MBA Rankings Largely 'Follow The Money'

All the analysis, however, hinges on the quality of the alumni sample. If few alums from a school return Forbes’ survey, it can throw off the entire calculation–which is why Forbes says it doesn’t rank schools whose response rates fall under 15%. Still, that’s quite low.

Ultimately, says Turner, it is difficult to put simple metrics around “the rich and nuanced environment that makes for a top program. It is practically impossible to quantify such things as intellectual vigor, creative thought, collaborate environment, ambition, leadership, stellar teaching, innovative curricula, networking prowess, interpersonal skills, success in the workplace, to say nothing of your unique fit with a program’s culture.”

FOLLOWING THE MONEY NUMBERS USED TO RANK SCHOOLS

School	U.S. News (2011 Mean Salary & Bonus)	Forbes (Post-MBA Mean Salary Five Years Out)*	Financial Times (Post-MBA Salary Three Years Out)**	Economist (2010 Mean Salary)
Harvard	$139,735	$230,000	$178,249	$114,896
Stanford	$140,972	$205,000	$192,179	$118,793
Wharton	$137,311	$225,000	$172,353	$113,659
MIT (Sloan)	$132,618	$200,000	$157,337	$110,000
Northwestern (Kellogg)	$130,092	$183,000	$145,834	$107,027
Chicago (Booth)	$133,424	$205,000	$152,585	$108,045
UC-Berkeley (Haas)	$129,776	$171,000	$146,811	$107,451
Columbia	$134,233	$198,000	$166,497	$106,472
Dartmouth (Tuck)	$138,220	$200,000	$151,182	$106,578
Yale	$125,735	$150,000	$142,455	$98,324
New York (Stern)	$128,888	$160,000	$134,093	$100,448
Duke (Fuqua)	$128,666	$162,000	$139,405	$102,056
Michigan (Ross)	$127,817	$146,000	$129,649	$98,720
Virginia (Darden)	$127,595	$178,000	$134,936	$100,839
UCLA (Anderson)	$119,109	$159,000	$136,331	$97,191
Cornell (Johnson)	$122,329	$180,000	$141,727	$96,800
Texas (McCombs)	$118, 410	$144,000	$121,170	$95,221
Carnegie Mellon (Tepper)	$117,650	$147,000	$132,325	$93,723
Emory (Goizueta)	$121,050	$128,000	$124,832	$92,371
UNC (Kenan-Flagler)	$101,904	$136,000	$118,959	$93,926
USC (Marshall)	$109,619	$144,000	$121,060	$93,600
Washington (Olin)	$99,354	$119,000	$106,668	$84,565
Indiana (Kelley)	$106,195	$109,000	$113,217	$89,144
Georgetown (McDonough)	$111,721	$138,000	$123,290	$91,721
Ohio State (Fisher)	$91,696	$115,000	$105,426	$85,197

Sources: U.S. News & World Report, Forbes, The Financial Times, The Economist

Notes: * Forbes’ collected 2010 average salary for the Class of 2006 and then uses this data to calculate a return on investment as the key metric of its ranking.

** The Financial Times collects average salary of alumni three years after graduation and then adjusts the data for variations between industry sectors. This includes data for 2012 as well as one or two preceding years when available.

BusinessWeek’s Historical MBA Rankings — 2010 to 1988

Financial Times’ Historical MBA Rankings — 2012 to 2001

Ranking The Rankings