What is common to IndiaInfoline, Microland, Swiggy, Fractal Analytics, Pepperfry, et al? They are all entrepreneurial ventures, which have achieved success. They are also businesses started by founders who had acquired an MBA degree from a top Indian business school before they became entrepreneurs.
The popular rhetoric around the MBA has a lot to do with preparing our brightest and best for careers in large, prestigious, private enterprises. Many corporate leaders are MBAs from top schools and it is still largely true that many young MBAs aspire to become leaders of private sector companies. This is largely a function of the way the expectations, aspirations and role models of young MBAs are shaped.
Do MBAs make good entrepreneurs? Under a set of circumstances, they do. There is, of course, a strong argument for encouraging entrepreneurship in business schools. We need our best young people to become job creators, and not job takers. There are a few other factors that are in favour of a greater trend to entrepreneurship in business schools.
Firstly, the current generation of MBA aspirants have been parented differently and have a significantly higher need for both autonomy and self-expression.
Secondly, shifts in technology and the dynamic nature of tomorrow’s workplace imply that the very job security that large companies were valued for may prove elusive. And, thirdly, a dynamic environment implies that traditional silos will weaken, and there will be more business models that lie at the cusp between silos. Newer, fresher, digital savvy generations are less encumbered by the past and better positioned to visualise the new businesses of tomorrow.