A Master of Business Administration has become one of the most popular and biggest money-making degrees, both from a revenue standpoint for educational institutions and for those who succeed in making a huge-leap in the pay scale post-graduation. It’s a program that’s also extremely popular. But to be admitted to a top program requires careful planning. Whether you’re thinking of applying this Fall or a few years down the road, let me highlight a recent trend that will force you to start planning today.

The Average Age is Getting Younger

In the past, all business schools used to “strongly recommend” that candidates possess a minimum of 2 years work experience prior to applying. While 2 years was the usual guideline, most admitted participants would enter with 5-6 years, putting the average age at around 27-28.

The argument was simple. Most of the learning that occurs in an MBA is through class discussion, and sharing of stories and experiences. Without enough work experience, you would have less to share and potentially have a tougher time really appreciating some of the situations that are studied. With my MBA experiences still fresh in my mind, I totally agree. It was obvious in class to tell those students who had been around with amazing experiences under their belt to share, versus the younger students who when challenged had a hard time defending their views.

With that being said, there is a new movement and philosophy regarding this topic, led by schools such as Harvard and Stanford. These schools are slowly but purposefully trying to lower their average age to 25-26. Harvard recently introduced its 2+2 Program (http://www.hbs.edu/mba/admissions/2+2/), encouraging those still in their undergraduate programs to apply. If accepted, you are basically pre-admitted to the MBA program 2 years from today, while you go off to get your 2 years of work experience after you get your first degree. Harvard will even assign a Career Coach to help you with your job search. Not bad, eh? The only catch: You have to apply the summer before your final year of undergrad; otherwise, you have to go through the regular MBA process.

Why the sudden change?

One of the first reasons has to do with recruiting. Top B-schools such as Harvard pride themselves on attracting superstar candidates. By encouraging young applicants, Harvard is attempting to be the first to latch on to potential top talent before other schools do, or other distractions such as a rising career or family get in the way. Harvard wants to ensure that these top candidates enrol, and when they go on to do amazing things post-graduation, Harvard is able to take the credit for the “sudden” transformation. It doesn’t hurt that these superstars become amazing alumni (i.e. big donors!) too.

A second reason has to do with the statistics. One of the most important numbers, besides rankings, that prospective applicants look at when assessing a school is the percentage increase of salary a.k.a. the ROI – how high does your salary jump pre-MBA to post. Many believe that this metric is the main (and some say only) reason people invest in returning to school. Personally, if this is your only motivation, there’s lots of easier ways to make that happen than B-school. However, by admitting younger applicants, schools are making this number look way better than it really is. Younger applicants with less experience come to B-school with lower salaries, so of course, upon graduation their percentage increase is going to be much higher.

The most important reason though comes from the feedback of professors. With students in their upper 20s, many professors are finding it extremely challenging getting through to them. It’s hard to teach an old dog new tricks. Older students are much more set in their ways. With more work experience under their belt, many are more skeptical of some of the generic teachings that professors try to impart on them. How much can you really learn and actually change as a person in a condensed 10-month/1-year program like an INSEAD or Ivey?

However, the main driver of change has been the huge number of corporate scandals that have tarnished the reputation of the MBA: Jeff Skilling (Enron – Harvard), Joseph Berardino (Arthur Andersen – Harvard), Anil Kumar (McKinsey – Wharton). Students that are younger with less experience will come into the MBA program with a more open mind and be more receptive. To put it more bluntly, professors will have an easier time breaking down an impressionable 25yr old and then brainwashing them with the “proper” MBA training that will hopefully prevent any future Enrons from occurring again. At least, that’s the theory.

What does this mean for you?

If you’re thinking of waiting until you have 4-5 years of work experience to apply, think again. As more schools begin to follow the lead of Harvard and Stanford, your best chances will be when you’re 25-26. Of course, there will always be schools that will buck the trend (e.g. IMD avg. age 31 & INSEAD avg. age 29). This means that you may need to start planning right now.

A well-planned and well-executed MBA admissions strategy can take a good 2 years. You must first start by assessing your strengths, but most importantly where the weaknesses in your application may be. Then you need a plan on how to fill these gaps, whether it’s more leadership examples or strong letters of recommendation. If you only start 6 months before you apply, it will be too late. Admissions Directors know all the tricks, so if you all of a sudden start pilling on the community service, or become a Big Brother just 1 year before to pad the application, they will see right through it. Those of you interested in a program like the Harvard 2+2 may need to start planning as of your 1st year of undergrad.

One of the most important reasons for potentially moving up your MBA timetable is where you’ll end up in your career immediately after graduation. Many large multi-national employers such as GE, Johnson & Johnson and LVMH have standard MBA leadership / rotational programs for students to enter where everything is standard, including your pay. In investment banking and management consulting, two of the most popular post-MBA professions, regardless of your background, experience or age, everyone starts at the Associate level.

So, if you graduate at 26, you could really take a big leap forward in your career, while if you’re now 30, you may have only taken a small step forward, and some would argue that if you didn’t take 2 years off for school you’d be at the same place now or maybe even further along. There are some older MBA graduates that even have to take a pay cut or a step back in their career progression, in order for them to make the transition into a new industry.

The flip side is that having more experience will give you an advantage over your younger peers during the job hunt. Your resume will have more depth, and in the interviews you’ll have more stories to tell. Companies will also tell you that although all graduates start the same, because you have more experience, you’ll move up faster. While that might be true, there’s no guarantee.

In short, if you’re thinking of an MBA down the road, now is the time to start planning! If you’re lost on where to start, below is a list of some of the major tasks in the MBA admissions journey.

• Determining your Personal Brand and Future Goals
• Assessing your Application’s Strengths & Weaknesses
• Creating a Plan to Fill your Gaps
• Writing the GMAT/GRE
• Finding the Right School & Program
• Visiting Campuses
• Securing Letters of Recommendation
• Crafting your Admission Essays
• Revising, Revising, Revising…

Too many people come to see me 1-2 months before the deadline for help. By that time, any major challenges or gaps in your application are hard to overcome. Spending the time now to put together a plan will guarantee that you’ll improve both your overall application and your chances of success to get in to the program of your choice.

If you’re reading this article via a RSS reader or by subscribing to my feed or through email, I don’t think I need to tell you too much about how powerful and informative blogs can be. Blogs have quickly moved from a niche personal outlet to the mainstream. CEOs from large MNCs to celebrities and politicians are all jumping on the blog (and for that matter Twitter) band-wagon.

The education industry is no different. As students begin to move away from their home town to their new university environments and experiences, they have been quick to use the blog, and other social media channels, as a way to let their friends back home know what they are up to. Blogs have been a great way for prospective students to get a real feel and insider perspective of how life can be like at the schools they are interested in.

Admission departments are now beginning to embrace this new marketing channel as well. While MBA programs have been soliciting student volunteers to be part of their official blogs for sometime now, undergraduate programs are joining in on this growing trend. One concern some administrators have had is the lack of control and influence on the specific content student bloggers write about.

This New York Times article gives you some more insights about the issue, and talks about M.I.T.’s policy of allowing their student bloggers to write censor-free.

The corporate world has also been engaged in blogging as a marketing tool for new recruits. One thing to be aware though is that corporations generally have much stricter guidelines for “official” bloggers and I wouldn’t be surprised if virtually every corporate blog has some sort of approval (read: censorship) process to adhere to. This was definitely the case when I helped Deloitte Canada start their first recruiting blog aimed at undergraduates back in 2006. Keep that in mind.

This week’s (Sept 14) cover story of BusinessWeek magazine highlights their results of the 2009 edition of “the Best Places to Launch a Career”…and $10 says you won’t be able to guess who it is. I’ll give you a hint. I know this company better than ANY other one in the world.

First, a caveat. This article is heavily biased towards the U.S. job market, and while most of the companies on the list are MNCs (multi-national corporations), some of the specifics that are mentioned in the article apply only to certain U.S. office locations, and not necessary to what is happening in all countries of the same company. Secondly, the article’s perspective is from the eyes of an undergraduate student, not necessairly MBAs or other more seasoned professionals, although I believe many of the arguments made in the article could be applied to Master’s students as well.

Now, to add a little credibility to the article, here’s a quick excerpt of how they compiled the rankings (in their words):

To compile this ranking, BusinessWeek polled 60 college career services directors across the country; collected data from a survey of 60,000 U.S. undergrads by Universum USA, a Philadelphia research company; and required employers to submit statistics on everything from pay and benefits to training programs and retention.

60,000 may not seem like a lot, but I wouldn’t say that’s an extremely small sample size of say just a 1,000 people. So who’s at the top? Well, the top 4 companies are all from the same industry and are often collectively known as the “Big 4″. Yep, you know who I’m talking about now, right? Ernst & Young (E&Y), Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and KPMG. And the winner for
2009…where I spent almost all of my professional life at…Deloitte.

With decent pay, variety and generally a strong culture of growing and grooming fresh graduates into fairly seasoned business professionals, I can see why the Big 4 dominate the list. Some of the training programs offered are also a big attractive point to students, and the fairly large and collegial group of other young professionals at these firms definitely helps.

Now, I know many of you are probably shaking your head right now and are extremely skeptical, but remember the title of the article. It’s the best place to LAUNCH a career, not necessary the best place to work for the rest of your life. The days of a fresh grad joining the Big 4 as an analyst and staying their entire career until they reach Partner/Principal are virtually over. But whether you’re in the Accounting side or the Advisory / Consulting side, working in the Big 4 definitely opens your eyes up to a wide variety of industries; you learn like you’ve never learnt before, mainly because of the situations you’re put into (and perhaps the lack of expertise on your team), and you definitely develop your soft skills, as you’re mostly always in front of clients.

Of course, even at Deloitte, there are some not so good things, and many things that could be improved. Pay yes is okay…but some may say that’s over-stating things. Compared to the actual hours you have to work at times, the pay probably doesn’t look so hot, but from a macro perspective, as a new fresh graduate, 21 – 23yrs old, you’re not starving, that’s for sure. If you want to know more specifics about Deloitte or the Big 4, feel free to leave a comment below. There are also some good sources of insider information from sites such as the Vault. You can learn quite a bit from following the company-specific forums where insiders post, but take all comments with a grain of salt. The insiders contributing on the forums are generally those that are most disgruntled

The other point to highlight from the article is around the amount of responsibility young new graduates will be getting in their jobs today. With graduate hiring down significantly at most companies, and many places have trimmed down their workforce, those graduates lucky enough to have jobs will find that they will have to take on multiple responsibilities at one time and fill the shoes of those that are no longer with the company. So, the glass may be half empty to you, but to some, it’s definitely half full.

You should be able to find this specific issue of BusinessWeek magazine on store shelves now. (Always wanted to say that)

Here’s a link to the online story.

As you enter your final year of school before graduation, whether it’s at the high school, university or post-graduate level, you will inevitably have to make the choice of what you want to pursue as a possible career. If you’re one of the lucky ones who have always known what they want to do, I’m jealous. However, if you are still not sure you’ve found your true passion or calling, well maybe you’ll find some comfort in the fact that you’re in the majority.

One of the challenges when trying to determine what career to pursue is understanding what one actually does in a certain profession. New careers and specialties are also always being invented, so with what can seem like endless possibilities, the thought of making a choice can be daunting.

While I’m not a big fan of “Top 10″ lists or rankings, one useful trait of these publications is that they give you a consolidated source of information to kick-start your research. The U.S. News & World Report has recently been publishing a list of Best Careers which it updates each year. They say they score hundreds of careers based on the following 5 criteria:

1. Job outlook, which took into consideration the above three factors
2. Average job satisfaction
3. Difficulty of the required training
4. Prestige
5. Pay

While I wouldn’t put too much weight on what they consider “hot or not”, the 1 page profile they include on each career mentioned is a great source of information. They also take some time to profile up-and-coming, as well as best-kept-secret careers such as: Creative Perfumer, Simulation Developer & Orthoptist

One other great resource I highly recommend, and is mentioned in the article, is the Occupational Outlook Handbook, which profiles more than 250+ occupations, including a description of the nature of the work, listing of training / education requirements, and a job outlook analysis with data projections.

In terms of Best Careers in 2009? A few that made this list include:

• Health Policy Specialist
• Management Consultant
• Pharmacist
• Registered Nurse
• Urban Regional Planner

Some notable omissions from the 2009 list: Investment Banker, Dentist and Editor.

Note: Some of the analysis is very U.S.-centric. Click here for the original article.

Any careers you think are missing or haven’t gotten a fair shot? Let us know what you think by leaving a comment below.