Would getting a Masters in Finance or Management look bad?

Im looking very hard at Duke's MMS program, UT Austin' MSF, Vandy's MSF, among others. My question is, would getting a masters degree in a business subject (after I've already got a BBA) look bad to BSchool admissions?

22 Comments
 

not necessarilly.

in my opinion.. if you did a top BBA or equivalent, then it looks bad -- I'd think like why your previous BBA didn't give you enough for a decent FT job.

if you did a BBA at a lower-tier school, I think it's understandable -- your previous school wasn't a big enough pond for you, so you're trying to revamp yourself and be stronger

but still, there are so many scenarios with BBA to MSF/MiM. TNA's old posts have stuff about it. just look them up

 

Well i really don't think so. Duke is a great college and its MiM program is really proving itself to be top notch, so if i was in an Adcom and i see an applicant trying to get into Duke after a BBA degree, i would just assume that he is trading up and looking to come to Duke so that he can improve his chances of finding a great job later on. This becomes especially true if you have a UG degree from a lower ranked college. Also in my opinion most ad comms wont even pay this fact much attention, they will be more interested in knowing what is your reason for taking up a MiM and if you are able to give a satisfactory answer, then you should be golden. Lastly more than 50% of the admits to a MiM degree are previous business degree holders, so dont let that hold you back. Hope the answer helped.

Abhyank Srinet Founder at www.MiM-Essay.com
 

Tons of people do an MSF and then do an MBA further down the line dude.

If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses - Henry Ford
 

Yeah, the MSF at Florida is really good. Their placements are solid also. I was looking at their resumes today and do yourself a favor, get your resume professionally redone or use the M&I format. A lot of the resumes on that site had horrible formatting.

MSF and MBA are not redundant. Honestly, if you do end up getting an MBA, concentrate in something interesting or something that will augment your MSF. No need to get an MBA with a finance concentration.

 

Wait, you're a high school senior, and you're already worrying about your MBA, which you will maybe apply for in ~6 years?

 
ChimpoYes, and I am not really going to obsess over it, I just want to plan a little bit.

That's a great quality man but don't plan your life away, its good to have a general idea but don't forget to have fun and let life come to you...

If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses - Henry Ford
 

When applying to an MBA program, you have to disclose all academic coursework. Therefore, even if you stopped now, you'd still have to tell them about the finance classes. Since the reason for the classes and the MSF are the same, you might as well get a degree to show for your work.

That being said, I'm not so sure that saying you did it to study for the CFA is adequate. Either your MSF program is not very rigorous or you learned way above and beyond what is needed for the CFA. Many people find studying the material given by the institute more than adequate (though finance/accounting experience would definitely help you survive CFA lvl 1).

Instead, simply saying you did an MSF for the purpose of learning a skill set that others learn while they are IB Analysts (which you obviously missed since you chose the military route instead) should be more than sufficient to explain why you did it. Though you wouldn't think so from most MBA programs, there's still a place in the world for technical skills, even for managers. After all, you need to at least understand what the people you manage are doing. Anyway, beyond that explanation,it's just a matter of why MBA, why now, which you seem to have down.

 

Thanks, yeah that's kinda what I thought. I mean I think it would be difficult to disqualify a person for being overly qualified (business academic wise) from a top school although I know some schools do deny people they think will not come to the school to make themselves look more selective.

 

My biggest concern was the redundancy from their impression as an easy disqualifier, I may have a bit more of a challenge articulating why MBA if I have finance...

 

learning "soft skills such as managing/leading" sounds kind of bs'y, considering his background. if i saw that, i would ask, wasn't he supposed to do that in the air force/military?

 

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