Inevitably I compare it to the Penn State MBA. After
nearly two score, I noticed many similarities with each other. At this point, I
noticed some topics not yet covered., but I reserve comments until the course
is finished. Of the differences, this is a slight slant toward international
business and a larger emphasis on entrepreneurship.
When I joined the MBA program, the administration at Penn
State emphasized employment with an average salary’s beginning at thirty
thousand, equivalent to nearly eighty thousand now. Courses for concentration
lacked entrepreneurship as well. I had intended French, but time forced me to
concentrate in operations and finance, to which I added courses some four years
later at Penn State.
I went into the job market without an offer, but
determined to compete with the Japanese in operations. Thanks to the Power MBA
and the courses on LinkedIn, I am updating that as well. I still see my future
in operations and finance, so I’ll be adding more courses on both later.
The most notable course in marketing easily passes the
one I had at Penn State. Not only does it cover corporate marketing, but also
individual marketing. Penn State did provide a course in speech communication,
but it assumed that the degree was sufficient toward individual marketing.
Given some of the hostile interviews I’ve experienced, it was wholly
inadequate. When I joined Toastmasters, I had the opportunity to demonstrate
what I’ve learned since the MBA course in speech communication.
The Power MBA has moved into branding, which the Penn
State MBA never explored. This group has a wider view of the MBA, at least in
the survey. The is no time for concentrations, so maybe it’s why the Power MBA
tries to explore a wider field.
I have heard through Zoom meetings about having a
personal brand, but the Power MBA explores not only what a brand really is, but
also how to plan a brand. So, the question now is how to use the brand for
personal benefit after planning a brand. When I worked at Bodek and Rhodes (now
part of Alpha Broder), management was building the brand of Next Level, of
which I was part by entering mill orders for customer. The management at Bodek
and Rhodes didn’t consider giving me a larger part in building the Next Level
brand, even though everyone knew I was severely underemployed there.
My conclusion:
The Power MBA, like the one at Penn State, implicitly
hints that individuals must build their own brands to overcome the old “It’s
not what you know; it’s who knows you”. By building a personal brand,
networking become more effective. It is a lesson sorely lacking, which assumes
it comes with experience. However, should that experience run into severe
underemployment, and the Alopexian Paradox takes over, it may be decades before
the wisdom of the way to a successful career appears.
The Fourth Module of the Power MBA
The progress on this course is so different from my experience
at Penn State that I’m not sure whether it’s because of the updates or the
means of the internet. This module concentrates on business and marketing
strategies. It many have been a strategic management course at Penn State.
Outside of the Boston Consulting Group, Penn State didn’t
touch on matrices, although one did show up in a personnel management class I
took on employees. The Ansoff matrix emphasizes growth alternatives, and
organic and inorganic alternates. I saw the buzzword “synergy” remains, and
some of my classmates probably practice it from the executive suite.
Finding purpose in life as well as business manifests in
Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle. Once again, building a brand as part of that purpose
returns. Hidden as implicit advice for entrepreneurs opens blitzscaling and
when to promote growth.
Pricing brought me back to the program at Penn State. How
to strategize pricing in light of other concepts in this module was quite
different. Both programs tend to avoid quantification of concepts like price elasticity,
which challenges me to explore it after this course.
The concept of value came to me many years later when I joined
H&R Block, so the value curve added to my knowledge. As I noted in the
previous article, Penn State assumed the value of the degree and how the concept
of value works in business.
The final piece of the module is Hangry and how they saw
an opportunity to exploit, instead of reading about Ted Turner in an article
how he built an empire. The next module deals with actual leadership.
