About to complete MBA, don't want to teach, should I get PHD?

[qwerty11]

I have an associates in BA, a BS in marketing, and soon to have a MBA -concentration: supply chain mgt,logistics. I am 22 yrs old.

I have a high desire to own my own business. Preferably a consulting business in marketing research and logistics analysis. People have told me that the experience would be better than the PHD. What do you guys think?

[bjm8]

Among the multitude of reasons I can think of, below are two that exemplify why there's absolutely no reason for you to go for a PhD:

1) What benefits do you think that a PhD would provide if you just want to own a business (other than having 'Dr.' on your business card)?? A PhD will teach you to research and become a scholar, not "how to become a consultant". An MBA will suffice for your needs.

2) If you go to schools with an statement of purpose that says "i want to become a consultant", you likely won't be admitted anywhere.

Get the experience. A PhD won't teach you how to run a business. It might even be a detriment, as you'll become very focused in one particular field, and will try to apply your one field of expertise to every situation you encounter. Your customers may not like that.

If anything, take more MBA classes to better prepare you to start a business. Your best bet would be to go after a job with one of the big consulting companies. They'll train you, and best prepare you for a consulting career, as long as you are willing to put in the grueling hours and travel.


Just my .02.

[LennyBee]

From everything I've read and heard, the business PhD is designed solely for academics - if you're not interested in doing academic research, then there's no sense in spending the 4 to 5 years pursuing it, and you won't likely get in if you indicate that your long-term goal isn't a faculty position. It would be much more useful to spend 4 to 5 years getting experience in a consulting firm.

[possible_phd]

You are exactly the sort of person who should NOT get a PhD. About 5 minutes of Google research would have made that pretty clear.

Best of luck with life post-MBA!

[PhDCPA]

Possible_phd said it best!

[MathMathMath]

A question for you - why do you want to get a PhD? My impression (although I could be wrong) is that you would like to have another title/degree, but haven't really thought through how a PhD would help you. If that is the case, then I don't think you should get a PhD.

Overall it seems like a PhD would not benefit you more than gaining experience for the equivalent amount of time working in consulting. If getting a PhD would be a very meaningful, enjoyable, enlightening experience for you, then I don't think it would hurt you. But I don't think it would help you much either, so unless it is something you are truly passionate about (I didn't get the impression that you are), then I would definitely not do it.

[oldprogrammer]

Because your consulting business would at least be research-based, as stated, I would think a PhD would be helpful in the case that the type of marketing research you intend to carry out for your business is cutting-edge enough and experimental enough to require a PhD. Or the type of customers you intend to target expect a PhD background. The closest parallel I can think of is economic consulting.

[doctoraldude]

Originally Posted by oldprogrammer

Because your consulting business would at least be research-based, as stated, I would think a PhD would be helpful in the case that the type of marketing research you intend to carry out for your business is cutting-edge enough and experimental enough to require a PhD. Or the type of customers you intend to target expect a PhD background. The closest parallel I can think of is economic consulting.

four or five years is however a HUGE chunk of time to lose for an aspiring entrepreneur

[possible_phd]

Because your consulting business would at least be research-based, as stated, I would think a PhD would be helpful in the case that the type of marketing research you intend to carry out for your business is cutting-edge enough and experimental enough to require a PhD.

That assumes that he wants to be doing all the analysis versus running the business. Principles in consulting firms tend to spend most of their time on business development and hire people to do the actual work. Likewise, a lot of market research firms have "market scientists" on staff but are oftentimes lead by people with market research industry experience, not PhDs.

Of course, there are exceptions, including professors who start their own firms based on their research.

[oldprogrammer]

Originally Posted by doctoraldude

four or five years is however a HUGE chunk of time to lose for an aspiring entrepreneur.

It is unless that time is used to acquire knowledge that will provide the competitive advantage of the business. That's like saying an aspiring software entrepreneur would be wasting his time spending 4 or 5 years learning how to write software.

Originally Posted by possible_phd

That assumes that he wants to be doing all the analysis versus running the business. Principles in consulting firms tend to spend most of their time on business development and hire people to do the actual work.

You're right, I am assuming that - at least at first. I doubt that as a 22 year old he will have the capital for hiring people to do the actual work and will have to do it himself.


I'm not really disagreeing with you guys, just offering the OP an alternative view. For example, Brin and Page were working on their PhDs when they decided to start Google. If they had not been working on their PhDs they would never have found the creative synergy necessary to produce the intellectual foundation for their future company (or much of their startup funding). But again, I agree that this is an outlying possibility.