I’m terrible at math..is an MBA in reach?

I'm not going to argue the value of quantitative skills for sharpening one's thinking. The only problem is, in today's world, sharpening your mind in certain directions may be difficult given time/money/ROI available.

I'm actually opening up this conversation again to throw in a little note for the "told you so" crowd.

I've been reviewing materials for an eCommerce class in a particular MBA program that does not have a direct quantitative skills/statistics requirement. The book I've been looking at is a recommended supplementary Dummies book regarding Web Marketing. In this book, they mention the "long tail" curve. . . essentially, an 80/20 rule regarding sales (which boils down to 80% of your revenue comes from cheap items or niche sales, rather than big stuff). They even mention that Wikipedia has an entry on long tails. . . which will then lead you into a discussion of statistics.

Now, most folks with a basic high school education can understand any kind of simple 80/20 rule summarization. But, to really grasp the meaning of a long tail and to have better insight into that rule and how it affects your marketing mix, maybe having taken a statistics course would help-- even a business statistics course.

If someone would at least mention these sorts of things in passing while discussing the benefit of quantitative skills for MBAs, it would be a helpful nudge rather than an "eat your vegetables" lecture.

 

Math and MBA

Hey, I just wanted to encourage you that there are MBA programs that will take you with no stats or calc and I do recommend taking the GMAT, many state schools will take you with just a GMAT score even if it low... if your quantitative is too low, they may put you on remedial admittance for a semester, but will still admit you. I recommend studying the Manhattan math series to prep for the GMAT. I recommend an AACSB school, dont go with a school with no accreditation. Its a waste of time.
Im not a math whiz myself, but worked hard through my MBA and ended up with 3.73. You can do it too. Good Luck.

 

You can do MBA. Many other fields are available to do studies in MBA.Prefer them.

 

Basic mathematics like Statistics and accounting is required in MBA. It wont be that difficult. You can take assistance from your classmates or professors and mathematics can be manageable. Don't stop from doing a management course if you want to just because you are not good at maths. So dont worry and go ahead.

 

Not every MBA requires these; it's just that most do and most MBA holders from this board seem to think they're necessary. I can't argue against the usefulness of statistics and quantitative analysis; I do have a tendency to argue where people try to push the notion of "do it because I had to" without a practical explanation as to why. Thankfully, as I noted in an earlier post, I've come to peace with the notion of statistics in business programs but I wish there was more of a common understanding of the "why".

I don't consider accounting to be a field of mathematics and I will argue its value less, but thankfully many programs don't consider basic accounting to be a necessity unless you're working towards a career in that field. Most MBA programs focus more closely on management or cost accounting, thankfully.

And as one posted piped in a few posts back, there are other educational backgrounds in demand right now that may have less saturation than MBAs-- it doesn't hurt to consider those if math is going to be your "brick wall".

 

Saying you are bad at math will not help you a lot. Better you work on it and try to improve it.

 

Well, for right now I'm not getting the MBA or any masters degree. I don't want to go into debt with student loans when it's not a guarantee that i'll get a promotion if I have the degree.

I'm going to concentrate on some certifications. While i'm at it...do any of you have study tips for certificcation exams?