This is about a friend who used to be a good software engineer and did MBA late(early thirties). He now regrets going to business school as most of his friends who stayed in engineering are doing way better in terms of position and compensation. Also, most startups and even established software companies value engineers more. Should he go back to engineering? He is in a pm role in a big tech company now.
What is your passion? Why keep chasing after the next shiny thing?
How does an MBA help engineers? I feel like MBAs are more about the connections you make and experience you gain than anything else
It's important for someone in say a PM role to at a minimum posses some level of business acumen. MBA could help with identifying room in the market for growth, estimate business value of products or changes, etc.
Will MBA qualify you for salary increase (engineer or PM)? What about engineers starting a startup?
Did your friend go to a top-tier business school to get his MBA? (Harvard, Wharton, Stanford, MIT, Kellogg, Booth, Haas). Typically, a top-tier MBA is what drives the compensation boost.
Typically, Engineers pursue MBAs if they’re passionate about “business-driven” roles. Exactly, like Product Management or even Management Consulting (McKinsey, Bain, BCG)
He went to a top 20 school. But he feels like he spent too much time (and money )on business school . If he had just put more time and effort in his software career he would have built upon his existing experience and gotten ahead more instead of starting from scratch in a new line of work mid career
Maybe switch to engineering management?
Won’t that be a hard switch? He’s been out of engineering for 5 years now.
PM role is at the intersection of engineering & mba. May be do that and get into fang
He’s already in pm role in fang but pay and promotions are way better in engineering ( engineer roles) in his company.
The trick with PM role is making sure you have a good product. As you are competing with startup founders
If he wanted to make money then why not go for lawyer or something? You get into mba if u prefer management level stuff. There are high paying people in all fields. Its stupid to think of software devs are making more money so I should go for that. He can make big money by finishing mba and joining bank or something. Play with the cards you have, don't look at others.
What’s money if you’re unhappy? If your friend has passion as a engineer, then of course go back. If PM is your friends passion then focus there. They’re completely different careers. There will ALWAYS be someone who’s doing better than you in terms of compensation. Stop comparing yourself. Run your own race.