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Retail: An option for biz-school grads
A businesswoman walks past an H&M clothing store in Chicago
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TEXT OF STORY
Bill Radke: This morning, retail chains report their September sales numbers. And most analysts expect the news to be bad. You might think in this spending slump, the retail industry would have a tough time attracting new corporate talent. Marketplace's Ashley Milne-Tyte says: not so.
Ashley Milne-Tyte: It turns out the shrinking financial industry is good for retailers.
Burt Flickinger runs consulting firm Strategic Resource Group. He says MBAs who'd normally go straight into investment banks are re-thinking their options...
Burt Flickinger: And are actively and aggressively pursuing jobs to go into management and executive-training programs with leading retailers both in the U.S. and worldwide.
Flickinger says all those bankruptcies and buyouts in the retail world mean those companies need more MBAs to do merger and acquisition work. And he says retailers worried about the future got rid of too many people.
Flickinger: Even well-capitalized retailers laid off too much top talent so that retailers don't have enough bench strength for this consolidation and expansion.
So he says retailers need business-school grads to re-fill their ranks and start the climb to the executive suite.
In New York I'm Ashley Milne-Tyte for Marketplace.
Mr. Flickinger is now an expert regarding 20-something "top talent"? Fantastic! He is an expert regarding bankruptcies, M&A, global warming, natural gas, Wal-Mart, failing family businesses, Scotty Pippin, the Buffalo Bills, "loser" Yale economists, Charles Dickens,and each and every global "ticking time bomb". My suggestion to Flickinger: Get your own house in order and stick with bankruptcies!
Tomorrow's leaders attend the Service Academies, including the Naval Academy, the Air Force Academy and West Point. Why? Key words: honor, valor, and leadership. My most successful CEO friends are sending their sons to the Air Force Academy, turning down every Ivy League offer. Retail is not on their collective horizons.
Business school grads are not going into Retail. Mr. Flickinger loves retail and bankruptcies, his bread and butter business, but my understanding is that the Harvard and Yale MBAs avoid Retail like the Swine Flu. An MBA to work seven days a week? The students want meaningful lives. They want to make the world a better place ... as they inherit their Dad's Spending Deficit.
