MBA: which concentration will pay back?

Hello,

If you were doing an MBA program and could choose among the following concentrations:
-HRM
-Accounting/Finance
-Project Management
-Marketing
-International Business

Which one(s) would you choose if the only deciding criteria would be the best employment prospects?

Thanks for feedback,

Dennis

 

Project Management, due to its growing recognition as a separate field. HR positions aren't terribly stable and tend to get outsourced easily. If two companies merge they usually lay off a bunch of HR people. International Business is a bit vague. I don't know anything about current Marketing prospects, plus the whole field kind of horrifies me. Accounting/Finance... good, I think, but very competitive and for Accounting you will need extra study.

Another suggestion: go to monster.com and hotjobs.com and keyword searches in your location using each of the 5 key word combinations plus manager. "project management"+manager within 100 miles of my zip code gives me 278 hits. "International business" +manager gets me 4. Rough keyword searches aren't totally indicative but they'll give you some guidelines.

 

Dennis,

qvatlanta has summed up nicely. But I would add the following:

A concentration in Project Management is good but will not take the place of the PMP cert.

If you want to teach; Acct/Finance is great. However it takes 18 graduate hours to satisfy most college qualifications.

If you aren't too concerned about additional business accreditation you can obtain a Masters certificate in PM from Amberton University and then use these classes as part of one of the MBA programs by working them in as electives. You could also use the PM classes as electives in some of the other graduate degrees Amberton offers. End result of this path would be a Masters degree and a Masters certificate in PM. Plus they are cheap. Pick the right Masters and you could get an additional 18 hours in another subject.

http://www.amberton.edu/MDegrees.htm

Good luck on your decision,

Kevin

 

I would say an MBA with an Accounting/Finance concentration, but I must admit biased as that is what I am pursuing. I am also building on my undergrad accounting degree.

William

 

You will be hard pressed to find a company that wants to hire a "real" project manager who claims they have do not have PMI certification. PMI certification drills into the nuances of being a project manager. That's far far more important than an MBA concentration with say 3-4 classes in project management theories and I emphasize "theories". It's easy to find tons of people who claim they're project managers but there are few who are really good at it, understand process management, budgeting, scheduling, resourcing and the coordination to make things happen. There are of course some companies want to hire a "project manager", when they mean a Jack of All Trades and hence, they won't mind that you don't have deep knowledge in project management. I worked in a Fortune company that hired a lot of project managers for business and IT projects and their main focus is PMI certification. "Show us what certification you've got, show us what you've done, show us what you can do."

Which concentration? You should study whichever concentration that you enjoy most, not because it's the flavor of the month because it changes all the time. If you want to be a project manager, you should seek out PMI courses, certifications, etc.

 

PM....but try to tie it back to IT in some way. Those individuals who are able to take a broken IT process/program and make it work will be invaluable in the next few years.

 

Each of those tracks is totally different!!!

-HRM - Are you going to be involved in hiring, interviewing and screening personnel or taking care of employee needs?

-Accounting/Finance - Accounting is esoteric. So is Finance.

-Marketing - Will you be involved in marketing a product or trying open new doors that aren't currently open to sell a product?

-International Business - Will you be involved in business transactions that go beyong the United States?

-Project Management - I have a friend who has this degree and he starts and finishes construction projects.

What is your interest?