Is An MBA Needed For Creating A Rewarding Finance Career?

Do you want to pursue a career in finance? Are you thinking about getting an MBA? Will an MBA degree boost your employability and offer you excellent career opportunities in the financial services sector? Let’s have a look...

MBA For A Finance Career

An MBA in finance will provide you some great opportunities to start your finance career. You can work in multinational corporations as a financial analyst, financial advisor or an accountant. To help aspirants achieve their career goals, globally reputed B-schools like London Business School, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard Business School are currently inviting applications for the MBA programmes they offer. But can an MBA degree actually help you in building your finance career? Or is it just a waste of your money?

Most people believe that simply by getting an MBA you will be able to amp up your career. However, the fact is the progress of your career basically depends on your skills, abilities, knowledge and experience. However, an MBA qualification can definitely open up new doors to better opportunities. It depends on you how you make the most of these opportunities and use your skills in the workplace.

Is An MBA Enough?

Your MBA education will prepare you to start your finance career with confidence and knowledge so that you can add value to your company. To make the most of your MBA degree you will need to possess intelligence, specific skill sets, experience and money or the capacity to take student loans. Moreover, you also need to make the right connections with the right people so that you can work in the best positions in financial services.

According to the efinancialcareers CV database, it has been observed that if you wish to make your career in trading, then there isn’t any sense in pursuing an expensive MBA programme. Apparently, merely 7 per cent of trading professionals who have posted their resume on efinancialcareers database in the last one year posses an MBA degree.

Why You Need An MBA

An MBA can significantly help your career if you are planning to build your career in the investment banking division or IBD as more than 15 per cent professionals in this field have an MBA qualification. In the United States, MBAs are particularly widespread in this sector with almost 19 per cent IBD professionals with MBA degrees, as compared to 13 per cent in Europe.

Furthermore, if you plan on working in private equity in the future, then spending huge loads of money on your MBA can be worthwhile. The private equity sector comprises of the highest volume of MBA qualified professionals in financial services, with American private equity firms with the most MBA graduates. However, it was found that MBA graduates comprise of only 19 per cent and 22 per cent of the total PE populations respectively.

So if you are planning on building a rewarding career in the financial services sector, then you should consider the fact that most of the professionals in the financial services sector are not MBA qualified.

How MBA Applicants can develop a Personal Brand?

A number of b-school applicants are hesitant to think of themselves as a product or brand. However, in order to find out the best MBA programme to match their unique profile, they need to take the time to examine their personal qualities, aspirations and values.

You can put it into other ways as well. Suppose if you are entrusted with the task of creating a marketing campaign for a new car, and if you decided to highlight the seat warmers and sound systems of the vehicle, when the potential customers are looking for fuel economy, then your marketing message may not be able to create frenzy in the market.

The drawbacks in preparing your brand message for MBA application are similar. What you need is to think like a marketing strategist and develop a personal brand only after identifying its strengths. Here are three exercises to help you do it effectively.

Make a brag sheet

Though the practice of bragging is usually disapproved of in the real world but when it is about effectively sending out a set of messages you eventually want to communicate to admissions committee, the best way to begin is by writing down most unique, wonderful, exciting things about yourself. Consider it as brag-storming.

You should know that admissions committees look for pleasing candidates with experience of life and those who have chased their passions and achieved their professional as well as personal goals.

Create stories

MBA applicants should sift through a wide range of life experiences and find out their core strength. Leading off with what applicants perceive as their strengths and then searching for example stories to back things up is not a fruitful idea. 

You can write stories about personal successes, leadership achievements within and outside of professional life, instances when your actions made a difference or times when you initiated to solve a problem. Do not hesitate to jot down setbacks or failure, as the strategies you made to overcome them are the best supporter of your success in business world.

Discover stories for strengths

To separate out your stories, you need to discover the aspects of your skills, strengths, talents and character contributing to your achievements. You should ask yourself how your life is shaped after certain experiences or the strengths, attributes and talents assisted you in making a difference.

Usually, the goal of a traditional marketing plan is to come up with a product in effective and thoughtful manner. Here, the product is MBA applicant. The goal is awareness about the self, and going through your accomplishment is of greater help. You can focus on the best MBA strategy once these factors are clarified.