<p>Sakky, I don’t think the M7 are necessarily the “dominant” 7 schools in terms of popular consciousness and recruiter desirability. They are definitely 7 of the top 10 MBA programs. But I’d say Ross is as good as half of the M7 programs and Tuck and Haas are up there too.</p>
<p>Well, all I have to say to that is that Ross then needs to get into this group to make it the “M8” group or whatever it is. Because if you haven’t been invited into this group, then that is a problem, at least in terms of perception.</p>
<p>Sakky, most people don’t really know or care about the M7. It is more of a very loose academic colaboration, where a few faculty members meet once a year to share ideas. It does not really impact the perception of a program. In fact, it is merely 4 years old if memory serves. I am not so sure that programs such as Haas and Ross cannot join. I think it is more a question of their not having any faculty who care to expend their time in this endeavour. But where it really matters, in the eyes of academe and the corporate world, Ross certainly holds its own. </p>
<p>Corporate Poll according to BusinessWeek:</p>
<h1>1 University of Chicago</h1>
<h1>2 Harvard University</h1>
<h1>3 Northwestern University (Kellogg)</h1>
<h1>4 University of Michigan-Ann Arbor (Ross)</h1>
<h1>5 University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)</h1>
<h1>6 Columbia University</h1>
<h1>7 Stanford University</h1>
<h1>8 Cornell University (Johnson)</h1>
<h1>9 University of Notre Dame (Mendoza)</h1>
<h1>10 New York University (Stern)</h1>
<p>Peer Assessment Score according to USNWR:</p>
<h1>1 Stanford University 4.8/5.0</h1>
<h1>1 University of Pennsylvania (Wharton) 4.8/5.0</h1>
<h1>3 Harvard University 4.7/5.0</h1>
<h1>3 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan) 4.7/5.0</h1>
<h1>3 Northwestern University (Kellogg) 4.7/5.0</h1>
<h1>6 University of Chicago 4.6/5.0</h1>
<h1>7 University of California-Berkeley (Haas) 4.5/5.0</h1>
<h1>8 Columbia University 4.4/5.0</h1>
<h1>8 Dartmouth College (Tuck) 4.4/5.0</h1>
<h1>8 University of Michigan-Ann Arbor (Ross) 4.4/5.0</h1>
<p>Recruiter Assessment Score according to the USNWR:</p>
<h1>1 Harvard University 4.6/5.0</h1>
<h1>2 Stanford University 4.6/5.0</h1>
<h1>2 University of Pennsylvania (Wharton) 4.6/5.0</h1>
<h1>4 Northwestern University (Kellogg) 4.5/5.0</h1>
<h1>5 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan) 4.4/5.0</h1>
<h1>5 University of Chicago 4.4/5.0</h1>
<h1>7 University of Virginia (Darden) 4.3/5.0</h1>
<h1>8 Columbia University 4.2/5.0</h1>
<h1>8 University of Michigan-Ann Arabor (Ross) 4.2/5.0</h1>
<h1>10 Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper) 4.1/5.0</h1>
<h1>10 Cornell University (Johnson) 4.1/5.0</h1>
<h1>10 Dartmouth College (Tuck) 4.1/5.0</h1>
<h1>10 Duke University (Fuqua) 4.1/5.0</h1>
<h1>10 University of California-Berkeley (Haas) 4.1/5.0</h1>
<p>So yes, the M7 are definitely among the top 10 MBA programs, but like I said, they are not the only top MBA programs when it comes to perception. Haas, Ross and Tuck (among others) do quite well too.</p>
<p>First off, I find the ‘corporate polls’ to be extremely suspect. After all, like I said before, what corporations ultimately want is somebody who will work extremely hard for minimum wage and demand nothing… That is why superpower schools like HBS, Wharton, and Stanford get dinged (relatively speaking) by corporations because graduates of these programs demand a lot of power and a lot of pay, and corporations obviously don’t like that. But that’s not a bad thing, that’s actually a good thing. Schools should ultimately be about giving the STUDENTS what they want, not the corporations what they want. </p>
<p>For example, one of the major knocks about, say, Stanford, is that corporations always complain that they can’t get the Stanford MBA’s to take jobs outside of Silicon Valley because the graduates just like it there too much. But why is that a bad thing? I think that’s actually a good thing. The Stanford graduates are apparently getting something they want, which is to stay in Silicon Valley. If the corporations don’t like that, that’s their problem. They can’t or won’t give the graduates what they want. </p>
<p>Similarly, take HBS, Stanford, and Wharton. Another constant complaint about these grads is that they are arrogant and they demand too much money. But the way I see it is, HBS, Stanford, and Wharton grads have a reason to be arrogant. They’re arrogant because they are good, and they know it. And they can demand a lot of money because they know that they can. At the end of the day, they are the highest paid of all the MBA classes. </p>
<p>Ultimately, corporations want a bunch of people who are not only highly skilled, but who are also highly pliable and will do whatever the company wants them to do without complaint, including the crap jobs. But as an MBA student, is that what you want? It’s certainly not what I want. I want to have the bargaining leverage on my side, and if that ultimately means ticking off some corporations, so be it. I want the corporations to know that if they don’t give me what I want, I can go elsewhere.</p>
<p>But anyway, none of that is to say that Michigan is a bad school. Far from it. And I can see how one could make a case that Michigan might actually be highly competitive with, say, Columbia, which is probably the lowest of the M7. But I think it’s a rather hard case to make that Michigan is as good as half of the M7. As good as Chicago? As good as MIT? As good as Stanford? That’s a pretty tough case to make.</p>
<p>Sakky, most strategic recruiters and higher-ups at exclusive companies I have spoken to consider Stanford, Sloan and Columbia to be equal to Ross. I am talking about comapnies like McKinsey, Goldman Sacks, Boeing, GE, Honeywell etc… I personally consider Chicago to be slightly better and I consider Kellogg, Harvard and Wharton to be the top 3. All 8 of those B schools are excellent.</p>
<p>Sakky,</p>
<p>Everything said now brings us to the curst of our discussion i.e. even though yale may be ranked lower than HBS,standford etc etc by some ranking index Its not ridiculous if one is rejected by Yale couz in the past I have seen quality students rejected by Yale getting into HBS,standford, wharton, darden etc… they have somewht a tough scanning process… </p>
<p>and sakky as u have pointed out the flaws in the ‘corporate polls’ in the same way every poll etc. has its inherit flaws. the US news 2007 has included schools which werent there earlier, if tht is fne then try buying this —vanderbilt #49 where as ,rice university and a few other less known have been ranked above it. hence to call yale rejecting students accepted by higher ranking schools ridiculous probably needs a lil more thought. nevertheless…</p>
<p>besides whts this M7. I am a student and i am sure most of us out here neighter know nor care about this M7 thing. gettng into a renouned school is something a student is proud off but does this M7 thing like an extra presitege tht a student can carry ? if not then how does being or not being in M7 it benefit me ? </p>
<p>I encourage u to include ur opinion and comments on M7.</p>
<p>Well, if you get into the rather incestuous and inbred world of business academia, you will certainly care about the M7.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.ivyedge.com/Admission_Home/Business_School/business_school.html[/url]”>http://www.ivyedge.com/Admission_Home/Business_School/business_school.html</a></p>
<p><a href=“M7 (business school[/url]) | encyclopedia article by TheFreeDictionary”>M7 (business school)</a></p> | encyclopedia article by TheFreeDictionary;
<p><a href=“http://www.mba7gcf.com/[/url]”>http://www.mba7gcf.com/</a></p>
<p>Look, I am not saying that the M7 designation is “fair”. I am saying that it is what it is. For whatever reason, the M7 is considered to be a highly exclusive group of B-schools, and hence, at least in some people’s eyes, a cut above the rest. Maybe that’s unfair, but that’s how it is. Just like how it’s not really “fair” that Harvard Business School has by far the best brand name of all of the B-schools in the world. It’s not fair, but that’s the way it is, like it or not. </p>
<p>Look, it’s not a matter of most people caring or not caring about a particular school classification on a daily basis. The truth is, the vast majority of people in the world don’t know or care about any school rankings of any kind. Heck, there are hundreds of millions of people, maybe billions, in the world who don’t even get enough food to eat every day. Millions of adults in the world don’t know how to read or write in any language, including their native language. </p>
<p>Where rankings and classifications matter is when it helps you to get a job or to establish networking or rapport later in life. You’re right in the sense that 99% of the time, nobody will care about where you went to school. But it’s that 1% of the time when it matters. And after all, if you’re going to pay the same amount of money anyway (which you would if you were not a state resident of a particular public school, and you can’t get a scholarship), then you might as well take that extra boost if you can get it.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That’s funny they would say that because none of these companies hires that many Michigan grads (relative to the number of graduates). According to Businessweek, here are the number of graduates hired at McKinsey from each school. </p>
<p>Columbia - 47
MIT Sloan - 26
Michigan - 10</p>
<p>Stanford (and HBS) refused to participate in this survey, but trust me, it was a lot. McKinsey was the most popular destination for Stanford graduates, but I don’t know the number (but I’m quite certain it’s going to be easily more than 25).</p>
<p>In fact, Goldman Sachs, Honeywell, and Boeing didn’t even make the top 14 of recruiters at Michigan (GE did though). </p>
<p><a href=“Businessweek - Bloomberg”>Businessweek - Bloomberg;
<a href=“Businessweek - Bloomberg”>Businessweek - Bloomberg;
<a href=“Businessweek - Bloomberg”>Businessweek - Bloomberg;
<p>Neither the Michigan report nor the Goldman Sachs specific report specify much success of Michigan of getting grads into GS. Yet GS reports hiring significant numbers of Columbia and Sloan grads (and surely Stanford grads if Stanford had participated in the survey) </p>
<p><a href=“http://bwnt.businessweek.com/recruiting/index.asp?s=goldman+sachs[/url]”>http://bwnt.businessweek.com/recruiting/index.asp?s=goldman+sachs</a></p>
<p>So the point is, I still don’t see that Michigan has really entered the major leagues of consulting and banking in the way that Sloan, Columbia, and Stanford clearly have. This is not to say that Michigan is bad, as Michigan is clearly better than most B-schools are. But to say that Michigan is at the same level as the other M7 schools is a bit of a stretch. Keep in mind that Michigan is a rather large B-school (especially compared to the small minnows of MIT Sloan or Stanford). Yet you raised the point of McKinsey and Goldman Sachs, but that begs the question that if they really think that Michigan is that good, then why don’t they hire more Michigan grads? Specifically, why is it that MIT can get 2.5 times more grads into McKinsey than Michigan can? </p>
<p>Lest you think that the businessweek data is skewed, you can take a look at Michigan’s own employment profile of 2005 (the BW data is for 2004). As you can see, really, not that many Michigan grads went to McKinsey or Goldman Sachs. In fact, speaking of McKinsey, because McKinsey is the largest of the strategic management firms, you usually find that Mckinsey will hire a lot more grads out of a particular school than will the competing firms like Bain or Booz Allen Hamilton, often by 2 or 3 times. For example, more than twice as many MIT Sloan grads went to McKinsey as to any other strategy consulting firm. Yet in the case of Michigan, the ratio is 1:1. That’s an indication, like it or not, that McKinsey really doesn’t respect Michigan that much. If it did, it would hire more Michigan grads. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.bus.umich.edu/pdf/EmploymentProfile2005.pdf[/url]”>http://www.bus.umich.edu/pdf/EmploymentProfile2005.pdf</a></p>
<p>Alexandre,</p>
<p>Actually M7 holds conferences and recruit together. I recieved 5 interviews from M7 conference meetings including my only interviews with firms in Asia and Europe. I know you like to think Michigan is a top 5 program, but its been my experience working with and knowing many top MBA grads and recruiters that the top 7 is as follows.</p>
<p>Harvard
Wharton
Stanford</p>
<p>Kellogg
Columbia/ MIT/ Chicago</p>
<p>I concur with Sakky. Having interviewed and attended Mckinsey/ BCG/ and Booz Allen events/ interviews in NYC I felt like I met 5 Columbia, Harvard, Wharton, etc grads for every Michigan grad.</p>
<p>In fact I have Columbia’s 2005 employment report right here. BW must have overstated Columbia’s entry at McKinsey, it was 31 hires and 17 interns.</p>
<p>Here are the top firms at Columbia with # of hires.</p>
<p>Mckinsey 31
Lehman 28
Citigroup 25
Goldman 22
Booz 20
BCG 19
Morgan Stanley 15
Deutche Bank 13
Amex 12
BofA 12
JP Morgan 12
UBS 11
CSFB 10
GE Capital 8
Merril Lynch 8
Barclay 7
Bear Sterns 7
Deloitte 7
Fidelity 6
Gabelli 6
IBM 5
LOreal 5</p>
<p>The second tier firms (Deloitte, Bear) are barely on the radar! Most who wanted to go into Banking or Consulting are at the top firms. The others went into random areas (like myself) after losing interest in consulting/ banking. Although I to not take a consulting job, it was nice getting easy interviews at places like BCG and McKinsey! I am not sure its as easy outside the M7.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Like I said, the BW numbers are from 2004. That probably accounts for the difference. </p>
<p>Granted, part of the difference is that Columbia just has lots more students than Michigan does (in their full-time programs). But still, I have to say that the fact that Mckinsey only hired 8 people from Michigan, yet hired 31 from Columbia and 24 from MIT in 2005 is pretty difficult to explain away.</p>
<p><a href=“http://mitsloan.mit.edu/global/employment/detailed05.php#hirers[/url]”>http://mitsloan.mit.edu/global/employment/detailed05.php#hirers</a></p>
<p>Sakky, it is not difficult to explain away. More students at Columbia are interested in Consulting than students at Ross. Until the mid 90’s, Michigan Business School was primarily a Production/Operations school that sent over 50% of its students to heavy manufacturing firms. Ross has changed over the last decade, but even today, many of its top students dream of one day being leaders of industry. Still, Ross has taken an active role in seeing to it that 25% of its class is interested in Consulting, 25% in investment Banking, 25% in Marketing and 25% in operations and production. But 25% is a relatively low percentage. Schools like Wharton and Harvard are almost 40% Finance and 40% management. As it is, schools like Wharton, HBS and Columbia are 50%-100% larger than Ross. And when you add the ratio of students who are interested in (and have prior professional experience in) Investment Banking and Management consulting recruits aren’t going to be as common as they would be at HBS and Wharton. </p>
<p>At any rate, I stand by my previous statement. The M7 aren’t necessarily the top 7 MBA programs. They are definitely all top 10 MBA programs, but there are a couple of other MBA programs that are definitely as good.</p>
<p>Yeah, but all you’re saying is simply reinforcing the point that McKinsey probably does not really consider Michigan to be one of its top recruiting destinations. Whether it’s because the Ross students aren’t good enough to get into McKinsey, or whether it’s because they don’t WANT to get into McKinsey, it doesn’t matter. At the end of the day, for whatever reason, McKinsey only hired 8 MBA’s from Ross. </p>
<p>Consider your argument about the focus on operations. The fact is, if there is one B-school that is more focused on operations than anything else, it has to be MIT Sloan. I think it is rather indisputable that Sloan is the best MBA program to go to for pure operations. Both USNews and Businessweek (when BW used to publish its discipline-specific rankings) agree on this. Heck, the entire dual-degree LFM program, of which comprises about 1/8 of the entire Sloan class exists to steer people towards operations jobs, and many regular Sloanies also want operations jobs. Nevertheless despite Sloan’s powerhouse operations specialization, the fact is, McKinsey hired 25 Sloan grads. Granted, many of them went to McKinsey’s Operations Practice but then that just begs the question of why more Ross students who are interested in Ops don’t end up in that Practice too. </p>
<p>You also say that lots of students who are interested in and who have prior practical experience in banking and consulting won’t go to Michigan. But that just begs the question of why not? In particular, why would they be so much more interested in going to, say, Sloan or Columbia or Stanford instead? </p>
<p>One might now ask the question of who said that consulting (or banking) was necessarily the most desirable jobs for MBA’s? The answer is, the MBA’s said so. That’s what Fortune Magazine discovered, with consulting and banking taking 6 of the top 10 slots (with McKinsey being #1). </p>
<p><a href=“http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/mba100/[/url]”>http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/mba100/</a></p>
<p>Hence, it’s not that I am personally saying that McKinsey is the most desirable employer. Rather, it’s the MBA students themselves who are saying it in the aggregate.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m afraid this is not true. According to the data, about 22% of Ross students went to consulting. About 20% of Columbia students went to consulting. So, actually, a (slightly) greater percentage of Ross students are more interested in consulting than Columbia students are. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.bus.umich.edu/pdf/EmploymentProfile2005.pdf[/url]”>http://www.bus.umich.edu/pdf/EmploymentProfile2005.pdf</a>
<a href=“http://www.columbia.edu/cu/business/career/employmentreport/2005/er2005.pdf[/url]”>http://www.columbia.edu/cu/business/career/employmentreport/2005/er2005.pdf</a></p>
<p>I agree that Columbia is larger than Ross (600 to 420). Yet Columbia got 31 of its grads into McKinsey, whereas Ross got 8. Scale down the number of students at Columbia to make it proportional, and Columbia still clearly got significantly more into McKinsey. </p>
<p>The same can be said for MIT. 26% of Sloan grads did go to consulting, which is higher than Ross’s 22%. Yet, MIT did get 24 people into McKinsey. Again, compared to Ross’s 8, scaled down for the different percentages who went to consulting, and MIT still got more in. </p>
<p><a href=“http://mitsloan.mit.edu/global/employment/detailed05.php#profile[/url]”>http://mitsloan.mit.edu/global/employment/detailed05.php#profile</a></p>
<p>I guess you will have to ask McKinsey Sakky. As far as I know, Ross is one of the 6 or 7 MBA programs that McKinsey visits on a frequent basis. Nobody can question the fact that Ross is one of the top 3 or 4 destinations for the most exclusive MC recruiters. I challenge you to find me a single McKinsey interview schedule that does not have Ross on it. Even when McKinsey has a schdule of only 5 or 6 schools, Ross will be on that schedule. </p>
<p>Whether or not many Ross students opt to work for them is another story. It isn’t like Ross students have trouble finding good jobs. The average starting salaries of its students, once you take cost of living factors into consideration, is equal to those at any other top 10 MBA program. Among the most popular destinations for Ross students are the likes of Citigroup, J&J, Lehman Brothers, McKinsey, Bain and Booz Allen. Try to remember that few companies get more than 10 Ross students annually. For some reason, Ross students are spread all over the place. I doubt it has anything to do with quality. </p>
<p>I mentioned Goldman Sachs as a major recruiter on campus. I know for a fact that last year, Goldman Sachs gave offers to over 30 Ross MBAs. Only 4 accepted those offers. In fact, more (11 I believe) BBA Ross students took jobs with Goldman Sachs last year than MBA students. So it isn’t always the case of Ross not being popular or respected. Sometimes it is simply a case that Ross students do not gravitate to the same destinations.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Well, the fact is, McKinsey also visits all of the M7 extremely frequently. Nobody is saying that McKinsey doesn’t have a presence at Michigan. But to say that it has a bigger presence there than any of the M7 schools is a reach. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>By a similar notion, I would say that no McKinsey schedule would be complete without the M7. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>But the same is true for every other school. McKinsey made plenty of offers to Sloan students that were turned down. McKinsey made plenty of offers to Columbia and Stanford students that were turned down. I don’t know of any reason why Michigan students would be any MORE likely to turn down offers than the students at the other schools would. </p>
<p>The point is, like I said, it’s hard to explain away that, at the end of the day, only 8 people from Ross went to McKinsey. That’s not a lot. In fact, the top 2 consulting hirers at Ross are Deloitte and ATKearney. While these are fine firms, let’s face it, they are not as desirable as, say, McKinsey or BCG (again, reference that Fortune Magazine list). Contrast that with Stanford, MIT, or Columbia where McKinsey is the clear top consulting hirer (and in fact, the top hirer period). Let’s face it. A lot of people who take jobs at Deloitte and AT Kearney would rather be going to McKinsey, but didn’t get an offer. Not all of them are like that, but a lot of them are. In that sense, Deloitte and Kearney are basically “safety companies” for many people who simply weren’t good enough to get into a better firm, in the same way that you apply to a safety school in case you can’t get into the school that you really want. </p>
<p>Look, don’t get me wrong. I like Michigan Ross a lot. I think they produce excellent general management and operations students. But it’s hard to argue with the facts. If nothing else, the data indicates that Ross is not as good for consulting relative to the M7. That doesn’t mean that Ross is a bad school. Indeed Ross is clearly one of the best schools in the world. But compared to the M7, the comparison gets difficult.</p>
<p>I completely agree with Sakky. Places like Deloitte and AT Kearney tend to recruit heavily at the 10-20 schools, look at UVA, Michigan, UNC - those two are the top consulting hiring firms. Contrast that with Sloan or Columbia, where hardly anyone even takes a second look at these offers. I know many who consider these to be “practice round” companies, where you can practice case interviews before you interview with the elite firms.</p>
<p>Also, The fact that all 7 M7 deans meet regularly and formed a group WITHOUT Michigan tells me Michigan is not in that category. Nothing shows me why Michigan is a top 7 school over any of the M7. To be honest, outside of you I have never even heard Michigan mentioned in the same breath as the other 7. Go to businessweek.com forums, ver few people even put Michigan close to the same category. I would guess almost 90% of those admitted at Columbia, Sloan, or Chicago and Michigan would take those offers over Michigan.</p>