INSEAD Posts Strong 2014 Jobs Report

MORE THAN ONE IN FOUR OF THE CLASS WENT TO ONE OF THREE CONSULTING FIRMS

More than one in four of the entire INSEAD class–26.7%–went to one of the three top firms, M/B/B. INSEAD’s reliance on consulting for MBA jobs far exceeded any other top business school in the world by a good margin. In the U.S., by comparison, Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business were at the high end, sending 35% of their MBAs into consulting last year–still six full percentage points less than INSEAD.

“Around half of this rise is due to more students choosing to return to their former employers with the rest coming from welcome growth in new hiring,” wrote Hastie in the school’s employment report. Many consulting firms prefer their employees to do a one-year MBA program, which typically lacks a summer internship that students can use to more easily transition into another field.

HIGHEST REPORTED SALARY; $187K FOR A JOB IN PRIVATE EQUITY OR VENTURE CAPITAL

The rise in consulting largely came at the expense of the corporate sector in which jobs fell seven full percentage points to 42% of the class. Financial services remained steady at 17& of the class, with some 41 students going into investment banking, sales and trading, and another 24 entering the private equity/venture capital field. In comparison to the big hauls by the consulting companies, the INSEAD hires by leading financial service companies were rather tepid. Credit Suisse led the financial pack with eight hires, followed by Citi and Morgan Stanley, which both employed six INSEAD MBAs each.

The highest paid 2014 MBA out of INSEAD landed a €168,000 base salary, or $187,102 base, with a PE or VC firm in Western Europe. The lowest salary: €25,300, also to a graduate in Western Europe. INSEAD said the regions offering the highest salaries were North America and Northern Europe with the lowest starting pay in Southern Europe.

Technology took an equal percentage of INSEAD’s Class of 2014 with finance, with 11% headed into e-commerce and Internet companies and 6% landing jobs in telecommunications and information technology. If you included media, tech actually surpassed finance. Amazon hired 39, most among the non-consulting firms, and Microsoft took 16 INSEAD MBAs, while Google hired 13. Uber (11), Apttus (11), Samsung (8), and Apple (7) were also among the major employers of INSEAD grads last year.

EIGHT OF EVERN TEN MBAS MOVED TO A NEW SECTOR, COUNTRY OR JOB FUNCTION

Hattie noted that “he term “GAFA” (Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple) has entered the student lexicon alongside “MBB” (McKinsey, Bain and BCG) – with Amazon and Google both in our top-ten recruiters for 2014 and Apple in the top twenty. Indeed, IT, telecoms, e-commerce, internet and media now account for 19% of the total class – more than the entire financial services sector. Unsurprisingly perhaps, tech salaries are higher than in many other fields.”

As is typical at INSEAD, 2014 was a year of big career changes for many graduates. “Some 81% of the class moved to a new sector, country or job function, while 21% rose to the challenge of change across all three dimensions,” INSEAD reported. Still, more than half of the graduating class–55% n all–took jobs in Europe. Some 20% landed positions in Asia Pacific, while 11% gained jobs in Africa and the Middle East. About 10% of INSEAD’s class accepted jobs in North America, while just 4% ended up in Latin America.

The startup culture also appears to be alive and well in Europe. “In the longer term, the biggest career-change trend that we see among our alumni is a movto start their own company some years after graduating. Indeed some 6% of the class of 33% 2014 started their own companies immediately on leaving INSEAD and we see more and more students choosing to go work for a start-up or SME as a stepping stone to start their entrepreneurial journey.”

DON’T MISS: AN INTERVIEW WITH INSEAD DEAN ILIAN MIHOV