Stories by Julian Bajkowski, Helen Han and Lauren Thomsen-Moore

A question of letters

When it comes to making choices about furthering professional qualifications and training there are certainly no shortage of academic options. For the last 30 years, an MBA degree has been seen as the benchmark that the business community sets for managers to progress to senior executive level. Yet with the rise and rise of the information technology industry, most tertiary institutions offering an information sciences or computing degree are adding a Masters option — often in the form of a Masters in Business Technology or a Masters in Information Technology Management — while almost every tertiary institution in Australia offers an MBA. The question for many about to take the plunge back into academia is which one will hold more sway when times get tough, and which will bring in more bacon when the sun shines.