I'm considering an MBA but have no experience or undergraduate degree in business. All I have is deep interest and motivation. For those who have one, is the program difficult? I am not very good with math or science (but I ended up with a science-focused degree lol). I'm more of the arts type. Any advice, information, etc will be appreciated.
I finished up an executive MBA program and graduated in December 2013. The program was in the top 20 of business schools. Although the program was for working executives or professionals, it felt more full time. I will be honest for about two years, I didn't have any kind of social life at all.
I am 36 and we had folks younger than me (a 29 year old at the beginning of the program) and a few older than me (one was 52). I think the average age was 36-37.
We had folks from all backgrounds: medicine, law, a lot of engineers, a few health care admin related folks, sales folks, and more creative arts people such as journalists, etc.
My background (BS Accounting) was based in the financial services industry in internal audit for awhile, business analyst in a HR operations environment for a large company, product management and project management in IT functions and HRIS functions.
For me, some of the material was "easy" and others was difficult even with my background. My financial and managerial accounting courses in the core were just painful.
However, the work was doable. And since you are a nurse, I imagine the material would not be too complex for you. I am more of a liberal arts person but I managed to get a few H's (High Passes) in some quantitative classes such as economics and finance.
My school believed in assigned study groups that you stuck with during the Core year no matter what (aka even if you had dysfunction in the group you were expected to work through it). My team lost a few folks so we had to "figure it out" with only 3.5 people (for the first part of the year our number 4 did not participate due to having already taken those classes the previous year when he had to stop due to a new job). We had 4 at the latter part of the year. The study groups were your rock. There were times when some of my study team mates had to pull a little more weight than me due to my work/life and there were times that I did the same for others. Without a study team there was just no way of getting through all of the work honestly.
However, as much as I was annoyed at times during the program (I went to school every other weekend all day Friday, sometimes Friday night and all day Saturday, sometimes a full day on Sunday and sometimes after work on Thursdays), experienced any kind of social life except with my classmates, I miss those days. The work was hard, but not impossible. The hard type that makes you really think differently. I miss being in that intense intellectual environment surrounded by focused professionals with ambitions and goals. I really think I was the most product that I have ever been at that time since I managed to fit in a grueling job, school, etc.
It was amazing how you just got used to it and managed to balance it.
It was well worth it, although I had to make a horrible decision to go 90k in debt since my employer shut down my side of the business and renig'ed on paying for the program. I had a lot of support during school and my layoff to get a new job, etc.
Silversun makes a good point though-- you can learn MBA material on your own, through independent study, through online classes, etc. You can get an MBA at a for profit school, an unranked public school or a top program.
But the part of the MBA that makes sense is the strong network, the learning from your classmates, highly regarded professors with interesting research who inspire you to really learn. You do not get that everywhere. The strong network usually comes from the top schools. The delivery of the knowledge, the environment sets schools apart from the churn 'em out programs.
