
Sheryl Sandberg Says an MBA Doesn't Matter in Tech - jackgavigan
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-12-16/sheryl-sandberg-says-business-school-doesn-t-matter-in-tech
======
c0achmcguirk
I'm a developer at a financial services company. I was content to be a
developer and let the "business" folks define our stories and I'd just code
them. I never understood the application I was building on a deep level--it
was always superficial.

A friend convinced me to take a few MBA classes at a local university. The
first class was accounting. It opened my eyes to understanding what our
product and business owners were saying on my projects at work. Now I could
understand the "why" behind the screens I was building! I asked questions that
made them re-think their screen mockups. Since then I've graduated and taken
classes in Finance, Leadership, Economics, and my favorite: Strategy.

I use more knowledge from my MBA in my coding career than the stuff I learned
in my undergrad in Computer Engineering.

In my experience, an MBA doesn't make me a better "coder." But it has given me
confidence and competence in my interactions with customers and the leadership
team. I'm very glad I took the time and effort to pursue my MBA.

~~~
pvnick
I would be interested to hear from you, and anybody else with similar
experience, what were some of the most valuable courses you took. That is, for
someone with no interest in pursuing an MBA but with the opportunity to take a
course or two, what are the must-haves?

~~~
Retric
That's going to be heavily weighted based on your personal background and the
quality of the specific class.

~~~
pvnick
Thanks for your reply.

> That's going to be heavily weighted based on your personal background

Could you elaborate?

~~~
Retric
Accounting is _really_ important, but if you have the basics getting to the
point you can see though accounting tricks has limited value and takes a lot
of work.

It's like an extreme version of the 80:20 rule. You can get some basic c
functions to compile in a few hours, but seeing though the winner of an
obfuscated c contest on your own might take years.

Just remember, your not a specialist and becoming one takes a lot more effort
than a few MBA classes.

------
rayiner
I'm always skeptical about stuff like this. Sandberg's springboard into her
career was two-fold: working at McKinsey after HBS, and working under Larry
Summers, who was her thesis advisor at Harvard UG. She went to Google as a VP
after her stint in government.

There is a huge "getting your foot in the door" advantage to that credential.
I can totally believe she didn't use much of what she learned at HBS in what
she did at Google. But would she ever have gotten that VP job at Google
without that sterling resume?

~~~
pvnick
Good point. Pedigree is and always has been a huge advantage. A
disproportionate number of execs' backgrounds I've looked into have
Yale/Harvard/Stanford/etc somewhere. I wonder if that will ever change. Having
worked with many folks who attended those universities, most do not strike me
as being intrinsically more capable than their counterparts who attended other
universities, although a few have a high degree of self-assuredness (which,
granted, is quite valuable as a career trait).

------
eitally
I've never worked with MBAs before, in all my tech career, which included
stints as a programmer and then a long period as a manager/director where I
was in a much more business-oriented role. I always had a preconception that
"MBA" essentially meant "management consultant", those high-priced guys who
were paid to support bad news the CEO didn't want to seem came from himself.
Restructuring advisement is certainly a valid role business consultants
fulfill, but it's definitely not the only one, or even one of the more common
ones.

I joined Google this summer and I have 2 ex-consultant MBAs in the team I'm
managing, along with a third employee who is ex-BCG-but-no-MBA. They are
awesome. They freaking rock at analysis, and are highly skilled at asking good
& pointed questions to help nail down business opportunities & good/bad ideas.
Two of them have technical BSes (EE & CS) and are fantastic PMs: well
organized, analytical, strong communicators, outgoing, and perhaps most
importantly, they know when they're weak in an area and how to recruit
complimentary team members.

This by no means should be considered advice that everyone needs an MBA, that
all MBAs are equal, that all tech PMs need an MBA, or even that all Google
MBAs are good at their jobs, but _MINE ARE_ , and they'd be much less
proficient if they hadn't spent that extra two years in business school (along
with tech internships both years). Just like everything else, people need to
set goals and work appropriately to achieve them. For some individuals this
will suggest an MBA; for many others, not so much.

Honestly, the biggest piece of business school advice I'd offer anyone is that
if you can't get into or afford a top tier school, don't bother paying a
school at all. Just try to DIY it the best you can. The gap between what
students get out of the tier 1 programs and everything else (with a few
notable exceptions _) is immense.

_ I'm not counting exec MBA programs at all. They're specifically targeted at
people who are already execs and just look to amp up certain skills (M&A,
international development, etc).

~~~
serge2k
Why would you jump to the conclusion that their skills have anything at all to
do with their MBAs?

~~~
eitally
Because I'm managing them and I talk to them and watch them work every day.

------
ryandrake
> Sandberg suggested a career in tech might not even be necessary to catch
> Facebook’s attention. “We don't look for a specific background or skill-set
> when we make hiring decisions,” she wrote. “As my friend and Instagram COO
> Marne Levine says, we hire athletes and cross-train them.”

From a randomly selected job posting on Facebook's web site:

    
    
      Requirements
    
      B.S. or M.S. Computer Science or related field
      Experience building high-performance, large-scale server applications and reliable software
      Expert knowledge developing and debugging in C++
      End-to-end experience in online ad serving and background in online advertising/auction theory strongly preferred
      Knowledge of Perl, PHP, or Python a plus
      Knowledge of Hadoop/MapReduce a plus

~~~
eastbayjake
I believe Sandberg was referring to positions where someone might think an MBA
is required, like product management. No one is asking whether an MBA might be
useful for highly technical roles, like the above posting for someone doing
the technical implementation of an online ad engine.

~~~
niels_olson
From what I've read of Sandberg, she is an executive looking at grooming
executives. In her mind, "professional" is equivalent to a plumber: not her
children.

Her athlete analogy makes a special sort of sense in that context. I have seen
a strong connection from the athletes and spec-ops people I went to school
with now moving into executive positions. I'm not sure what the common
denominator is, because I know a lot of athletes who are now in construction
too. But if you're an athlete and can hang intellectually, there's a desirable
mindset there. And I think that mindset is the striver: they see themselves
every day as a little faster or a little slower, never the same. And they
always want to be faster.

In Plato's Republic, there's a chapter on training the guardians, and I think
that reflects her ideas reasonably well, in so far as a _lot_ of Western
leadership practices derived from the Greeks and the Republic in particular.

------
n3on_net
I wonder if she would still become COO of Facebook without Harvard MBA and all
the oportunities resulted from it.

MBA is probably really not necessary, but if you have the oportunity to do one
on a top school, it may open some doors and expand your network. At least it
has no negative effects (if you can efford it).

Especially if you have technical background and want to move to management
position. It simply diversifies your background and strengthens signaling.

~~~
swingbridge
The issue with pointing to things like "the Harvard MBA" is that people who
are selected into top tier programs are likely to have done just fine on their
own anyway... so it's really hard to say that the MBA is why she was
successful. I think she was successful because of qualities she already had,
not something she learned in business school.

~~~
cheald
I think the implication may have been that the "Harvard MBA" credentials - not
necessarily training - may have been instrumental in her career path. Degrees
are filtering mechanisms, and while it may be true that an MBA isn't needed to
succeed once you're in the door, it may be harder to get your foot in there in
the first place without them.

------
swingbridge
Honestly the MBA has always mostly been an advanced degree for people who
didn't get an advanced degree in a real subject. Lets people tick the 'grad
school' box. The real world value has always been quite questionable and yes
I'd agree here that in tech it's mostly useless, if not actually even a
disadvantage.

For what's it's worth nearly all the excellent executives I've met over the
years didn't have an MBA and nearly all the worst ones did...

~~~
jevgeni
Well, I have had the opposite experience, but then again I'm not in tech.

Thing is, the useless MBA image comes from the indiscriminate and formalistic
practices of HR recruiters, who would equate an "MBA" with "value". So the
incentives have changed from "I want to bring my company forward" to "I want a
cushy job with little actual work".

And it is true, that traditional business education has now suffered from
this. What I ask myself, if CS will be immune to this. Judging that Fizz Buzz
is still a thing, I'd say no.

~~~
x1024
So you're saying that "No true MBA graduate is useless".

~~~
jevgeni
Why are people on HN so obsessed with trying to find argument fallacies in
comments?

No, I am not saying that. The words "true MBA" have the same amount of content
to them as "a true kitchen sink": zero.

I say that people buy education for different reasons. Some get an MBA because
they want to flash their CVs, have a cushy job, and avoid the strains of being
original. Others get an MBA because they need the skills, the language, the
professional network, and the confidence, that such degrees (at least from
good universities) bring for a specific goal they want to accomplish, be that
within an already established business or not.

Saying that those kind of mind sets (or only one of those mind sets) is
strictly particular to a group of people, which made a certain academic choice
is wrong.

In my professional experience, for example, I've met a lot more engineers who
were absolutely useless from a business perspective, than I've met useless
MBAs. Of course, this is because I've met way more engineers than MBAs.

~~~
x1024
Well, when you quantify your opinion like that, there's not much of an opinion
left to even debate.

"Different people get an education for different reasons" is a nice statement,
and I would even agree that it's true. But nothing follows from that. It's not
a statement that one can draw conclusions from.

In your original statement you're saying "MBAs are useless now, but it's
because of HR, and it sucks that MBAs are useless but it didn't always use to
be like that". Now you're saying "no, they aren't useless, in fact they're
better than engineers".

Oh, how easy it is to claim a strong point when you're unconstrained by the
truth.

~~~
jevgeni
I haven't claimed a strong point. Neither have I said anything like what you
are implying I've said. I've only tried to clarify my previous comments at
which I seem to have failed.

------
anjc
It confuses me endlessly that MBAs should be so misunderstood by so many
people, it being suggested that they are only good for networking, that people
with MBAs are cold and evil, and so on. They're simply a course which teach
you the fundamentals of several areas which are relevant to business. It'd be
like saying that a degree in CS would be superfluous for somebody who wants to
program. If you love programming, then you'll get value from every aspect of a
CS degree. Likewise for an MBA and business. Also, truly they only teach the
fundamentals. An MBA's exposure to marketing/accounting/management would be
_far_ more diluted than that of an 18 year old who pursues a degree in one of
these specific areas, so I'm not sure why people seem to be so threatened by
the MBA.

It's also funny to read in the article that Thiel has said MBAs are useless,
because his books are a joke when compared to the most basic business courses.
It's also laughable that Sandberg would say this, having already gotten an
education from a place which has been central to business trends globally for
decades. It's likely that Facebook et al would not exist without HBS and
similar institutions in the US.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
The usual criticism is that MBAs believe the degree endows them with far more
strategic intelligence than they really have.

It's like officer school. The worst graduates come out absolutely convinced
they can run an entire army, when in fact they're still almost completely
clueless.

Aside from the networking - which is not trivial - the benefits of an MBA for
talented individuals seem to be exposure to the idea that strategy,
cost/benefit analysis, accounting, marketing, and the rest all exist, and are
more relevant to a business than the code base.

This can be a surprise to straight CS people, many of whom only care about
code.

But by analogy, many MBAs only seem to care about money.

There's more to running a successful business than the bottom line - or at
least there should be - and more subtle management principles that build
businesses by _making customers and employees happy_ as well as making
shareholders rich don't seem to figure at all in MBA schools.

The MBA point of view seems to be that happiness doesn't matter when there's
profit to be made.

Ironically, there's a lot of poverty in that view - not just morally, but
politically _and economically._ In the longer term it leads to the kind of
economic picture we have today, where there's a lot of profit being made, but
at the cost of rapidly shrinking broad prosperity and economic freedom for
most of the population.

~~~
anjc
I can't agree on your interpretation of an MBA point of view, but I will say
that it does seem to be the most prevalent interpretation. Thinking solely
about the bottom line could be the result of a twisted grounding in
accounting, but no other course in an MBA relates to profit in any direct way.
Almost every class typically/simply involves being grounded in decades of
research in complicated areas.

It seems to me that your interpretation is more of a criticism of public
shareholding and the duties of the board. Coincidentally, board members in
public companies may be MBAs, and their consultants may be MBAs, but the
Masters isn't why they're pursuing profit.

Lastly, I had whole courses on the happiness of employees (Organisational
Behaviour, HR), but like Strategy and Marketing and every other class, they
were extremely theoretical and totally unrelated to practicalities of business
such as profit.

------
noir-york
> She said her MBA helped her get a basic sense of business, which might be
> instrumental “for some people and in some situations,” but dismissed the
> notion that the training would offer a leg up at Facebook.

My background is economics (and political philosophy) - and I work in tech -
first as a programmer, the product manager, and now as founder: knowing
economics has been useful in my roles as PM and founder.

Everyone should know some basic economics - micro-econ concepts such as
marginal utility, producer/consumer surplus - as its useful for business.

And everyone should know basic macro stuff (interest rates/GDP/etc) because in
a democracy it pays to have informed citizens.

An MBA, however, is overkill.

------
marcus_holmes
I'm in startup tech, I have an MBA, and I agree. The qualification itself is
largely irrelevant.

More to the point, most of what I was taught in my MBA course is irrelevant to
a bootstrapping startup using Lean/Customer Development methods.

~~~
cumeadius
ehh... MBAs are pretty useful when you raise ridiculous later stage round and
need to justify a high burn rate so you hire a team of them....

The MBA could be useful but most MBA curriculums have not adjusted to the
speed of firm development in the startup space. the degree needs a 21st
century revamp.

~~~
marcus_holmes
It needs decoupling from academia, like a lot of university education. It's
not a vocational qualification, yet industry treats it as if it is (Computer
Science also suffers from this), so the universities do their best to make it
as vocational as they can.

It really needs to be separated out into "advanced management training", a
"masters of business research" for the academics, and really a "business
teaching qualification" as a third option. Trying to wedge all these
objectives into one course is hurting everyone.

------
xivzgrev
Then why do several prominent tech companies have MBA preferred in their
business job postings? I noticed maybe 9 months ago during a job search.

I also have a friend who is MBA and works at FB. They have a whole formal
program set up for them.

So while it may not be advantangeous per Se I think companies do use it as a
proxy for character traits or pattern of achievement. Because of that it is an
advantage. Even if not if they have a formal Recruiting program then IT is an
advantage.

~~~
code4tee
Because, honestly, HR at most of these "tech companies" is rather clueless.
Also as an investor if I see a tech companies looking to pack the halls with
MBAs that tells me a lot about its soon to be bloated future.

If someone is really skilled outside the MBA and it was more of a tack-on then
they'll probably be fine. ...but in my experience the person relying on their
MBA is the type of clueless executive that demands all the metrics for their
division be totally reworked into some crazy ridiculous Excel spreadsheet
because that's the only thing they know how to use and they think this means
that they are doing analytics. These are the types that slowly destroy
companies these days.

~~~
stvswn
So you stopped investing in Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple? Each has
formally hired MBAs for years. Google just promoted one to CEO. I assume
you're calling the top of each of these companies? How have they managed the
MBA death spiral for the past five years -- is their demise just a matter of
time?

------
efraimip
I agree 100% with Sheryl. I'm a 7 time serial entrepreneur. built a few big
ones. the only bad/failed ones were because of MBA leaders in the company. the
only good ones were with techies leading who learned through experience the
practical application of scientific business practices.

99% of all top tech company CEO's are techies who learned practical business
through experience --- and are not MBAs.

Sheryl Sandberg knows exactly what she's talking about. MBA was designed for
corporate middle management. No need for that in a startup - especially at
founder level.

Now I invest in startups. I do not invest in MBA founders. I'm doing very good
investing.

Its simple. Every logical argument says the same.

------
asfandyaar
I guess an MBA is more for networking and opening doors, and not necessarily
for important job skills.

------
thedogeye
Taking two years out of your life to study business full-time will improve
your business judgement. That this is controversial always surprised me.

~~~
curun1r
I haven't found this to be universal. If anything, I think it can warp your
thinking in a way that can be beneficial in certain circumstances, but is
really scary in others. By way of example:

I have a parent who teaches at a top-5 business school. A few years ago, I had
the opportunity to travel to Japan on a trip where my parent acted as a
faculty chaperone and was able to attend some of the meetings with Japanese
business leaders. One of the trips was to a 400+ year-old sake brewer. After
the tour of the brewery, there was a Q & A period with the president of the
company. The business school students asked him question after question about
expansion, new product lines, finding new markets, advertising
campaigns...everything they could think about to achieve growth. His answer
was always basically the same and to the effect of, "I'm happy with the
current situation. I make a profit making the best sake in the world, just as
my ancestors have made it for the past 400 years. I provide a comfortable life
for my family and the families of the people who work for me. Why would I want
to change?"

It was a profound experience for me to watch him try to explain what should be
a completely reasonable position to a group of people that have had the ideal
of growth beyond all else drilled into their head so thoroughly that they
simply couldn't understand contentment with the status quo. On the ride home,
the whole group was complaining about why they'd even wasted their time
talking to someone so ignorant. Comments ranged from, "He'll be out of
business in 10 years" to "At least we got to drink sake."

I worry that putting MBAs in charge of businesses puts a skewed view on risk
and desired outcomes. Each and every one of their suggestions could have
backfired immensely and most would have required taking on considerable debt.
It's this way of thinking that gives people the unicorn-or-bust mentality and
look down on those who try to build "lifestyle businesses" (I hate that term).
The world would be a much better place with fewer unicorns and more lifestyle
businesses. The hockey stick isn't necessary to be successful, at yet it seems
to be all that MBAs understand.

~~~
icebraining
But did the course make the students think that way, or are students who think
that way more likely to enrol for an MBA?

~~~
curun1r
That's a fair point. Those skills are probably completely unnecessary for
building small, sustainable businesses. But whether they self-select or are
produced, I can see it leading to broad, cynical generalizations about MBAs
which are, for the most part, true.

------
stvswn
Why is it that every couple of weeks the tech world has to re-adjudicate the
MBA argument? Is it just a fun debate? Why do so many people care about other
people's degrees?

I have an MBA, I normally go around saying it doesn't matter. Mostly it's
because bragging about your MBA is douchey, and we know it. I don't feel like
people I work with care either way.

------
secondbond
To be honest, you don't need MBA in management too.

------
therealchiko
I think Sheryl might be missing the point that it depends with where you're
coming from. Career paths differ and I think it's hyperbolic to reduce it to
one "true" way and discredit some things from a privileged position.

A lot of top execs do have the credentials often dismissed so I'm not
personally sure they'd be there without that kind of education.

The value of attending business school (assuming it's a top school) might be
more related to "outside" factors such as more opportunities, tapping into
good networks and of course, involvement in different disciplines with all the
resources you need to grow your thinking and expertise.

What I am concerned about is that some statements can easily be taken the
wrong way by people who honestly would benefit from MBAs. Facebook not
choosing or using an MBA as main criteria is fine, but Facebook is not the
only company that matters and i'm sure having an MBA does also not discredit
you in their eyes.

------
DannoHung
Corporations are legal constructs that require specific domain knowledge to
correctly administer and develop. MBAs are ostensibly targeted at that (in the
same way Computer Science degrees are ostensibly targeted at teaching you
domain knowledge to think and reason about the specific mathematics that
underlie computers and software).

What you get out of them and their utility probably is very contextual in the
same way any degree is.

My suspicion is that for many roles and at many times in a technology
business, the utility is low, but that for some roles at some times, it is
quite high.

Ultimately, the thing that's might be funky is that if you hire someone for
their expertise in domains pertinent to MBAs, you are putting them very close
to having control of the legal construct of your business. Like a sysadmin,
you need to place a lot of trust in them to ensure they are doing their job
correctly if you _don 't_ have the domain knowledge to provide careful
oversight.

------
davnicwil
Aside from the value of the degree itself, can anyone attest to the usefulness
of any particular knowledge gained from doing an MBA, particularly around
running small companies and startups? If so, any recommendations for
resources, books etc?

This whole issue (usefulness of MBA in tech management) sounds very similar to
the usefulness of CS degree in development issue. We can talk all day about
the effect the CS degree has on getting jobs in the first place, but putting
that entirely aside, as a developer with a CS degree, I can certainly point to
some very useful things for the job that I learned in the course of doing the
degree, and I could tell somebody without a CS degree what those were and
where to read about them. Ignoring the entire issue of whether or not the
'piece of paper' would help them in their career, this knowledge certainly
would.

If anyone (MBA or not) has any such advice, I'd be very grateful to hear it!

~~~
hectormalot
I'm a chemical engineer and self taught programmer who turned strategy
consultant. Graduated from my MBA a few weeks ago, so I might be a bit biased
:)

I've found that different people find different things valuable in their MBA.
We had an entrepreneurship prof who was also an investor who took us yoking
from term sheets to buy outs. Found that super valuable, but yes, no doubt
could read up more on this online as well. Same for finance, which was a topic
that I didn't know that well before. From a course perspective also got more
out of strategy than I expected, but that seems to be very dependent on the
prof teaching. (Read 'profit or growth' by bala if you want a book, but more
suited for large corporates)

Above all though, i think you get more out of the MBA in personal development
(leadership in group work, dealing with pressure, being confident with new
material, etc.) and network (after 1-2 years you are at least well connected
to a group of people that have high business ambitions, plus alumni). In that
sense it's difficult to replace the full MBA experience with a set of MOOCs.

Finally, I've always found it powerful if someone in a room full of technical
people knows more about business than any other tech guy in that room (or vice
versa, being the only biz guy who understands tech or can program in a room
full of biz guys). The MBA is one way for technical people to make that step.

realizing that I didn't answer the question... Here are some things I think
would also be interesting, regardless of the paper for more tech oriented
people:

\- time value of money (finance)

\- basics of accounting (p&l vs cash flow, you'd be amazed how many startups
die by running out of cash even though their p&l is positive)

\- understanding competitive advantage & successful market entry (strategy)

\- basic operations: the difference between efficient and market responsive
supply chains (right supply chain for right product, i.e. Don't typically
airfreight toilet paper); and the newsfeed or model if you make real products

\- lots around marketing (pricing, channels, etc.)

\- some stuff on more executive lvl management (do executives have most impact
by the decisions they make themselves, or by the premises they set for others
in the organization within which they make decisions? If the latter, how do
you work best as an exec?)

\- negotiation 101: there are some great HBS cases available online, it's even
fun as a Friday afternoon to negotiate between people and see what works best.

\- governance and boards

\- basics of investing, leveraged buyouts, private equity/VC

~~~
davnicwil
This is really useful, thanks!

------
jheriko
I think this depends on the kind of person you are, as well as the field you
are in.

If you can learn things for yourself effectively then there are a whole range
of degree level courses which are completely unnecessary. In fact, not wasting
your time with them, can be an advantage of its own...

Although even then... its always good to have others with experience teaching
you. Regardless of the subject matter.

There is no 'rocket science' in business and there is plenty of material
available to learn from.

------
mercurialshark
As many have noted, it's not necessarily 1:1 useful in the context of advanced
skills training. However unsavory, many mid to large tech companies have a
relatively high concentration of engineers who later received MBA's in very
senior positions. So yes - the cliche that it's a way to climb the corporate
ladder can still ring true for tech, if the tech company you want to work for
is structured in the conventional way.

------
the_watcher
The biggest value an MBA provides (and this is not me claiming it does or
doesn't provide other value) is that companies recruit out of them. If you are
looking to make a career change, it can be tough to get considered for roles
you might do well in, given your lack of experience, but companies are
demonstrably more willing to hire into roles without relevant work experience
if coming from a solid MBA program.

------
samfisher83
Would she be where she is without her Harvard MBA? Its not all about the
education. Its about the doors it opens and the connections you make.

~~~
silverlake
More important was her connection to Larry Summers, the Secretary of Treasury.
She was given a role that far exceeded her experience, which gave her an
advantage over the other 2000 Harvard MBA grads in her class.

------
xacaxulu
In a tech consultancy, especially if you are in the payments space or do any
work with financial institutions can be very helpful. Closely defined, yes it
doesn't seem helpful in tech alone but we work in/for businesses and our
software solutions are often used by business. Understanding overarching
business drivers is very helpful.

------
germinalphrase
There is a common perspective in this thread that XYZ skills/knowledge are
useful to understand (even if one's not seeking the social signaling
associated with a top tier MBA).

Can anyone post some favored texts/resources for self-directed learning?

What do we include in the HN home-brew MBA?

~~~
rchaud
Unsurprisingly, someone has attempted to make a business out this exact
question. The Personal MBA site has a good selection of books to get your
started. It's categorized under different topics like marketing, finance,
strategy, etc.

[https://personalmba.com/best-business-books/](https://personalmba.com/best-
business-books/)

------
oldmanjay
I think of Sheryl Sandberg as an ad exec who happened to get into tech at the
right time. I'm not really aware of any technical bona fides, just the usual
executive ability to extract money from technical processes for personal gain.

Am I missing something?

------
pbreit
Oh, it matters. It can easily be a hindrance because the thinking required by
large business, consulting and wall street is quite different that that
required to get a business off the ground.

------
allsystemsgo
I have 3/4 of an MBA. Stopped with just an MS in IT Management. I could finish
it but, didn't seem that useful.

------
harryf
Once could make the argument that having an MBA is actually a hinderance in
tech...

~~~
samsolomon
I don't know that more education is necessarily a bad thing. For a startup
it's the opportunity cost of someone who has spent several years in an MBA
program that makes that candidate unattractive.

~~~
djhn
You are implying that startups value experience, and more so when gained early
in one's career - so they would be discounting knowledge based on how late in
one's life it's gained.

I reckon this comes form the American/British style tradition of going
straight to college, graduating at 22 and then starting a career. In Europe
styding/working isn't a mutually exclusive, binary option. It's not uncommon
to graduate at 25 or even 30, whether that's because of mandatory military
service, self-funding study concurrently with studying, finding interesting
opportunities while at university, pursuing arts/theatre/sport, etc.

In fact, I've never disclosed my age to employers whether during or after
hiring. Since it can't be easily deducted from graduation years, I've had
people estimate anything from 19-40 in the past few years.

If you are comparing two potential hires, the age should be irrelevant.
Experience, skill and future value (including fit and other subjective
aspects) vs. their price (salary) is pretty much the only relevant
consideration.

------
ramanamit1234
People need a general business understanding for most jobs, even government
jobs.

------
gtpasqual
Most people with a top-tier MBA would never wanna work in tech.

Sure, it may seem interesting to be an executive in Facebook, but that is not
nearly as lucrative (and interesting) as working in trades or billion dollars
deals in finance.

~~~
UK-AL
I believe tech has been competing pretty well against Management consulting
and investment banking for top mba grads.

------
kabouseng
>> "Sandberg suggested a career in tech might not even be necessary to catch
Facebook’s attention. “We don't look for a specific background or skill-set
when we make hiring decisions,” she wrote. “As my friend and Instagram COO
Marne Levine says, we hire athletes and cross-train them.”

So how does one interpret this? It sounds like she doesn't really have a good
idea as to what makes a great employee, and falls back to magic catch phrases,
altough this is probably an industry (actually multiple industries) wide
problem currently (How to identify a great employee a-priori).

So if she doesn't really know what makes for great employees, is her advice
about MBA's really relevant then?

IMHO yes MBA's have a bad rap, but just like everything the knowledge you gain
from a MBA program can open your mind to thinking about problems in a whole
different way. A lot of techies have no concept of how the business side of
the industry works, and it would not be a bad thing to understand it. But you
can also gain that awareness from a couple of good books on the subject, not
just from attending a MBA.

Just for completeness the other advantage of a MBA is the network, which is
another discussion. (Of value for the person, not necessarily for the
business, which is the point of the article)

~~~
jor-el
Can you suggest some books? I would be interested to read them.

~~~
kabouseng
Well I don't have a MBA :D, but I do have a masters degree of a similar
orientation (Masters in engineering management). I can only recommend the ones
I have read and found of value:

[1] Crossing the chasm (Marketing related)

[2] Peopleware (HR related)

[3] How to win friends and influence people (HR related)

[4] The Goal (Business related)

[5] Critical chain (Project management related)

[6] Who moved my cheese (Change management related)

and any of the lean / agile businessy books for ex.

[7] The lean startup

These might not be viewed as traditional MBA material, but my course featured
some of these along with more traditional academic books on subjects like
financial management, people management, operations etc. I can provide these
textbooks to you as well if you like.

*Amazon links just for convenience, no affiliation.

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Crossing-Chasm-3rd-Disruptive-
Mainstre...](http://www.amazon.com/Crossing-Chasm-3rd-Disruptive-
Mainstream/dp/0062292986/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450359318&sr=8-1&keywords=crossing+the+chasm)

[2] [http://www.amazon.com/Peopleware-Productive-Projects-
Teams-3...](http://www.amazon.com/Peopleware-Productive-Projects-
Teams-3rd/dp/0321934113/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450359341&sr=8-1&keywords=peopleware)

[3] [http://www.amazon.com/How-Win-Friends-Influence-
People/dp/06...](http://www.amazon.com/How-Win-Friends-Influence-
People/dp/0671027034/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450364297&sr=8-1&keywords=how+to+win+friends+and+influence+people)

[4]
[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0884271951?keywords=eli%20g...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0884271951?keywords=eli%20goldratt&qid=1450358834&ref_=sr_1_1&sr=8-1)

[5] [http://www.amazon.com/Critical-Chain-Eliyahu-M-
Goldratt/dp/0...](http://www.amazon.com/Critical-Chain-Eliyahu-M-
Goldratt/dp/0884271536/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450359400&sr=8-1&keywords=critical+chain)

[6] [http://www.amazon.com/Who-Moved-My-Cheese-
Amazing/dp/0399144...](http://www.amazon.com/Who-Moved-My-Cheese-
Amazing/dp/0399144463/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450359425&sr=8-1&keywords=who+moved+my+cheese)

[7] [http://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-
Continuous-...](http://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-
Innovation/dp/0307887898/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1450359450&sr=8-1&keywords=The+lean+startup)

