When I started the MBA program at Xavier University, a number of my friends wondered why I, a visual creative, would go into something as dry and uncreative as BUSINESS! I was working for the University at the time, so got a big discount on tuition to any program. There were several that intrigued me, but the MBA program has a good reputation and I looked into it more. And here’s the truth of the world that I discovered (though I’d long suspected): EVERYTHING is business. I don’t care if you’re an artist, church, hospital, tech startup, or landscaper, you probably need money to do what you do and customers to give you that money. One thing that I found very interesting in this infographic is that the number one cause of small business failure are issues realated to finance. Not that a company might not have or be making money, but without some sense of managing money as a resource, you’ll eventually run into problems.
Has the MBA diminished my creativity? I don’t think so. In fact, I’d say that it’s honed it. Once you get a sense of what the business goal is of something you might be working on, it helps immensely to come up with a more focused and viable solution. Something that’s not only nice to look at, but functional as well.
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