Applicants Invest 90 to 140 Hours To Apply

The survey also found, not surprisingly, that a vast majority of applicants who used consultants would recommend to others consulting help. Many of the respondents, however, were asked to complete the survey by the consulting firms they used so this finding should be treated with some skepticism. Nonetheless, only 1% of the respondents said they would absolutely not recommend the use of an MBA admissions consultant to other applicants (see below table).

Source: AIGAC 2013 survey

The admissions consulting group also asked applicants why they chose to apply to their target list of business schools and what kind of uplift in their earnings were they expecting as a result of having an MBA on their resume. Of all the factors in selecting a business school, impact on career and school reputation were identified as being most important.

On a rating scale of one to five (with five being very important), impact on career received a 4.7. School reputation got a score of 4.5, while the school’s alumni network was next at 4.2 (see table below).

Source: AIGAC 2013 survey

The survey also found that expectations of MBA applicants are fairly high when it comes to their future salaries. A quarter of the responding prospects expected their salary to more than double after earning an MBA degree (see table on following page). Interestingly enough, however, the more an applicant made before entering business school, the lower their expectations were for earning a big percentage increase post-school. Applicants who were already earning between $150,000 and $200,000 before their MBA, expected the degree to give them only a 5% boost in pay when they graduated.