The FT's European Business School ranking ranks 40 full-time MBA programmes in Europe, including ten who did not get into the published global 100. Here are those 'hidden gems;-

Business School Country Full time MBA 2014
Leeds University Business School UK 30****
Aston Business School UK 31****
Birmingham Business School UK 31****
University of Edinburgh Business School UK 33****
Bradford University School of Management UK 34****
Edhec Business School France 35****
HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management Germany 36****
Eada Business School Barcelona Spain 37****
Neoma Business School France 38****
Politecnico di Milano School of Management Italy 39****
University of Liverpool Management School UK 40****

I am surprised to see Liverpool in the list, and I'm impressed that Neoma gets into the top 40 so quickly. Edinburgh and EDHEC are continuing to rise. It's a little sad to see Bradford and HHL falling: perhaps the growth of MSc programmes at HHL is taking energy away from the MBA?

I wouldn't call any of them "hidden gems". Students from the schools above have no job prospects, especially from non-established business schools like Edinburgh which should not offer an MBA.

I wouldn't call any of them "hidden gems". Students from the schools above have no job prospects, especially from non-established business schools like Edinburgh which should not offer an MBA.

Perhaps I should correct myself, I was referring to the UK business schools. I suppose HHL and Edhec are fine schools in their own right.

Honestly speaking what value is there in doing an MBA at Leeds/Bham/Edinburgh/Aston etc? As far as I am aware these schools don't even teach using case studies but purely theory (which makes sense given their academics haven't got any real world experience).

I also think isb2015 is mistaken. The FT rankings are based, more than anything, on salary and placement. The comment about Edinburgh is especially unfair: I imagine the person is speaking about Edinburgh Business School, an unaccredited business school at Heriot-Watt University. The University of Edinburgh Business School, a different institution, is a triple-accredited MBA ranked in the top 30 in Europe by QS (http://www.topmba.com/mba-rankings/region/europe/2014) at one of Europe's oldest and most prestigious universities. It's hardly a non-established school: Edinburgh has been teaching commerce for 100 years. It started MBA teaching in 1970 as the Scottish Business School, a joint project with the business schools at Strathclyde and Glasgow.

If you go to http://rankings.ft.com/businessschoolrankings/european-business-school-rankings-2014 and add in the fields for MBA salary, you'll see that UEBS graduates are getting an average salary of $91k. That puts it above ranked schools like Vlerick, Tias, Lancaster and ESMT.

Birmingham, Leeds, Aston and HHL are all producing average salaries between 81k and 85k, just below Durham.

As for the comment that these schools don't even use cases: isb2015 has perhaps not looked into this at all. I would find it very hard to imagine that triple-accredited schools are very different in their use of case studies. Edinburgh certainly uses case studies, even on its undergraduate programmes, and is a huge producer of case studies.

Actually, schools like these which are bumping around the bottom of the FT can have great international mobility -- even in the UK. In this respect, take a look at Best schools for international students' placement http://www.find-mba.com/board/41143

[Edited by Duncan on Dec 12, 2014]