Does Business School Equal CEO School?

When I think of business school and the MBA program, I always take a step back and say to myself, “what am I supposed to be learning here?” I have long been under the impression that obtaining an MBA is also accompanied by a plaque that reads “Master of the Universe.” Now while you may not receive a plaque, if you navigate B-school correctly, you will have the tools to be the master of a universe. Your own.

MBA Student vs. New CEO

 There are many similarities between being a newly minted CEO and being a full-time MBA student. There are definite differences, but the similarities lie in the day-to-day pace, time management skills, and workload.

During b-school, you will face the rigor of balancing your classes, daily networking events, graduate club luncheons, along with guest speakers and panel events, all while trying to find a job or launch your own venture. Mind you, that only covers your day schedule. Your evenings will be consumed with more networking events, happy hours (always fun and a necessary stress reliever), studying (can’t forget about that!), and finding time to process it all. If you can learn to run your life efficiently in the business school environment, then you are well on your way to understanding what it takes to be a C suite executive or run your own company.

Your First Year of Business School

 As a first year MBA student, you will be tested early and often. You will be bombarded with a ton of information. New things you learn will conflict with what you previously thought you knew.

Then, you have to mesh with your new cohort. Things move fast and you have to get up to speed while still hitting targets. The most valuable thing you can learn is how to filter though the noise. The life of a brand new CEO is very similar.

How? Taking the helm as the CEO of a company, you are faced with the task of assessing the business landscape, identifying the most critical issues that need to be addressed immediately and setting the stage for you to hit the company's performance benchmarks. As CEO, you may come in with your own agenda and initiatives that will change shape once you are in office. You may have to adjust your strategy due to changes in customer tastes or in the economic climate. However, you also have to be mindful of which events in the marketplace will affect your company and its strategy and what is just noise.

Assuming you make it past the first year, you now have the new challenges of the second year to tangle with.

Your Second Year of Business School

As a student you should now be up to speed with the flow of classes and the culture of business school. You will probably have new agendas and new initiatives. Looking for a job or securing funding for your startup is now a top priority. You will also have more of an opportunity to set the pace by choosing a concentration and electives in areas of interest. This can be just as stressful, if not more, as you have less room for error than you did in your first year.

 One of the more challenging dynamics is dealing with team projects where you and your colleagues have competing agendas. You and/or some of your colleagues may be more focused on post-graduation pursuits, while others may be focused on rounding out their GPAs with good grades or vice versa. This can cause some tension amongst team members and you have to navigate this as best you can.

As a CEO, you will need to build on the previous successes (or failures) and take the company in the right direction. For some that means a change of strategy (career change), for others, it may be righting the ship, keeping it on course or a combination thereof (career progression). You will also need to understand the value of leveraging relationships, managing office politics and inter-departmental team dynamics. You will have to understand how to get the right people to work with you and for you so that you can further your agenda. Otherwise, you may find yourself at a stalemate with people within your organization.

Finally, there are other activities that will take a lot of your time and become higher profile as you move along. Email, Email, Email. Mountains of email. Learning to skim is a key skill in both worlds. Networking. Meetings. Networking. Meetings. Rinse. Repeat. The bulk of your time outside of reading or generating deliverables will be (at least should be) spent meeting and talking to other people. Expanding your network on a consistent basis is key to getting things done and progressing in your career. These relationships could be the difference in a job offer or board approval of a new project. Build relationships. Then build some more.

The End is Just the Beginning

If you have pushed your way through business school and you have arrived at graduation, the idea is that you should have a job lined up or be ready to launch your own venture. Unfortunately, this may not happen perfectly for everyone. However, that does not indicate failure, just as a down year doesn't equal a failed CEO. A strong CEO assesses what worked and what didn't work, makes adjustments, and moves forward with a revised plan. As an MBA student, you have to do the same and if done properly you will be well on your way to becoming a C-suite executive.

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