Finance Led Early MBA Job Offers This Year

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)

Slightly more than one in four of the early job offers to MBAs in the Class of 2014 came from the finance and accounting sectors, according to a new analysis from the Graduate Management Admission Council.

Though business schools won’t release their employment reports on the Class of 2014 until the fall, the vast majority of graduates have job offers in hand by February and March. That’s because the summer internship has in many cases turned into a tryout of sorts that often leads to an offer.

The latest GMAC data, for example, shows that 57% of the Class of 2014 had job offers by February/March, and nearly two thirds came in traditional MBA sectors with finance and accounting leading them all with 26% of the early offers. Consulting was next with 21%, while products and services was at 18%.

EARLY OFFERS IN HEALTHCARE SHOWED HIGHEST MEDIAN SALARY BUMP: 109%

Tech firms made 15% of the early offers this past year, up from 13% in 2012 and 2013 and only 9% in 2010. The increases are due to rising demand for MBAs from the tech sector, which has been booming in recent years, as well as greater interest from MBAs in a career path in tech.

MBA students with early job offers reported that the median salary bump–the percentage increase over pre-MBA pay–was 97% in the tech field.

That was second best, behind only healthcare/pharma which had the highest median change in salary at 109%. Early offers in manufacturing were pretty lucrative, too. Those offers promised a 91% bump in starting MBA pay. The median salary bump in consulting was 87%, while the bump in finance and accounting was 63%. Early offers in products and services had a 64% bump, while energy and utilities showed a 59% increase.

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)

The GMAC data comes from the organization’s survey of 3,049 business school graduates at 111 universities worldwide. Released in June (see Job Offers Up In Tech & Healthcare), the data is from the 15th annual Global Management Education Graduate Survey which looks at how B-school grads view their programs and offers a snapshot of their early job search and career intentions. Some of the information in the report was synthesized in a series of slides released by GMAC last week called “B-School Job Market In Six Graphs (see entire presentation on following page).”

HIGHEST SUCCESS RATES FOR EARLY OFFERS CAME FROM HEALTHCARE AND MANUFACTURING

Among the more compelling highlighted information was the fact that those looking for jobs in manufacturing and healthcare had higher early success rates than others. Nearly three-quarters of the business school job seekers in healthcare/pharmaceuticals and manufacturing had early jobs offers, much higher than those looking in more traditional sectors such as consulting and finance.

Some 74% of the early job offers came in healthcare and pharma, while B-school grads headed into manufacturing had 74% of those offers made in February and March. That compared with 58% in consulting and 57% in finance and accounting. Products and services had the lowest reported rate of early job offers at 49%.

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)

Source: 2014 Global Management Education Graduate Survey (GMAC)