Is The MBA Worth It?

Nine out of 10 B-School alumni would still pursue a graduate management education knowing what they know now. That’s quite an endorsement of the value of the MBA and other graduate degrees in business. More interestingly, MBA alums were more convinced than other business alums who felt this way. Some 78% of the graduates of two-year MBA programs answered definitely yes, while another 17% said probably yes (see table below).

Source GMAC Alumni Perspectives Survey 2018

Alumni rated their graduate management education on a variety of outcomes. The greatest agreement among alumni of full- time MBA programs show that their education increased their earnings power. Professional and Executive MBA alumni agree that their education prepared them for leadership positions. Alumni of quantitative master’s programs indicate their education prepared them for their chosen career. Non-quantitative programs show the greatest agreement among alumni for preparation to work in culturally diverse organizations (see table below).

Source: GMAC Alumni Perspectives Survey 2018

One major benefit of a good MBA program is the network you acquire when you graduate. That network can help you throughout the career and the data backs up this point. More than nine out of ten alumni, regardless of program type, would recruit a student for a job opening from their alma mater. More than half of B-school alumni would definitely recruit a student from their alma mater for a job opening (52%) and 43% probably would. That’s yet another powerful endorsement of the degree (see table below).

Source: GMAC Alumni Perspectives Survey 2018

Another measure of value for a graduate management education is the Net Promoter Score (NPS)—a widely used industry metric for gauging consumer brand or customer loyalty—used by alumni to rank their likelihood to recommend their graduate business program or school to others.

Overall, many more alumni are promoters of their business school rather than detractors and this holds true across the spectrum of program types included in this survey, with Net Promoter Scores ranging from a low of 14 for Master in Management (MiM) alumni to a high of 59 for Executive MBA alumni (see table below). It’s worth noting that the highest NPS was for the two-year, full-time MBA experience.

Source: GMAC Alumni Perspective Survey 2018

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