Hello, is here somebody who could tell me more about National Taiwan University - College of Management? I am interested in Global MBA Program, but have almost no references about quality, experience, suggestions, liife in Taipei ecc... Have you somebody studied there?
Thanks a lot!

NTU's the country's top university. Most students will be Taiwanese and you won't have the sort of interactive and non-hierarchical educational approach in the top 100 schools because Taiwanese businesses don't want junior managers like that. You'll have a traditional, academically-strong education there. If you want to work in Taiwan, then it's a great thing to do after an intensive Mandarian course.

Hello Duncan, thanks for quick answer. Could you explain me, what do you mean by saying " you won't have the sort of interactive and hierarchical educational approach in the top 100 schools because Taiwanese businesses don't want junior managers like that"? And is it advantage or disadvantage in your opinion?

I am a typical career switcher, looking for an university with strong focus on general management and case studies. I do not think I will stay in Taiwan after studies, but I am interested in Chinese language, taiwan culture ecc...

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I think one reason might be that there are huge scholarship schemes for international students going to Taiwan, and another is that fees are very low there. And, of course, some people might prefer the greater freedom, lesser inequality and better living conditions of Taiwan.

Duncan has got the point, of course that I know, that universities in HK or Singapore are better ranked and probably of the higher quality. That is why I am wondering if somebody could compare the quality of NTU with other universities with regards to the amount of tuition fees and living costs. Duncan, could you please tell me what did you mean by "interactive and hierarchical educational approach" that is missing in Taiwan, in contrary to TOP 100 MBA's? What do you think is the biggest difference between NTU and other schools regarding the way of teaching that an applicant (and graduatee) should consider? Thank you.

NTU is very cheap, and so is Taiwan.

By interactive, I mean a method of teaching that is based around classroom discussions which can be competitive and focussed on contradiction, risk taking, experimentation, and speaking without knowing. None of these things are deeply cherished in Taiwan. By *non*-hierachical, I mean a method where most of the learning is from your classmates, where text books and 'correct answers' are not the central methods, where the teacher is also the learning.

Of course the central artefact of this is the case study approach: I think it's very hard to teach this way in a mainstream business programme in greater China. Certainly there are niche programmes like BIMBA and so on, but it's very hard to get Taiwanese students to work that way in such a mainstream, conservative and high status school as NTU.

I think that anyone considering working in Greater China faces a very different set of considerations depending on how familiar they are with the Chinese business culture. If you "get" that culture and work within it, you'd want a course that's really suited for that. The case study approach is not necessarily the right method for people who will be working in traditional, hierarchical organisations. In almost all top 100 schools, especially those outside East Asia, much more of the work will be group work and oral work by the students.

So, to sum it up: You think that MBA degree from NTU (or other Taiwanese uni, like Chengchi) worth it especially if one would work in greater China after graduation and not in Europe, right? Or can I benefit from Taiwanese MBA if I return to Europe? Thank you.

I think it's very hard to be really successful in greater China without speaking Chinese. If you speak Chinese, and ideally have some family connections, then I think NTU and Taiwan are great choices. Taiwan and the Taiwanese are wonderful. NTU is a very prestigious school.

In Europe, I think you might suffer from the lack of a network. If part of your goal with the MBA is to develop leadership and soft skills, then the skills you developed at NTU would not be very useful in a European company. It's an interesting and quirky choice. Viewed only financially, there's a big opportunity cost involved, and some risk.

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This is a very useful comment. You clearly have a better feel for MBAs in mainland China, and I am not surprised with what you say about the accredited programmes because so many of the faculty have studied and worked abroad, and so have many of the students. NTU just will not be so international. I feel that a lot of what you say is true about mainland China, but perhaps less true about Taiwan. I have not been there since 2009/2010, but the discussion about freedom is a long one. There is, for example, slavery in mainland China: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/10/17/world/global-slavery-index/

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If you're laughing about slavery, then I think the discussion is far enough from the issues of MBA admissions for us to end this thread here.

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Yes, I bought slavery into the discussion because you didn't see why I think there's more freedom in Taiwan than in mainland China. If you don't think that there is slavery in China, then I invite you to ask why there is extensive documentary evidence that it exists and why Xi Jinping has spoken about the need to reform 'legal' slavery. Do you think this information is fabricated? Or do you think that illegal or punitive forced labour should be called slavery only when it happens outside China?

A new nice references:
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2013/01/07/uk-china-camps-idUKBRE90605Z20130107
http://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/1333894/29-million-trapped-modern-day-slavery-china-30-million-worldwide

The issue of forced labout is really extensive:
http://www.clb.org.hk/en/free-tag/forced-labour

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It's wonderful that the government is planning to abolish the official system: I wonder how long that will take to filter through. Read over the Hong Kong website and the other links I gave and you'll see that the issue is not limited to that. There are many issues from official bodies using forced labour under other names, and there is actual slavery where people are bought or stolen.