With over 20 business schools in Nigeria alone, and more than 15 in Ghana and nearly 30 registered business schools in South Africa, 3000 in India and indeed 13,000 business schools on Earth, it does appear that business school is becoming quite such a must-do for many. You would ask: but Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg never finished colleges not to talk of attending business schools? How about Richard Branson, Dangote or Oprah Winfrey? In fact,there is a staggering three-year low in the number of applications to full-time MBA programs. Critics of business school now use such jokes that MBA — Master of Business Administration — really stands for: “Mediocre But Arrogant”, “Management by Accident”, “More Bad Advice”, “Master Bullshit Artist” among others. Below, we discuss a few points about why we think Business School is or is not a hoax.

Enlarging Your Network

The six degrees of separation means that you are five persons away from meeting the most influential persons in town. You may argue that running a successful business would put you in a vantage point to meet more resourceful acquaintances without attending a business school, but building a successful business may be quicker because of current acquaintances. Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest man, had no extra certifications apart from his 1986 Princeton degree in electrical engineering and computer science, but e-commerce was a business that would require sound knowledge of programming, warehousing, book-keeping and a host of other sophisticated disciplines. There was no way Bezos’s dream of revolutionizing America’s book industry would fully materialize without him first understanding how folks in the American book industry think and work. Just a four-day course session on book-selling at the Benson Hotel, Portland, Oregon took care of that. That four day session would turn out to be one of the most useful study sessions he had ever been to, because he learned new things about customer service in the bookselling business and built a life-changing network of business associates and acquaintances, including top leaders in the highly influential American Book Sellers Association. Although, this is not a good case for attending business schools, it does however appear that meeting the right people in similar industries can go along way. Alumni associations also endure beyond business school days.

A Third Of World’s Best Performing CEOs Have Been To Business Schools.

Don’t get me wrong, the founders of top successful brands in the World: Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Dangote, did not attend any business school before starting out there companies, yet their brands are some of the most valuable in the world. But here is this report from Harvard Business Review: Only 32 of the 100 top-performing CEOs have an MBA. That is about 32% of the number. So then, you may ask again what happens to the remaining 68% of the number? Definitely, the odds are that you don’t always need an MBA to achieve any significant business success. On the other hand, you don’t have to also go very far down the list to find a CEO with an MBA. Francois-Henri Pinault of Kering is the highest-ranked CEO with an MBA. The HEC alumnus is 4th on the list. Others are Shantanu Narayen (#12) of Adobe Systems; Brad Smith (#16) of Intuit, and Hamid Moghadam (#17) of Prologis; Stanford’s Carlos Brito of Anheuser-Busch InBev; UCLA’s Laurence Fink of Blackrock, Harvard’s Jaime Dimon of JPMorgan Chase; IESE’s Luis Maroto Amadeus IT; Columbia’s Nancy McKinstry of Wolters Kluwer.

Get Paid More Before You Become An Entrepreneur Or In Case Your Startup Fails

Although business schools in America do not represent what happens around the world, they may however give an inkling about the value attached to business schools all around the world. The above picture shows that people who atttended business schools, for instance, at Yale SOM, have 77% percent chance of getting jobs immediately after graduation, and could take home salaries as high as $149, 964 per annum. Again, a 2016 study has shown that graduate business school alumni earn a median base salary of $2.5 million over 20 years post-graduation — $1 million more than if they had not attended business school. However, even this fact is not entirely reliable because how much you are paid sometimes depend on which business school you attended -the one in New Jersey or the other one in Milwaukee- and what companies you are working for. Again, this does not extend to other countries in the world. In Nigeria for instance, the basic salary for managers in one of the big fours is $35,000 per annum. This includes, of course whether there is an MBA certificate or not. Bigger corporations may pay more than that anyway. It is safe to argue therefore that in developing countries, business schools may serve the need to make CVs more attractive. However, while you can still get a better job with it, please do.

Business Schools Concentrate Courses Useful to Running A Successful Business

Unarguably, the idea of a business school is to bring together topics useful for running successful business such as accounting, administration, strategy, economics, entrepreneurship, finance, human resource management, management science, management information systems, international business, logistics, marketing, organizational psychology, organizational behavior, public relations, research methods and real estate among others. While this is perhaps the only business-related discipline that does that, much is still left unsaid about how all of that works in reality. It cannot be denied however that apart from adopting some intensive methods of teaching such as case method or skills-based approach, most business schools also go to the extent of using the business games approach which sometimes lead to the training of players in business skills (hard and/or soft). Consider Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn, alumni of Harvard Business School, who used their five-day immersion trip to Silicon Valley while they were at Havard Business School to fine-tune their vision of starting an internet company, CloudFlare, which is now valued at over a billion dollars.

Most Business Schools Run Business Plan Competitions; You Can Test -Run Your Business Plans or Ideas One More Time

Although good business plans may work whether tested in business plans competitions in all business schools or not, you may have one more time to test whether it can objectively work before starting off your business. All top business schools have a business plan competition. The competitions may offer you the opportunity to get feedback on your startup and to identify any gaps in your business model. In essence, it may be a rehearsal ground of some sorts where you get to practice your business pitch and develop yourself before major pitch events. Most of the times, price money may be won which can go a long way in helping you get your business off the ground.

Most Business School Are After Your Pockets And Give You Nothing

In 2013 alone, top 20 US MBA programmes already charged at least $100,000 (£72,000). London Business School once advertised a tuition fee of £84,500 for its MBA. While most business schools exist to rip you off, some however offer some form of financial support and incentives through loan forgiveness programs. Recently, support is being extended to entrepreneurs who are forfeiting high-paying positions to launch businesses. Harvard Business School’s Loan Reduction Program is one such example. Again, being part of a business school many expose you to different avenues of finance than other entrepreneurs. Some business schools may actually go as far as investing their resources or funds into student ventures or may link you up with venture capitalists, angel investors or business incubator programs. However, these may be true in some jurisdictions, but very false in most. You are left to do the research yourself.

You May Find Co-founders At Business School

This is not the reason you are going to a business school anyway, but there is a probability that you may just find a person who shares in your dreams and business idea. Many entrepreneurs have met their co-founders in their business school classes. In business schools, you are surrounded by other individuals who aspire to become entrepreneurs like you. Business school also presents many opportunities for you to work together on projects with the proposed co-founder before jumping into your venture together. You may learn one more thing about him before joining hands to co-found a business. Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn, alumni of Harvard Business School crystalized their vision to start an internet company, CloudFlare, which is now valued at over a billion dollars while at the Harvard Business School.

Mentorship and guidance. 

You may get mentorship and guidance from the vast array of networks you have. Again, being part of a business school community may also allow you access to some inner circles of networks of successful and experienced entrepreneurs who may volunteer their their time to mentor you. 

Bottom Line

Attending a business school is one thing, but to actually succeed in a business is a combination of factors beyond the parameters of a business school. At the end, you are always left to steer the course of your life. Whether a business school is actually a hoax or not is left for you to decide.

Cahrles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organisations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world.