While there are benefits to staying at home and studying your MBA there, broadening your horizons by studying abroad, could give you an added advantage career wise. The top countries in which people go to study their MBA are: the United States, United Kingdom, Spain, Canada, and Australia. However, earning your degree abroad provides you with multiple personal and professional benefits. So what are these benefits of studying abroad for your MBA?
You will experience personal growth. Studying and living in a foreign country will give you a new understanding of your personal heritage, values, and culture. A study done in the University of Maryland shows that 96% of alumni claimed an increase in self-confidence attributed to study abroad. In addition, you gain skills such as independence, self-reliance, and self-confidence, which are all applicable in the work force.
You will be able to advance in your career, as you will be able to stand out from your peers by having such a high-level credential and experience based on the fact that you will have attained international experience, such as strong cross-cultural communications and familiarity with international standards, laws, and regulations. Once you have that kind of knowledge, moving back home and pursuing your career there will be easier. A study done by IES Abroad shows that 25% of graduates who studied abroad gain higher starting salaries as compared to those college graduates who do not study abroad.
You will get to broaden your worldview and make diverse partnerships by your exposure to a new culture and way of life, which will allow you to gain a broad and sophisticated view of the world, and expand your thoughts and values. A study done by American Institute of Foreign Study (AIFS) showed that 80% of people who studied abroad said that it allowed them to adapt better to diverse work environments. It will also help you form partnerships with citizens from all around the world that will enable you to work effectively and tackle global and multinational challenges, which is definitely an added advantage in the workforce.
You will get to strengthen your leadership skills because studying abroad exposes you to these different business and leadership styles that will help you to gain valuable experience, while working with a diverse team.
You can gain really valuable life skills by immersing yourself in different cultures and experiences and you may also attain master-level proficiency in a different language. According to the IES Abroad study, about 84% of alumni felt that studying abroad helped them build valuable job skills, such as language proficiency, cultural training, and tolerance for ambiguity, adaptability, and communication. Such competency will help you while networking and forming partnerships, as you will gain the respect of other cultures.
Companies are also looking to hire individuals who are flexible, multilingual, and comfortable in multicultural settings. The same survey by IES Abroad showed that 97% of graduates who study abroad secure jobs within the first 12 months, compared to only 49% of respondents in the general college graduate population. Studying your MBA abroad, gives you those specific skills, thus aiding you to garner that managerial position you have been eyeing or even establish your own multicultural company in different countries.
Studying abroad will also help you gain knowledge that you may have not acquired in your home country because education systems are different all over the world and some are proved to be better than others, so you may learn something new and vital in another school abroad. Statistics show that 59% of employers say study abroad will be valuable in an individual's career later on with their organization.