New roles and spaces

Online MBA has helped many working professionals climb up the office hierarchy or even pivot to an entirely new career. But there are challenges.

- Sheena Sachdeva

Garima Arora quit journalism in 2022 to pick up a public relations and marketing job. Finding herself ill-equipped for the new role, she decided to go for an online MBA, offered by SVKM's Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies.

Upon graduating this year, she joined as manager, corporate communications at Ola Electric and credits her programme for landing her the new role. "I shifted into public relations and wanted to learn the skills relevant to industry as I was facing issues," she said. "The role included decision-making, programme management and stakeholder management. The course helped me understand these skills and apply those in my role almost everyday," she stated.

The growth of online MBA programmes over the past three years has been the result of two developments the pandemic, which effectively pushed all programmes online for over a year, and the University Grants Commission's permitting online degrees in 2021.

Management, at both the undergraduate and postgraduate levels, has become one of the most popular disciplines for online education. But there are challenges.

Students told Careers360 that they missed the benefits of peer interactions and learning as well as access to alumni networks.

Rashmi Subramanium, 27 and from Thane, Maharashtra, recently graduated from Mizoram University's online MBA in entrepreneurship. He found the content updated and the quality of lectures and mentorship strong but absence of peer relationships and alumni connections were big gaps.

No hands-on learning

The course helped Subramanium understand the concepts of entrepreneurship but didn't provide any handson entrepreneurial activities.