You asked your question to MBAhipster...so I am sorry for jumping in and interrupting.
1) Age matters ... somewhat. Typically MBA in US is a young person's game. Simple reason is that at 25 your avg. salary that you can let go doesn't hurt you as much (opportunity cost) than what you tend to make post MBA.
Of course this is gross generalization. I did my MBA when I had 6+ years of work ex. It worked out for me since my purchasing power due to currency conversion and otherwise as well was in peanuts, now it's much better.
2) Previous work experience matters. Changing functions is extremely difficult - if not impossible - the more experience you have. I had 6+ in hardcore telecom in India in engineering/project management. I thought I'd make a good candidate for someone like a Verizon or Cisco in their let's say product management roles. But it appears that those firms value functional expertise more over industry knowledge for those specific roles.
So an English major 23 year old someone was selected by Cisco for Product Management roles over a guy who could detail a telecom network in his sleep. Your software development experience of X years won't be washed away with 2 years of whatever specialization -- unless --- it's another tool belt specialization - something like a Data Scientist / Data analysis.
You see, like any other culture or society.US is full of perception. If you get your MBA from a mid tier/ lower mid tier school. Then you'd be seen as a brown guy who needs H1B etc etc. and a risky investment.
3) Companies are risk averse. Given for a similar "generic" roles like Brand Management, Project Manager etc. a 20 year old english freaking major having studied Shakespeare, poems etc. would make a less riskier junior project manager than you despite you having a PMP and 8 years of work experience in making codes or whatever you did.
For a generic but somewhat specific function like Finance/ Accounting/ Suppy Chain no company will hire you at a manager level - because you don't have relative work experience. You may get hired at a junior level/ analyst level making $60,000/year.
For a specific roles in tool world. You maybe hired and make $120,000/year. If you have like AWS certification or know the difference between Kafka and Spark. But then again --- you don't need to get your MBA for that. Go for a less expensive 1 year MS + some certification program if that's what you want to do.
4) Brand Name matters: If you get into top MBA schools like Ross for example then don't worry about point 1,2,3 I mentioned above since there still be companies like EY/Amazon/Deloitte coming to your campus or alumni connecting with you to help you out. If you get your MBA from outside of top 15/20 in US - then I don't need to tell you the consequences. You are smart enough to figure those out.
Hope it helps.
You asked your question to MBAhipster...so I am sorry for jumping in and interrupting.
1) Age matters ... somewhat. Typically MBA in US is a young person's game. Simple reason is that at 25 your avg. salary that you can let go doesn't hurt you as much (opportunity cost) than what you tend to make post MBA.
Of course this is gross generalization. I did my MBA when I had 6+ years of work ex. It worked out for me since my purchasing power due to currency conversion and otherwise as well was in peanuts, now it's much better.
2) Previous work experience matters. Changing functions is extremely difficult - if not impossible - the more experience you have. I had 6+ in hardcore telecom in India in engineering/project management. I thought I'd make a good candidate for someone like a Verizon or Cisco in their let's say product management roles. But it appears that those firms value functional expertise more over industry knowledge for those specific roles.
So an English major 23 year old someone was selected by Cisco for Product Management roles over a guy who could detail a telecom network in his sleep. Your software development experience of X years won't be washed away with 2 years of whatever specialization -- unless --- it's another tool belt specialization - something like a Data Scientist / Data analysis.
You see, like any other culture or society.US is full of perception. If you get your MBA from a mid tier/ lower mid tier school. Then you'd be seen as a brown guy who needs H1B etc etc. and a risky investment.
3) Companies are risk averse. Given for a similar "generic" roles like Brand Management, Project Manager etc. a 20 year old english freaking major having studied Shakespeare, poems etc. would make a less riskier junior project manager than you despite you having a PMP and 8 years of work experience in making codes or whatever you did.
For a generic but somewhat specific function like Finance/ Accounting/ Suppy Chain no company will hire you at a manager level - because you don't have relative work experience. You may get hired at a junior level/ analyst level making $60,000/year.
For a specific roles in tool world. You maybe hired and make $120,000/year. If you have like AWS certification or know the difference between Kafka and Spark. But then again --- you don't need to get your MBA for that. Go for a less expensive 1 year MS + some certification program if that's what you want to do.
4) Brand Name matters: If you get into top MBA schools like Ross for example then don't worry about point 1,2,3 I mentioned above since there still be companies like EY/Amazon/Deloitte coming to your campus or alumni connecting with you to help you out. If you get your MBA from outside of top 15/20 in US - then I don't need to tell you the consequences. You are smart enough to figure those out.
Hope it helps.
