Hey there, folk. I hope you’re all having a nice weekend. It’s a cold one here in Chicago, but that’s to be expected at this time of year…brrrr! Anyways, enough about me and my shivering…let’s get to the email for this entry.
The email below is from a graduate of an Indian MBA program who had questions about “business planning” positions. When he sent me this email a few months ago, he was about to interview for a role in that area and was looking for advice. As you can probably imagine, I’m REALLY far behind in responding to this one, but I wanted to get back to him anyone and post the response in hopes that it might help some of the readers of this site.
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ST wrote:
Hi Marquis,Firstly, I would like to say thanks for all the useful/informative/indepth writing across your blogs. Though it was not relevant for my admissions in India, a lot of your blog post helped me when I met the admissions officer 🙂 Thanks!
I have been trying to ask people around me(seniors, professors) and not many of them have been able to give a proper opinion on this. So, I wanted an opinion from a US MBA graduate who has had a consulting career.
I finished my MBA from an Indian BSchool(top 5 in India – XLRI) and am currently interviewing for a role of a business planning analyst/mgr at a big firm(one of the top 50 mkt cap firms in India). It has been very difficult to find the right career path for this role. I don’t see many US MBA graduates taking up this role. My queries were:
1. Why aren’t any US MBA grads in business planning role? 2. Can you share with me some good business planning profiles? Basically, I want to see the career path in terms of what they are upto after a couple of decades etc… (google has been very unhelpful here) 3. Your opinion on this role. Is it something very new? Atleast its very new in the Indian market.
Briefly, the role sounded very similar to consulting(internal consulting). Work involves things like doing costing to improve bottom line or metrics to improve efficiency etc…
I think its an absolutely awesome profile but want to get some feedback from people who have been there and done that…
-ST
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My video response:
Question about business planning positions for MBA graduates from Marquis Parker on Vimeo.
Key points: Note: I’m assuming that this reader is referring to “strategic planning” when he asks about “business planning” positions
– “Why aren’t any US MBA grads in business planning role?” –> There are plenty of US MBA grads in strategic planning roles, but many don’t go into these roles straight out of business school; My guess is that more MBA grads go into Consulting right out of school because of the general nature of that industry.
– “Can you share with me some good business planning profiles? Basically, I want to see the career path in terms of what they are upto after a couple of decades etc… (google has been very unhelpful here)” –> A common career path from a strategic planning position is “Strategic Planning Associate -> Manager -> Director -> VP of Strategy -> Sr. VP of Strategy (or Chief Strategy Officer if the role exists at a company)”
– “Your opinion on this role. Is it something very new? Atleast its very new in the Indian market” –> I believe that strategic planning roles are a great way to learn the ins and outs of a company and its industry; These definitely aren’t new roles in the US and are often good landing places to Consultants
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