<p>Hi!</p>
<p>I'm currently a freshman studying Computer Science at Caltech and I was thinking about what I may want to do in the future when the idea of going to business school sort of popped into my mind. I'm not sure if that's what I truly want to do (or if it's just the hype around the idea) or if it will even be beneficial for my career path. I'm hoping someone here can help me with that!</p>
<p>To give you a bit of background about myself, I have had two (albeit small) startups of my own: </p>
<ul>
<li>A non-profit organization that assisted people with disabilities in my community</li>
<li>A small business that assisted other small business with developing an online presence (e.g. creating websites, Yelp pages, Facebook pages) for them. </li>
</ul>
<p>Outside of academics now, I attend and organize hackathons across the nation. (If you don't know what a hackathon is, here's some more information: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackathon">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackathon</a>.) While attending hackathons, my teammates and I come up with product ideas, develop said products within the 24 or 36 hour deadline, and attempt to "sell" the idea to judges based on its use for society and technical difficulty. Organizing hackathons involves reaching out to companies for corporate sponsorships (hackathons are usually free for participants) and managing event logistics. In school, I'm a member of the Entrepreneurship Club at Caltech. I hope to be able to work on a technology-based startup in the near future.</p>
<p>Beyond this, I don't have a clear idea of what I want to do. Management positions at consulting firms sound interesting (but I only have a vague idea of what these jobs entail). I would love to eventually found and run my own company.</p>
<p>My questions to you: Should I think about pursuing an MBA? What would some of the benefits of this be? If it is a good idea for me to think about pursuing an MBA, what are some things I should keep in mind while pursuing my undergraduate degree? Any other advice?</p>
<p>Thank you for your help! I really appreciate it.</p>
<p>As I see it, technology is going to do very well in the foreseeable future. Having a degree from Caltech will open many doors for you, not only in the technology world but also on the business side being in management consulting and a quantitative member in investment management.</p>
<p>However, I suggest you stay the course in technology, better to work at a larger corporation for your first job, stay a few years, learn everything you can and then you will be ready to join a smaller or a start up company.</p>
<p>MBA may not be necessary for you. People mostly do an MBA when they want to change career or if their career has stalled or if they attended a non-elite undergrad and needed an elite MBA to advance in their career so they attend a top MBA to get better recruiting though the career office.</p>
<p>If you feel an MBA is necessary down the road, you can even attend an Executive MBA program during the weekends then you wouldn’t have to take 2 years off. Most of the top MBA programs don’t have part time programs.
I would suggest taking some basic business and finance classes at Caltech. </p>
<p>Thanks for the advice cbreeze! I’ll definitely check out some of our business/finance classes. </p>
<p>Make sure you keep your grades up. A good GPA from Caltech in CS will open a lot of doors.</p>
<p>Thanks CHD2013! We’ve been on Pass-Fail lately (required for first two quarters) so I’ll definitely be focusing on grades this upcoming quarter.</p>
<p>MBAs are good for people in your situation. If you are not sure where you think your career might end up, it’s better to have general academic resume. A broader, more general education would be better for you in my opinion (and not considering you have a lot of time to think, plan, change your mind before you have to decide). MBA gives you a good overview of the core business disciplines relevant to all companies regardless of sector + managerial decision-making tools. You might lack that education as a computer scientist? Given you have a technical non-business undergraduate degree in the works, I think MBA would be a perfect compliment and broaden your career options.</p>
<p>Given your technical proficiency as a Caltech student and CS major, I would likely lean towards pursuing a masters in engineering management (nicknamed the “engineer’s MBA”) over an MBA.</p>
<p>I see you as an engineer managing other engineers.</p>
<p>At least, that is my plan as someone who came from MIT and is currently doing masters at Johns Hopkins.</p>