Top Finance MBAs

 Apart from Marketing, the most popular MBA specialisation is Finance


 Finance  tends to appeal to quantitative types and will often have several ex engineers  in a class.
 Some of the best Finance programs are

• 
  
• ·         CMU – Tepper
• ·         Dartmouth College – Tuck
• ·         Harvard University
• ·         MIT – Sloan
• ·         NYU – Stern
• ·         Stanford University
• ·         UCLA – Anderson
• ·         University of Chicago – Booth
• ·         University of Michigan – Ross
• ·         University of Pennsylvania – Wharton
• ·         Yale University

Top MBA programs in Marketing

One of the most popular MBA specialisations is Marketing.
  These days all marketing professions will tell you that it is becoming a very quantitative field  driven by the  use of big data  analysis.


All  of the top MBA programs have strong marketing    programs but these  stand out

• ·          Berkeley – Haas
• ·          Chicago -Booth
• ·         Duke – Fuqua
• ·         Harvard
• ·         Northwestern -Kellogg
• ·          Stanford
• ·         Texas – McCombs
• ·         UCLA – Anderson
• ·         Virginia – Darden
• ·          Wharton

the MBA ApplicationEssay

 For many students the most daunting  part of the MBA application is not the GMAT or interview but rather the Essays.

  In all honesty , this need not be the case. Most MBA application essays are generally similar and  will involve  writing to answer the following questions

 1. Why  MBA? (   talk about your long term  and short term goals and how am MBA fits in

2. Why  this  University?  Each school wants to know how it fits in to your  plans . Every  institution has dsomething unique, Do your homework and  talk about why the school is  the right fit for you

3. Why You?     Why should  you be accepted?   write about  your experiences and how  you can contribute to the    intellectual and social  life on campus.

 Over the next few months I will writing tips on all 3 as swell as looking at several institutions  from my list of  top programs  individually.

The GMAT

  Almost all MBA programs , especially the better schools require the GMAT as   part f the application

 The  GMAT is a adaptive computerized test offered around the world several times a year.
 see GMAC.org for details.

 Scores range between 200 and 800. A score of 640 and more is the minimum for most competitive porgrams thougha few schools are starting to boast of average scores exceeding 700. This happens at univities such as Stanford and Chicago which  attract  peple from technical backgrounds and  have a student body interested in finance roles.

MBA specialisations

 Most MBA programs allow students to specialise  in one or more busines related fields. Think of this a equivalent to an undergraduate major.

 Everyone takes a core  MBA overview ( usually 1 year)  and spends the second year focussing on a concentrarion

 The common  options for this are

• Marketing
• Finance
• Operations/Supply Chain management
•  Information Systems/ Technology Management
• Strategy
• Human Resources

Several universities offer highly focussed  career oriented options such as Retail management, Health care management and Real Estate.
 Most of the universities in my top  programs list offer all the standard concentration  plus several other esoteric optoins such s Sports management.

  Careful selection of your  specialisation can help prepare you for a career switch post MBA .

Top MBA programs

 In this post,
 I am listing what  are considered to be the best MBA programs and am sticking to schools that are invariably in every top 25 list year after year


 USA

• HarvardUniversity
• Stanford University
•  University of Pennsylvania - Wharton
•  University of Chicago - Booth
• Northwestern  University - Kellogg
• Duke Universiy - Fuqua
•  Dartmouth College - Tuck
• Columbia University
• University of Virginia - Tuck
•  University of California Berkeley - Haas
• UCLA - Anderson
• Yale University
• Carnegie Mellon University - Tepper
•  MIT - Sloan
• University f Michigan Ann Arbor - Ross

Canada

•  University of Toronto - Rotman
•  York University - Schulich
• University of Waterloo - Ivey

 

UK

• London School of Business
•  Cambridge University - Judge
• Oxford University - Said
•  Warwick University
• City University - Cass
• 
  

Europe

•  INSEAD (France)
•  HEC Paris ( Frane)
•  IE (Spain)
• IMD ( Switzerland)
• SDA Bocconi ( Italy)

Rotterdam School  of Business  ( Netherlands)

India

•  Indian Institute of Management ( 7 camouses)
•  Indian School of  Business (2 campuses)

Asia

•  NUS Singapore
•  HKUST - Hong Kong
• CEIBS - China
•  INSEAD - Singapore
•  NTU  - Singapore

 Over  the next few months I wil looking at most of these schools individually to break  down the  student profile and  look at the essays  and requirements. Do keep reading regularly

Basic MBA requirements

 Here is a list of the things most MBA programs require from all applicants