Thank you everybody for your valuable suggestions. I really appreciate all of you for investing your valuable time and efforts in providing opinions.
I would like to apologize for delayed response. As I am working in shifts, I couldn't managed to reply on time.
@Navneetsarin, Yes, you are right that MBA from distance learning is not very good qualification, but now I don’t have the time and capacity to prepare for entrance tests & money to get admission in some good but private institute. For me right now working and earning is necessary. Also I am 31, which is actually too late to study. But I am doing MBA with a thought that “Distance MBA is better than No MBA”.
I have often seen that for various jobs company demands “MBA qualification”. If you check in online job portals even there it is often mentioned in requirements like “Any MBA – any specialization”
Now if I apply to any jobs without MBA then it may happen that my application gets filtered or rejected there itself if no MBA is stated on my resume. If I have MBA (though distance) qualification mentioned on my resume, I may get interview calls, and there atleast I get the opportunity to perform in an interview & prove myself. So keeping that in mind, I am doing distance MBA. Also, I am really interested to study management subjects and nowadays, having MBA degree has become very common and each and everybody has this as a minimum qualification. I too don’t want to lag behind.
Now coming to my confusion between finance and HR. Like Saiconsult stated, that those who want to pursue finance must have flair for numbers, figures & maths. My number crunching & mathematicals skills are mediocre. Not too bad, but can’t be as good as CAs or CFAs. But however I can manage to study Finance subjects in my MBA course. Because the course being distance learning is easier compared to full time courses in elite institutes. Also, I have checked the core finance subjects offered as a specialization by the university from which I am pursuing MBA right now, most of them I already studied in B.com & M.com. However in specialization I may study some subject in little more detail. As far as knowledge of the subject is concerned, I can gather knowledge by studying management books of various other publications and through experience. So its not like my knowledge will be limited to the course I am studying. The MBA I am doing is not that great, but I want it on my resume. It is not the only thing which will help me develop the knowledge, that is something I will need to make efforts in various other ways too.
But question is, in which field I should proceed further. HR or finance? I have no experience in either of it. I don’t have knowledge of Tally or ERP, however I would like to learn that. As I have mentioned in my previous post, I have worked at mid-level positions like front desk, tele-mktg & customer care, admin and counseling. I would like to share few more things about myself or that I have in my mind. I know that you gave your lot of your time to read my thread & provide suggestions above, but if possible pls one more time go through my post and finally suggest me whats best for me. And in the end, I will go with what my heart says.
Here are few things/confusion in my mind,
- I feel that I can be able to study both finance and HR, but during my first semester I liked subects like Organizational behavior & HRM the most.
- I feel that I already studied some subjects related to finance specialization in M.com (external),however my percentage in M.com was very low. So I feel why not study new subjects of HR?
- But then again fear about less job prospects in HR field (like I mentioned in my first post about the suggestions of friends/relatives/faculties etc.)
- I am attending classes on every weekend at the study center of my university. Saturday evening & Sunday – full day. This classes are optional. Now if I take HR, then the study center refuse to arrange classes. They are telling that only if minimum 7 students take HR then only we will arrange classes else you can only attend classes for common subjects. We can’t arrange it specially for less than 7 students as we have to pay to faculties. The faculty and counselor over there are telling me that why do you want to take HR? It has no value and so no one from your batch is choosing it. there is no such thing like HR in India. It is in the infant stage. There are almost 50 students in my batch, I wonder no one wants to take HR. Most boys are preferring Marketing, operations & finance. Only 2-3 more girls are interested in HR, but the number is not enough for special classes to be arranged.
- Its not that I can’t study without the help of classes which are optional & the course is distance learning anyway, but this weekend classes gives me the feel of doing full time course & I get to learn atleast something from faculties & co-students.
- Deep down I am interested in HR, but one more thing that I am afraid of taking HR, like many here stated that those who seek to specialize in HR must have good communication & interactive skills, must be a people’s person & have emotional intelligence etc…… Now the thing is, I am not sure if I am people’s person. But I like to observe and understand people, I can know whats going on in their mind, but am not sure if I can lead, deal with & manage (esp. difficult) people. I like to read articles & books on psychology, I have read some books related to parenting and its effects on people’s personality, values and attitudes etc. So I like to understand people & I believe that I am observer of people but frankly, the thing is that I am sensitive, introvert and shy person. I am trying to be open but somehow not able to get over it due to some apprehensions but working on it and I hope to change. I had difficulty dealing with difficult people in the past. I lack fluency in language, communication & presentation skills right now, become nervous in front of audience – I am working on it. I worked as a counselor. I was comfortable in tele-counselling or one to one counseling but when asked about giving presentation at seminar, I used to back-off. As a result they removed counseling as my primary duty & shifted me in admin & mis. At my workplace I see HR people as good communicator, speakers, announcers. I am not sure how much time it will take to be like that. But I really want to be like them
- Though people say that MBA-finance has better options, I did some research on job portal sites. First of all most banks recruit people less than 28 or 30 years of age (I am 31), some big companies are considering age of candidate especially for finance related position. . Then financial analyst jobs are available very less, and if available, then most of the companies require MBA full time degree or CA/CFA/ICWA etc…. Now rest of the jobs that are available in finance field are like “Relationship manager”, “advisor” “BDM” and all this positions are related to selling of financial products, some of the jobs are of BPOs and KPOs like accounting process or mortgage processes etc.. all this jobs require either a degree in finance or experience in that particular field, and they pays good. But all those jobs are more of a marketing/selling jobs rather than finance. And right now I may able to do such jobs but in the long run I don’t want to grow in marketing for sure…. However my research could be wrong as majority of people says that finance has many options, but am not sure.
- So after considering all this, even I feel that HR is good for me, but what about job prospects and what about the skills require for HR that I lacks partly… partly because I have interest and some flair for it like emotional intelligence & understanding people, but on leadership skills as well as communication part, I am little less confident right now…. But I badly want to work on it… One regret in my mind I have is that nowadays I see very young people having excellent communication & leadership skills while despite being experienced I haven’t developed on this part yet. Some of my seniors & supervisors at my workplace are much younger than me….. Few incidents took place in my life that led me to be like this but I believe that I am much better than I was before but still like work-in-progress & not fully groomed.