I have a quick question about B School. My undergrad degree is in finance. I will be hopefully taking Level II in June. It seems to me that pursuing an MBA focused in finance would be overkill. My thought on the matter would be to extend my skills to accounting. While I enjoy finance, I do realize the industry is hurting and I’m not buying into a short term turn around. Is my thinking of diversifying my skills to accounting ignorant? I would assume the two skill sets would complement each other well.
dd, I know plenty of ppl with MBA & CFA, so it’s definitely not an overkill. It’s also never late to learn and extra skills will never hurt you. It might come handy sometime in the future. Or maybe not. So what?
I’m set for the attending the MBA program, but I’m wondering if an MBA in finance is overkill for someone pursuing the CFA with a finance undergraduate major.
digger, I think it depends on what you want to do! If you want to be an analyst, majoring in finance would not be overkill. Usually you have more than one major in an MBA program, though, and accounting is certainly a natural complement. You may want to add another random major like marketing or strategy to give you more versatility if you aren’t sure you want to be an analyst. I’m getting my MBA and will likely major in Finance and Accounting but will also major in general management and take some marketing classes to round out my skill set.
need MBA and CFA these days, its that simple
It’s not overkill. MBA will teach stuff not on the exam. Many people on this forum have the false belief that the CFA covers everything you need to know about finance. Not true. I’m currently taking an MSF after having completed LIII. I’m learning a lot of new concepts.
MBA covers a lot more than CFA, trust me. plus, no networking with CFA. B school = all networking. need both, last time i will say it. world more competitive, some desi in bombay will do your job for 1/3 what you net, so you gotta really be worth your ish to make it in states. crazy, i just call as i see it.
r u drunk??
ditchdigger, finance in undergrad, plus CFA, plus MBA in finance is way too redundant! Take a general MBA if you must.
finance is a very broad field… find the finance track curriculum and check how much it overlaps with the other stuff you have already studied
Regarding the CFA and MBA, I’d say it depends on the MBA program. I’ve found that my finance classes have a very different emphasis from the CFA curriculum. Whereas the CFA curriculum stresses the nuts and bolts, the MBA finance classes have a broader, managerial perspective (as you’d expect). Of course, there’s enough overlap to where working on one would help you in the other, but not enough to guarantee success.
I’m doing this right now - Just finished my first semester and I’m on L3 - It’s not overkill. MBA and CFA are very different, especially if your undergrad wasn’t in business. On the finance side there is a fair deal of overlap with CFA material - but it’s a lot more real world application. Accounting is a bad choice, unless you want to work in accounting - if you want to stay in finance long-term this will be confusing to recruiters. Only do accounting if you actually want to work in accounting - you’ll have plenty of accounting courses in your MBA curriculum.
I agree that its overkill if you have a BBA specializing in finance, assuming that is what you mean by finance undergrad, as a lot of the non-finance MBA classes will be redundant b/c of your undergrad marketing, accounting, managerial courses depending on what you focused on most. I’m in the same debacle and have decided on an MA MacroEcon to broaden even further as I already have sufficient education in Marketing and Strategy and wish to beef up on my little education in economics.
Thanks everyone. I have a lot of time to decide since I begin next fall, but that item drew some curiosity.
Ditchdigger2CFA, I have an MBA from St. Thomas (2004) with an emphasis in Accounting. At that time I wanted to get the CPA and my undergraduate was finance, so I did not have enough accounting credits to sit for the CPA. The MBA helped me with that. I’ve got the CPA and spent two years in public accounting. Now I am pursuing the CFA, sitting for Level I in June 09. In my opinion, you will be better off going to the UoM. My MBA was part time, but I was taking 3-4 classes per semester so I finished it pretty quickly. I think St. Thomas is a weak program and the recognition of Carlson Business School and their network will serve you better. Of course, at this school lever, a program is as good as you want it to be, but in general I was not impressed with St. Thomas professors. The only finance class that I took was terrible. I believe there is no real difference between full time and part time when it comes to the quality of education, but you might have a different opinion. I am just giving you my mine. I have met people that went to Carlson and the school sounded stronger. I have seen people with undergraduate in accounting, a master in accountancy from St. Thomas or MBA with an accounting focus, and working in public accounting after passing the CPA. That is an overkill. I think the same would apply to undergraduate in finance, MBA focus in finance, and passing the CFA. It would be a lot more beneficial for you to have a different focus. I even wonder if you could have some kind of independent focus where you would take finance, accounting, and any other area that you find appealing. Something you might want to talk to your advisor, especially if you go to St. Thomas. If you did an accounting emphasis, the CPA would be quite easy to pass. You would have to spend 1 year in public accounting to be certified, and that is probably not in your plans, but something to consider. In summary, you will not be earning much from more finance classes at St. Thomas if you pass the CFA. If you were going to a top school, I would have a different opinion, but I doubt it in the case of St. Thomas. I hope this helps.
ditchdigger2CFA - Do you live in MN?
I sure do. Today sucks since it is terribly cold out. I spent my morning shoveling.
Alex, Thank you for such a nice walk through. I agree, Carlson does have a better recognition and much better career opportunities than St. Thomas. That said, I spoke with plenty of UST Alums who said they enjoyed their time there, especially in the Aristotle Fund. My goal is to get accepted as one of the fund managers. My Carlson app is still pending, but I would not be surprised if I were denied. My GMAT was not stellar, my work experience is average, and my undergraduate grades are average. The big issue with me is I was laid off in October. A full time MBA program has been appealing to me for some time so the lay off really solidified my decision. Coming up in January I have a temp position at a CPA firm assisting with income tax returns. The partner really encouraged me to look into accounting and tax while I was in business school. While finance and accounting are somewhat different, they are along the same tangent. Likewise accounting is interesting to me. So I wanted some insight if the CFA coupled with an MBA in accountancy would work to my advantage. It appears it may not, but it is something I will still look into. I often see ‘CPA Preferred’ for finance related positions . So I’m concluding that the overlap, but not overkill, would be beneficial. Are you still working downtown? If so, it would be nice to speak with you further about this. There is a free MN CFA Event on Thursday. It is there holiday party which includes an open bar and free appetizers. I will be attending, you should consider checking it out. http://www.cfa-mn.org/apps/eve_detail.asp?eve_ID=328 Holiday Party! 12/18/2008 4:30 The Hotel Minneapolis 215 Fourth Street South Minneapolis, , MN 55401 612-317-2888
I live in the twin cities as well and am a Carlson Alumni - It’s a great school, if you get in I would suggest you go there over UST. Good luck! ditchdigger2CFA Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > I sure do. Today sucks since it is terribly cold > out. I spent my morning shoveling.
We’ll see what happens with Carlson. The application is pending. I visited the school several times and met the admissions team. The GMAT is the big hit on my application (580), otherwise I seem to fit the average category for incoming students.