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Business schools from all over the world take over London’s Business
Design Centre this week as they try to woo the best young business brains
to their courses. The annual MBA Fair, organised by the University of London
Careers Service, plays host to schools from France, Spain, Austria, Germany,
Canada and the US, and 34 educational establishments from England, Scotland
and Eire.

If you’re aiming for the top, mere excellence in science or engineering
won’t be enough to get you there. To reach senior positions, you will also
need to excel in managing people, finances, facilities and time. If your
career leads you out of science, the same logic still applies.

Some view a career in science as a way of avoiding being a manager.
It is nothing of the kind. As careers develop, technologists move away from
the laboratory to become project leaders, departmental managers, research
directors. Alternatively, they move into jobs outside science where management
skills are also essential.

An MBA may not always be the answer. There are many ways of gaining
management skills: traditionally, most scientists learn management by doing
it and watching what other managers do. Over the past decade, there has
been an increase in management education so people can hone their skills
on short courses, or by taking a diploma or higher degree – on a full-time
or part-time basis.

There are now 93 business schools in Britain each year producing around
5200 MBA graduates. In 1993, 23 per cent of these were scientists and 32
per cent engineers. Many used their management qualification to move into
another area of employment. Research and development, information technology,
production and administration were net losers. Corporate planning, finance,
marketing and personnel were the winners. On graduation, many moved away
from public sector jobs, construction and the engineering industry to take
up employment in areas such as consultancy and finance.

Students on all the best MBA courses – and only 28 of those offered
by the 93 business schools in Britain are accredited by the Association
of MBAs as ‘worth doing’ – usually have at least two years’ industrial
or commercial experience. ‘The average age of an MBA student on a full-time
course is 27, on part-time courses it is 30 and over 35 for distance learning,’
says Roger McCormick, director general of AMBA. ‘They bring to their studies
not only the desire to learn but also a wealth of experience.’

Is it worth doing an MBA? Alan Beaney, a mechanical engineer, was employed
in new product development for an engineering company when he decided to
study for an MBA at Cranfield University. ‘I had already completed an accounting
diploma because many of my clients were accountants,’ says Beaney, ‘but
I wanted to be able to see the whole picture. It was important to me to
understand about the marketing of new products, where the finance came from
and how they fit into the whole strategy of a company. After the MBA I joined
Smith & Nephew, the healthcare group which makes a range of products
from shaving cream to artificial knee joints. I’m working with the managing
director of our European organisation finding solutions to business problems.’

Most full-time MBA courses last a year, with core modules covering subjects
such as business strategy, accounting, finance and quantitative analysis,
marketing, operations management and human resources. All courses include
a range of options and are usually completed by an industrial or commercial
project which culminates in a thesis. The core studies cover the fundamentals
of business while the options allow students to specialise in an area of
business which interests them.

‘The bubble has burst for MBAs,’ says Beaney, ‘you should only do it
if you really want to. It gives you a broader business outlook, but it’s
expensive.’ Fees vary from £4500 at the University of Birmingham
to £20 000 at the University of Cambridge, and the average is around
£8000. According to an AMBA survey, the average MBA graduate increases
salary by 16.4 per cent in real terms. Twelve years after the MBA people
are earning £64 000 in finance, £56 000 in consultancy, £55
000 in manufacturing, £43 000 in engineering and £35 000 in
the public sector.

MBAs cover a range of management activity, but many would prefer to
develop their knowledge and skills in a specific area such as marketing,
purchasing or human resources. These needs are catered for by courses such
as the diploma in marketing leading to membership of the Chartered Institute
of Marketing (offered by universities such as Kingston, and Strathclyde)
or the diploma in personnel management available at Oxford Brookes University,
Leeds Metropolitan University and many others. These exempt students from
many of the professional examinations of the Institute of Personnel Management.

So, if management is your aim, why wait until you have graduated? Within
the University of London, both King’s College and University College offer
management courses alongside their studies for scientific degrees, as do
the universities of Warwick and Sussex. The number of universities doing
this is increasing.

Opinion about such courses is split between those who believe they
add a valuable dimension to the study of science, and others who consider
that they dilute the science content of degree courses. Prospective students
are clearly in favour of these courses, and the applications and A-level
grades required for admission to them seems to be increasing quite sharply.

If management is your aim, perhaps the ideal way to learn is to do so
at your employer’s expense: 56 per cent of MBA students are fully sponsored
by their employers. Around 16 per cent are given part of their fees, and
just over 20 per cent pay from their own resources.

Neil Harris is deputy director of the University of London Careers Advisory
Service and head of the Careers Service at University College London.