It was an honor to be invited as a resource speaker in the 2020 national conference of my esteemed professional organization, the Real Estate Brokers Association of the Philippines (REBAP). About 300 real estate professionals attended this on-line event. Being a faculty member in the academic community of higher learning, I was asked to share my thoughts on what is the career progression in the real estate profession. And so, I answered the following questions.
Is there guarantee to success if we pursue and acquire a master’s degree?
No. A high school graduate can become successful in business. There are very smart individuals like dropout Bill Gates who is an exception to the rule. Dropping out of school did not make him successful. But he managed to learn things by himself.
In many fields like the arts, entertainment, and even in real estate, it is experience, industry knowledge and skills, collectively with hard work that aid individuals to advance in their chosen careers.
Unless, of course, this becomes a requirement to our real estate professional license, I think, pursuing a master’s degree should not be because of a prescription of law. More important is self-determination and self-motivation to one’s intellectual development that cultivates all-inclusive competencies needed for professional competitiveness. There is value to what we learn in a master’s program.
Even the world’s largest charitable organization, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, places importance on education. They target students who are enrolled in the master’s program and offer limited paid summer internships. Bill Gates said that students learn the valuable skills of seeing through to the end and they gain confidence which is linked to their success.
In 2018, Harvard Business Review featured the world’s 100 best-performing CEOs in different fields. Highlighted were 32 CEOs with MBA degrees. Placed 17th is American Hamid Moghadam, who has been in the industry since 1997. He is CEO of Prologis, the world’s largest logistic real estate and REIT company. He took his MBA from Stanford University. At the 37th slot is David Simon, an American billionaire. Simon Property Group is the United States’ biggest shopping mall operator and largest retail REIT company. Ranked 46th is Indian-American, Satya Nadella of Microsoft, the company co-founded by Bill Gates. He took his master’s at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
The Financial Times wrote that 92 percent of surveyed companies intended to hire MBA graduates in 2021. The expected MBA salary is US$115,000, however, due to the pandemic, the rate could be lower.
Master’s degree holders have higher salaries because organizations will not survive without the ability to get things done; and top business schools will teach you a progression of methods and issues that help evaluate the most cogent solutions and ways to implement, whatever the problem is.
How does the bachelor’s, master’s and the doctoral degrees, and the CPD differ in terms of their benefits to a real estate professional?
Continuing Professional Development (CPD) ensure maintaining professional standards in our field and qualification. It helps us update our skills and knowledge through seminars which are commercial programs given to attendees on a specific topic conducted in a classroom lecture-content area type of learning. Therefore, CPDs in real estate revolve on updated topics like on taxes and the law.
An undergraduate course in finance would teach you the “what” and “how” while a master’s in finance or an MBA will teach strategic decisions and the “where” and “why.”
A bachelor’s degree is just the bare minimum for entry into the qualified workforce. My niece who lives in the US once said, “Here, a college degree is equivalent to a high school degree!”
People with an MBA are searched for because of their ability to critically think. Critical thinking is a process of analyzing things that requires students to evaluate business dilemmas/problems and create the best plan of action. It represents a way of thinking, not just a set of accounting skills or knowledge about the law or taxes which we get from CPDs.
Critical thinking is not a course, but it is intertwined into the master’s program. The MBA, for instance, relies heavily on the case-study approach, thus, are mostly case intensive studies and application of deep-rooted theories that helps student cognize why things happen in certain ways in the business world.
The master’s degree program fosters students’ analytical ability to deal with ambiguity and solve complex problems. They learn how to frame the problems, ask questions and collect data. What we also learn can bring innovative ideas and value-added improvements to the business.
How do we measure the impact of the master’s and doctoral education on the career success of brokers?
The focus of a master’s degree and a doctoral degree is different. A master’s degree will deepen a broker’s knowledge in real estate career and skills. A real estate broker who has a doctorate degree can do critical and analytical written research-based studies that would uncover more understanding and knowledge about the gaps in the real estate industry.
To manage one’s success, you need to measure your success. We can ask ourselves, “Am I out-competing my competition?” “What are my financial, social, intellectual, and emotional stats before and after I gained my master’s degree or my doctoral degree?”
What would you advise your colleagues on professional development?
My father, a successful businessman, once told me that I am lucky that I am going to school because I will encounter less mistakes. He did a lot of trial and error and it was costly. In school we can make mistakes.
I also have students who own their businesses who said that if they only knew the theory, they could predict what may happen and probably, they would have done it in another way that would have saved their businesses.
The recipe of having a master’s degree, CPD, and years of work experience, gives a breadth and depth of knowledge useful to our career.
If companies in the global competitive environment can see the value of hiring employees with master’s degree, wouldn’t real estate professionals, who are engaged in a competitive environment, benefit also from acquiring a master’s degree? You may not employ all that you learn, but I think there are useful concepts to gain.
And while it might not be for everyone as it entails dedication to complete it, there is value in gaining higher learning.
Career progression is not only moving up the ladder but the discovery of challenges and new opportunities. As we grow in our careers, it gives us a sense of purpose. We learn important knowledge and skills that will make us professionally competitive.
The author is a part-time faculty at the Management and Organization Department of the Ramon V. del Rosario College of Business, De La Salle University where she teaches in the MBA program. She welcomes comments at [email protected].
The views expressed above are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the position of De La Salle University, its faculty, and its administrators.