Do You Know How to To Improve MBA programs?
What is the one idea that would improve graduate management education? If you know, the Graduate Management Admissions Council, the folks who own the Graduate Management Admissions Test, would like to hear from you. They are about to sponsor a contest to find out. And you need not be a current student or faculty member to enter.
The relevancy of MBA programs has drawn widespread attention in the wake of the Great Recession and record levels of unemployment among 18-29 year olds. Who knows the answer to what will keep us economically competitive in the years to come?
Is Talent Overrated?
Ahead of the financial meltdown Geoff Colvin, author and journalist wrote a book called Talent is Overrated that has recently been reissued in paperback with a new afterward (Portfolio Trade).
It casts a light on what Mr. Colvin calls world class performers, but others would label achievement through opportunity, persistence and enthusiasm for a task.
The book works on several different levels with insights useful to corporate managers, job seekers and recent graduates.
Even with a fiscal crisis Mr. Colvin still makes the case that financial capital is abundant, but the scare resource is human ability. (If only those who have lost their jobs agreed with him.) The illustrations Mr. Colvin uses to support his thesis, Exxon, Microsoft, and Apple are large corporations that hire for specific areas of responsiblity. “Microsoft hires incredibly smart people,” he said.
Mr. Colvin is also keen on an individual’s cognitive abilities, what some might call brainpower, but he says companies don’t necessarily emphasize them. Perhaps, that’s why he sees opportunities for the resurgence of the corporate manager. “There is going to be a shift to managerial responsibility,” he said. Technology superiority as the basis for economic superiority is about to change.
Where those managers may come from is still open to debate. A recent issue of The Economist (May 8-May 14, 2010) called into question the convention of hiring MBA’s since it said banks and consulting firms are increasingly recruiting people without the degree, particularly mathematicians and computer scientists. And it appears more companies are developing home grown talent.
Since the emphasis in Mr. Colvin’s book is on world- class performance, it would appear the sooner you start, the higher you can soar. If you are considering a so called “encore career” , Mr. Colvin predicts that the more your skills transfer, the more effective you will be.
By far, the best piece of advice applies to companies and new graduates. Think deeply about your core and what you won’t cut. “Focus on that,” he said. Customers will have new problems and will have to come up with new solutions. Don’t just cut price.”
Paying Lip Service to Job Hunting
Temporary work is considered a bellwether of the economy. And as the economy perks up, (over 284,000 temp jobs have been created since the low in September 2009, 50,000 in February alone), some of the millions of unemployed may be toying with temping as a way of getting back into the job market.
Those still on the sidelines, may want to consider the findings of Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor David Autor. With his colleague, Susan N. Houseman of the Upjohn Institute, he’s found that temporary help job placements do not improve subsequent earnings and employment outcomes. His study covered low skilled workers. And he says the temp work takes away from the hard work of job hunting.
What hard work? He directed me to the troubling statistic uncovered by his colleague Dr. Alan Krueger of Princeton University who with Andreas Muller who published a paper in May 2008 entitled The Lot of the Unemployed: A Time Use Perspective.
It seems before the financial meltdown unemployed Americans spent a mere 40 minutes a day on their job search, while their gainfully employed colleagues spent a full 408 minutes on the job. What did the unemployed do with the rest of their day?
For openers they spent nearly double the amount on the care of others, 112 minutes for the employed vs. 226 minutes for the unemployed. What did they do with the rest of their time? The unemployed spent more time on education a day, 25 minutes, vs. 11 minutes for the employed. And they spent a disproportionate share of their leisure time watching television, 201 minutes for the unemployed vs. 109 minutes for those who were employed.
Dr. Krueger is on leave at the Treasury Department and unavailable for comment. And, yes, in May 2008, the recession was just beginning. It’s become a truism that jobs are hard to come by and it’s an employers’ market. Still some job seekers might get better results if they redoubled their efforts.
Tags: job seekers, time management, unemployment
Job Seekers Take Note and Heart
For the nearly 90% of employees who have kept their jobs in this recession, a game of musical chairs may be about to begin. As they’ve watched their colleagues endure layoffs, and perhaps experienced some survivor guilt, the added responsibilities appear to have taken a toll and may be near a breaking point. More than half the workforce expects to have a foot out the door in the New Year.
In a newly released survey Right Management (the subsidiary of Manpower, Inc. that handles outplacement) asked 900 workers, “Do you plan to pursue new job opportunities as the economy improves in 2010? Rather than expecting to stay put, fully 60% replied that “yes, I intend to leave.” And nearly another quarter, 21% said “maybe, so I’m networking.”
Hiring managers take note.
Tags: job seekers, networking
New College Grads and Where the Jobs Are
It’s a tough time to have just graduated in this recession. All the enthusiasm in the world and a pocketful of internships may not be sufficient insulation against the downturn.
According to a press release about the latest Michigan State University’s Recruiting Trends Survey of more than 2,500 companies and institutions, hiring levels are at their lowest levels in several decades. This would help explain an unemployment rate for 20-24 year olds that was over 15% in October, the highest level since the recession began. Some job hunters may be tempted to become entrepreneurs, or at least seek out entrepreneurial companies.
The survey found that while mid and large sized companies (500 employees are more) expected a decrease in hiring, companies with fewer than 500 employees expected an uptick in hiring this year. “These companies are guardedly optimistic about hiring over the next year,” said Phil Gardner, Director of MSU Collegiate Employment Research Institute.
He says that in addition to students focusing on e-commerce and entrepreneurship, other sectors than can expect to see hiring increases include agriculture production, environmental sciences, information systems, statistics, non-profits, nursing and social work and multimedia including web design.
This week, in the New York Times feature, “The Boss,”
I interviewed Michael Chasen, the president and CEO of Blackboard, an online learning company based in Washington, D.C.
Recently I spoke to Elaine Romanelli, Mr. Chasen’s entrepreneur professor at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business. Dr. Romanelli’s research focuses on the characteristics of firms and regional industry environments that are likely to promote new business foundings.
Dr. Romanelli offers these observations that would be entrepreneurs and job seekers at entrepreneurial companies may want to consider.
What does your background tell you?
Dr. Romanelli says that people whose parents were small business owners are more likely to be small business owners themselves. And she said, they’ve developed a, “a habit of mind,” which allows them an ability to spot opportunities and know how to turn those opportunities into products.
Leave yourself open to opportunities…
Beyond that, she says serendipity or accidents may also play a role in successful entrepreneurship. Mr. Chasen’s close friend Matthew Pittinsky was enrolled in a Master’s of Education program at the same time Michael was at Georgetown. And it was Mr. Pattinsky who introduced Mr. Chasen and an entrepreneurship project he developed tin Dr. Romanelli’s class to his boss and launching Mr. Chasen’s business career.
Chose your business location carefully…
Lastly, Dr. Romanelli she says context matters…what others might call location. She says there is knowledge and combinatory of knowledge in areas that are populated by specific industries, e.g. the motion picture industry in Los Angeles and start-ups in the Silicon Valley and ringing Route 128 around Boston. It’s important to chose your location carefully.
Recently the Ewing Marion Kaufmann Foundation analyzed U.S. Census Bureau data and found that companies less than five years old created nearly two-thirds of net new jobs in 2007. While attrition for new companies is high, newly created and young companies are the primary drivers of job creation in the United States.
Tags: jobs
A Family’s Career Journey
What happens when a family goes through career transitions together? My first of a series of occasional
guest blogs appears today at www.careerdiva.net and is now reproduced here.
Usually I’m writing profiles of executives and business trend pieces. Still when I told Eve my college aged daughter is grappling with decisions about majors and internships and my husband is career transitioning, she generously offered this guest blog post.
My daughter’s a sophomore and some experts are saying careers she’s preparing for don’t even exist yet. So as she weighs a major—this week history is under serious consideration—what else will she need to do to make sure she’s not overqualified or under prepared at graduation?
Will the work ethic that had her clocking part time hours at the local book store since she was 16 and loading up her schedule with a two day a week part time internship inoculate her against the downturn and unemployment rates that hover in double digits for her age group or will it be a recipe for burnout?
An internship appears to have an edge, but is no guarantee. Last week the National Association of Colleges and Employers, a Bethlehem, PA trade group, released the results of their 2009 Student Survey and 23 percent of graduates with an internship had a job in hand just before graduation last April. Just 14 percent of those who hadn’t been interns landed jobs. http://www.naceweb.org/press/display.asp?year=&prid=308. In all likelihood a good attitude will serve her well as Eve recently reported. http://www.evetahmincioglu.com/web/blog/2009/10/23/do-college-grads-need-miss-manners/#more-1391
Still depending on how long a recovery takes recent grads in the job market now, and perhaps my daughter, may pay a price for bad timing. Till Von Wachter, an associate professor of economics at Columbia University says graduating in a recession leads to persistent effects on earnings and career outcomes. He writes in an e-mail, “Some never quite catch-up, and stay employed at lower wage jobs in lower paying firms after a recession ends.”
As my daughter weighs her options, she may consider her father’s experience. He’s been in data processing since punch card and slide rules were considered high tech and he landed his first job six months ahead of a recession.
He’s navigated a dozen jobs, and several career changes including joining and being laid off from two start-up companies, one in the mid-eighties that burned through millions of dollars before evaporating and another that downsized during the dot.com bust before selling itself to a competitor.
He walked away from the first company with worthless stock certificates. Soon, there was the job with another company that, up to that time, had a tradition of no layoffs. When they went through a major retrenching five years later we had our first lesson in belt-tightening that served us well after the dot.com bust.
A layoff in June is the most recent. As he segues to new career options once considered the stuff of science fiction—software as a service (SaaS) and digital marketing services among others, some experts say he, and probably my daughter, would do well to consider the new requirements of job hunting. Social networking may not be enough.
Rita Weiss, a career coach in Westchester County, says its essential to get clear on what you want to do and when networking always thinking “How can I help” as opposed to “What can I get?” And she says this is no time to go it alone. While peer groups, associations and volunteer activities can all help with job hunting, she advocates finding an accountability partner. She writes, “Most of us find it far too easy to not follow through on commitments we make to ourselves.” But when we make a commitment to others, there is a much greater change that we will follow through.”
Combining Great and Leadership
On Saturday, I traveled 100 miles round trip the original Hall of Fame of Great Americans on the Bronx Community College campus that once belonged to New York University.
The 630 foot sweeping colonnade punctuated by busts of famous Americans was designed by Stanford White at the turn of the last century.
The “greats” were clustered by categories—statesmen, inventors, authors. Still, many of the names that might be synonymous with commerce seemed in short supply. As an example, George Westinghouse was primarily known as an inventor.
The only clearly recognizable business bust was that of Andrew Carnegie, as well known as a philanthropist as he was an investor. Even he was a fairly late arrival, added some three quarters of a century after the Hall was inaugurated.
Only the day before a newly released book from Random House arrived. Entitled When Remarkable Women Lead, it was written by two McKinsey consultants. McKinsey appears to gain traction when the economy goes into the reverse. They have recently been in the news for their recommendations for streamlining Conde Nast.
The first two chapters seem like a direct descendant of the book The Managerial Woman by Margaret Hennig and Anne Jardim which coincidentally came out in 1976, the year that Andrew Carnegie’s bust was added to the Hall of Fame. The authors promote the idea of “Centered Leadership.” I’m interested to see how they develop their theme.
Tags: consultants, female executives, leadership
A Way to Make the Fifties Happier
The headline was definite. “Americans Least Happy in Their 50s and Late 80s,” trumpeted the results of the Gallup-Healthways Well Being Index.
Surely the results came as no surprise to any card carrying fifty something member of the sandwich generation.
An ever lengthening to do list that includes teen and late teen child rearing, ministering to aging parents and squeezing in the possibility of a last promotion or two in a tanking economy is not exactly the best recipe for happiness. Who has time to contemplate happiness anyway?
The forties are long forgotten and the sixties look almost effortless by comparison.
Perhaps we’ve had it backwards all these years. Instead of a work family balance juggle that escalates in the fifties, maybe we need to consider an alternative. Why don’t be consider a ten year work hiatus in the fifties, an early and limited retirement, until myraid family responsibilities come back to a manageable size. Then we can retrain and have at least a decade of work ahead without distraction. Maybe then the fifties would be the happiest decade of all.
What Stanley Kaplan Wrought
Stanley Kaplan who died on Sunday at the age of 90 came of age during The Great Depression and sought entry to medical school at a time when minorities were subject to stringent quotas.
Although he graduated second in his class at City College in New York City and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa he felt his religion and his affiliation with a public school worked against him. He wrote, “I had a double whammy against me.” The experience made him an advocate of test preparation.
More than that, some would say the late Mr. Kaplan was a visionary and an entrepreneur. He certainly spawned a crowd of competitors, The Princeton Review and even his former opponent The College Board among them.
Still Mr. Kaplan’s lasting legacy may not be his family or his philanthropy. He may well have planted the seeds of the salvation of the newspaper industry. As Karen W. Arenson reported in The New York Times, “Today, Kaplan is a diversified education company with than a quarter-billion dollars in revenues and is the Post Company’s largest business.”
Other newspapers have followed suit. In Britain, The Daily Mail and General Trust, the tabloid conglomerate, last year brought in 18% of its revenue from its information subsidiary.In 2008 it acquired subidiaries through its Hobson’s division that are familiar to anyone who has filed a college application recently—Naviance, College Confidential and AY Recruiting, which processes the Common Application and provides recruiting services for many schools, Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation among them. They have a subsidiary scouting for such opportunities.
Just as Mr. Kaplan found a niche in the lucrative world of for profit test preparation, newspapers have profited from it. And it is possible other imitators may not be far behind.
Tags: entrepreneurship, New York Times, newspapers, small business, test preparation, Washington Post
On the Anniversary of a Lay Off
Commemorating an anniversary seems an appropriate way to inaugurate a new blog. July 29 is the day I was laid off from one of the nation’s leading department stores.
As anyone who has been laid off knows, it is a painful experience. In my case I had helped train the personnel manager who fired me when several years earlier, recently divorced, she arrived at the store to begin her retailing career on the selling floor.
Although mentoring someone 17 years older was a stretch, as an entry level operations manager I persevered, even as she jumped the promotion line ahead of the rest of us 20 somethings into middle management. Clearly we were never on the same track.
Just as I had discharged my obligation to train her, she discharged hers in dismissing me. Her parting was a direct, “You’re just not……(fill in the name of the store here.) And perhaps it was true, from her perspective. As the freelance journalist that I later became, I learned there are many sides to a story.
It took some time to find my footing first. Unemployment and its partner, battered self-esteem, seemed like near constant companions along with a newly found passion in personal finance to preserve a small nest egg and stretch unemployment insurance benefits.
The period of unemployment set in motion an abiding interest in careers and management and one of the mainstays of my journalistic portfolio—personality profiles of senior management. I continue to grapple with the idea that a dismissal was “strictly business.” In all business transactions there is always a personal relationship, chemistry or the lack of it, that greases our interactions.
In the coming months, as companies stop shedding jobs and the nation regains its collective footing, this blog will answer questions about careers in the post Great Recession economy. Feel free to add your thoughts to the conversation. We’ll offer tips and suggestions, reporting and insights so you can better understand your career and the individuals—your colleagues, your managers, your subordinates, your customers—who influence and in some instances hold sway over it.
Today’s question—How did you negotiate a company leave taking? What would you do differently now if you had the chance?
Tags: Careers, layoff, mentoring, unemployment
