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David Laing has always been the ambitious sort, and counts himself lucky to have discovered early that his chosen profession - mineral surveying - had a very limited career ladder.
When Laing graduated with a degree in science (estate management) from Sheffield University in 1987, chartered surveyors
numbered 46,000, and chartered mineral surveyors 89.
"The only way for career progression when I graduated was that someone at the top of the chain would die and everyone else would move up a rung."
So Laing spent six years cross-training in IT before accepting an IT position with a geographic information systems company, which later transferred him to New Zealand.
Ambition still burned, so a year after taking up the post as programme manager at Wellington port company CentrePort, he signed up for the Master of Business (MBA) programme at Victoria University of Wellington. Two years on, the newly minted graduate says not only has the degree given him a better understanding of how businesses operate, it's also opened his mind to further career opportunities beyond the IT industry.
The MBA turned 100 this month, and is still going strong if the number of graduates pouring from business schools is anything to go by. According to the Financial Times, this year 500,000 students will graduate with the degree from schools all over the world. New Zealand has 10 MBA programmes and last year 425 students graduated from part-time and full-time programmes - the second highest number in the past 12 years, the MBA Agency said.
The degree is valuable to schools as a brand flagship - the University of Auckland has trademarked the name of its MBA programme (The Auckland MBATM). They're also useful revenue spinners, although costs vary according to what's on offer: an executive (part-time) MBA at Massey University costs $29,000 and the full-time degree costs $21,000; the full-time Harvard MBA will set students back about $140,000 at today's exchange rate.
It's certainly fashionable to bag the MBA for being irrelevant (a list of acronyms found on the web includes "management by analysis" and "mediocre but arrogant") or simply as being a ticket to a giant pay packet.
However they're more relevant now in New Zealand than ever, says Peter Withers, director of academic programmes at the University of Auckland Business School's graduate school of entrepreneurship.
As New Zealand companies become more engaged in global business as opposed to just exporting, they'll encounter companies run by people with MBAs, he says.
"To compete with them, we've got to play at the same level of the game."
To highlight that issue, Withers points out that there are a large number of SME-owning baby boomers, rapidly approaching retirement and perhaps looking to cash up.
He predicts several SME mergers, and says New Zealanders will need MBA skills to manage the resulting larger companies.
There are various kinds of MBA programmes. The executive or part-time MBA is aimed at business owners who will continue working while they study.
They're generally older (in New Zealand the average age is 38) and the course focuses on enhancing business analysis and decision-making skills.
The full-time MBA students are younger and less experienced in business, so the course has a more structured framework, Withers says.
Of course, the MBA doesn't suit everyone. When Warwick Kendon, now 62, was struggling to cope with the growth of his business, he chose a mentor over further study. Kendon's attic stair manufacturing business, Sellwood Products, had grown from being a sole trader selling four units a year in the early 1980s to a company with a staff of eight, juggling 400 annual orders by 1999.
The fast-growing business required management beyond his expertise, but the thought of spending his evenings studying was not attractive. "I fall asleep in front of the TV at night - never mind having to study after work."
Through a connection at Business North Shore he met mentor Kel Marsh, a director of business consulting company Corporate River, who agreed to take Kendon under his wing. New Zealand Trade & Enterprise subsidised part of the bill, and Kendon says the experience was just what he and the company needed.
Marsh has helped him identify and implement processes and systems that help the business run smoothly, and, although growth may not be so good this year, Kendon says after taking on his mentor sales boomed to 3000 units a year.
All MBA students have mentors, but it's the degree's global recognition that attracts many.
Wayne Walford, who will start stage two of the two-stage Waikato Management School MBA next term, is keen to live and work overseas, and sees the MBA as his "worldwide ticket".
The 48-year old Waikato Chamber of Commerce chief executive already has a wealth of management experience behind him: he spent 10 years in health management, has held several arts and community events-based management roles, and managed Bob Clarkson's 2005 Tauranga election campaign.
Walford sees the degree as "confirming 20 years of experience [wrapped] up in one qualification".
The degree has already helped him in his CEO role. Financial structures and the formulas used to evaluate financial statements are no longer a mystery. He even claims report writing is "fun".
"The chamber of commerce is all about empowering businesses and [the MBA gives] me a whole lot of background so I can just start supporting business development ... right away."
So, will the MBA survive for another hundred years? John Tucker, director for Waikato Management School's centre for corporate and executive education, reckons so, but acknowledges there are challenges for the future. The key messages at a recent MBA conference in Norway, Tucker says, were that the degree had to be delivered faster, it had to be absolutely globally focused, and focus more on sustainability.
To keep up with students' changing demands, New Zealand universities have been adapting themselves. Waikato Management School has cut its MBA programme from 2 years to two years; the University of Auckland Business School has introduced a "globally focused" paper on complexity and adaptive management systems. Both offer a trip overseas to talk to expat business people, attend MBA lectures in their host city and see "real life" overseas business.
The MBA will always offer valuable theory that underpins practical experience, says Tucker.
"Without it you may end up in a situation where you know that something almost fell down, but you don't quite know why, and you don't know [what you need to do to] prevent it from falling over next time."
100-year history
Though other institutions also claim to have launched the MBA, it was made famous by the Harvard Business School, starting in 1908. By the 1950's, MBA courses began to be offered outside the US and, accordingly to the Financial Times , 500,000 MBA students will graduate this year.
