So who went to grad school?

[The Sisko]

I finished grad school back in May. You have to want it. If you are committed and want it, you'll actually do better than in undergrad since you've been through it all before. If you're going just to go and don't really care then the odds are already against you. 

 

Best bet is if you go, merge a field you have genuine interest in with a career you really want.

^^This. I just finished my MPH in policy and management at Emory. It was a two year program designed for career distance learners so I didn't have to quit my job or change my schedule much. Aside from having burned out in my prior career as a respiratory therapist, I did the MPH because I was really interested in finding out the causes of a lot of the dysfunction I was seeing in healthcare delivery. I was pretty scared because it had been a loooooong time since my undergrad work but I really enjoyed it, well, except for doing my thesis.   Even though I enjoyed it, it was a lot of hard work and if I wasn't fully invested in it, I probably would have quit at several points.

 

In the right employment circumstances with a good MBA, absolutely.

In many businesses senior management are very haphazard in their approach to strategic analysis, marketing, and other disciplines because they are difficult areas to learn on the job through experience.

But if you aren't in a role where people will value your ability to understand strategy and present insights that impress them (and reward you for it) maybe less so. :-)

Oddly enough I found those to be some of the easiest of my courses. Maybe it's just the way my brain operates. Now operations management, THAT was hard. 

 

In all honesty, I can't really be that picky.

 

I hated undergrad. I just felt like I was wasting my time. My GPA is pretty low. I'm going to have to do very well on the GMAT in order to get in. Even then, I'll probably be throwing myself at the mercy of the court in letters . . .

 

I hated undergrad too. However I've changed since those days. I found that I actually enjoy learning stuff now. I also got a lot out of the discussions and the back and forth with other students and instructors. I was fortunate in that Emory turned out to work well for me since I didn't have a choice - I worked there so they covered the cost. In your case you can probably go anywhere so make sure that you do your research to determine if the school is a good fit for you AND what subjects you're interested in and/or good at. It makes a huge difference.

 

One final thought. I work in emergency management too. I like what I do but if I wanted to make a change it could be a bit difficult since it's very specialized work experience. If at all possible, you really should get the MPA, MBA or whatever your research says you'll be most interested in. It will give you a lot more flexibility. You can get EM certifications from various places, many of them free.

[Corcaigh]

Oddly enough I found those to be some of the easiest of my courses. Maybe it's just the way my brain operates.  Now operations management, THAT was hard. 

 

 

Any good executive education program should make it crystal clear that "cost" and price are not correlated.