Any New Online DBA?

Have you considered Marshall University? It's less than 60k and it's AACSB accredited.

 

I’ll do more research on Marshall this evening! It completely slipped my mind.

 

I do remember one of the reasons I did not give a “hard” look at Marshall was the fact they want a minimum of 10 years experience. I am sitting at about 6 years of experience.

 

If you like a concentration in strategy, organization behavior, or international business, University of North Carolina Greensboro online PhD could be a good choice as it's the cheapest AACSB accredited online program in the US. Since I am interested in accounting, I will start with WVU in the Fall. I struggled with the decision between WVU and University of Pittsburgh but ultimately do not want to pay the $100k+ tuition.

 

I am going to look into a few more and see what I can do to pursue the degree at an AACSB school. The vast majority of them require either a minimum of 10 years or 12 years of experience. I’m sure I will find something to fill the itch.

 

I just looked at the fact sheet https://bryan.uncg.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/PhD_In_BA_Fact_Sheet_v13.pdf for the program at UNC Greensboro and it doesn't list experience as a requirement likely because it is a PhD instead of a DBA. Regardless, I think years of experience is likely to be one of the most flexible things a school has to contend with for applicants because I suspect it can be rather ambiguous.

 

We can always make the argument that more education will help one's job performance, but I don't think that's justification for spending tens of thousands to a hundred thousand dollars on a doctoral degree. There are many cheaper ways of gaining the same knowledge, and a doctorate is overkill for the vast majority of jobs. In my opinion, it's not a good idea to earn a $40k DBA to be a continuing education instructor or a high school business teacher when people are doing these jobs with bachelor's degrees and earning potential is relatively low. College administrators move up the ranks either as instructors/professors or on the non-academic side in administrative positions. If you're not already on that career path, you might have to take a substantial pay cut to start in an entry-level position. According to Indeed, 35% of college administrators have a bachelor's degree and 37% have a master's degree; the average salary range is low. If you want to run an organization's training division, you would likely find cheaper doctorates in education, human resources, or organizational development. There's also I/O psychology, but those doctorates don't tend to be cheap. Even then, you can't just walk into a management position without relevant human resources, adult or corporate education, or I/O psychology experience.

These are things I would consider.

1. Is this degree required or strongly preferred for the position I want?
2. Will I see positive ROI from increased earnings?
3. Is this only for personal development or personal achievement?

 

HigherEdJobs provides salary data broken down by academic field, institution type, and job title.

Non-Tenure

https://www.higheredjobs.com/salary/salaryDisplay.cfm?SurveyID=57

Tenure

https://www.higheredjobs.com/salary/salaryDisplay.cfm?SurveyID=56

 

I think so far, it is pretty well-known that AACSB online PhD/DBA programs are few and far between.

Honestly, I am not sure full-time academics would pay me what I am making right now with my company. I am in the six figure range annually and unless one got a tenure track position as a larger b-school, it’d be hard to match my pay.

Having said that, the degree would more or less be for personal development/gratification. Would it be nice if it helped increase my salary? Sure. However, I have the mindset going in that it would not and because of that, I am okay with that outcome should that be what happened.

I will continue to research the various programs and see what fits me in the long run. There are few AACSB programs and to be quite frank, my wife might kill me if I told her I was spending $100k on a degree program. Lol

 

I agree, but many people just fall into these jobs because of no choice. If you do several years of non tenure track work (on contract), and all of the sudden you lose your job, it is not going to be easy to find another one in your area. I know few people in this situation, one person took a job as a high school teacher, in Canada you can get close to 100K if you hold a doctorate and teaching experience as a high school teacher, the salary is very similar to what he was making as a non tenure track professor. Another one is teaching continuing education because is all he can get. There is a reason why you aim for a tenure track at graduation, if you don't get it, you fall into these type of positions when your CV only has teaching and research experience. Very few plan for an adjunct career path, you just fall into it and it is hard to leave this path once you have 20 years of adjunct experience under your belt. Many just get the DBA to remain employed and do not look anymore for tenure track positions as there is the age factor as well, most schools hire new faculty members in their 30s or early 40s, if you are already in your 50s or 60s, you know that it is just about milking the cow and the doctorate is just to avoid falling into food stamps. It might sound negative but the reality for some.

 

It’s often worth a salary premium, it’s likely a hiring advantage, and it seems to me like a social good to have some doctorate holders in education and in traditional academic disciplines among the educators in high schools and in nondegree adult ed.

Is it much less so to have some doctorate in business holders among the educators in high school and nondegree business/vo/tech ed?

 

They're teaching entry-level courses, so I'm not sure how much value a doctorate-holding instructor will add. It's like earning a medical degree to teach CPR. In my state, you only need a bachelor's degree to teach. Marketing, health science, and trade/industrial teachers need a bachelor's degree plus two years of related experience. Health science and trade/industrial teachers also need to maintain an occupational license or certification. While these openings are few and far between, they usually stay open for a long time. Not too many people want to go through the teacher certification process for less pay, few openings, and the possibility of needing to move across the state.

 

I'd suggest reading some of the posts Rich has made about how his doctorate served him (or ask him). Because I maintain that it may well be less about the doctorate than how you use it.

If all you do is add a doctorate to your current resume and change nothing else about your approach then I don't believe you will see significant results. I base this on the numerous applications with doctorates that I see that blend seemlessly into the sea of resumes. If all it does is add another education line to your resume then that's going to be a very expensive line to add with very minimal return, if any.

Career level is very important. If you're at "too low" of a level then a doctorate can be a hindrance. The reason can be middle managers, who may not even have a masters, feeling threatened by hiring someone with a doctorate (it happens). It can also be that a person with a doctorate may be seen as one who will grow discontent with that lower level position faster and be overly eager to advance to the detriment of the job they are being hired for.

It can absolutely be a solid pathway to establishing authority as a consultant.

The question should always be what will add maximum value to YOUR career. Let me give you an example.

Say we have an HR Benefits Specialist named Kevin. Kevin has a bachelor's degree. Kevin fixates on earning an MS in HR and has chosen the online program at Villanova because it will add some prestige to his resume given that his undergrad is from a lackluster school like SUNY ESC. The problem isn't that the MS won't offer value, it's that it will be a very expensive step and the return would be marginal given his current job level. Don't get me wrong, an MS in HR is much more immediately useful to a career than a doctorate would be. But even more immediately useful to Kevin would be a certification through say, SHRM. Or if he's super content to stick with benefits, CEBS.

Experience as a benefits consultant is great. But CEBS is a pretty premier certification for that field. To say you're an expert in employee benefits and not have ANY certification is going to put you at a disadvantage. Particularly because many of those postings will be "Certification required" while Masters is merely "preferred." Kevin is free to plan his career accordingly. And the imperfect nature of this example is that a Masters is something a person can hammer out in a reasonably short timeframe relative to a doctorate. Still, for Kevin's career planning certifications should be more the short term goal than an advanced degree. In the HR world the absence of a certification is a glass ceiling. You can have three doctorates. No cert? Thank you for applying for the position. We've reviewed your application but have chosen not to pursue your candidacy.

Your comments include phrases like "would be good to have." Which may be true. However, "would be nice" should only come after "is necessary" unless you have tens of thousands of dollars to throw around. Sure, it would be nice to have a doctorate in my position. However, I would not be "using" it nearly the same way Rich did. And so I would never see the same result. No one is going to tap me on the shoulder and say "Hey, Neuhaus. We just realized you have a doctorate. Here, have some more money." And as, at this stage of my career, I don't think a doctorate would add any transformative value to the way I do my work it would be a waste of time and energy. Worse, it would take me away from projects that actually do add value to my job and career.

More education =/= more money or higher job satisfaction or increased performance. It just doesn't. There's a reason why we have some very over-educated people punching cash registers these days and it isn't because "just one more degree" would make a difference.

 

I couldn't agree more. Oh, there are select places and situations where having the degree can matter. I happen to work in a nexus of two of them: talent development and consulting. That's why I tend to support the idea of doing a doctorate, especially a professional degree. I have a personal bias.

That aside, Neuhaus is saying something valuable when he addresses the transformative nature of doing the degree, and how one uses the learning and experience drawn from it. That's why I find all this window shopping about degrees particularly boring. Credits, tuition, and all that. It's so "small ball," missing the point of doing the degree entirely. Most posters tossing out that data--and that's what it is, data; it's not even information because it lacks context--aren't doing a doctorate themselves and cannot speak word one about the thing they're pricing.

As I've said before, doing a degree is an exchange of capital between the student and the school. The student gives his/her money and academic effort. The school, in turn, provides and education and a degree. The money and the degree get talked about a lot on this board. Not enough insight is provided on the academics and learning. This is because so much data is being tossed up by some posters who haven't done it and can't provide the context necessary to give that data the meaning it needs to be valuable information.

I'm not saying they shouldn't do it, of course. I'm saying that things like degree title, credits, tuition, travel, and other minutia do not tell the whole story. Not by a long shot.

 

As expected, I was admitted to the Liberty University DBA in Finance. Quite odd because I got a text message versus an email with an admissions letter. Will continue to wait and see if I hear from Jacksonville University over the next few weeks.

 

Good strategy, Josh. I hope Jacksonville U. gets anxious and starts a price war!

"My Mama done said - better shop around..." Apologies to Smokey Robinson & The Miracles

 

Got word my application is going to admissions committee tomorrow.

 

Good - they're getting anxious. Time to start working on your counter-offer!

 

I guess I was a little premature with Liberty. Ha! Got that text yesterday but an email this morning. Now to wait and see about JU. Still researching some other programs but thus far, have not found any others that I feel fit me.