Is MBA Necessary to be Successful in Business?

For the last two decades, MBA education in India has provided a sought-after career to a majority of students. But, from the past few years, the exponential increase in the number of Management colleges and students have given rise to certain issues and scenarios that make every MBA aspirant question:   

Are management programs of India still as lucrative as they were a decade ago?

If you are an MBA aspirant, then it is crucial for you to pause for a moment here to analyze the following aspects of Indian Management education.   

1. False Placement Promises

Apart from the top 25-30 management colleges, the story of every management institute of India is the same, i.e. boasting about their fake 100% placement guarantees. However, these institutes focus more on charging a hefty amount as program fees rather than training the students to become industry-ready and placing them in the corporate sector.   As a matter of fact, a study by All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) shows that in 2016-17, out of 2,50,000 students that passed out, only 47% of the MBA students were placed which was 4% less than the previous year and at a five-year low. Ideally, the institute should take full responsibility for the student placements and not just fake promises. Sunstones, for instance, take full accountability of placing a student in a well-paid job. They focus on developing the workplace skills of a student and give them hands-on experience to make them industry ready.

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2. Colleges run by Politicians/Builders

Most MBA institutes are real-estate investments under the pretence of educational institutions managed by politicians and builders. The attractive concrete structures posing as Management institutes and colleges focus more on admissions of students, extracting a huge sum of money as their program fee, rather than focusing on quality education and placements. In fact, between 2001 and 2012, the government bodies approved a large number of requests for opening management institutions in the country. This included permission to those who had no prior experience of running a college or an educational institute. As a result, these institutes failed to get the students placed and are now on the verge of closure or have already shut down. MBA aspirants must go for institutes which are managed by academicians with industry connect since these professionals understand the requirement of the industry and impart the education accordingly. Sunstones, for example, includes India’s leading professionals and academicians as a part of their Management team who adopt a job-relevant curriculum that provides adequate corporate exposure to make students industry ready.  

3. Minimal Industry Exposure  

The current Indian Management education focuses mainly on imparting theoretical knowledge with zero hands-on experience. This creates MBA graduates that do not possess any practical knowledge and hence are not readily accepted in the corporate world. Ideally, MBA program should stress more on making students industry ready through internships and corporate exposure. Sunstones provides a 9-month intensive internship opportunity for every student that gives them experience and exposure of the corporate world and an ‘on-the-job-learning' opportunity. This internship enhances the student's workplace skills and gives him an edge over other students in the placement drives.

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4. Outdated Curriculum

B-schools are consistently failing to update their syllabus which has widened the gap between what is needed in the current Job market and what is being learned. The continuous use of outdated and irrelevant curriculum is churning out students who are not at all Industry Ready and thus, struggle in the competitive race of Placements.   The syllabus must closely follow industry trends and keep on changing as and when required. Moreover, students must be exposed to the industry through management internships that will train them enough to tackle various situations in the corporate world.   

5. Under-Qualified Faculty

Many B-schools in India have recruited inexperienced faculty members with poor industry linkages. This shifts the teaching method from skill-based knowledge to theory-based which reduces the soft skills acquired by the student to a bare minimum. The high Student-Faculty ratio and outsourcing of teaching also add up to this issue. Thus, there is a tremendous pressure to find skilled teachers who possess adequate experience and subject matter knowledge to benefit the Management students. Sunstone's faculty includes accomplished teachers with exceptional links in the industry, who readily share their vast expertise with the students.  Also, a low student-teacher ratio of 12:1 enhances the learning process of the students.