This document discusses the value and perception of MBAs from multiple perspectives. It outlines that MBAs remain a top choice due to the professional characteristics they provide. The document then outlines desired future traits for large organizations, including being collaborative, innovative, and responsive to communities. It also lists traits that recruiters look for in MBA candidates, such as communication skills, analytical abilities, and leadership. Overall, the document examines the current and future value of MBAs from the standpoint of individuals, organizations and recruiters.

1. Perception of the value of an
MBA is crucial.

2. • MBAs Remain the Top Choice It is
perceived that certain professional
characteristics are innately present in most
MBA recruits

3. A Look into the Future
• An organization less like an army (hierarchical, focused
on winning) and more like a family/community
(collaborative, focused on well-being of members) than
today's large organizations;
• Better able to deal with complexity
• Has a flexible definition of 'work' that is purposeful and
meaningful to its people;
• Is accessible, inclusive and diverse
• Is responsive to the communities it operates in
• Is self-managed, innovative and entrepreneurial

4. • Generates deep mutual respect and trust in its people;
• Is resilient and agile, and capable of 'acting in the
moment'
• Attracts people skilled at collaboration and inclined to
work collaboratively;
• Has a self-determined, shared set of values;
• Is committed to "not being evil“
• Is amoeba-like (permeable borders, good sensors, able
to change shape when necessary, a strong guiding
nucleus, and replicable;
• Is attuned to and responsive to customer needs (rather
than "trying to sell them something they don't really need
or want");

5. • Accommodates needs and conflicting demands of its
people, using principles of reciprocity;
• Motivates and engages its people;
• Cross-pollinates people, ideas, knowledge, points of
view;
• Is transparent and authentic;
• Is not location-based or location-dependent;
• Uses sustainable, cradle-to-cradle practices, and does
more with less;
• Engages customers and other partners in design,
development and decision-making, to tap into the
wisdom of crowds;

6. • Has rotating leadership, with leaders who see where the
future is going before others do, and inspires others to
act on that vision, and who are able to translate the
complexity around them into simple truths that have
meaning, direction and predictability (rather than
encouraging the cult of leadership and the messiah
complex of many of today's leaders).
• Accommodates and leverages the skills and qualities of
women;
Finds and clears away obstacles that prevent its people
from doing their best
• Learns from nature
• Teaches people to communicate extraordinarily well, and
encourages authentic, powerful conversations;
• Recognizes our responsibility to leave a legacy for our
children, and pays attention to them and learns from
them

7. The foremost traits that corporate recruiters
look for in MBA candidates are:
• Sound communication and interpersonal
skills
• Ability to analyze and strategize
• Leadership skills

8. The realisation, by organizations as well as individuals, that narrow
professional qualifications or functional skills are ultimately not
enough in a business environment where there is a need to take
an integrated and increasingly global view of how a decision in one
sphere impacts on others – precisely what an MBA teaches.

9. • Sea changes in the attitude of business schools themselves, as they
have competed to provide programmes which reflect the needs and
realities of business and industry;
• For instance in giving a multinational dimension to team and group
work and relating the dissertation or project (a key part of almost all
programmes) to the real world.
• Thus part-time and distance-learning students often undertake
projects for and within their own organisation, while full-timers do a
piece of ‘live’ consultancy for a client who is prepared to pay for their
services.
• In both cases the exercise is overseen by a faculty member, so in
effect the client is getting the services of a consultant at a discount
rate.

10. • Companies generally look for candidates who will both
slot comfortably into their system and simultaneously
stand out.
• Fitting in means having the basic qualities needed to
participate well in the system and be accepted as a peer,
rather than as an oddity, by one’s colleagues. If you can
do the work, subscribe to a organisation’s goals and get
on well with the other members, then you will fit in.
• Standing out means bringing something unique to the
organisation, something that distinguishes you from
other members.
Fitting in and standing out

11. Traits are companies looking for in an MBA
• Internationally mobile
• sensitive to cultural diversity / good cultural fit
• good technical grounding
• specializes in strategy, operations, and human-capital
• Better understanding of a company’s integrated
functionality
• international outlook and a marketing mindset
• adapt readily to a fast-changing environment
• out-of-the-box thinking and action
• good sense of timing
• leadership potential
• street smarts

12. • entrepreneurial-minded
• passion for the product -- and the business behind it
• consensus-driven
• strong mental athleticism
• persuasive
• willing to learn
• articulate, curious, and motivated
• mix of humility, respect, and wisdom
• taste for long hours and an irreverent culture
• Emphasis on professionalism
• Stress on deliverables and deadlines