Submitted by Mauricio Coindreau, MBA student from London Business School, currently working at uPort to create an open identity system for the decentralized web.

If you ever thought about doing an MBA, then you’ve probably heard of those dreaded phrases:

· Is an MBA worth all that money?

· You can learn more in investing that money to start your own company.

· Isn’t missing 2 years of working going to push you back?

· How will you pay back your loans?

· An MBA is just an excuse to party.

· Basically, is an MBA worthless?

I won’t try to answer any of these questions. If you’ve done an MBA, thinking about doing it or just decided it’s not right for you, then you have already answered these questions by yourself. Rather, I want to try an answer a more relevant question that comes up once you started doing an MBA and must decide where you want to work for the summer and why would an MBA join a blockchain company?

From day one most MBA’s schools get a visit from the top consulting, banking and tech firms, looking to find new talent for the summer. They give gifts, exchange business cards and actively recruit throughout the year. But for people with different goals for their post-MBA careers, you must bootstrap, do research and hopefully find the perfect match for a new experience during your internship. Those who don’t go through the “structured” route, might find themselves working for an NGO halfway around the world, trying to launch their company or working for a small start-up that is looking to change an industry. All these possibilities come in all shapes and sizes, meaning that students will be attracted to different characteristics of these unstructured options, so what does working on blockchain offer that can’t be compared with all other?

(image source: https://www.pscconnect.com.au/protecting-your-business-weighing-up-your-options/)

First of all, there’s a blockchain for everyone. With the ambitious goal to build the web 3.0, as well as both investment and entrepreneurs flowing into the space, blockchain is developing several DApps and companies that range from all kinds of industries. If you are interested in supply chain, healthcare, finance, social impact, gaming or real estate (to name a few), blockchain has you covered. Innovating in these industries means being a pioneer on what will potentially revolutionize the web as we know it.

Secondly, it’s growing like crazy. Not only have job postings for Ethereum exceed 1,000 vacancies on LinkedIn, but some of the biggest companies in the world such as Facebook, Google, Amazon, and IBM have all recently created their own Blockchain divisions. Developers are learning Solidity, new Ethereum related repositories are multiplying like crazy in Github and every time you see the news, you see someone mention this new rising industry. Yes, it’s all still up in the air about what will really happen with all this hype, but the interest and excitement is real.

Finally, it will empower you to innovate and build something valuable. The typical internship usually lasts about 10 weeks. Joining any company, you will usually have a couple of weeks of training, a couple more of understanding what is really going on and have the last 6 weeks to look useful enough to secure a full-time position. When you join a blockchain company everyone is trying to understand what is going on, as the industry is changing every day. So basically, you will be training, understanding and creating from day one, along with everyone else. Different from a structured company where you are the new kid on the block and try to catch-up, here, everyone is a new kid, and innovating and testing new things is what we do every day. Additionally, being in a decentralized environment, will give you the opportunity to collaborate in way that stimulates your creativity to solve unimaged problems. In no other internship, being a big corporate to small start-up, will you have enough freedom and ability to actually create something valuable.

Why would an MBA do an internship at a blockchain company? Simple, to understand it and to have the opportunity to do something that matters not just for your career, but for a whole industry.