This story appears in the September 2025 issue of Utah Business. Subscribe.
Obtaining a master’s of business administration (MBA) was once considered the gold standard in business career advancement. As the job market becomes increasingly competitive and the cost of education skyrockets, the question becomes: Is an MBA still valuable in the eyes of employers and job seekers?
NO, IT’S UNNECESSARY
“I’ve hired people with their master’s, and I’ve hired people who were baristas at local coffee shops. The people with their master’s can talk concepts with me, but when it comes to execution, they’re at a very similar level. They are still learning the ropes of what it means to work in corporate America.
In my opinion, it’s all about application.
Experience can only come in one of two ways: time and exposure. You can’t shortcut time, but you can shortcut exposure if you were working with someone who brings you into the meetings that you don’t belong in, who opens up the back end of the business and shows you things that maybe someone else in business wouldn’t share with you. … If you can get that exposure, you can accelerate how quickly you gain experience. And experience is really what unlocks true potential for most people.
I’m a huge believer that you don’t have to have all the answers. You don’t have to know every book or every page in the book. You have to be a librarian. You have to know where to find the book. If you can get comfortable being a librarian, it becomes really easy to say ‘yes’ to things.
I respect someone who comes in and has that hustle and grit. The thing I look for in hiring more than anything is: Do they have an insatiable appetite for learning? Maybe it’s not the person who’s taking all of the courses. Maybe it’s the person who’s going out and trying a million different things and eating that all up.
You have to ask yourself and then answer for yourself: What is the best way for me to advance in my career and do the things I want to do? And I think most of the time, if people really look at it objectively, getting your MBA doesn’t make a ton of sense.”
Founder & CEO | The Grounded Company
YES, IT GETS YOU IN THE DOOR
“As a woman — and a minority woman — my parents told me very, very young that no one was going to make things easy for me. If anything, they were going to make it harder for me. So, I always feel like I have to be over-prepared, which really pushed me to go get my MBA.
On a personal level, pursuing the MBA was about expanding my cognitive toolkit in ways that allowed me to think more strategically, solve problems with a broader perspective and navigate complex situations with a sense of structure and confidence.
It wasn’t just about gaining academic knowledge but developing the ability to frame challenges, consider the long-term implications and analyze situations from multiple angles.
Personally, it’s like learning a ‘new language,’ a language that lets you converse not only in the world of business but also in leadership, operations, innovation and organizational dynamics.
I found that it also sharpened my decision-making skills, enhanced time management skills, and helped me become more resilient, because — let’s face it — getting an MBA is hard!
Professionally, the MBA provides a foundational framework that allows individuals to work across a wide range of roles and industries. It’s not just the hard skills you learn, such as finance, marketing or operations. An MBA can help you become more of a critical thinker and creative problem solver.
You learn adaptability skills that allow you to integrate that knowledge into real-world business situations.
An MBA is a ‘multidimensional tool’ that can unlock opportunities. It enables business professionals to move beyond the tactical and into the strategic, helping them lead with confidence in a complex, ever-changing global marketplace.
There are job descriptions that require MBAs or graduate degrees, and you’d need to have one just to get through the bots and the software filters. At some of the biggest institutions here in Utah and the United States, I wouldn’t even make it past the bots if I didn’t have one.
There are very successful people who don’t have one, but there are millions of others who have to get in the door a different way. So why not be over-prepared? I’ve never regretted not getting it. I have my last three jobs because I have it.”
EVP, Business Development | Reef Capital Partners