Contemplating an MBA in Finance to complement the CFA charter

Water Cooler Careers
#1

I’m strongly considering going back to school for my graduate degree in finance. I’ve always intended on completing it, but have held out for an employer to subsidize some of the tuition, instead of having to take out a loan for the whole cost. When I was studying for the CFA exams, and after ultimately getting the charter, I did not think an MBA was all that necessary in landing a job in equity research or portfolio mgmt. That’s where I want my career to progress towards. But with my experience as a Sr. Financial Analyst in industries outside of financial services, and a project manager earlier in my career, I’m thinking an MBA will be necessary. As a charterholder, I’ve been overqualified for all my past experiences as an analyst - I know that’s because I don’t have actual real world experience in asset and wealth management. A finance focused MBA program feels like the only way to go to get into that field.

Would love some feedback on this. Also, have you completed a graduate program? What materials did you use to study for the GMAT?

#2

Can’t comment on the relevancy or prevalence of an MBA in ER/PM, but if you end up not travelling down that track and end up staying in corp. fin or moving to something like PE an MBA is probably 10 times more important than the CFA. From my experience even roles in Treasury departments in large firms have many more dual CFA/MBA empoloyees than solely CFA.

I did complete a graduate progam; bought one of those giant GMAT prep books, and just worked my way through the whole thing cover to cover (took about 4 weeks). In my opinion, the key to the GMAT is having a solid block of time leading up to it to entranche yourself in the question types / solving techniques and get good at solving problems quickly.

#3

Op_Yahoo - thanks for your feedback and tips on the GMAT prep. Appreciate very much!