Why You Should Stay on the Job while You’re Enrolled in an MBA  

The traditional model for higher education and career advancement was relatively simple: after high school, enterprising individuals would pursue an undergraduate degree that would help them discern what professional path they wanted to take; after finishing their undergrad, they would take a more specialized professional degree, such as a Juris Doctor or Doctor of Medicine, at which point they would begin their career in the workplace.

Over the past thirty years, however, this model has become increasingly unworkable, and many students now take less traditional paths to enter the workforce. Not only are young people more likely to take a variety of different jobs over the course of their working life, they are also more likely to upgrade their skills multiple times.

This has meant that for many, the part-time Master of Business Administration (MBA) offered by prominent schools like the Lazaridis School of Business & Economics is an ideal program for younger people who don’t want to take time off work to pursue more education, but who see the value in upgrading their credentials.

Designed to ground students in all aspects of business while also giving them the freedom to specialize in a wide range of areas, including accounting, entrepreneurship, strategic management, and organizational behaviour and human resources management, the Lazaridis MBA offers full-time study options at its dynamic Waterloo campus. It also provides a part-time Toronto-based stream for students who want to pursue an MBA while working full-time.

The part-time MBA makes it possible to complete your degree in the evenings and weekends— a major boon for younger workers who want to upgrade their skills but don’t want to leave their current occupation. This is of particular value for members of the Millennial Generation, who may not have the freedom to drop everything to go back to school.

As Millennials enter their late twenties and mid-thirties, many are re-evaluating whether or not they have the skills necessary to thrive in the twenty-first century workplace. Studies have shown that while Millennial are extremely hardworking, but they also tend to be more cautious than previous generations, and more willing to juggle multiple jobs and maintain regular employment while going through school.

For this reason, many Millennials are realizing that an internationally recognized MBA that allows them the flexibility to pursue their studies part time offers the best of both worlds. Not only can they gain the knowledge and credentials necessary to advance in their careers, they can do so without giving up their current job or taking on more debt.

If you are considering pursuing an MBA in the coming year, make sure you explore options available for part-time study. Because programs like the one at Lazaridis offer students the flexibility to study at an internationally recognized institution without leaving their current position, they make it possible for Millennials to take the steps they need to advance their careers without worrying about losing momentum or going deep into debt.

There will always be students who prefer to study full-time. But as traditional paths to the workplace become the exception rather than the rule, it is likely that more students will find themselves drawn to education options that can accommodate the realities of modern work and life.