VIEWPOINTS : Advice for Business School Graduates : What words of wisdom can professionals offer to those starting careers?
Full of high expectations, thousands of MBAs and other business school graduates are spilling onto the labor market this month. Free-lance writer Michele Lingre asked people with a variety of outlooks on the working world what words of advice they would have for these graduates. Excerpts follow:
John Z. DeLorean, the former General Motors executive who headed the now-defunct DeLorean Motor auto company.
“Where I would start is by looking at the most successful, richest and wisest man who ever lived: King Solomon, who, if he were alive today, wouldn’t own a Fortune 500 company, he’d own all of them, and he could buy and sell 10,000 Donald Trumps or Boone Pickens, Rupert Murdochs and everybody else put together.
“If you really want to understand what success in business is, I would say you ought to take King Solomon’s advice, which is written in Ecclesiastes. King Solomon carefully enumerates a number of business principles, but, in the end, he discovers that the tremendous wealth and incredible assets and tremendous adulation he had was for naught without a solid spiritual basis.
“People are finding that out today, too, because we have gotten to an age of unbridled greed. I’ve met the wealthiest men in America, and most of them are unhappy. The happy people are those whose orientation is accomplishment. So the thing (business school graduates) should do is become involved in something they really enjoy and strive to make a significant accomplishment. You do that by working hard. The key is not how much money you make, or anything else, it’s true happiness.”
Patricia King, author of “Never Work for a Jerk.”
“In the recent past, MBAs and other college graduates have swallowed whole the notion that people find all of their fulfillment through their jobs. They find themselves very disappointed when their careers plateau. They need to find other outlets. There are plenty of those: family life, friendships, community service, interest in the arts.
“It doesn’t matter where you start. Most people I know of who are successful, happy adults today didn’t go into a particular area right out of college, stay and find success 15 or 25 years later in that same field. So they shouldn’t think of their first job out of college as momentous beyond what it really is, a starting point.
“They should stay in places where they feel they’re making a contribution, learning something and where they’re enthusiastic most of the time about what they’re doing. They should not hang on for too long if they don’t feel that kind of satisfaction. People who have a bad boss, a bad job situation, hang on way beyond the point where there isn’t any hope. They almost have to get to the point where they can’t stand it anymore. Although I don’t recommend that people hop around for just no reason, I feel strongly that they shouldn’t waste their time staying with something while their confidence and their self-esteem are being destroyed. . . .
“Young people need to be practical, but they don’t have to be cynical. If they see people doing things that are unethical, they should speak up. Most of the time I don’t think people get fired for pointing out something unethical. Business needs people with conscience. At what price do you sell your honor?”
Dwayne O. Andreas, chairman and chief executive of Archer-Daniels-Midland Co.
“If a young person’s objective is to become a businessman, I think the most important thing in your younger years is to be resourceful enough to understand every single phase of the activity that you’re in, because finance, sales, purchasing, manufacturing and transportation are all closely related and have strong overlap. Each one depends on the other. That’s why it’s very important to be a generalist.”
Earl G. Graves, editor and publisher of Black Enterprise magazine.
“Young minority students coming out of school ought to look at two options. One which I encourage all the time is looking at the myriad of ongoing, strong and emerging black companies that are looking for young people.
“Now there are those students who clearly have it in their minds they want to work for Drexel Burnham Lambert, and that’s fine. They want to do investment banking; they want to do the big deals. They ought to identify early in the game a person who is going to be their benefactor, their rabbi as they say in New York City, who is going to tell you whether or not you are doing the right thing.
“Identify in the corporate hierarchy a person who has an interest in you, not necessarily someone black. It works for the majority students. The minority students shouldn’t fail to take advantage of that kind of leverage. The higher up in the company you can go, the better it is because a person one level above you, he or she is still trying to sort out who and where they are in the fix of things. And that person may not be secure enough to want to push you.”
Carl D. Jacobs, manager of the Sibson & Co. consulting firm’s Los Angeles office.
“One pitfall a lot of MBA graduates fall into is having overly high expectations for compensation, advancement and prominence. Some MBA schools have very high expectations of their graduates--Harvard is particularly known for that--which may be unrealistically high. MBA graduates may think they know more than they really do. They do learn a lot. If it’s a good program, they gain some good practical experience, but still haven’t applied it.
“It is nice to be assertive, but MBAs should be careful not to be overly aggressive. Employers will respect employees who safeguard their own rights, but not one whose interest becomes self-serving. There is a line between clarifying your agreement and pushing for more.
“Another thing to avoid without refusing appropriate work assignments is getting overcommitted. (New business school graduates) may be too eager-beaver and back themselves into a corner of promising more than they can deliver. They have to recognize that they are coming in new and they are not going to be as efficient as an existing employee. They should examine how they are doing and how much they are doing. They don’t want to be bored, but they can’t work 16 hours a day, seven days a week.
“One ethical lesson to keep in mind is if you don’t know it, say it. Honesty and integrity are important. I will not trust the person who tries to snow me. Also, relax a little bit. Remember, the employer wants the employee to succeed as much as they do. If they do make a mistake, they should admit it and say, ‘How can I do this better next time?’ Ask for feedback.”
Ben Cohen, president of Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc., an ice cream company in Waterbury, Vt.
“I never went to business school or graduated from college, but I could not imagine having course work that would prepare me for the various situations I’ve had to deal with at Ben & Jerry’s. The name of the game is people and learning to deal effectively and supportively with people. Establishing a communication system within your organization can only be learned by experience.”
Steven D. Lydenberg, an investment associate with Franklin Research & Development, a money management firm.
“I would argue that one should define doing well very broadly and that the financial rewards of working for a company are important, but the social ones are equally so. And if these are people who want to be happy 20 years from now working for the company they started with, they should be looking for social commitments.
“For a graduate concerned about the social side of the corporation, family issues are a good point to look at now. That would give me a clue whether a company is properly thoughtful in a broad range of areas. An MBA coming out of school in 1983, for example, could have looked at what was happening at Procter & Gamble Co. in terms of parental leave and child-care programs.”
