Hello Duncan I got admitted to IE IMBA and MBD. I cant decide on which course to pick. While MBD is a less expensive course, MBA promises more opportunities. However I cant pick because being an Indian (Work ex: 4.5 Years in Oil and Gas) I am not sure if I can get work visa in Spain. I did a lot of research but I cant find any tangible data on this. If you could shed some light on the following, it would help me make my decision.

1. What are the job possibilities in Europe after a MBA from IE?
2. What are the job possibilities in Europe after a MBD from IE?
3. What is the work visa situation there? Is it a major concern for Indians studying in IE?
4. In case I dont get a full-time job while studying, will I be able to stay back in Spain to look for a job? If yes for how long?

All the above questions are specifically from an Indian's point of view and I am more than willing to learn Spanish.
I want to relocate to Europe and work there for 5-10 years.

Take a look at my post called Do you need to know the local language, liked on my profile page. If you don't speak fluent Spanish now, I don't see the point of studying in Spain if you need placement.

With the MBA you'll probably have a wider set of career possibilities. With the MBD your job prospects will be more narrow. However, many businesses need analytics / big data people now so having a narrow focus in this field may not be that bad. However, the question is, do you plan on staying in these roles? Or would you rather have more flexibility?

I have updated the post on the first page of this long thread to reflect the 2018 FT ranking.

I have updated the post on the first page of this long thread to reflect the 2018 FT ranking.

Hello Everyone,

I have got offer from DCU Ireland for MSc Business Management and Audencia Business School for International Masters in Management. I also got offer from Coventry London for MBA in International Marketing. i have 3 years of experience in Mechanical Engineering. Now i want to upgrade my role to management side.
I am confused which college to choose, i have gone through the pros cons for all three institutions, which made me more confused in taking proper decison as time is very less to decide.

Audencia Business School: Good ranking, nice exposure and industrial relations with average salary, but French is must. I am a beginer in French.

Dublin City University: Nice college with average reputaion with English language, but getting a job in Ireland post studies is really tough and not easy within stipulated time range.

Coventry London: Good exposure due to its presence in London city centre, English Speaking but expensive city with visa restrictions and max students has to return their home country post studies.

I am from India, and want to do job post studies for some years. Kindly give me soe genuine advise on which college to choose because i am not unable to come on any conclusion

See https://find-mba.com/board/general-forum/best-msc-mim-degrees-for-international-students-placement-52915

I have noticed that schools with with number of international students, have usually the highest ranking in international mobility
Int. mobility ranking is "Whether alumni worked in different countries pre-MBA, on graduation, and three years after graduation"

I have to question (if anyone knows) if the number on the ranking is counting only int. students, or it is counting all students, and if it is based on % or net amount of students that work in different country. Example follows

Let's say we have two schools with 500students each.

It sounds like (and I may be wrong) that
-a school with 10% int. students(50 students) 100% of which found job abroard,
would rank lower than
-one with 90% int, students(450 students) but only 50% of them found job abroad.

If this ranking is based only on amount, 450 would rank higher, but anyone looking for mobility should prefer the 1st one?

I would like to know, if someone knows

It's counting all students. What you miss out otherwise are the home students who find work abroad.

[Edited by Duncan on Apr 16, 2018]

OK, but isn't that working against the U.S. schools ranking, most of which have less than 40% int. students? (and the other 60% or more are locals and probably want to find job in U.S. anyway)

It would be nice to have some more data on the matter because I have the feeling that the int. students that find work in the U.S. are, as percentage, more than what the mobility rankings show

(I have updated this post with the 2018 FT ranking data)

Lots of MBA students are looking for the opportunity to find work in other countries. The FT rankings are very useful because they show the schools with the best international mobility, the highest employment rates and the most international students. In this post, which I update annnually, I pick the 40 FT-ranked schools with the highest international mobility, remove the ten with the fewest international students [in 2018, I've removed 9 because two schools had equal scores], and then remove the ten remaining with the worst careers services ("placement", in earlier rankings).

The top 20 schools are below, sorted by their 2018 FT ranking from top to bottom. I've put a * after the name of schools that made the list in 2017 (extra stars if also in 2016 or 2015).


Rank in 2018
School name
2 Insead**
4 London Business School***
11 Iese Business School***
13 University of Cambridge: Judge***
18 National University of Singapore Business School*
20 Esade Business School***
22 Nanyang Business School*
24 IMD**
29 SDA Bocconi*
33 University of Hong Kong
36 Alliance Manchester Business School*
41 Warwick Business School***
46 City University: Cass*
51 Imperial College Business School*
60 University of St Gallen***
61 Cranfield School of Management***
75 Edhec Business School*
94 WHU Beisheim
96 Essec Business School
99 EMLyon Business School

Seven of those are in the bottom half of the FT top 100, the same as in 2017, showing that good outcomes are possible even for students without stellar GMAT scores if they have good applications.

A notable factor, in 2018, has been the rise of schools in the far east: NUS and Nanyang re-entered (and HKU are entered) the top 20, while Insead, EDHEC and ESSEC all have full-time MBA tracks divided between France and Singapore.

PS The same approach is used to compare masters in management degrees at https://find-mba.com/board/general-forum/best-msc-mim-degrees-for-international-students-placement-52915

George, it sounds to me like you'd prefer two different variables: the number of international students who change country; and the number of domestic students who change country. Those data aren't available to us. We have an aggregate that shows the sum of those two. I think a school that had a small number of international students but which was very good at placing them would, eventually, end up with many more international students. So, I feel very happy filtering out schools with very small numbers of international students, also because those tend to be very unusual people: people with personal connections, high motivations and language skills. For example, very few foreigners attend top Indian schools, and then tend to be people of Indian origin. If my British niece attends ISB, the IIMA or IIMB, she won't have similar outcomes to the other international students.

Given the data we do have, we can only ask: is this school's international mobility higher or lower than its number of international students would suggest? I have put a chart at https://twitter.com/DuncanChapple/status/986278176405049344 with that comparison.

In a way, we could do this numerically, by adding the % of international students and the ranking for international mobility. I did that calculation, which is obviously problematic, and got:-

Schools with more mobility than their numbers of international students would suggest (I guess many of these are schools with more international mobility opportunities than international students):
HKUST Business School 7
SDA Bocconi 11
CUHK Business School 23
Ceibs 31
Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad 35
University of Pennsylvania: Wharton 36
Sungkyunkwan University GSB 44
University of Pittsburgh: Katz 46
Dartmouth College: Tuck 48
Indian Institute of Management Bangalore 51
Indian School of Business 58
Indian Institute of Management Calcutta 72

Schools with less mobility than their number of international students might suggest (I guess many of these are schools with fewer internaitonal mobility opportunities than international students):
University of Strathclyde Business School 38
University of Edinburgh Business School 41
University of Bath School of Management 45
Lancaster University Management School 49
Durham University Business School 53
Babson College: Olin 60
University of Connecticut School of Business 63
Leeds University Business School 65
University of San Diego School of Business Administration 69
Cornell University: Johnson 84
Pennsylvania State University: Smeal 86
University of Southern California: Marshall 90
University of Texas at Austin: McCombs 96

PS The numbers after each school's name is its FT ranking for international mobility.

[Edited by Duncan on Apr 17, 2018]

very good read and I think it will interest many of the international students that read the forums. It may deserve it's own thread

The first thing that comes to mind is that some universities may have the same percentage of int students that find job in different country, but may rank differently because of the different cohort size? (if the ranking counts just numbers) That would scew the results

It would make sense that many residents of U.S. would simply not want to find job abroad. They tend to want to stay there (to the best of my knowledge), so some data about those that WANT to change country and managed it (or not), as percentage and as ratio to the total, may be the most accurate ranking metric

The best target for int. students that want to find job abroad would be a school that is ranked higher than what the number of int student would predict (basically a school with low number of int. students, but that still ranks relatively high in mobility - it would make sense also in the respect that there is a certain limit to the amount of int. students the university can place)

No, the international mobility ranking is not based on the share of the study body that worked in different countries in the years before and after the MBA. It would not make sense to use absolute numbers.

Actually, US business people are more interested in international experience. Most of the Ivy League MBAs are great examples of schools with better than expected international mobility, with the exception of Cornell (perhaps its 12 month options drag it down).

I'm not sure the sweet spot is exactly what you describe. I'd instead look for schools that were notably higher than the trend line, so that would include the Chinese schools and SDA Bocconi.

30,000 views for this post. Thanks people!

Nice work, Duncan - really informative thread!

Hello Duncan,

Thanks for your tips on this thread!

I’d like your feedback and opinion on the mba program at Rotterdam School of Management. I am particularly concerned about the school’s placement record.

I’ve worked as an economist at a top bank in the Middle East and I intend to transition to management consulting in Dubai or Europe. ( PS: I am an EU passport holder so I can work in europe).

Could you pls let me know if RSM’s mba is a good choice? Do you think IE business school is a better choice for me?

Thanks so much

I replied to your message with the same question before I read this. But I am not the only person here.Also, please let us know what appeals to you about those schools, since they don't seem like top options unless you have specific ties to those countries.

Hello Duncan,

Thanks for your tips on this thread!

I’d like your feedback and opinion on the mba program at Rotterdam School of Management. I am particularly concerned about the school’s placement record.

I’ve worked as an economist at a top bank in the Middle East and I intend to transition to management consulting in Dubai or Europe. ( PS: I am an EU passport holder so I can work in europe).

Could you pls let me know if RSM’s mba is a good choice? Do you think IE business school is a better choice for me?

Thanks so much

Dear Mr. Duncan,

I’m from the South East Asia and I am taking one or two years off for higher education and working experience in Europe before going back home to manage our family business as my father wants to enjoy his retirement in the next few years.

Currently I’m having the following offers:

1. Executive MBA in sustainable business - Business School of Lausanne- Switzerland (45k CHF)

2. MBA 1-year - Aston University - UK ( with my scholarship it’s 19k GBP)

3. MBA 2-year - Birmingham Business School - University of Birmingham - UK (25k GBP)

4. Master of International Business - University of Barcelona - Spain (6k EUR)

Really appreciate if you can advise me on the prospects and value for money of those programs.

Thank you and best regards,

Kaspy.

[Edited by Kaspy on Jul 02, 2018]