Even an MBA Can’t Help You Keep a Job in Today’s Work Environment

It looks like recent MBA grads aren’t the only ones feeling the bite of the economy—even those that have found employment are feeling the pain.

Several Wall Street firms, including my own, have disbanded their 2007 incoming MBA classes. For those of you unfamiliar with this term, a class is basically a group hiring that investment banks and other firms in the financial services industry from leading undergraduate and business schools. Analyst classes are filled with the brightest students from the top undergraduate institutions and associate classes are filled with the smartest MBAs from the nation’s best business schools.

Could you imagine graduating from a Harvard, MIT, Stanford or Wharton with around $80,000 in debt and having no way to find a job because no one is hiring (except may McDonald’s of course). Well, this is what recent 2008 MBA graduates are currently facing. However, the bite is extremely more severe when you have recently graduated from a top MBA program and are told that you no longer have a job six months down the line. To make it even worse, it’s not only you; but, the other one-hundred or so members of your associate class plus thousands more at other firms all around the city. Let’s not forget to mention that those student loan payments have just started to kick in and you have to pay enormously over-priced rent of $1,800 for your converted two-bedroom apartment that you are sharing with a roommate. Well, this exactly what happened to a young lady that I had the opportunity to meet today.

Today I had lunch with a spring 2007 graduate of one of the top Ivy League MBA programs. She had previously worked for a firm (which will not be disclosed for legal reasons) where she performed credit research. Due to the market conditions of the industry her group covered, head began to roll with massive lay-offs not only within her division; but, within the entire firm. It was brutal as nearly all middle-management was let go and even lifers at the firm with over twenty-five years of service and only two years away from retirement were let go. Eventually, budget cuts came down to recent hires into the associate programs. Instead only axing a few and retaining the best employees, the entire program was discontinued.

So now we have all of these freshly graduated MBA’s who are yet to land their first gigs looking for jobs, then you have a ton of seasoned employees that were recently laid off and now you have this group of MBAs that have had six months of experience, have just gotten settled into their living situation and cannot get a job. This is exactly why I chose NOT to go to business school. Too often have I heard this, and similar stories, about job offers being rescinded and classes being shrunk or discontinued.

This is just proof to show you that an MBA is yet nothing more than a BULLSHIT degree that holds little value. It’s not like holding a medical or law degree, where you learn a specific skill that you can use. To become a doctor you must obtain an M.D., to become a lawyer you obtain a J.D.; however, to become an employee at a firm you do not need an MBA. If you ask me an MBA should not be classified as a “professional” degree because it simply not required in order for one to do his or her job.

Graduating from business school does not automatically make you the CEO or President of a firm. A one point in time, in a galaxy far far way, an MBA was like a ticket into an exclusive “old boys” club that landed you the opportunity to get a real sexy job (trader, investment banker, etc.) and potentially make a good chunk of change. However, this trend has definitely been changing as everyone and their mother are going for MBAs while the number of available jobs is dwindling to a pittance.

If the Ivy League kids’ MBA: degree can’t save them in this market then who is safe? But hey, to all you struggling MBAs out there that are regretting wasting the time, halting your careers and amassing major debt, at least you can light your degree and start a fire to keep you warm in Central Park if it ever came down that.

My $0.02