An American sings “God Save the Queen”
Global leadership, travel, and an MBA in a year sound great? One of our newest ambassadors Erik Edstrom shares some great reasons why you should consider an Oxford MBA and get ready for Pot Pies.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Many officers transitioning from the military choose to go to American business schools. I opted to go to Oxford. Although there are many reasons to go to Oxford, here were my top motivational reasons:
1. 1-Year MBA = ½ the fees of an American Business School—I was not lucky enough to get any sort of substantial scholarship and knew that I was going to have to take out some loans and liquidate a lot of hard-earned savings from the military. I figured I would pay half the sticker price of an American B-school and get the same degree
2. The Oxford Brand—Oxford is held in high esteem across the world. Recently it was ranked number 2 in perceived prestige
3. The Dean—Dean Peter Tufano has had a long career at HBS and was recently hired a couple years ago to overhaul the way that Oxford does business. He has been an extraordinary visionary and understands the unique value proposition of the program
4. It gave me the chance to be an athlete again—I rowed at West Point and had I not been serving in the military, would have liked to have taken a stab at rowing for the US National Team. Service took precedence then, but at Oxford, since it doesn’t have NCAA rules, allows graduate students and undergrads to compete on the same teams. There were Olympic medalists on our team and the majority of the rest were either on national team squads of differing level or will become the future of the sport in coming Olympics. It’s an incredible feeling to experience what it means to be part of a team of this caliber.
5. Class Diversity—At US B-schools, you have what…80% Americans; at Oxford it was the inverse: 20% Americans, 80% from the rest of the world. This demographic gave me enormous understanding and awareness of what it takes to be a “world leader”…. Not to mention the amazing trips, bringing us to……
6. Travel—Despite my 40 hr/week commitment to rowing for the first 2/3 of the year, I traveled to 11 countries in 4 continents during the final 5 months of my MBA. From London, the whole world is accessible to you.
7. World Job Exposure—If you want to work in a different country for a few years, Oxford is a good place to launch from. Internships employ globally and it seems to me to be less difficult to snag a job in South Africa, London, Singapore, etc…
8. Longevity/Tradition/Cool Factor—I think I like antiquated universities with history—perhaps why I went both to West Point and Oxford. So much history is made by Oxford graduates, you cannot help but to be inspired to be a scholar in their footsteps. I ate dinner every night in the hall that was used in Harry Potter, I drank wine on the lawns in a ceremonial scholar’s cape, I went to parties in Einstein’s old room when he was a visiting researcher, and generally just had a whale of a time. Oxford is more fun than many other places I have encountered…. and when I’m 70, I’ll be hella proud of bringing my family back to my Oxford college for a gaudy dinner with flowers and port wine on the tables, fireplaces lit, and stroll down the same wet and narrow cobblestone paths that have been trodden by so many people who changed the world.
9. Social Impact Focused—Oxford sees business not as simply a monetary transaction or route to Saks via your Porsche, but they understand that business requires responsibility and should be intertwined with social good. These values are seen in their commitment to social entrepreneurship and tight connections with the Skoll Foundation.
I have talked a lot about why you should attend Oxford, now why shouldn’t you go to Oxford?
1. You Are Very Concerned With Business School Rankings and Require a “Top 3” Ranked Business School— It is true: SBS is a relatively young program and does not reside at the very top of today’s rankings (although I firmly believe that year after year, it will continue to claw its way towards the upper end of the chart). However, in no way will this limit your ability to score that highly-coveted job at a celebrated company, and let’s be honest, if you are looking down at someone for doing a degree at Oxford, what does that say about the person making the comment? This being said, you can probably achieve additional networking leverage from attending B-school at one of the battle-hardened champions (i.e. Harvard or Stanford) and will most likely command a higher starting salary at your first job. Although Oxford is less concerned with being a sausage factory that pumps out highly-paid bankers or consultants, these career paths are not frowned upon and many MBA’s do find themselves in these roles. Instead, Oxford is much more suited towards solving major social issues whilst making money rather than having profit be the only proxy by which success is measured. Oxford is a completely different and perhaps more quirky flavor of education. Although we do not wear suits to class, you will wear either black or white tie formal-wear more than any other time in your life–it’s a bit odd.
2. You love America and cannot bear the fact that you will be separated from it for a period of time
3. You want to go someplace sunny—the weather in England is, as they say, “rubbish.”
4. You abhor pot pies
