Ep. 77 - What is the Master of Business Administration (MBA)?

In Episode 77 of the CSUSB Advising Podcast, Matt Markin chats with Professor Ernie Silvers, MBA Programs Director and full-time faculty member at CSUSB's Jack H. Brown College. Professor Silvers discusses the MBA Program, admissions, tips for writing a personal statement, careers, and department resources. 

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Matt Markin  
Hey Yoties. This is Matt Markin, an academic advisor here at Cal State San Bernardino, and welcome back to the CSUSB Advising Podcast. This is episode 77 and today we're learning more about the MBA, the Master of Business Administration. And to help us learn more about the MBA. We have special guest Professor Ernie Silvers, who is the MBA Programs Director and also full time faculty member at the jack H Brown College here at CSUSB. And a couple fun facts about Ernie Silvers is that he received the 2023 Outstanding Educator Award from the Inland Empire Chapter of the American Society of public administration, and is a three time most valuable professor in 2019, 2020, and 2021, Ernie, welcome to the podcast. 

Matt Markin  
Hey. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So happy to be here.  As we were talking earlier, I feel like I've actually made it. I'm on the Matt Markin podcast. 

Matt Markin  
So can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Your background in Higher Ed?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Well, I started out. I've always been the reluctant leader. I started out working for my father in his trucking business, and he we had many spirited debates about, why won't you once you be my sales person, to which I promptly said, No, I'm not going to do that. And we had loud arguments about it. I left his company to be a salesperson, which is ironic from that organization. I went to corporate. I lasted 11 months in corporate that didn't play well in corporate. Went to a automotive parts manufacturer as an inside sales manager, which was amazing, because I didn't know anything about automotive parts, but they hired me anyway, which is still a mystery to me. I stayed with that company for a long period of time. Got bored with sales manager, became General Manager, then Vice President, General Manager, CEO, then eventually president, CEO of 105 year old family business. During that time, I became acquainted with Dick Dixon, who was teaching at Cal State San Bernardino. And Dick would always tell me, you're gonna have my job one day. And at that time, I had just finished my MBA, I was a CEO. I was planted. I was, you know, really, my career was sort of like, I'm okay, I don't really need anything. But he would say, you're going to have my job someday. And I said, I can't even spell professor, let alone be one. I don't know what you're talking about. I am not going to have your job one day. Well, lo and behold, I got hired by Cal State San Bernardino to teach a marketing class, which was amazing. And I started teaching for Mike Stull in the management department. Taught for Mike for a long period of time. I applied for the MBA slot, kind of on a bet, right? I guess a dare. Someone sent me the job description and said you should apply for this. And I said, Are you kidding? They would never hire me? And they did. And so that was five years ago. But the interesting part is, I did not stop my MBA job while I was or my my CEO job while I was doing the MBA job. So I really had two full time jobs going on. I was running a business in the morning, and I was doing MBA in the afternoon. I was also teaching. So I had a lot of things going on, and I just over the last year or so, had to back off from that. So, so I got here always saying I'm not going to do that. I'm not gonna do that. And the lesson here is, don't ever say never, because that's what happens. You know, I told my guy who said, you're going to have my job, you're going to teach at Cal State, I said that's never going to happen. And there that happened. So MBA, so that's kind of my deal. You know, you never know where you're going to go. You just sort of ride the waves, and it's been fun. My business experience by running a company, my CEO experience, I bring to the classroom, and it helps me help students. Here's theory, here's how it really works. This is what it looks like. That's what it sounds like. It's helped me interesting as MBA director, I'm the first non tenured faculty member to be in the MBA. I think that's important, because, as I say, you know, I've been out there. I've had the real job. I've run companies, I've started things. So when you're talking to people coming back to college for a master's degree to continue their education, to grow their toolbox, I can, I can speak from a position of been there and done that. I agreed late. I didn't degree. Get my master's degree till I was a seated CEO. And I suggest you never do that, because I was always arguing with my professors about, that's not how that works. That's not how that works. But that's, you know. So that's a little bit about me. That's how I got here. 

Matt Markin  
I like the way you put it, you know, ride the wave, you know. Because just like. You're saying you never know what kind of opportunities are going to be out there. And in a sense, you may not think you qualify for something, or you're not going to get the job, and someone takes a chance on you.

Professor Ernie Silvers  
I tell my students, as regular as it comes to mind, that somebody with less talent than you is doing what you said you weren't talented enough to do. I make a habit I did when I was in the automotive aftermarket. I make a habit of trying to get close to successful people to figure out, what's the magic. What's the magic? I've discovered there's no magic. Matt, there's no magic. It's like, no, no, you're killing me. It's like telling me there's no Santa Clause. There's no magic. What these people do is they don't quit, right there. They have talent, they have skills, they have something, but there's no magic. They just don't quit. They're relentless at get up and grind, get up and grind, get up and grind. And you layer successes until eventually you you have this, you know, reputation of here's here's somebody who has it going on. There's no secret, Matt, there's no secret. So unless you get your podcast posted to coyote radio, then that'll that'll end the secret there.

Matt Markin  
Then you've made it.

Professor Ernie Silvers  
you've made it. Yes, we're all in Coyote Radio. I know.

Matt Markin  
So how would you describe to a student the MBA?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
I'm not quite sure how to answer that question. The MBA is a it's a master's degree program that, I guess would be a bit of a lid on the undergrad program. It is meant to be experience intense, to add advanced skills to an undergrad business degree. Sometimes folks come to MBA after acquiring a degree. Oh, in the sciences, psychology is a popular degree where I got a psychology degree. But I don't want to spend the next 468, years of my life going getting more degrees and doing internships, I guess I get, I need to go get a real job. And so they'll, they'll combine and one degree with the MBA degree that works really well sometimes. So the MBA is a degree that is meant to be finishing touches on or to your career as far as education goes. Once upon a time, and a long time ago, because I'm old, high school diploma was all you needed to get into the workforce. Then it became the college degree. Now it's pretty much the master's degree. That's how they separate resumes. If you don't have it, if you don't have a master's degree, chances are you're you're going to get overlooked. I talked to a student just the other day who said, you know, I've been doing this for a period of time. I have a good job, but I'm looking around. It's time to move, and I'm realizing that the qualifications are MBA or master's degree in my chosen field. So that's how they separate candidates, and that's how they how they promote people. Oftentimes, you know, do you have a master's degree? But so it's the finishing touches. And I don't mean finishing as you're done, because you should, you should constantly be learning, refining your skills and sculpting your ability to perform in your career. But as far as education goes, unless you're going to climb into the ranks of academia, would you need another degree, a terminal degree, like a PhD or an ed? So in business world, it's kind of the finishing degree. It's the barrier of entry, I guess, for some things. 

Matt Markin  
And what would be like the admission process or application process like for a student wanting to do the MBA?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Well, my advice to students often is make sure you need one. You know, first and foremost, a lot of people like I say they think they need one, and they really don't need one. They want one. And that's not bad. I mean, if I want a degree, but if you're going to talk to me, because I'll talk you out of it every time, if I can only, because folks imagine that the MBA is a magic fix for all of my problems. You know, I'm a hot mess. I don't know what's going on. My career is a mess. But if I had an MBA, everything would be better. That's not true. So you should discover, do I really need one? And why do I need one? Is it for me to get promoted? Is it for me to move in my career? Is it for me to move out of my level to the next level with a different company? So you do that exploratory process? First, I think, shop for schools. Absolutely. Shop for schools. Are you looking for an online degree? Are you looking for a face to face? Do you want an executive program in MBA? We offer all three we are one degree with three options. We have an online version, we have an executive version, and we have what we call a traditional version of the MBA. So what is it? You want from the degree. And ideally what you want from the degree is you want education. You want exposure to thoughts and ideas, to networks, to things that are going to make you better as a person, better as a candidate. Growth. It's a growth step, you know? It's kind of like going to summer camp. We matured in summer camp, right? So it's that once you make your selection, and of course, you would choose Cal State San Bernardino, right? Matt case, where else would you go but Cal State San Bernardino? Then you just go through Cal State Apply. If you go to the MBA website, you can or just if you Google MBA at CSUSB, you'll come up with our website. There's a link there that you can click to apply now, and go to Cal State applies, fill out the application, go through the process, and, you know, it's, it's really quite simple. We we try to make it as simple as possible for folks to apply. We also try to make sure that we get you in the right degree having, I have a background in sales, so I've always only sold things I believed in. I'm not. I'm not a predatory salesperson. I'm not going to sell you something if I don't think you need it. That's why I tell people, if you think you need an MBA, come see me. I'll tell you why. That's not true, because I don't want to sell you something under the illusion it's going to fix all your problems. If you're messed up when you got here and you're gonna be messed up when you leave, you need to have the right ideas. And so what's the right idea for getting an MBA? Been in my career for a little while. I've got experience, and I just need a bump in my skill set to push me over the top. Somebody in my organization, somebody in my industry, said, You know, if you had an MBA, right, that's a qualifier. So if there's a reason for it to further your career or to grow your skill set, or to bust you out of a rut, those are good reasons to get an MBA. Fun fact about MBA, our biggest inflow of students comes from our undergrad department, right? So you've taken a business degree in undergrad, and you roll right into an MBA. I see that as a failure in that you've just finished a business degree, you should be ready to go get a job, start your career, go get some experience, and then if you think you need one, or if it's told you you need one, come back. But to roll out of an undergrad degree right into an MBA, that's a failure in that we didn't prepare you to leave. Because our best students are those who have, I'll say, three years minimum, five to seven years preferred, sometimes 10 years of experience. They come in because those students bring value to the classroom, right? And I love teaching older students. I love teaching students with experience, because all students know things I don't know, right? Everybody knows something you don't know. So when you bring in this experience from the street into the classroom, that only adds to the discussion, that adds to the examples, to the observations, to how does this work? What does it sound like exposure to different industries, different situations? So the experienced student really adds spice to the soup, if you will. A rolled over undergrad, the experience for them is going to be, you know, this looks a lot like this stuff I just did, right? And except it's at a different level. And so I think the experience, and if you're going to pay for the MBA, you need, the experience that's going to benefit your career, that's going to grow you as a person, that's going to grow you as a career. If you roll right out of undergrad, it's the same old stuff, right? So I don't think you said you're doing yourself any favors. So if I have an opportunity to speak with a student, I real effort to inform them that, you know, you might just go get a job. And I tell that to people all the time. So you don't need a degree, you need a job, you need experience. Because as director of the MBA program, right? I mean, MBA is pretty prestigious. I have an MBA. Well, we want quality students, right? So I'm looking for quality students. And as a professor, again, that's that, are you going to bring something to my classroom that's going to make my class better? God knows, I need the help, Matt, but you know, so I need these students to help build the discussions and the backgrounds and plus the students who have been out in the field working, doing whatever it is they're doing when they come into the classroom, they're more mature as a student. They take it much more serious, right? They've got the experience in industry, so they know this is what it looks like to me. And oftentimes they can take what they learn in the classroom and employ it the next day at their job. So that's kind of cool, right? 

Matt Markin  
And let's say student is like, you know what I'm going to apply for, for the MBA, and I need to write a statement, um, student, go about writing that personal statement?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Oh, my goodness. Um. Hmm, that's a tough one for me, because I read so many of them. Well, you're not 10 feet tall, bulletproof, and you can't walk on water. I think this is where you you put into writing the self reflection on why do I want an MBA? Right? So what are we looking for as the MBA we're looking in the personal statement. We're looking to read that one. That's the first opportunity we have to sample your writing. Can you write? Can you play at the level of an MBA? Do you have you thought the process through? Do you have a valid reason for wanting a graduate degree, right? So it doesn't have to be a novella, right? Like half page, three quarter page is really sufficient. And so, like I said, it's kind of a self reflection. You're submitting a writing sample, and you're communicating to MBA office. This is who I am. This is my experience. This is why I want the MBA. This is how it's going to make me better. And if you can put those things in writing, then it communicates to us, okay, this wasn't just a whim. I didn't lose a bet. I've thought about this. I've done my research. I'm ready to come here, and I enjoy speaking with students who's to tell me just that I've done my research, I've looked around, I want to come here to Cal State. We do have a lot of love from our undergrad alums who, you know, they did their undergrad degree two years, five years ago, and they want to come back to Cal State. I think that's cool, right? We love Cal State. You and I both work here. We have been here for quite some time. We're like, right? So anybody who's loving on our campus, we like that, and it feels good when somebody says, I had a great experience in my undergrad. I want to come back to Cal State. We like that a lot, because that means you want to be here, right? We're not, you're not just checking a box. We're not some generic program. So, you know, that's, that's what we like to see in the personal statement. This is who I am. This is my experience. This is my thought process. This is why I want the MBA, maybe you it's almost self aggrandizing. Maybe you kind of suggest why you believe you'd be a good student, right? Maturity is key. And you don't say I'm mature, of course, I'll be, you'll say that, right? But you demonstrate, I've been out there, I've had these jobs, I'm now at a point where I'm ready to come back to school and get that next level of education. And so that's what the personal statement does, is it just communicates I'm going to be a good student, or at least in my mind, I think I'm going to be a good student. And of course, the first semester will tell us that, right? And we'll see that right away, you know, so you but you have to have attitude, honestly, man, if you're going to come back and get a master's degree, here's why. I talked to a lot of students, they are, they graduated, you know, like I said, 235, years ago, they're they're progressing along in their degree. And during that period of time, they have gotten married, they have kids, life change, their adulting, okay? And if you're going to come back and get an MBA in the mix of all that, you're about ready to train wreck your life. Okay? Because it's, it's, it's not listed on the top catastrophic events, life events, but I can tell you, when I did my master's degree, my wife and I did it together, right? And so we had harmony in the household, because we were both students going through that. But if you're the only adult, working adult who's also attending school, and you have a spouse at home with children who remember you, you know, being available at certain times, and now you're not, because you're getting a degree, that's a major life shift, and you have to, you have to be prepared for that. And I'll ask students in interviews, it's like, well, you know, what does the significant other think about this? Do you realize you're about ready to train wreck your life? Because you're you're not going to be available on weekends anymore, you're going to have class, you're going to be burning the candle, you're going to be a little tired, you're going to be the only one, because everybody else is going to say you're such a downer dude. I mean, you just don't want to do anything anymore. So you have to be prepared for that. It's a mental thing that makes it sound terrible, doesn't it matter? It didn't sound that terrible, but I think you need to understand what you're signing up for. One, it's a significant investment. Okay? It's a significant investment. Two, it's a time investment that potentially will change your world, change your trajectory as a career, individual, professional individual. You gotta be ready for that.

Matt Markin  
Let's say a student does get into the MBA. Generally speaking, can you talk about what students are learning in their classes?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
It's going to be a wide variety. It's kind of hard to narrow it down and say they're going to learn this or that. Of course, we start the program going through our administrative communication course, which is a learn to read, write, speak like a professional, coupled with a second course data driven Analytics, which is using statistics to make business decisions. So those are our platform courses. So as a former CEO, as a small business owner, myself consulting entity, as a professor, the one thing that folks are scared to death of is speaking, and they will avoid it at all costs. So when you get a room full of young business professionals together and everybody's afraid to speak, come on up and speak. No, no, they don't like that. Well, that's how you get promoted. That's how you grow. That's how leaders are developed. You have to be able to speak. So we start the program with that, learn to write in a business format, learn to speak, learn to present. That's where we start your business thinking and then using the data driven analytics. Then we have core courses in business. So it's all really a general flyover of business from an administrative level, if you choose the executive program you will go through with with core courses, you'll get some management, you'll get some accounting, you'll get some financing, you'll get some supply chain, sort of general type courses that will help broaden your knowledge for this is how this works out in the world. This is how it probably works in your company. Executive course is designed for working executives who want to get through a program in 12 to 18 months, quickly, right? If you choose the traditional MBA, we add to it, what we call concentration. That's where you can you'll start out with the same basic two classes, you'll get the core concentration courses, and then you can spread out into entrepreneurship, or maybe heavier in accounting, heavier in finance, heavier in supply chain management, heavier in human resources. We've just developed a human resource concentration that's extremely popular because human resources, especially in California, is such a big deal now, you know, so they will be learning sort of a broad range of materials about this is business. You know, I always try to talk people into traditional because if you're going to come and you're going to do this, you should walk away with something other than a plain vanilla degree, right? I have an MBA. Doesn't mean anything to me, but I have an MBA with a concentration in entrepreneurship. Ha, now I know that you have been taught about ideation, creative thinking, problem solving, building businesses. Whoa, right? So entrepreneurship works with just about everything, right? And I'm hedging my bet just a little bit, but really, entrepreneurship works with everything, and entrepreneurship in and of itself, it's the entrepreneurial thinking, and if you can couple that with your MBA, it's like putting superchargers on your car, right? So you're not just an MBA. You have an MBA with a concentration, a specific concentration. Now I'm, I teach in the School of entrepreneurship, so I'm going to be leaning that way. Man, I like entrepreneurship, but if accounting is your deal, if finance is your deal, HR, all of those are good things. But you shoot out with it's like putting Chrome on your car, right? If you come out with just a plain car, kind of like a Tesla. You come out with a plain car, no Chrome, it's like, okay, so you have a generic MBA. If you come out with a concentration, you now have Chrome on your car, figuratively speaking, and it's now more attractive, right? I have an MBA with a concentration in boom, fill in the blank. And so you're special, you know, you're like the cherry on top, you know, I'm vanilla ice cream with a cherry.

Matt Markin  
Yes, yeah, that's something extra. 

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Yeah, we have to, you have to, you know. And in business, and especially with degrees, I mean, a degree is a degree is degree. You need to be looking for an edge. So what's going to be your edge? You know? And in MBA office, we are all keen on helping and speaking with I do a lot of counseling, a lot of coaching of students, because I don't want you to come out as just a plain grad, you know, undergrad or grad. I want you to come out specifically, you know, something special. Still, you a different version of you, a better version of you. Because, why do we go to school, right? Basically, why do we go to school? Matt, it's to get educated, right? To get educated and and to experience the college environment. It to experience whatever we can with networking with others. And you know, you'll remember the covid thing was just really a, oh my goodness, that was a real shock to all of us. So you want to come through for the experience as well as the education. I tease people, if you just want the piece of paper. I mean, you could go to Los Angeles and go to MacArthur Park and probably buy one if you want. I mean, get somebody to print one up for you. But you don't want just the degree, the paper, you want the experience, you want the education. And so that's what we try to coach people to do, is to make sure that you are engaged in class. You're engaging with your professors. Because it does take two I'm I haven't gotten in trouble for this yet, so I curse your podcast. Could probably fix that, but I'm a fan of when you show up to class and I tell my students this, do not, you know, I don't care if you agree with me or not, but if you don't agree with me, argue with me, debate with me. Let's chew on the ideas. Let's go back and forth, right? Because that's how we work it, Iron sharpens, iron type thing. And do that with your other faculty members too. One, you're engaged in the course, and two, you're going to ask questions other people have. Three, you're going to cause other people to get involved, to get engaged. And plus, the class is more interesting, right? So you can't just sit down, shut up and hold on that. That's that's, I can't do that. So you do need to engage. You do need to wrestle with ideas. You do need to challenge the material. Why is it that way? Well, how come? And how long has it been that way? And what are they trying to do to fix that? And you have to wrestle with the ideas. Why? So that you become used to dealing with problems. Because when you get back to your job, you know you don't just sit down, shut up and hold on in your work. I mean, if you do that's that's worry, right? You have to be able to ask questions. Something I discovered when I was a CEO, baby CEO. I found myself in a room one day, sitting with my insurance broker. Who was it my insurance broker and my accounting consulting entity, and we're sitting in a room and we're discussing a business issue, and the room went deathly silent when I realized that we had to make a major decision, and all eyes were on me, and they were waiting for me to make that decision, right? I'm like, Oh, that's my job. I have to make a decision. Well, I learned the hard way, right? And ideally, if you're going to come back and you're going to do an MBA, that's what you use the classes for, to go in there, to wrestle with the ideas, to think things through, to get used to creating solutions. You know, and entrepreneurs are, they're just problem solvers. That's what an entrepreneur is. They see a problem, they create a product or a service that solves a problem. Right? As a business person, that's really what you do if you're not a problem solver, if you're not doing something that increases your value within the organization, why do I have you? I mean, why are you here? That's boring. I mean, if you work for me, I'd find somebody to replace you, because you're boring. I need people to mix it up. So I don't mind a little back and forth. I don't mind. Hey, I don't agree with you. Yes, and you know what? Students won't do that. They come out of high school, or they come out of undergrad, and they've been taught, sit down, shut up and hold on. So they, when you first tell them, argue with me. They're like, you know, they won't. They won't do it. It takes several weeks of understanding that they're dealing with a lunatic instructor, and then they start coming out, and they start challenging, and they start I have a different opinion. I have a different view on that. I think it might be this way. I think it's better when it goes That's fine. That's how we make things better, that's improvement, right? So when we come to MBA school, that's what they're supposed to be able to do. You'd be surprised. I tell people that, you know, MBA students are really just bigger, older kids. They're, they're kind of the same, you know? And some people take offense to that, but you have to poke MBA students to come out and play, too. So hopefully, to answer your question, long winded answer your question, they should learn what it looks like, what it sounds like, what it feels like to work in an administrative executive role. Now, there's nothing like you know once your butt hits the seat and you wake up one day going, Oh, wait, you're waiting for me to make that decision. Oh, I'll get back to you. Can I call you? Can you send me an email? Remind me? Can I have a couple of weeks on that one? So that's, that's what you get out of MBA, is some of that? So that's, that's what I encourage students to do, though. Go wrestle with it, go tear it up. Go have a good time. Yeah, right. Learn to have fun in here. So when you go back to your job that you're having fun at your work too, and doing cool stuff that helps people, whatever it is you do, you're doing cool stuff.

Matt Markin  
And you were mentioning, and you were mentioning earlier, about, you know, having students kind of really consider, you know, why do you want the MBA? What are you going to get out of it? So let's say student goes through the program. They get their their master's degree. For students that you've seen graduate with an MBA, what kind of careers or things that have they done with the degree?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Typically, what I see are working adults, folks that have jobs, maybe their entry mid level in their career. So it's kind of a variety of things. Some use it to get that next level of promotion, to break into that next level of their job. It is also it's popular to come back to get a degree, because I'm looking for a job. I'm looking for a new job. I talked to a student two days ago, and he says, I am a financial analyst at XYZ company, and I either want to go to Disney. I want to work for Disney. I want to get promoted where I'm at, or I'm looking at this company over here. And as I'm looking at these things, I realized that I need an MBA, right? So the point there was, I'm going to get, I'm going to put this label on my name Ernie Silvers MBA, and that's going to help me be more attractive as a candidate to get to the next level that I want to go. They grow in their companies. They grow to new companies. They acquire a certain level of management leadership, they become more attractive as a candidate to other companies. So it's kind of a variety of things that happen. Those are the folks. Those are the models that I told you about. You have a specific reason for I'm going to do this because, fill in the blank, I'm going to get promoted. I know oftentimes folks can't get promoted if they don't have the Masters, right? So they come back to do that. Some people are looking for other jobs. That's that's always that breaks my heart. I've stalled in my career. I need a degree. Sometimes they come back because they're going to make a career change, right? I've been a this, whatever this is, and I really want to move into a management role in this industry. And in order to do that, I got to have a degree. I need to near, I learn. I need to learn more about executive management. So the bottom line is, they all come back for growth, right? I want to grow my career. I want to take a different direction. So it's a variety of things that happen, and the better that we can prepare them, right? Honestly, Matt, there's only so much we can do. You know, the student has to come back. Also, this is true for undergrad. This is true for grads. Cal State, San Bernardino offers so much, right? And you know, you work here too. There is so much, so many benefits that are available to students. Our Career Center, our library is amazing. Our Student Services is amazing. Our Career Services, resume writing, writing centers, all of this stuff that we have for the students. But if students never, go do it? Go, engage it. Go, partake. Go ask questions. You know, it's like the gift. They never open, right? It's like, No, you have to open the gift. I mean, there's so much cool stuff here for you to participate in, because when you leave, it's gone, right? So, come participate in Cal State. Come talk to the professors. Come participate in the events. I use something as a professor. This is just me, Matt, so this is not how we do it, but this is how I do it. You know how we'll have an event on campus? You're probably familiar with this to some extent. And they'll say, Oh, would you give students extra credit to come to my event? And I say, No, I won't I will encourage students to go to your event. I encourage my students to go to event. In fact, I have an event coming up next week. I'm encouraging students to go. Are you giving extra credit? No, here's why, Matt. I'm tired of bribing you to do something that you should do on your own accord if you're really interested in growing that sounds terrible, maybe. But honestly, why do I have to beg you to do the things that are free to you to grow your career? You know? Why would I do that? And the students just look at me like, dude, really, no, I'm not. I'm not bribing you anymore. So you should show up. And when students do show up to these things, they tell me one of two things, especially networking events, I'm scared to death and simultaneously loving every minute of it. Right? That's like a roller coaster, isn't it? Because that's a roller coaster. I'm scared to death and loving every minute. Of it, right? And and you have to be able to get that, that buzz out of your education, right? So Cal State has so much to help grow individuals as well as business professionals as well as a student. So people change when they come here. 

Matt Markin  
I would bet, probably for the majority, once they do it, after they attend the event, they're probably saying, I'm glad I actually went to it.

Professor Ernie Silvers  
They absolutely do, and I don't, I don't hear students say that was the worst thing I've ever done in my life. Because until you participate, until you go to an event, till you start networking, I tell students, I said, Look, you have to understand, if you come with me to a networking event, whatever it is, if it's a SHRM event, the faith based conference that's held by ampac Once a year, going to an event this afternoon, put on by IEE, it's not what is it? The Inland Empire Center for Economic Development, come to an event and participate. You're like a puppy at a picnic, right? As soon as I push you out in front of people and say, student, oh, my God, a student, everybody wants to talk to you, right? Suddenly you're the star of the show. People love to talk to students, right? And you have a great time. It is a little scary, but at the same time, it's fun, because you're getting attention. You didn't realize that you had an attractive factor, that you have value, that you're simply by being a student at Cal State, San Bernardino, people are interested in who are you? What do you do? What's your career path? How can I help you? Right? That's useful. That's abundantly useful. Why would you not want to attend? So getting them out there is the hard part. After they've been then they become familiar with and addicted. Overstates it, but they want to. They have a desire to go participate at a higher level.

Matt Markin  
And of course, you know, I'm sure there's misconceptions that one might have about certain programs. Are there any misconceptions you think students might have about the MBA? 

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Only that it's going to fix their problems. If you show up a dumpster fire, you're going to leave a dumpster fire. That's just it. Some folks think that the MBA is going to fix everything. My career will be all better if I just have an MBA. That's that's not quite true. It could be true, but you need some better foundation than that. Misconception is, I can't do it. Of course, you can. I don't belong here, which is weird. It's like, wait, you signed up, you applied, you were accepted. You're paying for this. What do you mean? You don't belong here. But some people believe I don't belong here. I don't feel like I'm worthy to be in this class nonsense, right? I'm not smart enough. There's a misconception. I don't know if I'm smart enough to do the MBA school. Yes, you are. Yes you are. Yes you are. We work hard to make sure that we vet applicants to get a good quality of applicant. So you do have to have a 3.0 GPA, right? You do have to be able to read, write, read at college level. And of course, we put the foundation there with the first two classes. But you absolutely belong. You absolutely can do it. I'm working, you know the working adult thing. I'm working adult. Have kids, well, if you consider what's going to have to happen to allow you to go to school, we have all of our classes start after 530 and on weekends, right on Saturday. So we are designed for the working adult. The bottom line is, yes, you can, you can do this if you want to. It's not going to be easy. There's going to be some difficult times. The other thing is, community, right? I'm going to be going through this all by myself. No, no, no, no, no. You have MBA office. You have MBA students. We have MBA ambassadors. We are a community within the Jack Brown College, you're surrounded by people who are doing just like you're doing either on your same path, a little bit ahead of you, a little bit behind you. You have faculty that are supportive again, MBA office. We support students all the time. I tell my students, all my MBA students, if you think you have a problem, come see us and we'll let you know whether that's true. But don't wait until you've blown it up or it's blowing smoke or shooting sparks. Come see us and say, Hey, I'm having trouble with this. I've got this going on, and we will help you, because we like to kill lizards before they become dragons, right? So biggest misconception is, I can't do this. Yes, you can. You absolutely can. It. Can change your life, but not by just showing up. You can't just show up, right? You have to show up. You have to engage and you have to protect. Take participate, and all of the awesome things that we do for MBA students, and potentially it will rock your world. You know, it will change how you look at things, how you approach things, how you problem solve, how you interact with people. I think that you enter the program at one level, one persona. When you exit the program, there should be a maturity, a mind, growth and education, growth and experience growth. You should develop a tenacity. Coming out of the program, I could do anything, right. They say, they say, jump out of an airplane. And if you survive that, you could do anything. Well, I don't need to do that, to do that, right? Because I did spend time in the Navy. I was in the air wing of the Navy, and they taught me there is no need to jump out of a perfectly good aircraft. I'm going without one that, right? So, but the reality is, is that you come out of the program differently than you were when you entered it, a better person, a better employee, a better leader, better manager. You know, kind of grown up a little bit, if you will, and not to disparage, but you come out a different person than you then you were when you entered it. And that's the goal, right, to be a better person, because that's why you came, right? You came because you want to be better, and we do our best to help you be better, whatever that means to you. 

Matt Markin  
You're mentioning already about students utilizing the MBA departments. Can you talk more about resources that that your department offers to students?

Professor Ernie Silvers  
We have the best advisor on campus. No offense, Matt, excuse me. I mean, because you're an advisor, but you know,

Matt Markin  
I'm mostly for undergrad, so...

Professor Ernie Silvers  
We have Deloren West, who is an exceptional advisor. He works with the students to make sure that they understand their program, to make sure that they stay on path, and if they have any issues that those get addressed and taken care of. We have student ambassadors. Student Ambassadors are a collection of best of the best. They are what I like to call our eyes and ears inside the classroom and to the students to communicate, to the students, to convey any issues back to MBA office or to the students to go to encourage them. If you have any challenges, all you can go to MBA office, use the director, use me. Like I said, I have a significant amount of business experience and can oftentimes help people sort things out. On the business side, I do as a side hustle. I do business consulting and career coaching, job interview prep, we have one of the best resume writers on campus. These things are all free to our students. We have we're still working on the internship. We don't quite have that one dialed out yet. We do this coming up. Let's see in a couple of weeks, next Sunday, as a matter of fact, but this will be airing at a different time. So we do events throughout the year next next Sunday is the MBA brunch, where we'll get current MBA students partnered with MBA alum, and they'll get together and hold a brunch and do some networking and some info sessions and so forth. We do a study abroad program, which was quite successful last year, thankfully, prior to covid, that was pretty, pretty big and powerful. Then covid kind of took the legs out from under that well, it's coming back. So the study abroad was quite successful last year. So where students go like last let's see, where do they go? One of our staffers who was also going through the program, they went to Greece and Rome and then came back, and that was a big deal for them. That was good. It built camaraderie, it built relationships. It got they had a chance to see what does business look like in other countries? Things of that nature? So we try to fill the students needs for whatever it is they might be. Students come to us with a variety of needs. We play information services like, What is your problem? We can direct you. We do a lot of that, connecting people, networking events, getting involved with student organizations and student clubs. Sometimes MBA level students, they're working. They don't have time for that, but sometimes they do so to whatever extent they want to get involved. Our job in MBA office is to help them get involved. We have grad assistant positions that are available. I have currently two MBA students working as grad assistants in our MBA office, right? So there's all kinds of things to do to get students. Students involved and engaged. And I think that's really the primary thing. Get students involved and engaged. What are you interested in? And then we try to direct them and help them out in that arena. So we have the best swag on campus, too, Matt, I don't know if you've noticed, but we have the best swag on campus. And not bragging, just saying, because,

Matt Markin  
Well, hopefully I can get some of that swag.

Professor Ernie Silvers  
Absolutely, we can hook you up, brother, I'm telling you.

Matt Markin  
Yes. Also, well, this has been a very insightful interview. A lot of great information for students to learn more about the program for the MBA. So Professor Ernie silvers, thank you so much for being on the podcast today.

Professor Ernie Silvers  
It's been fun. I can now put this on my resume. I've been on a matt Markin show. I'm happy. Thanks for having me, Matt.

Matt Markin  
I appreciate you being here.