The Benefits of an Executive MBA #6 : Building Lasting Relationships

While an EMBA usually opens up valuable new professional networks, it can also help build personal ties. However, one of the most rewarding aspects of time spent in the business school classroom is the benefit of being able to forge close personal relationships that could last a lifetime.

Ask about their Executive MBA experience and most EMBA alumni will relay just how this prestigious business school degree has strengthened their career prospects and enhanced their professional skillset. Equally important is the strong bonds they have formed with fellow students. These lasting friendships established in the business school classroom are yet another benefit of the Executive MBA.

A diverse environment

The EMBA classroom offers a natural environment for getting to know a diverse group of people beyond formal business contacts. For most students, the EMBA experience is one of great intensity and challenges –juggling a demanding work-life-study balance. It is often in such situations, and in moments of stress and strain, that people have the chance to get to know one another at a more profound level. EMBA students are likely to share similar problems and difficulties throughout the program and can offer one another support. This forms a bond that is much less likely to emerge from a day-to-day context.

New friendships

By their mid-thirties, most professionals tend to be embedded in established structures, both professionally and personally. As such, it’s not always easy to meet new people and make new friends at mid-career level. An EMBA program thus opens more than one door for students: studying an EMBA creates the shared experiences so important for friendships, and allows students to forge a bond with each other.

It also serves as an ideal context to meet like-minded people, motivated and driven by similar impulses. In addition, the EMBA classroom allows candidates to broaden their circle of friends beyond national and cultural borders. Making friends from completely different cultures and traditions might well be one of the most rewarding and enriching experiences the EMBA experience has to offer.

Professional sounding boards

These new connections can be just as important in the professional context in the form of advisors, allies and sounding boards. Fellow students and classmates can more easily understand the complexities of issues that might arise during or after an EMBA degree than perhaps an employer or work colleague, as they are operating on a similar intellectual basis.

Friendships made during the EMBA could also provide an ideal opportunity for candidates to explore new professional and personal networks, perhaps opening new pathways to move to a new country, a new city, or a new company.

Long-lasting relationships

Developing a lasting friendship is not just restricted to classmates and fellow students. Important and valuable connections could also be made among the school’s alumni network or with faculty. A mentoring relationship could evolve into a life-long friendship of respect between teacher and former student that will continue to benefit the EMBA candidate throughout their professional and personal lives.

For the unattached, single EMBA student, there’s always the possibility of finding romance in the EMBA classroom as well!

While the many professional benefits of an EMBA are often talked about, the personal ones formed upon a shared desire to develop professionally, seek new knowledge and make the most of new opportunities are also an invaluable part of a candidate’s Executive MBA experience.