While the market may not be at its best right now, there's never been a better time to pursue the career of a do-gooder.
According to a Bloomberg Businessweek article, "MBA Grads Tackle Social Problems," a "new breed" of b-school graduate is emerging. These optimistic, ideal-driven MBAs are striving to make a profit—they are, after all businesspeople—but not by taking advantage of people on Wall Street or even by pursing traditional careers in consulting, but by participating in nonprofit organizations and healing environmental and social ills.
In the short-run these MBAs may not make as much as their more traditional peers, but they believe that in the long-run doing good will pay off—financially, as well as environmentally and socially.
For these new MBAs, job satisfaction is extremely important. They aren't just looking to make a buck, but are looking for jobs "that allow them to earn a living and help a cause that is deeply personal to them."
To encourage MBA graduates to pursue their humanitarian dreams, some programs, including Yale SOM and Stanford GSB now offer loan forgiveness programs for their public/nonprofit-pursuing graduates.
Health education, education for low-income students, restoring houses for low-income families, training autistic employees, and recycling initiative programs are examples of nonprofit projects that new MBAs have launched, as mentioned in the BBW article.
It looks like MBAs are tired of being the recent targets of moral critique and are ready and eager to "do well by doing good."
Related Accepted Resources:
- The MBA Oath: Where Business and Ethics Meet…Maybe
- MBAs Search for Green Pastures
- MBA Applicants: 3 Ways to Back Up Your Social Enterprise Goals
- Sustainable Development and the MBA
- Beyond Grey Pinstripes: Ranking of MBA Programs
- Public Policy Enters MBA Field
- UCLA Students Green with Environmental Interest
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