Open Source Personal MBA revisited
Posted by Jorge Bernal September 20, 2006
This came when replying to The Open Source Personal MBA, it went longer than expected so I decide to share this here.
What I tried to explain is that currently, the PMBA project tries to help you acquire the concepts acquired in a standard MBA, so you solve the price problem, but only that.
Like in Open Source, the openness doesn’t bring perfection, mostly if you try to copy a wrong concept. Fortunately, when a critical mass of users appear, the small proportion of common sense gets noticeable and things begin to work.
Just in case, I’m using the metaphor of linux desktops some years ago, when they tried to clone windows. It’s a similar case: it’s not better because everybody uses it, whether it’s windows or an MBA.
Maybe we should begin changing its name to reflect its evolution. Something like “Principles Of Enterpreneurship”. It can’t be master since you can’t ever again assume to be a master. Things change too fast. Business is too generic, we want to focus on new big hits of the next years: a family who runs a small business doesn’t need to know very much about all these things if they want to stay small. In fact, I think this is all about getting big without exploding.
BTW, about the windows cloning, that came to me yesterday when I discovered an article about giving Ubuntu an OSX look. Well, you can try if you like, but don’t expect anymore than a slightly better look. I just love this quote:
Perhaps I just have higher standards, but the Ubuntu makeover looks like lipstick on a pig to me.
Warning I’m not calling Ubuntu a pig, I still consider it the best free desktop distribution.
Alright, so what you are saying is that the very concept of MBA is wrong, right? I’m not going to discuss that, I agree that it does not suit everybody and that having an MBA does not mean you have learnt what you need, but I am not so sure that the PMBA is just a cheap copy of an MBA. I think the kind of books they propose are more self-achievement oriented, trying to be suitable for a different segment of the market, particularly to self-taught professionals.
And I DO think PMBA is a good idea but not enough developed, so that is why I was proposing some changes and more openess to make a cool PMBA. Maybe the name needs to be changed if we want to say more accurately what it implies, but you must admit that MBA is a catch word, telling quickly what it is about.
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