EMBA, where to start?

Picking an EMBA program is a tricky decision to make. Whether you get financial support from your company or you’re self funded, there will probably never be another time in your life when so much money is going to be invested in your education. And, once you’ve made up your mind, once you‘re actually going to apply, confident that you’ll manage to keep up with work, studying and your life, picturing yourself studying after work and still finding time for your own leisure, your wife or husband, your kids or whatever is important to you in your life right now, then you have to run through the long list of EMBAs that exist, the different schools, how they compare, their reputations, the rankings, the organization of the programs, the different modules, paces, international trips, potential campuses, the feedback from the alumni, the online discussions, the advice coming from so many different sources all claiming to know what’s best for you. 

I know, I went through all that.  Now, in a way, you can count yourself lucky compared to MBA full-timers. Due to your geographic location, there’s at least a certain degree of limitation in terms of the schools you can realistically attend even tough it's not rare to hear about people getting on a long distance flight to reach their school of choice. Indeed, you do share one thing with the full-timers. The school you’ll pick will follow you for a long time so you want to get it right!

At the end of the day, and to use a big word, you’ve got to find a school that fits your ethos as these 20 months or so you’ll spend in the EMBA will be amazing if you get that right. So ask yourself:

-          What kind of settings make you feel comfortable? Do you prefer small, tight knitted group or giant promotions to meet as many people as possible?

-          What kind of subject or specialty are you especially interested in?

-          What kind of network do you want? Do you want it to be massive? Small but accessible? Specialized or diverse? in in a particular geography?

-          Are you happy with the format, the pace of the program? Will your employer be flexible enough to allow you to attend all sessions?

 That’s a big cliché in all articles talking about picking a MBA, whether it’s full-time or executive, but you’re going to spend a lot of time with people on the program and they’ll be your network after that. Make sure you pick the school that has the crowd that suits you because not only will you benefit more from it in the long term but also because it will simply be more fun, especially during the last minute, stressed group meetings to complete that assignment.

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