Where The Healthcare Industry Gets Its MBAs

Andy Alderman of Cardinal Health speaks to Health Sector Management Bootcamp orientation at Fuqua School of Business join 2015. In a poll of 32 elite programs, Fuqua graduated the third-most number of healthcare-bound MBAs in 2016. Courtesy photo

WHERE TO GET THE BIG BUCKS 

Median base salaries for newly hired healthcare MBAs top out at $125,000, a plateau achieved by three schools: Wharton, Harvard, and Stanford. All three also report median sign-on bonuses of $20,000. The highest reported median bonus came from UCLA Anderson School of Management, at $30,000; Duke reported a median bonus of $27,500, and both Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management and the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business reported mean bonuses of more than $25,000.

In terms of salary, after the big three came some usual suspects. One school, Haas, reported a median base salary of $123,500, while three schools reported median base salaries of $120,000: Columbia Business School, Dartmouth University Tuck School of Business, and MIT Sloan School of Management.

Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management reported a median base salary of $118,498. Most schools were in the $100,000-to-$110,000 range in median or mean base salaries. Vanderbilt’s Owen School saw its healthcare MBAs achieve among the lowest median salaries in the field, at $105,000, which is probably another indicator of the market in “small-town” Nashville. The lowest reported base salary at a U.S. B-school was at Georgetown University McDonough School of Business, a mean of $92,171.

MEANWHILE, IN EUROPE … 

Europe, of course, has an altogether different healthcare landscape than the U.S. That may explain why none of the five schools P&Q examined saw more than 5% of their 2016 MBAs go into that industry — and why those who did made less than almost all of their U.S.-graduated counterparts.

Two Madrid, Spain-based schools, IE Business School and IESE, paced the European schools at 5%, but both had quite low salaries, even in comparison with their continental counterparts: a median of US$76,128 at IESE, with a median sign-on bonus of US$29,150, and a mean of US$70,128 at IE (no reported median or mean bonus). Compare that to the median salary at INSEAD (US$94,600) or the mean at London Business School (US$99,477).

It also seems that healthcare as a path for MBAs is not exactly catching on in Europe. IESE’s 5% is down from 6.2% in 2015, HEC Paris’ 2% is down from 4% last year, and IE’s 5% is down from 4%. Base salaries at the Spanish schools fell by small amounts, too.

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