msday86 wrote:
My perception is that people at non-profits get to do more "big-picture" stuff earlier on in their careers, and this is a good reason why they're marketable as MBAs. Is this true at all?
aaudetat wrote:
My background is nonprofit: a year of AmeriCorps*VISTA and then five years at a community development credit union.
Recruiters have liked my resume. I've gotten lots of GM recruiting emails, but also a bit of consulting. One of the top firms that is known for liking people with quirky backgrounds recruited me pretty hard. And after doing ZERO networking with another, I threw in my resume at the last second and got on their closed list.
I would say so. At 24 I was managing two programs, with direct reports (leading and training and supporting a team of over 60 - ok, most of them volunteers, but some paid staff and full-time interns too). I managed our budget, wrote grants, did reporting, marketing, hiring, firing, training, marketing, operations, IT, set strategy, and created partnerships, both local and national. You don't get paid a lot, but instead you get a lot of responsibility. I dug it. It was a bit of a downer to realize that my work world is actually going to shrink a lot now that I'm an (in-progress) MBA.