www.nickhodge.com

In 1993 I star­ted on the road to a Mas­ters in Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion. More com­monly known as an MBA.

Com­pleted in 2002, the MBA has given me a deeper under­stand­ing to the­or­ies driv­ing busi­ness. MBAs are designed to provide a broad under­stand­ing of how organ­isa­tions work. I found the most enlight­en­ing top­ics related to Legal stud­ies and Account­ing. I can now read a P&L, Cash­flow and Bal­ance Sheet with confidence.

Within a year of tak­ing a man­age­ment role after com­plet­ing my MBA (est cost $16,000) I had recouped my fees.

What an MBA does not provide is how to man­age people.

If destined for a man­age­ment role, people man­age­ment where you spend most of your time. Not read­ing con­tracts, deal­ing with paper­work and account­ing. Each of these are spe­cial­iz­a­tions that have strict reg­u­lat­ory con­trols and there­fore organ­isa­tions employ experts to ful­fill the roles.

People Man­age­ment can­not be left up to HR. All man­agers are people man­agers first and foremost.

I con­tend that People Man­age­ment: keep­ing your team motiv­ated, work­ing together and pro­duct­ive is the hard­est job.

Learn this, and you have done your MBA.