In 1984 there were 92 schools offering an EMBA degree, up from a mere 10 just a decade earlier. When I was applying to full-time MBA programs back then, the EMBA degree was the single alternative to a traditional, full-time program. Fast-forward to today, and there are permutations of both types—including online, evening and weekend versions, and accelerated and part-time programs as well.

Attending an EMBA program was relatively avant-garde back in the 1980s, and those who grabbed the brass ring now have the benefit of time to evaluate that career decision. Working with a cohort of six EMBAs who attended business school between 1982 and 1991, I asked, Was it worth it? Given the experience, both of being in a nontraditional B-school program and what they gained from it, I asked if they would do it all over again. (I also posed this same question to a cohort who attended full-time MBA programs.)

A majority said that while pursuing an EMBA was a grind, it was worth it and they would do it again, even if they had to pay this time around. 

The good, the bad, and the dent in family life

While Denis McGarry’s career path didn’t depend on holding a graduate degree, he matriculated at NYU Stern after 10 years in the workplace to strengthen his understanding of finance and accounting. Today he falls into the “yes, it was worth it” camp, but his recollection of the experience is that it required a juggling act of balancing work, school, and family.

“I learned a great deal from my classmates and their experiences,” says McGarry, who earned his degree in 1989. “I pursued this option even though I was in a mid-level marketing position with a leading consumer packaged goods company.” 

McGarry notes he appreciated being able to earn a living while at school but confesses it was challenging to give coursework his full attention when working and raising a family. And just maybe, were he to do it again today, McGarry says he might want to explore other schools, citing Stanford, for its innovative d.school design program or Northwestern Kellogg, for its marketing reputation.

Transition opportunities

Another NYU Stern graduate, Brad Gewehr, believes he’d do the EMBA all over again, as well. “It was the right move at the time, primarily because it helped me transition into a new career path.” 

At the time he enrolled, Gewehr worked for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, obtaining his MBA in 1991. He changed jobs within months of finishing school, moving to Moody’s Investors Service, which catapulted him into a 30-year career in municipal finance as a rating analyst, investment banker, and director of both sell-side and buy-side municipal research teams. Today he is a senior vice president in the municipal products group at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Still, Gewehr reflects that the degree may not make sense for someone who isn’t receiving a “hefty” employer subsidy. And he suggests that for finance aspirants, the CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) certification might be a better option.

Gewehr also notes that the EMBA presents a reasonable alternative for mid-career professionals who cannot afford to pursue a full-time MBA, in terms of both tuition and the opportunity cost of leaving their jobs. The relationship-building and recruiting benefits inherent in full-time programs are less essential for the constituency that the EMBA serves, he adds.

Drive and self-confidence make all the difference

For David Jourdan, who received his degree from the University of Connecticut in 1982, his EMBA opened doors. “The fact I was able to get an advanced degree going to school at night was an achievement,” he says. “The degree will only take you so far. Your own drive and self-confidence will do the rest.” (This sentiment echoes comments made by pro-basketball executive Mitch Kupchak, who earned an EMBA at UCLA in 1997 while playing for the Los Angeles Lakers.)  

Jourdan, now retired after a career in retail banking, advises, “I think you need to be prepared to change companies, if not careers, to make the most of the MBA.” Looking back on his career, he admits he may have stayed too long in some of the positions he held.

Paul Murphy intones with sly humor, “I may have done things backward.” That’s because he earned an engineering degree from the University of Pennsylvania, where Wharton is renowned for its signature B-school program, while he pursued an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a top-flight school for engineering majors. 

The EMBA, he says, nonetheless was worthwhile. His employer, Cigna, footed the bill, and “the education gave me a broader view of the actuarial and finance work I was doing.” 

Though Murphy characterizes the program as a slog, stretching from 1985 to 1991, he fondly recalls his girlfriend at the time gave him a nice golf bag on completing the degree. 

The EMBA grind, for some not quite enough

Before the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) debuted in 1976, business school aspirants took the Admission Test for the Graduate Study in Business, which Gail von Dohlen Smith sat for in 1974, her junior year at Cornell. In 1980 she used these results to gain a seat in the University of California, Berkeley’s “SF-MBA,” program, as its EMBA offering was called. (The school was rechristened Berkeley Haas in 1989.) 

“I knew my scores were about to expire and my company would partially pay for the degree, so why not?” she recalls thinking at the time.

However, Smith’s gain of an MBA was not without expense. Courses were taught in downtown San Francisco, so there was no campus life or networking opportunities, and a limited choice of concentrations. She recalls having zero free time, between her day job, classes, homework, and commuting. 

“There was never any bonding with the school because I was never in Berkeley,” Smith says, adding that she appreciates that the degree “earned me credibility and better pay in my job then, and in the future.” While Smith believes it had value, her recollection of the experience was that it was stressful, and she doesn’t believe she would do it again, given the option. “I have no desire to be a hedge fund manager,” she declares conclusively.

It was okay, but…alpacas are more fun

Then there’s William Bernhart, who earned his MBA in 1983 at the University of Hartford, courtesy of a benefit package from his employer, United Technologies. His undergraduate degree was in English literature from Cornell, so he thought he should expand his business education.  

“I can’t say that it made too much difference in my career path, but it didn’t hurt, either.” However, he recalls the quantitative work “was torture.”

Bernhart maintains he likely would not have pursued an MBA if tuition wasn’t covered. “It would have been a financial hit, and I had a family to consider,” he says. “I knew I wasn’t going to be a CEO. I was a data nerd.”

Taking early retirement in 2014, Bernhart today owns and runs Chakana Sky Alpacas in Chester, Conn. Locally he’s known as Farmer Bill. “I retired into a new career at a time when most people my age are retiring out.”

Bernhart is hard put to say exactly how his EMBA is directly relevant to the work he does now, which includes birthing baby alpacas and hosting hundreds of visitors a year to his farm. What’s more, Bernhart is selling and breeding his herd, and sells alpaca-based products through an on-site retail operation called Pacatique. Still, he finds the worst parts of life as an alpaca farmer to be preferable to his days in finance and appreciates the position he is in to “spread alpaca joy all around.”

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