Got an BS in Biochm. Now what? MBA or PhD?

[chakbana]

Hello everyone,

I am a biochemistry major and I will be graduating this coming December. My GPA is 3.5 (due to a bad year because of personal problems) and I have been doing research since 2006, thus, as you can tell, I have a lot of research experience in areas like organic chemistry, immunology, molecular bio. and biochemistry.

I had planned to start applying for my PhD now, during this fall semester, to start the PhD program on Fall 2011. However, lately I have been considering the option of getting a MBA instead. Actually, my boyfriend was the one who came out with the suggestion of getting an MBA because I was telling him that I was getting bored at my current job (in a biochemistry lab). His reasoning is the following: if am getting bored now, how will it be during my PhD years? or as regular job? and by getting an MBA, I would have two job options, being capable of doing research with my BS in biochemistry or administrative work with the MBA.

To be honest, after that moment I have not been able to sleep thinking about that. I am so confused right now. Should I still go for my PhD or should I go for the MBA? Do you really think it is worthy to get a PhD if I do not want to be a professor? Please help me to make a final decision. I need to start filling out my graduate school applications and I do not even know if I should study for GREs or the GMAT because I so confused about my future right now. What do you think? MBA or PhD? I really need fresh ideas and to hear others' opinions.

 

Thanks!

[CharonY]

Well, what job do you want? And what do you need to get that job? The problem is that at your level potential careers may be overwhelmingly broad and hard to assess. Now, there are still certain career options in the industry which also require a PhD. However, if you do not know what you want to do, one cannot really evaluate whether it is worthwhile to pursue one. It is definitely not a good option to get a PhD (or a MBA for that matter) just because. One possible thing you could do is to check job websites for biochemistry jobs just to get a very rough idea what is out there that you may want to do. Looking at real job description is usually more useful than listening to what random poster say, unless of course they have a career in that particular field. Also check out some career guides. Your experience up to now is unlikely to be comparable to the real thing out there.

[Marat]

Don't think instrumentally about what you want to do, but rather, follow your interests. I say this for three reasons: First, as long as you are doing what you enjoy, it hardly matters whether it leads to something profitable in other terms or not. Second, if you do something you do not enjoy just because it is more practical, you will wind up spending 90% of your life experiencing a career you don't like, which will make the money and success you obtain pale in comparison. Third, you will find that the only way to do advanced work well in any field is to be able to find a way to fall in love with it. If you can't do that, then you will only lead a life of frustration and inability to do your best.

 

But having said all that, I wonder if, with your knowledge of biochem, immunology, etc., you have considered studying medicine? There are so many different lifestyles and types of medicine you can pursue with an M.D. that it is the perfect qualification to have in your pocket while you are trying to figure out what to do with your life.

 

An MBA is just a utilitarian degree with very little conceptual interest. From the 1980s to the year 2000 was the great era of the profitable MBA, but that has now passed, and most firms prefer someone with technical knowledge in the relevant field rather than with the sort of amorphous, brain-dead, 'leadership' skills of an MBA. You wouldn't really want to appear before the world armed with the degree that everyone now blames for the 2008 financial collapse.

[chakbana]

to CharonY: my initial plans were to get my PhD because I love to do research, that said, I wanted a degree which could give me the opportunity to do research in the biomedical area, and hopefully one day to run my own lab. I am aware of my job possibilities with a PhD, since I currently work doing research not only because I love to but also for a living. However, I am not planning to become a professor or anything like that; I just like to be in the lab. With respect to the MBA, I have not have that much exposure to that area to be honest...

 

To Marat: thanks for your comments; and answering your question: I have never being attracted by the idea of being a doctor to be honest; I think I will be heart-broken all the time by seeing my patients and not being able to help them in most cases because of the lack of treatment options/cures to some diseases.

 

Thanks to both of your for your comments!

[Marat]

I would just re-emphasize the many varied options which open up with an M.D. which would not be available with a Ph.D., if only because admission to medical degrees is so much more restrictive. Many M.D.s spend their whole lives doing lab work, but discover that they have an easier time getting hired because a medical research lab may need a few M.D.s but find that many of them have been attracted away to more lucrative work in private practise, so the M.D.s are 'precious' while the Ph.D.s are a dime a dozen. M.D.s can work in pharmaceutical labs, as scientific pathologists, as government regulators, as medical ethicists, as journal editors, or as academics, and in none of these positions do they ever have to hand out death sentences to individual patients they cannot help, as so often happens in regular practise.