Let me start again. I was looking at some random MBA ranking published by QS. I don't know what QS stands for and I only found it because a student of Bainbridge Graduate Institute (BGI) complained about its Corporate Social Responsibility ranking. I only know what BGI is because a Facebook friend who sought my advice on MBA programs attends BGI and posted about it.
You also know that it's a very inauspicious start to a blog post when it's the 3rd paragraph and you are still rambling. And writing in the second person. The point that I was making was that while I don't know what QS stands for, their ranking unintentionally has some interesting results. The ranking is devised through surveying major employers of MBA's and scoring their responses on an curve. Based on the spread of the curve between the various places, one can tell which specialties provide significant differentiation for MBA programs.
I am applying the same methodology from a Net Promoter Survey that a market research firm did on the Medicare Advantage industry. Through their methodology, they can tell what features provide a health plan a true opportunity for differentiation. For example, most Medicare Advantage enrollees think that their health plan's customer service is top notch even those who hate their plan. The scores cluster very close together meaning there is little to no opportunity for a plan to differentiate themselves through customer service. However, few members really think their Medicare Advantage plan has a good dental offering which provides an opportunity for differentiation.
My analysis of the QS MBA rankings by specialty is not as statistically robust as the market research firm. I applied the same methodology to come up with some expected and counter intuitive results which is what one wants to make analysis interesting and probably accurate. If the results are all expected than the analysis isn't very interesting. This is like most social psychology experiments that reveal gems like people tend to get angrier at football games when their favorite team is losing and reduced to playing its 3rd string quarterback whose name sounds like the the newest character in Glee. If the results are counter all counter intuitive, then they are probably wrong due to an incompetent research assistant.
After 5 mostly rambling paragraphs, here are the results. My methodology is that I looked at the number of schools that received a score of 100 and score of the top 10 schools and top 20 schools to see the spread. The number of schools that received a score of 100 was clustered closely around 4 or 5 programs. Average ranking of the 10th ranked school was 76 and average ranking of the 20th ranked school was 49. This is all done by specialization which are:
Entrepreneurship: Five programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 77, and 20th ranked school received a score of 38. This distribution pretty much matches the average scores so there is only an average amount of differentiation a program can achieve by focusing on entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is a fairly nebulous field so is this expected.
Information Management: Two programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 80, and 20th ranked school received a score of 37. Another average distribution except the fewest schools received a perfect score. Unless, you are a Harvard or MIT graduate which achieved the perfect score, there is an average opportunity for differentiation.
Finance: Five programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 48, and 20th ranked school received a score of 31. This is more interesting as there is a clear opportunity for differentiation in Finance. There are only 7 schools that received a score above 58 (Wharton, Chicago, LBS, Stern, Harvard, Columbia, and Insead). Graduates of those schools will separate themselves from the hordes of other MBA's in the field of finance (with the fin in finance pronounced like a fish's fin instead of fine by graduates of those elite programs.)
International Management: Four programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 79, and 20th ranked school received a score of 51. The distribution is above average in terms of how tightly it is clustered. This shows little differentiation opportunity and a cautionary tale. International Management used to be an area of focus for schools like Thunderbird as they hung their hats on breaking into the elite circles of MBA programs through International management. While Thunderbird was one of the four programs that received a 100, USC, Cambridge, and SDA Barconi were examples of schools with just an average reputation that were close behind. All of Thunderbird's focus still results it the school having a similar reputation as the fortified Thunderbird wine.
Strategy: Four programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 73, and 20th ranked school received a score of 36. Considering that strategy is thought to be as nebulous as entrepreneurship only with more buzz words, I was surprised that there was this much opportunity for differentiation. This was the most counter intuitive example as George W Bush has almost destroyed this specialization by calling it stratergery.
Operations Management: Three programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 89, and 20th ranked school received a score of 60. Operations management had the opposite story of strategy with a very tight distribution all the way to the 20th ranked program. There is little opportunity for differentiation probably became most employers have only met one MBA who majored in Operations management.
Innovation: Three programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of only 62, and 20th ranked school received a score of 42. While innovation is more buzz word than an actual specialization, it looks like employer believe a few schools do it well (MIT, Stanford, Harvard, Wharton, IE in Spain, London Business School, and NYU Stern).
Corporate Social Responsibility/Ethics: Fourteen programs received a score of 100, the 10th ranked school received a score of 100, and 20th ranked school received a score of 97. Despite all the talk, the MBA Oath, and general interest in the area, employers believe all the schools have the same capabilities. There is no current opportunity for differentiation which should be cause for concern for BGI or other programs which are trying to use this as a point of differentiation. Currently, employers believe there is a larger difference in students skills with a financial calculator then there skills in resolving an ethical dilemma. A BGI student blogs that the recent MBA's dubious role in the financial crisis should lower their schools' scores. However, the Notorious BGI student fails to explain what their program's students would do any differently. Would they get jobs at the SEC and better regulate the financial industry? Would they become CEO's and require their bankers to submit essays on their ethics? Would they even get jobs in the financial industry by touting their ethical skills? This survey suggests these skills would not impress future employers.
The results of this survey show the a stratergery of differentiating in Corporate Social Responsibility would have even a worse outcome than schools that placed all their chips on international management. There is little differentiation and what difference there is easy to replicate.
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