. Take engineering as an example. I know a guy who got his bachelor's, master's, and PhD in engineering, all at elite US engineering schools, who admits that he has never read a single work of Shakespeare. Not even one. The reason is simple. He's not an American citizen. He went to high school in another country (and hence never had to read Shakespeare there). He came to the US for undergrad, and he's stayed in the country ever since. But nowhere in his engineering studies was he ever required to read Shakespeare. As a result, he never did. In fact, by his own admission he's had very little broad cultural education whatsoever (at least, in Anglo-Saxon culture, for he obviously knows his own culture well).
Nevertheless, he now has degrees from some of the most elite schools in the country and will probably end up placing as a professor at a top engineering school. He may end up with an illustrious academic career and still have never read any Shakespeare or other Great Books. </p>
<p>I've also noted the quote "To succeed in business requires skills and qualities that can't be taught in a classroom". Well, that's a completely biased charge, for the fact of the matter is, to succeed in any*field requires skills and qualities that can't be taught in the classroom. Again, to take engineering as an example, just because you have an elite engineering degree doesn't mean that you know everything that you need to enjoy a successful engineering career. Engineering is arguably the *most pre-professional degree of all, and yet many new engineers in the workforce will freely concede that there are many things that they did not learn in school that they need to do their jobs. The problem is even more acute when it comes to less pre-professional degrees. For example, just because you have a bachelor's in history does not mean that you now know how to be a professional historian. Similarly, just because you have a BA in political science does not mean that you know how to be a professional political scientist. Hence, I don't see why the undergraduate business degree is being singled out. </p>
<p>Again, it's one thing to assert that undergrad business degree could be improved. That I can get onboard with. But to say that other majors somehow provide a better or more useful education is a dubious charge. Let's be perfectly honest. ** Many (probably most) other majors aren't that good either** when it comes to actually providing broad educations that will teach you what you actually need to know in the real world. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Case in point, most of the major consulting firms (supposedly home to some of the best business minds in the country, otherwise companies wouldn't pay mega bucks for their services) now often hire more people trained in the sciences and engineering than they do with 'business' degrees.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>If what you are talking about are undergraduate business degrees, then the explanation is simple. The top consulting firms tend to recruit at top schools, and relatively few top schools offer undergrad business programs. And even so, clearly there are often times more science +engineering grads in total than there are undergrad business students. </p>
<p>For example, at MIT, there are more undergrads in just one engineering major alone (EECS) than there are in the Sloan School. And that's just one engineering major. If you add up all of the rest of the engineers and scientists, then clearly you will have a highly lopsided ratio. I therefore would not be surprised to find consulting firms hiring more MIT science/engineering students than Sloan students simply because there are so many more of the former, but not because they necessarily think those students are smarter or better. </p>
<p>Now, if you are talking about the MBA program vs. the PhD programs in science/engineering, then your statement is clearly off-base. MBA grads vastly exceed the number of science/eng PhDs who are hired into consulting. Again, to take MIT as an example, something like 250 new Sloan MBA's will enter consulting every year (hence, about 1/3 of the graduating MBA class). You would be hard-pressed indeed to find 250 newly graduated MIT science/eng PhD's who enter consulting every year. After all, MIT only confers about 500 PhD's a year in total, and not all of them are in science/eng: some are Sloan PhD's, some are PhD's from the MIT Media Lab, some are PhD's in poli sci, architecture, urban planning, etc. </p>
<p>In other words, for the numbers to be even equal, more than half of the MIT science/engineering PhD's would have to be entering consulting. How reasonable do you think that is? Be honest. </p>
<p>And that's MIT we're talking about. MIT is obviously a deeply science/engineering oriented school. Its business school is also relatively small. Consider what happens at Harvard, a school with a behemoth business school and whose PhD's span the gamut of all of the humanities. If even at MIT, the number of sci/eng PhD's who enter consulting does not exceed the number of MIT MBA's going to consulting, one can only imagine what the numbers will be for Harvard. Heck, I would guess that the number of just the Harvard MBA's who enter consulting all by itself exceeds the total number of newly minted Harvard sci/eng PhD's (whether they went to consulting or not). I don't think that should be terribly surprising, after all, Harvard's engineering program is quite small and Harvard's science programs, while significantly sized, do not compare to the vast size of HBS. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I know plenty of people who have led fantastically successful business careers who've never set foot in an MBA course or undergrad biz course.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>And similarly, many of the most successful people in the computer industry not only don't have CS or EE degrees, but many of them didn't even graduate from college at all (and in a few cases, didn't even graduate from high school). We can talk about the supremely successful computer entrepreneurs such as Gates, Allen, Jobs, Wozniak, Dell, Ellison, etc. We can also talk about hard-core computer geeks such as Wayne Rosing, former VP of Engineering at Google and Director of Engineering at Apple, despite never having graduated from college. Or how about Janus Friis, lead developer of Kazaa and Skype, who never even graduated from high school. </p>
<p>Yet all of these guys have obviously enjoyed fantastically successful careers in the computer industry. Does it then follow that EE/CS is a worthless subject to study in college? It's the same logic. </p>
<p>Look, the fact is, there are plenty of people in the computer industry who have never taken a single formal computer class. They just taught themselves whatever they needed to know and were successful doing so. But that hardly means that computer classes don't have value.</p>
<p>So it comes back to my original question: why single out the business major?</p>
<p>Sakky, I think you are assuming business majors don't take courses in the arts and sciences. Most schools require business majors to take almost half their courses there, and spread it out between the humanities, social sciences, math, sciences, and languages. If it was any broader you would hardly be taking any business classes (which also cover a wide array of subjects). </p>
<p>Also, how useful a certain course of study is for the real world is dependent on what the person is going to do after college and the depth of study in the subjects relevant to that realm, not on the overall breadth of their studies. Now if we are talking about general development, you can make an argument for breadth -- it's going to cover more ways of thinking and strengthen areas of the brain you wouldn't use as much if you had only focused on the type of thinking you would be using after college.</p>
<p>This discussion of how "useful" a certain course of study is underscores the difference between business majors and most liberal arts majors: Business majors are largely pragmatists about education. You can argue they enjoy what they're studying (I do not doubt this at all), but considering the reasoning being leaned most heavily on here to justify them is their job placement and prospects,that seems fair.</p>
<p>As for liberal arts majors? Many, (though obviously I can't say most or all, considering their sheer volume and breadth, not to mention pre-med and pre-law tracks) see education as an end in itself. </p>
<p>To underscore this point I was going to make some references to Adam Smith and Weber, perhaps along with Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground. But then I realized that, as one of you said, they're just works of fiction or pieces of history. So obviously they have no bearing on today.</p>
<p>Yes, business majors do not pay attention to history or outside influences. Of course.</p>
<p>Sorry, the majority of business majors that I know have either double majored or minored in an outside field. Add in that among the people on this site, most get the majority of education from themselves. I have read Smith and 3-4 takes upon his works, and certainly haven't had a class that requires this. I have read many of Dostoevsky's works, but have only had Crime and Punishment required. I find that that form of 'culture' is something I can provide through electives and self motivation. And what of plays, music, and the like, only a few have required classes in these 'cultured' activities, however many people see them. Including many business men who keep theaters and orchestras alive through patronage and funds.</p>
<p>Sorry, business kids can be as cultured as any other group. Their discussions of the markets are certainly more applicable to conversations that number theory or quantum theory. So are the maths and sciences also useless? And foreign language - that is a skill, no added value as a person, even if it is percieved as one(and I am a spanish student).</p>
<p>I fail to understand the problem with a business major.</p>
<p>Most biz programs require the following classes outside biz</p>
<p>2 semesters written comm. and comm theory
1 lit class
2 advanced math
2 econ
foreign language-3 semesters
Psych
Ethnic studies
Philosophy
Humanities
2 semesters science</p>