MBA grads from top B schools are some of the most talented people I’ve met. I had a chance to work with 600+ founders from all over the world. Few of them were from business schools like HBS, Michigan, Stanford, Yale, Wharton, Kelly.
Some of my best experiences are working with founders who have been from B-schools.
It is really surprising that there’s skepticism in Silicon Valley that MBA grads are not great start-up founders. In fact going for an MBA is often looked down upon.
The truth is there’s no difference in MBA people and technical people as startup founders. Startups are risky. The chances of failure are equal.
Some MBA grads have done extremely well in the Silicon Valley.
• A quarter of all the unicorns have at least one MBA founder.
• Blue Apron, Rent the Runway, Cloudfare are a few rising start-ups where the founders are from Harvard Business School.
• MBA Unicorns are valued at $84 Billion.
I’m surprised that even though we have so many success stories, only a handful of MBA grads build start-ups.
As a B-school student, you have these qualities which I believe are crucial for start-up founders.
Ability to Think Years Ahead
For founders, ‘Vision’ is extremely crucial. To disrupt an industry you have to identify where an industry is going and few problems in that industry.
Lot of technical founders work on building best algorithm ever! But what will it change in the world?
Business Fundamentals
A start-up is about building a great business, not just products. Great product definitely helps, but building a business is crucial. Larry and Sergey of Google had to hire Eric Schmidt to run their business.
99% of products that come into the market fail. Reason? They can’t sell, market, finance or build a business. As an MBA grad, you’ll know how to sell and market. There’s a reason why global biggies rush to B-school campuses to hire them and they become leaders of global organizations.
Network
Your network is extremely valuable to a startup. Most startups fail because they can’t sell. Lot of time it is hard for them to find a connect with the company who would buy their product. Given that you already have friends working in world’s best enterprises, it is easy for you to get in. Sometimes a potential customer is just a phone call away.
Having said that — There are only two things, Persistence and Belief, that can help your startup become successful.
