LinkedIn MBA Ranking: Stanford Takes First, Indian Schools Dominate

Rankings are a rough business. Creating them is a time-consuming proposition. Publishing them subjects you to criticism. Let’s face it: LinkedIn endured a lot of second-guessing from its 2023 MBA ranking.

This year, LinkedIn addressed the most glaring omission from its first outing. Back then, it adopted an “America First” approach that excluded international business schools. This year, LinkedIn chose an alternative path. It incorporated non-American programs, doubling the size of its ranking from 50 to 100 schools in the process. It is now without controversy, however (see 2024 LinkedIn MBA Ranking: New Expanded Global Approach, Same Silly Mistakes).

This year’s headline: There is a new #1. Stanford GSB snapped up the top spot, knocking Harvard Business School down to 3rd. LinkedIn’s global perspective shows up early, with INSEAD wedging itself into the #2 spot. In fact, international business schools make up almost a majority of LinkedIn’s MBA ranking – 49 of the 100 schools in all. While American programs generally follow conventional wisdom, European and Asian programs often deviate from expectations.

A CREDIBLE BAROMETER OF TOP AMERICAN SCHOOLS

Among American programs, LinkedIn aligns closely with similar rankings catering to American schools. Behind Stanford, INSEAD, and Harvard, the Wharton School and MIT Sloan placed 4th and 5th respectively. Northwestern Kellogg, Dartmouth Tuck, Columbia Business School, and Chicago Booth ran from 7th through 10th respectively. In other words, every M7 school is represented in LinkedIn’s Top 10. In fact, Dartmouth Tuck is the only non-M7 school in the group, though it also crashes the Top 10 in both the American-centric Bloomberg Businessweek and U.S. News & World Report rankings.

At the same time, five American programs rank between 12th and 18th with LinkedIn: Virginia Darden, Duke Fuqua, Yale SOM, Cornell Johnson, and UC Berkeley Haas. All but Duke Fuqua and Cornell Johnson placed among the Top 10 in either the latest US News or Bloomberg Businessweek rankings (though Johnson finished 9th in the more expansive Financial Times’ 2024 Global Ranking).

In other words, LinkedIn corresponds closely to the big American rankings at the top end. The only real deviation is Chicago Booth, which ranks 10th among American programs despite making 2nd and 3rd with Bloomberg Businessweek and U.S. News respectively.

INDIAN SCHOOLS MAKE A STATEMENT

However, LinkedIn now delivers a global ranking in the tradition of The Financial Times. That’s a departure from Bloomberg Businessweek, which ranks America, Europe, Asia, and Canada separately using different criteria, and U.S. News, which ignores the rest of the world altogether. Truth be told, Poets&Quants ranks American and International programs separately as well. This difference is what makes LinkedIn’s MBA ranking so intriguing.

For one, the ranking gravitates towards Indian business schools. Case in point: The Indian School of Business ranks 6th overall. That’s higher than Kellogg, Booth, Tuck, and Columbia. Why? That’s the frustrating part of the ranking. LinkedIn doesn’t supply any underlying data, opting instead to publish the Top 5 finishers in each of its pillars. Not surprisingly, the Indian School of Business doesn’t appear on any of the pillar listings. Hence, it is impossible to know where the school excels. In fact, LinkedIn doesn’t even include a blurb its school profile aside from listing competing programs and providing access to the school LinkedIn page. Admittedly, rankings are a starting point, but applicants need more than a number to factor whether a program is worth further research.

Big picture, the Indian Business School’s performance may not be much of an anomaly. After all, it ranked 31st with The Financial Times, where it reigns as the top MBA program in India. In LinkedIn, Indian programs performed very favorably. IIM Ahmedabad, considered the country’s top graduate leadership program, placed 19th. IIM Calcutta, IIM Bangalore, and IIM Lucknow all cracked the Top 30 at 24th, 27th, and 29th respectively. That doesn’t count IIM Indore breaking into the Top 50 at 46th (and the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade just misses the cut at 51st). Credit Networking, where the top five scores all belong to Indian institutions.

EYE-CATCHING DIFFERENCES WITH THE FINANCIAL TIMES

India’s bounty is China’s deficiency. In The Financial Times Ranking, Chinese MBA programs account for 6 programs in the Top 50. With LinkedIn, only CEIBS and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology slipped into the Top 50 (at 41st and 49th, no less). Compare that to The Financial Times, where they placed 21st and 35th. In fact, several highly-regarded Chinese programs missed the LinkedIn ranking altogether: Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, Fudan University, Peking University, and Hong Kong University. The Shanghai University of Finance and Economics even made the Top 25 of The Financial Times and Fudan University ranked higher than the UK’s Cambridge University. Those are some substantive exclusions without any data to explain it.

LinkedIn also posts other headscratchers. In Bloomberg Businessweek’s MBA ranking, SDA Bocconi finished as the top MBA program in Europe. The school also placed 3rd in the world with The Financial Times, making it one of P&Q’s 10 Business Schools to Watch in 2024. In LinkedIn, it only musters a 58th-place finish, ranking behind 22 other non-American business schools. WHU’s Otto Beisheim School of Management ranked 63rd globally with The Financial Times but placed 14th in LinkedIn – ahead of IESE Business School and HEC Paris. You’ll also find sizable gaps with IIM Lucknow (29th vs 85th), Hult International Business School (31st vs. 86th), Rotterdam School of Management (32nd vs. 61st), Babson College (38th vs. 86th), Polimi Graduate School of Management (53rd vs. 97th), and Ivey Business School (55th vs. 90th). In these cases, the school ranking is far higher with LinkedIn. By the same token, The Financial Times conferred higher rankings to IESE Business School (5th vs. 20th), Esade Business School (17th vs. 50th), Georgia Terry (40th vs. 72nd), Washington Foster (30th vs. 76th), and the National University of Singapore (27th vs. 89th).

LINKEDIN’S MBA RANKING METHODOLOGY

The LinkedIn methodology is based on five pillars. Each pillar is data-driven, with four being tethered to post-graduation outcomes:

Hiring and Demand: Tracks job placement rates and labor market demand, focusing on recent graduate cohorts from 2019 to 2023. This assessment is based on LinkedIn hiring data and recruiter InMail outreach data.

Ability to Advance: Tracks promotions among recent cohorts. It also tracks how quickly all past alumni have reached director or VP-level leadership roles. This assessment is based on standardized job titles.

Network Strength: Tracks network depth, or how connected alumni of the same program are to each other; network quality of the recent cohorts (2019-2023), measured by average connections alumni have with individuals in director-level positions or above; and network growth rate of the recent cohort before and after graduation. This assessment is based on member connection data.

Leadership Potential: Tracks the percentage of alumni with post-MBA entrepreneurship or C-suite experience.

Gender Diversity: Measures gender parity within recent graduate cohorts.

To be eligible for the full-time ranking, MBA programs must be accredited by AACSB or Equis. That said, LinkedIn tinkered with its ranking eligibility this year. Now, programs must have 1,500 or more total alumni, including 400 graduates who earned their degrees between 2019-2023. Last year, the eligibility threshold was set at 2,000 alumni and 500 graduates from 2018-2022. At the same time, LinkedIn excluded executive, part-time, mini, and certificate-driven MBAs from the samples to ensure the ranking centered squarely on full-time MBAs. As a whole, according to LinkedIn, the data was “drawn from the anonymized and aggregated profile information of LinkedIn’s members around the world.”

With the inclusion of international programs in 2024, you need to create an America-only ranking to see which programs moved up or down from LinkedIn’s inaugural ranking. SMU Cox made the biggest jump, going from 43rd to 25th among American programs. Pepperdine University’s Graziadio Business School moved up 16 spots to 30th, while Babson climbed 9 spots to 29th when only American schools are factored. In contrast, UC Irvine’s Merage School lost 12 spots to finish 26th. Brigham Young Marrott and Minnesota Carlson also fell 11 and 10 spots respectively.

Among the pillars, Harvard Business School and Stanford GSB scored highest in both Career Advancement and Leadership Potential. Pace University boasted the highest marks in Job Placement, with George Washington University topping Gender Diversity and the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade setting the bar for Networking.

PLENTY TO CRITICIZE

The LinkedIn pillars methodology boasts several advantages. For one, the data can be considered current and credible, coming from a platform used by professionals to highlight their backgrounds and credentials. At the same time, it approaches career progression using a five-year swath. Taking a longer-term approach, it theoretically reflects the varying immediate returns from various full-time programs. As noted earlier, the ranking is outcomes-driven, focusing on early hiring, promotional tracks, network strength, and influential alumni – all advantages in maximizing a six-figure MBA investment.

That said, LinkedIn fails to disclose whether the five pillars receive equal 20% weights. That would be particularly glaring with Gender Diversity – an input that ignores equally compelling diversity measures involving geography, industry, and professional roles. Most concerning, LinkedIn fails to supply the actual data behind each school – or even an index score. That way, readers could compare schools head-to-head in the areas they value. Instead, LinkedIn simply lists the Top 5 schools for each pillar in a graphic. While this is an improvement over the previous year, it excludes the remaining 95 schools, leaving it to a reader’s imagination on where their target schools sit after the cutoff.

How seriously should you take the LinkedIn Global MBA Ranking? Last year, LinkedIn made a load of rookie mistakes. The ranking lacked all transparency. Like this year, it failed to provide underlying data or even rankings in various measurables. Hence, readers couldn’t conduct side-by-side comparisons. While the ranking skewed towards outcomes, it failed to integrate the most insightful outcome of all: starting pay. Being a first-time ranking, you couldn’t fault LinkedIn for lacking the know-how to conduct satisfaction surveys with alumni. However, LinkedIn seemingly believes that vague data around having a job in a well-known company means graduates are thrilled with their alma maters. Alas, LinkedIn profiles don’t convey earnings or experience – and that is a fatal flaw with this ranking.

To their credit, LinkedIn addressed the global representation issue with a vengeance this time around. By ignoring transparency and pay and focusing on quantitative data over qualitative sentiments, LinkedIn has attempted to run before it could walk. The result is the same: their ranking quickly crumbles upon review. It is a promising concept that again bungles the execution – leaving it the discount version of The Financial Times Global Ranking.

Click on the following links on the next pages to access the full 2024 LinkedIn Ranking

2024 GLOBAL LINKEDIN MBA RANKING: 2024 vs. 2023 AND COMPARISON VS. 2024 FINANCIAL TIMES RANKING

2024 AMERICAN LINKEDIN MBA RANKING: 2024 vs. U.S. NEWS AND BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK

2024 AMERICAN LINKEDIN MBA RANKING: 2024 vs. 2023