Traditionally, a graduation degree was enough to earn a job and the employee gained experience through the years and ensured his loyalty towards the organization. Today, organizations seek competent and qualified individuals who can be a source of competitive advantage.

The year 1991 did not only affect the protectionist regime but also changed the job market forever. The era of globalization changed the rules of the game completely. Traditionally, a graduation degree was enough to earn a job and the employee gained experience through the years and ensured his loyalty towards the organization. Today, organizations seek competent and qualified individuals who can be a source of competitive advantage. A degree in commerce or for that matter in engineering is not considered enough to ensure a job. Most stakeholders believe MBA as a panacea. However, whether this perception holds true or not needs to be seriously debated.



A Masters in Business Administration is increasingly being considered as a key to lucrative job offers. Even engineers and doctors who have job offers in hand choose to postpone their entry in the corporate world to make themselves more place able or to be precise increase their worth for their prospective employer.

Such perception of graduates makes good business for many educational institutes. A number of B schools have mushroomed in the past few years. If we consider the current statistics, in 2009 AICTE (All India Council for Technical Education) received 1084 applications for new management schools. As of now, India has about 1100 B-schools.

Role of B schools

All said and done, students and educational institutions alike, fail to see the bigger picture. The competitive advantage that a student may acquire by earning an MBA is a function of the B school's curriculum, faculty and infrastructure. The sum total of all this enables a potential employee to cultivate her skills. The absence or inadequacy of any of these creates an imbalance. An additional requirement for any B school today is to have a competent placement cell which can ensure an inflow of reputed organizations.

However, only a handful of institutions fulfill the above criteria and fail to provide the required support that can fill in the gap between a candidate's skill level and an organization's requirements.

Student's calibre

Furthermore, a reputed B school may not be the only criteria that might ensure a job. A student's calibre is equally important. Good communication and interpersonal skills along with excellent technical skills are prerequisite for getting placed.

Interpersonal skills play an important role in defining the success of an employee in the organizational hierarchy. From the organization's perspective it is the key to customer satisfaction and increased organizational effectiveness. Consequently, companies tend to select candidates who can be rated high on these skills. At times a Masters in Business Administration may not be proof of good interpersonal skills. Team spirit, assertiveness, empathy, listening skills etc are a pre requisite for the effectiveness of team structures that have come to define today's organizations. There have been instances where competent and qualified engineers from premier colleges were rejected because they lacked such soft skills

Recession woes

The economic slowdown made many MBA aspirants rethink their decision of spending a fortune on management education. The batch of 2009 suffered the most as a result of recession. Companies decided to put their expansion plans on the back burner and went for hiring freeze. Many competent freshers even from premier B schools found it difficult to find a job.

Conclusion

MBA is not a panacea. A number of factors affect the person's ability to get a job and an MBA is not a precondition for getting a job. There are still a number of organizations which place a lot of emphasis on experience and creative bent of an employee. Moreover, country's economic conditions, quality of education and the candidate's calibre are some of the prerequisites for getting a job.