Every school that offers both full-time and Executive MBA programs does so to cater to the career development needs of two different groups of managers. In general, the two different groups possess different levels of seniority and different career goals. The participants in full-time MBA programs are typically 3-5 years out of their undergraduate degrees and using an MBA to switch career paths. This requires a curriculum that focuses on developing deep, technical skills through a large slate of elective courses in order to launch a career in a new path. In contrast, participants in EMBA programs have established careers and established areas of expertise. Their interest in earning an MBA degree typically 12-16 years into their careers is to help propel themselves into the senior ranks of management or an entrepreneurial path. Instead of a deep exposure to a narrow set of technical skills, EMBA curricula typically allow participants to develop mastery in the soft skills that distinguish a leader and develop a broad, integrated view of the disciplines of management. The difference in these curricula is not one of rigor, but one of matching to career development needs and goals.

If one were to believe that an Executive MBA was “MBA-lite” and that the full-time MBA is more rigorous simply because the latter requires full-time study for two years and allows (some) participants to take courses with a lot of quantitative tools, then one could conclude that a four-year undergraduate degree in business must be even more rigorous than an MBA. Of course, I am not suggesting that. What I am suggesting is that well-designed, rigorous business degrees for participants just out of high school, versus participants with 3-5 years of post-undergraduate experience versus participants with 12-16 of post-undergraduate experience won’t look the same. As someone who has taught the same topic in undergraduate, full-time MBA, and Executive MBA programs, I encourage you not to confuse rigor with inefficiency.

To address your claim regarding recruiters, I think you may be comparing apples and oranges as it is quite unlikely that a new graduate from a full-time MBA program and a new graduate from an Executive MBA program are actually going to be applying for the same job. So, let’s control for that: how do you think an employer would compare two candidates for the same job when both candidates have 15 years of organizational experience, but one earned his MBA 15 years ago and the other earned his MBA this year from the same university? One might conclude that the more recent MBA experience would be more valued by an employer.

I hope these comments are helpful. Best wishes,

Danny
_____
Daniel A. Szpiro, PhD
Associate Dean for Executive Education
The Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management
Cornell University
das247@cornell.edu

This was an awesome podcast.
However, I was unable to see the transcript of this podcast.
Can you please check with your IT team for the same ?

Thanks,
Herin