Business & Bullshit

Moments ago, I submitted my final paper, for my final class, for what better be my final degree.

It was bullshit.

Maybe it's unwise to give away my secrets on what will eventually become a professional blog for me, but I can't bring myself to care. Those who know me know that I'm a very straightforward person...

Which, I suppose, is ironic to say on a post all about how much I bullshit. Oh well.

Here's why my final paper was bullshit. It was four pages. I wrote and submitted it in exactly 42 minutes. It was on a fake local delivery business, for which the idea came from ChatGPT. Over a page of my four page paper was a SWOT analysis on this fake business, which of course means that the analysis was also fake. Then I wrote a page on how my fake business with the fake strengths, fake weaknesses, fake opportunities, and fake threats, was going to gain the fake competitive advantage in the fake industry in my fake town.

Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. In 42 minutes, in between bites of my Little Bacon Burger from Five Guys, I wrote four pages of bullshit. And for all of this bullshit, they're going to give me a degree, which I personally feel is also bullshit. Especially seeing as how I know less about business than your average gas station manager, and yet society has decided that I'm now entitled to make more money than they do, because of some letters at the end of my signature block.

***Note to self: update signature block.

Listen, I'm not trying to say that MBAs are meaningless. I'm not even necessarily trying to say that my MBA is meaningless. I'd be lying to say I haven't learned anything.

BUT.

What I learned is outdated. It's 2023 (Jesus, it's almost 2024) and my MBA curriculum didn't mention Google SEO, not a single time. It's 2023 and my MBA curriculum didn't teach me about paid advertising on social media. It's 2023 and my MBA curriculum didn't teach me how to manage web analytics. I had to teach it to myself with free online courses. I certainly got more out of them than I got out of my MBA program.

Now to give myself some credit, it's possible I have a touch of imposter syndrome. I did go out of my way to teach myself some skills and arm myself with some knowledge, so as to not make myself look like a COMPLETE idiot every time someone wants to talk to me about Disney stock, or... whatever business people talk about. However, I like to think myself self-aware enough to know when I'm telling the truth. And the truth is that the whole thing is bullshit.

It's bullshit that I have a degree that I bullshitted my way through. It's bullshit that the only reason I have a bullshit degree that I bullshitted my way through is because I could pay for it. It's bullshit that the only reason I could pay for it is because I fought in a bullshit war when I was 19. It's bullshit that I only went to a bullshit war when I was 19 to pay for a bullshit degree that I bullshitted my way through.

It's all just... it's bullshit.

Anyway, I'm graduating tomorrow.

So. Congratulations, D. You bullshitted your way to an MBA. Now bullshit your way into a career, please.