Director’s Message
Director’s Message
Director's Message
Graduate business education requires a meaningful investment of time, money, and attention, and I think prospective students should be thoughtful consumers of that investment. ROI will not mean the same thing to everyone. Career advancement and compensation matter, but so can developing greater range in your current role, changing direction, building expertise, or expanding the people and perspectives you can draw on professionally.
You do not need to predict exactly where a degree will lead. You should, however, have some sense of why you are pursuing it and what you hope to gain from the work.
Be Intentional About the Investment
I have worked with graduate business students and alumni at many different career stages, and I have seen people complete the same degree and realize very different value from the experience.
| The credential matters, but what you do with the experience matters even more. |
Some of the strongest returns I have seen come from students who use the program actively, applying what they learn, testing it against real problems, and building perspectives and relationships they can continue to draw on.
That does not require having everything figured out at the beginning. It does require curiosity, effort, and a willingness to examine what you know, what you may be missing, and where you want to continue developing.
Use the Experience to Change How You Operate
Some of the most compelling feedback I hear from alumni is not about the credential itself, but about how they operate differently because of the experience. They describe seeing problems from more angles, understanding more of what sits outside their own function, and becoming more deliberate about how they assess information, make decisions, and involve others.
Graduate business education should add frameworks, methods, and perspective that remain useful when the situation is complicated and there is no obvious answer. Part of professional growth is also becoming more aware of the limits of your own expertise and knowing when another perspective is needed.
Keep Expanding Who and What You Learn From
I have spent my own career continuing to learn, and I see graduate education as part of that longer process rather than an endpoint.
Professors, classmates, alumni, practitioners, colleagues, and people working in different industries and functions can all expand what you know and how you think. The relationships built through those experiences can become sources of expertise, perspective, and opportunity well beyond the degree itself.
I especially value seeing alumni return to RCB with experience they did not have when they graduated. Their careers continue to develop, their expertise changes, and they become part of what the next group of students can learn from.
That continuing cycle of learning, application, and contribution is the kind of graduate business experience I want us to keep strengthening at RCB.
Assistant Dean and Director of Graduate Studies
