How the MBA changed the way I view the world

After crossing the halfway mark of his Executive MBA journey, Sai Pavan Kumar Bhamidipati shares his experience on the programme so far.

As someone working in the IT consulting industry, I always had the inquisitiveness to understand more about business. Before taking up my MBA, most of the business knowledge that I acquired was through informal conversations with people outside of the IT department. This knowledge, gathered in bits and pieces, was always insufficient to help me connect the dots. Some of my new product ideas, which seemed to be very valid and valuable from my perspective, were always met with a dead-end when presented to the business. These things motivated me to learn more about the world of business in a more formal and structured way.

After moving to Ireland from India in 2019, I worked on my goal of doing an Executive MBA as it will allow me to relate learnings from the classroom to my professional environment immediately, and better my understanding of business. I was also looking for a renowned institution that blends theory with interesting, recent case studies that could be discussed in a class with people from diverse backgrounds, offering their rich insights. Although I live in Dublin, I chose Warwick Business School. I decided to travel to the UK for my modules, as their teaching methodology and reputation matched the kind of learning I was looking for. Each cohort is diverse with people coming from backgrounds like the army, construction, consulting, medicine and automotive to name a few.

Crossing the halfway mark of my MBA journey, I can only say that the learning so far has completely changed the way I look at the world. I am always amazed by the way my classmates discuss case studies and how the same point is viewed from different perspectives or applied in different industries. This has taught me that there is no right or wrong opinion; it all boils down to the famous MBA word “It depends”. Interacting with such a diverse cohort also allowed me to appreciate the plethora of opportunities within each sector.

WBS ensures that the core modules are structured and ordered in a way that allows participants to build their business knowledge one step at a time. By the end of the core modules, I am sure that every participant will be able to look at their own employer/company or even other companies from a different perspective like me. The learnings from these modules enabled me to start analysing companies’ actions from a 360-degree perspective. It also helped me to better understand how various macro and micro economic conditions could impact a company and even analyse my personal finance decisions better. I was able to analyse leadership messages from a company in a much better way and made me start thinking as to what the next steps could be. The individual assignments, which most of the time are written about a company of our choice, really helped me to cultivate the skill of analysing a company’s actions or leadership messages. WBS also ensures that the elective modules available to participants not only suit people from different backgrounds but also reflect the latest trends in the business world. The mandatory international module is no exception and has some great choices like doing business in China, fashion in Italy, energy transitions or sustainability or even start-up financing in Silicon Valley.

Last, but by no means least, the programme schedule is another reason why I chose WBS compared to other institutions. The programme schedule provided options for participants to either travel once every two weeks to attend classes in London or once every six weeks to attend classes at the University itself. The programme also recognises the dynamics in a professional’s working life and allows the flexibility to defer or alter the programme schedule on a need basis.

While the reputation of doing an MBA from such a reputed institution will reveal tangible benefits like career growth or industry shifts, I can say that the learnings, which are intangible and hard to quantify, will allow me to view the world from multiple lenses for the rest of my life.