Applying to PhD in Management after an MBA

[etceteraetc]

I am wondering if there are any PhD in Management students or grads out there who successfully got into a PhD program after having completed an MBA? How did you demonstrate "research skills" in your PhD application?

I have an Undergrad in Business, and am working at a major CPG company in Marketing. My long-term career aspirations, however, are to teach Marketing at university or college level. Generally a PhD is required to teach full-time at university, and is an asset for college teaching jobs.

So, my next step is a Masters program, but I want to make sure I go into the right Masters program to enable me to pursue a PhD later on, and to be employable as a business school prof. Depending on who I ask, I am getting conflicting responses, so I would love some advice from people who have actually successfully pursued a business school professor career path.

- BBA --> MBA --> PhD. I would love to get an MBA, as it will also help me advance in my current career, and make me more employable if my teaching career falls through for some reason. However, I am told that since MBA is not a research-based degree, I might have trouble applying for a PhD later and might have to go get another Masters degree (e.g. MSc) anyways.

- BBA --> MSc in Management --> PhD. MSc is seen as the prep program to PhD. I am concerned, however, that the MSc degree wouldn't be of much use for my marketing/CPG resume in case I decide to continue in my current career.

Personally, I would much prefer to get an MBA degree instead of MSc, but would love advice on what else to do to ensure my PhD application will look great.

Thanks for your adivce!

[phdconfessional]

I started my PhD in Management this fall after completing my MBA this past summer. So the answer is yes, you can get into a PhD program with an MBA

To give you some additional advice:

As you already seem to understand, the focus of an MBA and the focus of a PhD program are drastically different. So will the MBA prepare you or provide you with any research experience? The answer is no. But like you, I wanted to have a marketable degree like an MBA under my belt in case this whole PhD thing didn't pan out.

That said, business colleges expect that a lot of their applicants come from an MBA background. In fact, some even build MBA classes into your program if you don't already have one. They do understand and value overall business knowledge. If you don't believe me, check out the vitas of faculty members at your current school or the schools you are applying to. You will see many of them have MBAs.

If you are dead set of getting your PhD and know research is your passion, I would recommend going the MSc route (if it is indeed research focused). There are other people in other departments that did come from research oriented masters programs, and they are a little ahead of the game because they already understand research methods, where to us MBA folks, research is brand new.

If you want to get research experience while earning your MBA, let your MBA director or a faculty member know that you are wanting to pursue a PhD after this and would love to get involved in a research project. I don't know if your MBA program has graduate assistantships, but if so, I suggest you apply for one and let it be known you want an assignment that is research oriented.

Other ways to help your chances of being admitted: NETWORK! I applied to 4 schools, all within a 3-4 driving distance of home. I contacted and scheduled meetings with all 4 of them. This gave me a much greater perspective on what programs would (or would not be) a good fit for me. Maintain correspondence with your contacts at each school throughout the entire application process.

The last tidbit: check out the research currently being conducted and see if your research interests align with any of the current faculty. When you write your SOP, you need to make specific mention of faculty you would like to work with and what areas of research you are interested in.

Hope this helps!!

[gallatinrf]

I agree with 95% of PhDconfessionals post.  Certainly, networking and research opportunities should be exploited to the hilt for anybody interested in a PhD program.    The best-performing PhD students are almost always those who enter the program with already-established research capabilities, possibly even with working papers,  and are already well-known to the faculty and to the academic community at large.  I doubt that I have much to add to her comments in this regard.

 

Perhaps the lone point of contention that I have with PhDconfessional - and of which I'm not entirely sure that we actually disagree at all - is that business school PhD programs (or the business academic community at large) understand and value overall business knowledge.  Sadly - and deeply ironically - this does not seem to be so.  While overall business knowledge may not hurt you, it doesn't seem to help you much either.   The truth is, many business faculty, especially the newer ones, simply don't know and, worse, don't care about real-world business.   

 

Nor am I the only one to say so.  Rakesh Khurana noted in his magnum opus, From Higher Aims to Hired Hands, that landed him tenure at Harvard Business School,  that "many of the discipline-trained scholars joining business school faculties were not intrinsically interested in business" (p.311 - see Google Books link below).  In his 2007 "Modest Proposal" piece in the Academy of Management Journal, Stanford GSB's Jeffrey Pfeffer decried business academia's "disdain for work that informs or that might inform professional practice", that "current review and status processes don’t particularly reward the production
of knowledge that anyone cares about", and, that business schools, for all their ostensible focus on innovation and organizational design, would never hire somebody like IDEO founder David M. Kelley, despite the fact that "one could plausibly argue that IDEO, through both its design and its management practices and culture, has had more effect on management than scores of academic articles combined."   Oddly, Kelley is indeed tenured at Stanford...in the engineering school (but certainly not GSB).  As Pfeffer acidly noted: "The engineering school may have wisdom that many business schools lack."   In the same spirit, Jay Lorsch of Harvard Business School published a 2009 piece in the Journal of Management Inquiry lamenting the "erosion of our faculty’s
belief in the sanctity of relevance, which I think one can only attribute to an influx of discipline-educated faculty
and to the shift in the belief system of the broader business academy."  

 

 

http://books.google.com/books?id=v3DfpKEsNREC&lpg=PA311&ots=cedgwTFf7x&dq=from%20higher%20aims%20%22intrinsically%20interested%22&pg=PA311#v=onepage&q=from%20higher%20aims%20%22intrinsically%20interested%22&f=false 

 

 

As ultimate proof of this, I would actually encourage interested readers to invoke phdconfessional's advice and carefully examine the backgrounds of business-school faculty at the top schools.  Concentrate especially upon the junior faculty who, by definition, were hired under current hiring practices, rather than the established tenured faculty who are characteristic of hiring practices of long ago.   While a minority of new faculty will indeed have MBA's, a strong majority will not, and indeed, many will have absolutely zero business experience whatsoever.  

 

Indeed, I might actually argue that real-world business knowledge may indeed hurt your academic business career by poisoning your psychology in the sense that such knowledge may deter you from pursuing research questions that are irrelevant from a practitioner's standpoint.  Your less experienced colleagues, on the other hand, will have no such compunctions about pursuing such questions.  And their peer-review referees/editors probably won't care either.  The upshot is that your colleagues will probably publish more than you will.  Then when it comes time for hiring/tenure decisions, they will be picked over you because they have more pubs.  The research questions of their publications may be useless for the practice of management.  But that doesn't matter, because all that matters is your pub count.   

[JohnfromMilligan]

I have to agree with Decaf. Most of the upper echelon business schools have many faculty that have all the degrees in the world, but the could not run a shift at a restaurant to save their lives. Do not get me wrong, there is nothing against theories. When I chose the small school I am going to, the professors have the Phd's and DBA's, but they have years of work experience that they can relate. To me, learning from someone that has done the job is much better, than someone that knows the theory behind the job. Just some food for thought.

[sapphirerodent]

I'm a BA Business Admin undergrad, and I did my MA in Economics.  I'm changing majors, and I've been acccepted to solid PhD Management programs, 3 in the top 25-50 rankings of productivity, one interview at a top 10 and another interview at a top 25-50.

 

From what I can gather, the PhD programs look for good research fit.  Things that through up red flags to adcoms is when an individual comes from industry, has an MBA and wants to pursue a PhD. In order to demonstrate research experience, it is important (if you have the time) to get on some projects, or at least work with some faculty and help them with data.  This will allow them to get to know you better and understand your motivations for getting a PhD, which will ultimately come out in your letter of recommendation.

 

If you are deciding which master's is the best to get into, I would actually recommend you look into other programs in the business school, such as a MS in Human Resources (for example).  These types of programs are more research orientated, often requiring thesis to complete, as well as courses that are focused on current research.  On the other hand, MBA programs are project / case study based, which does not give you that exposure.

 

You can also consider if whatever school you pursue an MBA at is flexible with electives, which then you can take some of the more research oriented coursework and note that on your personal statement.

 

Hope it helps! 

[milwaukiedave]

Also keep in mind you can do a DBA instead of a Phd if you want to focus on applied research. It's just another option to think about.

[tobeaprof]

If you know you want to pursue a PhD, the best ways to demonstrate research relevance are:

 - get a Research Assistantship during Masters, and if possible, get your name on a publication

 - find a program with a Masters thesis option (our MBA at UMass-Boston has this)

 - find a one year masters in management that is more theory/research based (mostly in UK, but some beginning to sprout in US too).

Remember, a PhD in business does not necessarily build on an MBA - here at UMass-Boston, the new PhD in Business Administration (Organizations and Social Change Track), is very happy to see applicants from Political science, sociology, psychology etc.

Best of luck!

[K80laf]

I have my MSc. majoring in marketing. If you aren't sure whether or not you want to go academic or commercial, I would get a MSc. (1) I didn't have any trouble finding a job, even though my masters wasn't an MBA. The ppl who interviewed me were just excited to see that I had a masters. (2) my boss loves that I know how to evaluate the success of my marketing campaigns via statistical methods - it was actually one of the main reasons I was hired. (3) it definitely shows you what to expect if you were to pursue a PhD. There will be less of a learning curve because you will already know all the basics. (4) Getting to publish my thesis and go to conferences around the world is the BEST!!

[somedayprofessor]

There are some PhD programs in business that award master's degrees en route to the PhD. This may be a good option for an uncertain future. Then if you decide mid-way that the PhD is not for you, your time is not totally wasted. This is a disconnected thought that came from reading through your question and all of the replies, but it may be something for you to investigate.

[nehalnavande]

I have completed my MBA in operations management and logistics from UK. Also after completion I have joined family business since last 8 months. But my aim is to pursue a doctorate degree from US or CANADA. Should I go for a DBA or a PHD. I'm a bit confused. Do I need a research proposal before I apply. Also should i search the universities first and then attempt for GRE. I'm planning for applying in spring 2015 or fall 2016. Please help

[Proctor]

if you are applying to phd management programs you should be aware that one of the most difficult and time consuming things is to find a topic and get really helpful tips for writing your mba paper

i personally spent several days till i came across to http://www.mbathesis.biz/top-5-tips-for-your-management-mba-thesis/

i must admit these tips helped me much in writing

[umairshabbir]

I started my PhD in Management this fall after completing my MBA this past summer. So the answer is yes, you can get into a PhD program with an MBA

To give you some additional advice:

As you already seem to understand, the focus of an MBA and the focus of a PhD program are drastically different. So will the MBA prepare you or provide you with any research experience? The answer is no. But like you, I wanted to have a marketable degree like an MBA under my belt in case this whole PhD thing didn't pan out.

That said, business colleges expect that a lot of their applicants come from an MBA background. In fact, some even build MBA classes into your program if you don't already have one. They do understand and value overall business knowledge. If you don't believe me, check out the vitas of faculty members at your current school or the schools you are applying to. You will see many of them have MBAs.

If you are dead set of getting your PhD and know research is your passion, I would recommend going the MSc route (if it is indeed research focused). There are other people in other departments that did come from research oriented masters programs, and they are a little ahead of the game because they already understand research methods, where to us MBA folks, research is brand new.

If you want to get research experience while earning your MBA, let your MBA director or a faculty member know that you are wanting to pursue a PhD after this and would love to get involved in a research project. I don't know if your MBA program has graduate assistantships, but if so, I suggest you apply for one and let it be known you want an assignment that is research oriented.

Other ways to help your chances of being admitted: NETWORK! I applied to 4 schools, all within a 3-4 driving distance of home. I contacted and scheduled meetings with all 4 of them. This gave me a much greater perspective on what programs would (or would not be) a good fit for me. Maintain correspondence with your contacts at each school throughout the entire application process.

The last tidbit: check out the research currently being conducted and see if your research interests align with any of the current faculty. When you write your SOP, you need to make specific mention of faculty you would like to work with and what areas of research you are interested in.

Hope this helps!!

I want to know your years of education at completion of your MBA as universities require at least 18 years to get enrolled in P.hD programs

[dansey2000]

I am looking for a Masters en route to PhD program and list of Universities that offers a program like that. I will appreciate any advice on this program. Thank you. I am done with my Bachelors in Business Management and will like to pursue a program that lead to PhD. But I know it take time and I taught sine financing a PhD would be a problem for me, getting a masters will enable me finance my PhD program. 

I therefore wish to take the Masters degree leading to PhD program and I need your advise, suggestions, contribution, and help. Thank you. 

[MarkMc]

I think using a MBA to a PhD is wise.  It gives practical business knowledge.  The program that I went through had core classes, breadth electives, and concentration.  You could add directed research into any of these areas (in your discipline or not).  I elected to add a directed research to my concentration.  I was also a dual MA candidate that required a research project, so I got experience on that side as well.  Now the waiting begins for the Doctoral applications.

[priyo]

Hi,

I want to do my PHD in USA. I have completed an integrated BBA+ MBA course with Specialization in Finance and Marketing. I am currently working in an e-commerce company in India. I want to switch to Academics as a career option. I will be appearing for GMAT end of this year and planning to apply for 2017 fall session. 

Can anyone help me understand the scopes of research in this field and good institutes I can apply? I am mainly looking at applying in USA.