When one considers the future, one thing that you need the most, is knowledge of the now. And a knowledge that is not half baked, based on guesses, or only first hand information, but a comprehensive picture. This sort of a picture is not easy to generate at all, and still less easy to understand. The kind of data that is available today is immense, and very varied, to process all of it for any event requires training. To not take advantage of all the information and make a choice on a limited amount is senseless. But it remains impossible to deal with the immense amount of information that must be comprehended. The answer to this dilemma is specialisation. Every field of study or operation has specialists minutely trained to process information of a particular kind. But with this ability of detailed study, comes the disadvantage or inability to see the larger picture, or of processing information of a kind you are not used to. The answer to that question has been a different kind of specialist, one that can understand most information, even if he cant process the data, and then compile all the information he receives into a single, unified, simple model, and then predict the future.
In the world of Bussiness, this specialist, who specialises in being a ‘jack of all trades’ is called an MBA. I feel the best way to think of it, is to imagine the company like a circuit, with highly specialised components, all connected to a circuit board. The MBA is the circuit board. Some people might lead to believe he is the Procesor, but that’s not accurate, the MBA is as much an employee as any other. But his job is making sure every one else can function. This involves looking beyond only the immediate needs of the company, in the now, but also a degree of foresight. The responsibility of an MBA goes beyond just the limits of his company, but must be encompass the economy as a whole, the understanding of which cannot be imparted on the job. To a man trying to make a cotton factory earn money, the stock exchange in London may not make sense. It may not necessarily make sense to an MBA, but he will realise that it does impact the business. It is this vision, and an understanding of things outside the immediate purview of production, or profit that make an MBA invaluable.
Perhaps it will be better understood when I tell you the entire idea of outsourcing was that of an MBA, or as we know Bill Gates knows little or nothing about programming. In the case of outsourcing, it is a revolutionary idea, and that could only come from someone with a slightly wider view of the world one limited to the confines of a 9 to 5. Bill Gates and the windows were barely made for each other, in fact you could argue that Windows as OS is barely made for a computer. But the foresight of Gates, is what made him the riches man around. It is this trained ability to, look beyond the obvious, and to be aware of the periphery, like a growing pool of English speaking urban, educated youngsters in India, or the fact that computers were the future, and striking the deal with IBM, in the insipient years of the industry that makes an MBA.
Of course the argument that one can teach himself all this, is acceptable, but the time involved in learning things, that would lie outside one’s field of interest, only to gain minimally, over the time spent educating oneself, defeats the purpose of the exercise. Even an MBA of about six years ago, finds commerce vastly changed, and is constantly involved in furthering his education. To be teaching yourself the basics while the MBA could with ease give you the boost of a couple of years, is something an MBA would not suggest. The fear that as an MBA you may loose whatever specialised skills you possess, is in some ways a legitimate one, because as an MBA you’re compulsorily limited to managerial tasks. But that’s not to say that you wont have opportunity to bring you’re own experience into play. An MBA does not limit the paradigm within which you think, but is in fact an attempt to systematise and make easier the search beyond that paradigm. So anything that you have done or can do, which is more than the training you receive as an MBA will always be a resource to you… and though it might be something seemingly unconnected with business like playing the guitar, an MBA will help you see it as a economic resource, and though you may never end up with an album, it will help none the less.
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