A note on the professional identity development paths for MBA graduates

A note on the professional identity development paths for MBA graduates

 

Regarding how an MBA education could influence the professional identity development an MBA graduate could take, I could think of 1 development path can be the scholar-practitioner development path. Please suggest 2 more professional identity development paths, with regard to MBA graduates in Hong Kong.

Yes — alongside the scholar-practitioner path, two other useful professional identity development paths for MBA graduates in Hong Kong are:

1) The corporate leader path

This identity frames the MBA graduate as a general manager, functional leader, or change agent who advances through organizational hierarchy. In Hong Kong, this fits well because local MBA programmes emphasize leadership, strategic decision-making, personal branding, and career progression into management roles across finance, consulting, retail, technology, and multinational firms.mba.hkust.edu+2

2) The entrepreneurial / intrapreneurial path

This identity frames the MBA graduate as a founder, co-founder, or innovation driver inside an existing company. It is especially relevant in Hong Kong’s fast-moving, cross-border business environment, where MBA programmes highlight entrepreneurship training, real-life corporate projects, business practicum, and applied problem-solving.mba.cuhk.edu+3

How to position them in your dissertation

You could present the three paths as:

• Scholar-practitioner.
• Corporate leader.
• Entrepreneurial/intrapreneurial actor.

 

Please offer 3 career advices to each of these three professional identity development paths, notably on the continuous professional development efforts to make.

Certainly — here are 3 career advice points for each path, focused on continuous professional development (CPD) for MBA graduates in Hong Kong.

1) Scholar-practitioner path

·        Keep a reflective learning journal and regularly connect workplace problems to theory; this helps you turn daily management experience into evidence-based insight.

·        Strengthen research capability through short courses in research methods, data analysis, and academic writing so you can stay credible in both practice and scholarship.

·        Build a habit of publishing and sharing knowledge, such as internal white papers, conference presentations, LinkedIn thought leadership, or practitioner journals, to maintain professional visibility and intellectual growth. This aligns with MBA career services that emphasize networking, coaching, workshops, and post-graduation support.mba.cuhk+2

2) Corporate leader path

·        Invest in leadership CPD such as executive coaching, team management training, negotiation, and strategic decision-making, because corporate progression depends on stronger influence, not just technical competence.

·        Keep updating industry knowledge through company visits, executive talks, alumni mentoring, and sector briefings so your judgment stays relevant to Hong Kong’s fast-changing business environment. MBA career services in Hong Kong explicitly support this kind of networking and industry exposure.mba.hkust.edu+2

·        Build a visible professional brand through presentations, LinkedIn, and cross-functional project leadership, since senior roles increasingly require both credibility and presence. Hong Kong MBA programmes also stress personal branding, interview skills, and career roadmap development as part of career preparation.mba.cuhk+1

3) Entrepreneurial / intrapreneurial path

·        Continuously sharpen opportunity recognition by learning about market trends, customer behavior, and digital tools; entrepreneurship in Hong Kong rewards fast sensing of change and practical experimentation.

·        Upgrade venture skills through CPD in business model design, financial planning, fundraising, and innovation management so you can move from idea to execution more reliably.

·        Expand your ecosystem through incubators, mentors, investors, and founder communities, because entrepreneurial growth often depends on access to advice, capital, and partnerships. MBA programmes in Hong Kong actively support this through entrepreneurship resources, mentoring, and startup-oriented networks.mba.cuhk+3

Are the literature review and research methods skills the MBA graduates learned from their dissertation project works relevant to the three professional identity development paths?

Yes — they are relevant to all three paths, but the degree of relevance differs by path and by how the student uses the dissertation experience.

Bottom line

Literature review and research methods skills are most directly relevant to the scholar-practitioner path, but they also support the corporate leader and entrepreneurial/intrapreneurial paths because they build evidence-based thinking, problem-solving, and the ability to make sound judgments from information. MBA dissertation research is often described as helping graduates develop useful skills such as information analysis, quantitative analysis, critical thinking, communication, confidence, and decision-making, though studies also note that the career effect can be uneven and depends on actual application to work.files.eric.ed+2

By identity path

Professional identity path	Relevance of literature review skill	Relevance of research methods skill	Why it matters
Scholar-practitioner	Very high	Very high	Supports theory building, critical reflection, and evidence-based practice.
Corporate leader	High	High	Helps evaluate market data, policies, strategy options, and organizational problems.
Entrepreneurial / intrapreneurial	High	High	Supports opportunity assessment, customer research, business model testing, and iterative decision-making.

1) Scholar-practitioner

This path is the clearest fit because both literature review and research methods are core to bridging theory and practice. A scholar-practitioner uses literature to frame workplace problems conceptually and uses research methods to study those problems rigorously, which is exactly the kind of identity work associated with combining practice and scholarship.journals.sagepub+1

2) Corporate leader

These skills are also relevant for the corporate leader path because managers increasingly need to justify decisions with data, scan literature or reports for best practices, and interpret evidence in a structured way. The literature shows MBA learning can strengthen educational capital such as information analysis, quantitative reasoning, and leadership, which are all useful for leadership roles.scielo.org+1

3) Entrepreneurial / intrapreneurial

For the entrepreneurial path, these skills are highly practical: literature review helps identify trends, competitors, and unmet customer needs, while research methods help test assumptions before committing resources. This is especially valuable in Hong Kong’s competitive business environment, where an entrepreneur or intrapreneur benefits from market sensing, experimentation, and disciplined evaluation of opportunities.redalyc+3

Dissertation implication

So, in your dissertation, you can argue that dissertation-based research skills contribute to all three identity paths, but in different ways:

• Scholar-practitioner: identity formation through theory-practice integration.
• Corporate leader: identity formation through evidence-based managerial competence.
• Entrepreneurial/intrapreneurial: identity formation through market-oriented experimentation and opportunity evaluation.

A collection of blog notes on using chatgpt for research purpose.