Yesterday, Philip Delves Broughton, author of What They Teach You at Harvard, wrote an opinion piece in The Economist that questioned the value of MBAs. In it, the accompanying diagram tracks the fall in Return on Investment in terms of salaries before and after graduation with an MBA degree.
I think it's telling that it's still seen as acceptable and significant to measure an MBA program by salary increase (if any) simply because it's easy to measure. It's typical of traditional business approaches. In a world where we sorely need meaningful and sustainable innovation, we should be using other measures that better reflect what innovation leaders are capable of achieving during their careers. Most graduates who leave to start companies do so at great decrease in short-terms salary and, instead, trade it equity and much larger long-term gains. In addition, these leaders and innovators are much more likely to create lasting, and more significant value to both economies and societies. How do we measure that? When this is the case, a decrease in salary after graduation is actually a good thing.
I'm not arguing that many traditional MBA programs don't serve students well. I find many lacking any preparation for a future that must be sustainable (socially, ecologically, and financially) as well as profitable and meaningful for customers and citizens, and employees alike. I see very few programs that question the failed economic models of the neoclassical paradigm nor prepare students to function in a world in which these new models must not only be replaced ASAP but where they will need to reflect new understandings of leadership, massively more transparent governance, and a different set of intersecting cultural contexts than the old "salary man" paradigm that was enshrined when the MBA itself was born.