Well, here we go again! It is rankings time, and there is a relative newcomer to the rankings gurus: LinkedIn recently published its second MBA ranking. Out of curiosity, I looked at this new one, along with those produced by the Financial Times, U.S. News & World Report, and Bloomberg.
Last year, Bloomberg caused some controversy by ranking Stanford number one, followed by Chicago Booth, Dartmouth Tuck, UVA Darden, and Columbia Business School, to round out the top five. That’s right – neither Harvard nor Wharton made Bloomberg’s top five. Bloomberg states that it uses the following categories when computing its rankings: Compensation, Learning, Networking, Entrepreneurship, and Diversity. And this is something that you, as a prospective MBA student, should look at. But wait, how does Bloomberg measure learning or networking? Does the company get information on students’ grades? Does it ask students how many alumni they spoke to or how many companies come to campus for recruiting? And what if you don’t want to be an entrepreneur but instead a marketing director or financial analyst for a top firm? You can always look at what the average compensation is for those positions on the school’s career page, but remember to also note the industry in which the top compensation is earned.
Let’s look at the U.S. News 2024 report. Once again, we find Stanford at the top, followed by Wharton, Northwestern Kellogg, Chicago Booth, MIT Sloan, and at number six, Harvard. Dartmouth Tuck and UVA Darden are tied at the number-ten position in this survey, with Columbia ranked number 12. U.S. News uses the following factors for its rankings: career placement success based on compensation; student excellence, which looks at students’ median GPA and GMAT/GRE scores; and “qualitative assessments by experts,” which includes “opinions by business schools, corporate recruiters and company contacts.” Okay, those are the experts. Obviously, career success should be weighed the heaviest, since that is the reason most candidates go back to school, right? And this ranking does just that – career success accounts for 50% of the ranking.
The Financial Times ranking is different in that it includes business schools outside of the United States, so its top ten are, in order, Wharton, INSEAD (France), Columbia and SDA Bocconi (Italy) tied at the number three position, IESE (Spain), Kellogg, MIT Sloan, London Business School, Cornell Johnson, and Chicago Booth. Harvard stands at 11 in this ranking and Stanford at 23. Dartmouth Tuck and UVA Darden are still hanging in there at 12 and 16, respectively. The Financial Times evaluates each program’s alumni network, carbon footprint rank, salary, value for money, career progress, and location, and it actually shows each school’s ranking in these categories. This is something you should look at. For example, under “value for money rank,” Wharton stands at 95, while Bocconi is at 5. Want to know which school is at the top of this category? The University of Georgia’s Terry School of Business. And where do the schools fall under “career progress rank”? The Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad is number one, but Stanford holds the number-two position, with Harvard at number five. But I ask, How can one honestly assess the value of a somewhat newly minted European or Asian MBA program relative to a long-established U.S. program? How does one evaluate “learning rank” for a one-year program versus a two-year program? And can overall compensation be fairly compared between a program with 1,000 graduates and one with only 150 graduates?
That said, let’s see what LinkedIn has to say this year about which MBA program is the best; it also includes non-U.S. schools in its ranking. The subheading for its ranking makes that clear: “The 100 best business schools to grow your career around the world.” I think this is a pertinent metric, since most large companies do business all around the globe, and the new generation tends to move around much more easily now. Many MBA candidates plan their career path to include a “tour of duty” in another country. In the LinkedIn survey, Stanford is at number one, followed by INSEAD, Harvard, Wharton, MIT Sloan, the Indian School of Business, Northwestern Kellogg, Dartmouth Tuck, Columbia, and Chicago Booth. UVA Darden shows up at 12. Sounds reasonable, right?
Poets & Quants recently published its thoughts on this new ranking, stating that “the professional networking site has exclusive access to highly valuable data on the careers of professionals worldwide.” But then the critique begins. First, not every professional is on LinkedIn, and those who are often don’t update their profile. Next, how does Poets&Quants measure “hiring and demand” and “gender parity” without using “school-specific admission and graduation stats”? Finally, Poets&Quants denounces LinkedIn’s “incredibly vague description of its methodology.” Well, yes, true enough, but most of the other rankings are pretty vague on their methodology, too.
So we have the rankings. Take a look back in history, and you’ll see that every year, whenever a ranking places a school other than Harvard, Stanford, or Wharton at the top of its list, it will be questioned and criticized as to its authenticity, transparency, and validity. Do you really think a program can change that much in a year? Not unless something really catastrophic has happened. The rankings “experts” simply change the value they give to certain aspects in the survey to keep things interesting for their readers. Harvard, Stanford, and Wharton will remain at the top of the pack, regardless of their position in the rankings.
For business school deans and admissions officers, the annual B-school rankings are cause for either joyful celebration or agonizing confrontations with university chancellors, students, and alumni. For the rest of the world, they’re a nonevent.
No matter which side you fall on, there will always be arguments about how the ratings were calculated. How many points were given to GMAT scores or to citations from faculty articles? How much weight was given to the diversity of the class or to the opinions of hiring companies?
Bloomberg Businessweek has been publishing MBA rankings since 1988, with the Financial Times starting in 1999. U.S. News & World Report, The Economist, and Forbes all publish surveys, and for a short time, even the Wall Street Journal hopped on the bandwagon. Now, every year, it seems a new ranking is launched. Each one claims to have the best methodology to rank the more than 5,000 business schools, and each one swears it is different from all the other rankings.
So, what use are the rankings to you as a prospective MBA student, and how do you know which one(s) to trust? All the MBA “experts” will tell you to look at the methodology and the metrics used. But that isn’t always easy to investigate – and who has that much time, anyway?
For my money, the only valid evaluation would look simply at job placements and return on investment. That is why you are pursuing an MBA, isn’t it? To advance your career?
Do the folks with the highest GMAT scores or best GPAs get the best jobs? Not necessarily. The student who has a personality, a wide range of interests, sufficient training in a functional area, and the drive to succeed is the one who will be able to present themselves best to a future employer. Whatever MBA program you attend, you will learn the basics of each business function, and you will go on to focus on a specialized area of interest. It all depends on what you put into the experience, not on the ranking of the school you attend. Yes, people have flunked out of Harvard and Wharton; some individuals with an MBA from Columbia or Stanford might not even land an “MBA” job when they graduate. Maybe they were not at the right school for them, or maybe they thought that getting a degree from a top-ranked school means a job would just land in their lap. That’s not how it works.
Your job as an MBA candidate is to look closely at many different programs: check out their employment pages, identify the courses they offer in your area of interest, and above all, talk to students and alumni to find out what the personality of the school is like and whether you would be a good fit there. If students and alumni don’t want to talk to you about the school, I would consider that a red flag. If you are hoping to work with a renowned professor, be sure that the professor actually teaches in the program. At many schools, the acclaimed researchers do only that – research. You might have classes taught by a PhD student instead. Ask questions!
There is a right school for everyone, and for you, that is the school where you will succeed. Sure, look at the rankings to get started, but don’t let them limit your choices. Years ago, before there were rankings, people attended a regional school that was nearest to their home, and many of them went on to become highly effective leaders. And as surprising as it might be, many CEOs do not have an elite degree. If you don’t believe me, I urge you to read about the research done by Professor David Kang in the Poets&Quants article “How Many Fortune 500 CEOs Have MBAs? The Answer May Surprise You.”
His findings might astonish you, as they did Professor Kang. Here is just a sampling:
“Of the 2023 Fortune 100 CEOs, only 11.8% attended an Ivy as undergrads, and only 9.8% hold an Ivy League MBA. Doug McMillon, CEO of Walmart, the top company on Fortune’s list, got his undergraduate degree from the University of Arkansas and his MBA from the University of Tulsa. Exxon CEO Darren Woods attended Texas A&M University and Northwestern University, and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella went to India’s Manipal Institute of Technology and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Of the 20 CEOs at the nation’s biggest companies by revenue, only one attended an Ivy as an undergrad—Amazon’s Andy Jassy, an alum of Harvard University.”
A Fortune article on Professor Kang’s research further states, “Moreover, 14 of the 20 CEOs went to public colleges. Apple’s Tim Cook graduated from Auburn University, Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett graduated from the University of Nebraska, and McKesson’s Brian S. Tyler graduated from the University of California at Santa Cruz.”
So what happens if you don’t get into one of the M7 schools? Think about it: out of 5,000 business schools in the world, any school that lands in the top 500 should be considered! The end result is determined by what you put into and take from your learning experience. If you are motivated and excited about learning and making an impact, you will succeed, with or without an MBA. Your performance and talent will take you to the top. But to reiterate, look at the school’s employment statistics, see what companies recruit there, and above all, talk to students and alumni from the program before you make your final decision on where to apply.
Personally, I believe that the MBA is the single most valuable degree one can have, because you can do so much with it in any industry, whether it be manufacturing, technology, or art and theater. And of course, your career trajectory will move much faster too. So use the rankings as a starting point but not as your ultimate decision-making point. In a smaller or lower-ranked school, you might have to exert a little more effort in networking to find your ideal job, but remember that every MBA program is also ranked on the percentage of graduates who receive an offer of employment, so the career office is just as determined as you are to help you land a job.
Dr. Christie St-John has more than 25 years of higher ed and admissions experience, including ten years in admissions at Dartmouth Tuck. She was formerly the director of MBA recruiting and admissions, director of international relations, and an adjunct faculty member at Vanderbilt University. Having also served on the board of directors of the MBA Career Services & Employer Alliance and the Consortium for Graduate Studies in Management, Christie has a deep knowledge of MBA and other graduate admissions. Want Christie to help you get Accepted? Click here to get in touch!
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