Is MBA valuable for data scientists?

Question

Is an MBA valuable if you're a working data scientist with a PhD? Currently at a small sub-division of a large company. I want to climb the ladder, but I’m worried about being pigeonholed as a specialist.

Answer

I have a PhD but not a MBA. I do know data scientists who has technical backgrounds (computer science, software engineering) and went on to get MBA after a few years of work experience.

From my conversation with them, they went on to get MBA because they wanted to move away from technical fields; after their MBA degree, they did successfully work in different job functions for a few years (consulting, product management, etc), but eventually migrated back to technical job functions because they found themselves still enjoy the technical roles better. I asked them if the MBA degree was helpful, considering that they still work on a technical role, and the answers were along the lines of "it is not completely useless but there are better way to get those experiences than getting a MBA".

My personal feeling is that MBA seem to be useful for data scientists only if you want to get away from the technical job functions. E.g. product management, business development, consulting... etc. If you are interested in technical job functions, but wanted to take on larger responsibilities such as managing the technical teams in project execution, MBA is probably not necessary (and I'd argue perhaps even counter-productive because the MBA degree optimize for different things, and you will be "away from the field" for 2 years). Most of the technical leads in data science in my company are from technical tracks (master/PhD), and very few have MBAs.

If you don’t want to be pigeon-holed into a specialist but still want to take on technical leadership roles, you should actively seek out opportunities that will allow you to take on bigger responsibility in the execution of the project, management of technical teams... etc. On the other hand, if you think you want to move away from the technical side of data science, perhaps MBA is the way to go, but even then, I don’t know if it is a necessity.

(Originally answered on quora: Is an MBA valuable if you're a working data scientist with a PhD? Currently at a small sub-division of a large company. I want to climb the ladder, but I’m worried about being pigeonholed as a specialist.)