GMAC Survey Finds that Corporate Employers Seek MBAs with Communication, Strategy, and Data Analysis Skills

According to the latest GMAC Corporate Recruiters Survey, competency in communication, strategy, and data analysis are the most in-demand skills for MBA recruits. And corporate recruiters predict they will only grow in importance over the next five years. The survey includes responses from 1,028 respondents in 34 countries. Over half of the respondents come from Fortune 500 companies.

Within the survey, respondents who named communication and technology as important future skills were also asked to provide detail on the specific areas of expertise that they predict will grow in importance. Within communication, 81 percent of employers selected cross-cultural competence, 77 percent chose multilingualism, and 75 percent chose active listening. Within technology, 80 percent of employers selected Web3/Blockchain/VR, 75 percent selected cloud-based technology, and 74 percent selected data visualization, AI and machine learning, and statistical analysis.

The survey also asked employers to assess graduates’ preparedness in these skills. Among U.S.-based employers, fewer than half agreed that graduates are well or adequately prepared in the areas of active listening, negotiating, nonverbal communication, multilingualism, cross-cultural competence, and conflict resolution. While U.S. companies were slightly more positive on graduates’ skills in technology, they still registered lower than other regions. Only 54 percent of U.S. employers agreed that graduates are adequately prepared, compared to 65 percent globally. 

GMAC Prospective Students Survey Finds Candidates Seek Business Degree to “Enrich Life and Develop Potential.”

The latest GMAC Prospective Students survey results provide a view into the shifting values and preferences of business school hopefuls. This year’s results show how Gen Z, who now make up the majority of business school applicants, and Millennials overlap and differ in their motivations, expectations, preferences, and career aspirations. 

The global survey includes over 2700 respondents from more than 130 countries. 

Key findings include:

Most candidates reported that they were seeking a business degree “to enrich their life and develop their potential.” 

• When respondents were asked to select their key motivation for attending business school, 79 percent of respondents chose “enrich life and develop potential.” GMAC’s report notes that this motivation was the top option selected across gender, generation, and region. 

• The next most frequently selected motivations included: Increase income (64 percent), Gain business knowledge (61 percent), and Enhance network (60 percent). 

• Gen Z respondents were much more likely than millennials (about 10 percentage points) to select “increase income” and “expand network” as top motivators.

Most candidates believe that businesses have a social responsibility to their communities. 

• Just over four in ten respondents globally, 42 percent, view Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) as essential components of graduate management education. While there were no noteworthy differences between generations, female respondents were more likely (52 percent) than males (36 percent) to hold this view.

• The majority of respondents agreed that corporations have a social responsibility to the countries where they operate and the people who support them. Among those who view CSR as essential to the business school curriculum, 80 percent agreed that corporations have a social responsibility. 

• Among U.S. respondents, differences emerged in views on corporate social responsibility between those who do and who do not identify as part of an underrepresented population. Among respondents who did not identify as an underrepresented population, 61 percent agreed that corporations have a social responsibility, whereas just 35 percent of respondents who identified with an underrepresented group agreed. 

The one-year MBA emerged as the most preferred program type. 

• Globally, candidates expressed the greatest preference for full-time, in-person MBA programs (of either one or two-year durations) over flexible or executive MBA programs or specialized master’s programs. 

• Gen Z respondents (87 percent) were more likely than Millennials (72 percent) to express a preference for in-person programs. 

• Women, Millennials, and first-generation candidates remained the most likely groups to express a preference for online and hybrid programs.

• North American respondents expressed a greater preference for longer programs (39 percent), over shorter programs that were 13-18 months (29 percent), or one-year or less (13 percent).  

Gen Z candidates expressed less interest in pursuing tech careers. 

• Among all prospective students, consulting continues to be the most sought-after industry for post-graduate work followed by technology. Interest in tech has leveled off among women and members of underrepresented populations.

• Gen Z respondents reported a greater interest in finance and accounting (41 percent) over tech careers (35 percent).

• A greater proportion of Millennials remain interested in tech (47 percent) versus finance and accounting (41 percent).

2022 GMAC Corporate Recruiter’s Survey: Strong Job Market Expected to Continue for Business School Talent

The Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) has released the results for the 2022 Corporate Recruiters Survey. The nearly 1,000 global respondents, which included both staffing firms and corporate recruiters, described a highly favorable hiring outlook for business school graduates. 

Below we’ve highlighted key findings. You can find the full results summary here. 

Hiring Outlook Is Strongly Favorable 

• Most respondents said they expect to hire MBAs this year—92 percent of corporate recruiters and 95 percent of staffing firms. In comparison with past surveys, this represents a highly favorable environment for graduates. 

• 63 percent of respondents expect international demand for business school graduates to increase over the next five years, with just about two percent expecting a decrease in demand. In the U.S. the outlook was slightly less optimistic, but still positive with 46 percent of corporate recruiters expecting demand to increase in the next five years. Just over half, 51 percent, expect demand to remain stable, while about three percent expect a decrease. 

Rebound in International Mobility

• A larger number of recruiters are open to making international hires this year. 56 percent of respondents said they are planning to or willing to make an international hire, compared to just 48 percent in 2021. Just under one-third, 35 percent, said that they currently have plans to make an international hire, compared with 24 percent last year. 

Recruiters Believe Business School Prepares Hires for Success

• Just under 90 percent of respondents reported confidence that business schools prepare students for success within their organization. When asked about the reasoning behind their confidence, most noted that graduates have: strong communication skills (73 percent), versatile skill sets (68 percent), and strategic thinking skills (66 percent). 

• U.S. recruiters ranked as the most confident in business school graduates globally with 50 percent noting highly confident and 42 percent noting confident.

• Recruiters from large, public companies reported higher confidence in business school graduates than those from smaller organizations. Among the Global Fortune 100 companies, 47 percent reported high confidence, compared with 24 percent from recruiters located within smaller organizations (<100 employees). 

• Industry recruiters in consulting and technology were the most likely to report high confidence in business school graduates, whereas nonprofit and government recruiters were the least likely to report high confidence. 

Salaries Remain Steady for MBAs and Increase Amongst Specialized Business Degrees

• While median starting salaries for MBAs are higher than for other new hires, the median planned offers remained consistent between 2021 and 2022. 

• Within the US, recruiters said that they plan to offer higher median starting salaries this year when compared to last year for some business masters degrees: Master of Accounting (median increased 25K compared to 2021), Master of Finance (increased 15K), Master of Data Analytics (increased 10K). Median salaries for Master of Management and Master of Business Analytics remained consistent with 2021. 

• Recruiters also noted that their companies are updating benefits packages to appeal to younger employees; 32 percent of recruiters said that they offer loan repayment assistance, and 40 percent called out the addition of corporate volunteering to their benefits package. 

U.S. Remains Least Likely World Region to View Online and In-Person Degrees Equally

• Globally, respondents in 2022 were more likely to view graduates of online business programs as equivalent to graduates of in-person programs (60 percent) when compared to last year. In 2021 just 34 percent agreed that they view graduates equally. 

• The U.S. lags in this assessment with just 29 percent of respondents agreeing that they view graduates equally (a decrease from 33 percent in 2021). 

• Those who viewed online programs as equal to in-person were slightly more likely to emphasize the importance of specific knowledge/skill areas. Those who did not view the programs equally were more likely to emphasize the importance of interpersonal/soft skills. 

Post-Pandemic, Prospective MBA Students Express Greater Interest in Hybrid Learning and One-Year Full-Time MBA Programs

The Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) recently released the 2022 results summary from its Prospective Students Survey. The survey, which was issued in 2021, garnered over 6,500 responses from prospective MBA students around the world. The resulting summary examines the shifting preferences of prospective students as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the delivery models of graduate management education. 

Below we provide a high-level summary of the findings. The full GMAC results summary is available here. 

While respondents do not feel that online and in-person formats provide the same value, there is growing interest in hybrid models. 

• Globally, respondents are still more likely to disagree that an online and an in-person graduate management degree offers the same level of opportunity in terms of networking (79 percent), value (73 percent), and career prospects (66 percent). But respondents are slightly less negative in 2021 than they were in 2020.   

• Globally, 20 percent of respondents in 2021 prefer a hybrid delivery model, an uptick from 14 percent in 2019. 

• Hybrid programs are particularly attractive to prospective students interested in an Executive MBA, Part-time MBA, or Flexible MBA, although interest in hybrid models increased significantly for all program types between 2019 and 2021.  

Consulting continues to top prospective students’ industry and job function preference lists, though interest in the technology industry continues to grow. 

• While both men and women express interest in consulting, men are more likely than women to select consulting as their industry (+8 percentage points) and job function (+9 percentage points) of choice. 

• Women are more likely than men to express interest in the marketing (+12 percentage points), media and communication (+9 percentage points), media/entertainment (+7 percentage points), and non-profit (+6 percentage points) industries.  

• Globally, interest in the technology industry increased three percentage points from 2019 to 39 percent in 2021. Among non-business undergraduate majors, technology is the most sought-after industry (49 percent). In 2021, a growing number of women expressed interest in technology compared to 2019 (+5 percentage points). 

• Prospective students most frequently list their post-degree career goals as: obtain a senior level position, get a raise/salary increase, obtain an executive level position, manage people, manage projects, and work for a company where they can travel internationally. 

• “Become the CEO of a company” provides a notable gender disparity within career goals. Globally, 31 percent of males list this as a career goal, while just 24 percent of females do. In general, U.S.-based respondents are less likely to name this as a goal (21 percent). 

• In 2021, the number of prospective students interested in changing industries or job functions (32 percent) returned to pre-pandemic levels after an uptick in 2020 (36 percent). Among U.S. respondents, a higher percentage are looking to make a career change (42 percent) which is, again, consistent with pre-pandemic levels (41 percent in 2019). 

International prospective students are more favorable on the use of standardized admissions tests.  

• Similar to pre-pandemic levels, about ten percent of prospective students say that having to take a standardized admissions test may deter them from applying. 

• About 60 percent of international students agree that standardized admissions tests improve fairness and reliability in evaluating applicants, and that they allow candidates to demonstrate academic readiness. Among U.S.-based prospective students, the number agreeing with those statements hovers closer to 50 percent. Similarly, while 63 percent of international respondents feel that standardized admissions tests increase transparency, just 55 percent of domestic respondents do. 

• While about half of respondents (52 percent) agree that test waivers make it easier to apply to a program, fewer agree that test waivers make it easier for applicants to gain admission (44 percent). 

• About 40 percent agree that the criteria to obtain a test waiver does not apply to a large proportion of applicants (43 percent) and the criteria to obtain a waiver is complex (40 percent). About one in five feel that schools should not offer test waivers for the 2021 admissions cycle. 

Wharton Announces First Full-Time MBA Class in which Women Comprise the Majority

The Wharton School has become the first of the “magnificent seven” (M7) to announce, within its newest full-time MBA class, that more women gained admission than men. Women make up 52 percent of Wharton’s incoming class, which is the largest proportion in the storied program’s 140-year history and a large uptick from 41 percent the previous year. The remaining M7 schools have yet to release data on their incoming classes, but last year, the highest percentages of women were found at Harvard Business School (44 percent) and Stanford’s Graduate School of Business (47 percent). 

While women now make up the majority in both law and medical schools, parity has been harder to achieve within MBA programs. However, according to the Forté Foundation, a non-profit that promotes gender parity in business, the number of women in business school has steadily increased over the last 15 years. Forté has tracked female enrollment in about 50 full-time domestic MBA programs, and notes that while women made up only 30 percent of the total in 2005, that number increased to 39 percent in 2020. Also in 2020, a record-high 22 MBA programs enrolled classes that were over 40 percent women.

Is this a trend or an anomaly due to the effects of the pandemic on women in the workforce? Business schools saw a large uptick in applications as a result of the pandemic. And while the number of applicants from both sexes increased, according to the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC), full-time MBA programs reported a 62 percent increase in applications from female students in 2020 compared to a 42 percent increase in 2019. 

Women, historically, have been more interested in seeking their MBA through hybrid and flexible models and the 2021 GMAC Prospective Students Survey showed that women reported a greater openness towards the hybrid learning models necessitated by the pandemic. Women were more willing to complete their degree online; 60 percent of U.S.-based women said that they were willing to complete more than 30 percent of their MBA degree online compared to just 52 percent of men. Similarly, women were more likely to agree that “career opportunities gained through an on-campus graduate business degree are the same as gained through an online degree” whereas men were more likely to strongly disagree (24 percent). 

While more data will be necessary to determine if the uptick in women applicants and matriculants is more than a response to a moment in history, there is room for optimism about the changes underway. Elissa Sangster, Forté Foundation’s CEO, expressed her pleasure that the pandemic didn’t deter women from seeking an MBA. “So many of our schools are hitting that 40 percent mark and heading north of it,” she says. “That’s going to change the dynamic already in business school and change the access point for women.” 

Business Schools Speak Out in Defense of International Students

Early last week, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency announced updated guidelines for the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), which will impact foreign-born students studying in the U.S. The updates include the following:

• Foreign students on F-1 visas who take full online course loads will not be permitted to maintain residency in the U.S.

• Students may take a hybrid course load with both in-person and online offerings. The student’s school must certify that he/she is not taking an entirely online course load.

• Students whose course loads change throughout the semester will still be subject to the rule. If a student changes her course selections or is required to switch to online-only at any point in the semester, she must notify the agency within ten days.

• Students whose schools are online-only should consider transferring to a school offering in-person instruction to lawfully remain in the country.

• Students who remain in the U.S. while taking an online-only course load may face “immigration consequences.”

The guidance, which was updated in response to the COVID-19 pandemic for the spring and summer 2020 semesters, to allow for online study, is a reversion back to the previous ruling that SEVP does not allow for a student to take an online course load and maintain U.S. residency. However, given the uncontrolled nature of the pandemic throughout much of the country, schools and students have expressed shock at the update, particularly as many universities are still seeking the safest means to proceed with classes in the fall and must now contend with decreased flexibility. The universities that have publicly responded to the guidelines have been clear in their intentions to support their international students.

• NYU announced that its fall plans would include a hybrid model with an emphasis on accommodating international students. Stanford, which had planned to provide most courses online, also pledged to support its students in finishing their degrees. Columbia University communicated its intentions to “alleviate the negative effect of these new regulations,” as well a plan to provide pop-up centers for students unable to return to campus.

• Princeton, MIT, Duke, California Institute of Technology, and Dartmouth told Forbes that they are reviewing the policy’s implications and noted the importance of international students to their communities.

• MIT and Harvard have filed a lawsuit against the administration stating that the option to offer remote courses during the pandemic is “of paramount importance to universities across the country.” Northeastern University has also joined the suit and Cornell is supporting it via amicus brief.

• The California State Attorney General has also announced a lawsuit against the new policy.

The updated guidelines are thought to be part of the Trump Administration’s push for schools to re-open for in-person instruction in the fall, as well as part of continued efforts to restrict immigration. Last month, the President suspended the H-1B visa program for the remainder of 2020 via executive order. While the order kept the Optional Practical Training (OPT) program in operation, which allows international students to work in the country for one to three years, the H-1B visa is often seen as the goal for OPT participants.  As such, the executive order disappointed business schools as it may serve to discourage international students from studying in the U.S. by making it harder to find long-term employment post-graduation. Last October, the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC) supported by a group of 50 business school deans, published and signed a white paper calling for an increase in H-1B visas to encourage the flow of international talent into the country.

There is a sense among U.S. business schools that the administration’s restrictions on immigration and work visas will only further harm their ability to compete internationally. According to GMAC, almost half (48 percent) of MBA programs saw a decline in applications from international students for their 2019 entering classes.

GMAC Asks Media to Delay Publishing Business School Rankings

Last month the Graduate Management Admissions Council (GMAC), along with several other business education organizations, requested that MBA ranking organizations postpone publishing rankings amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The request, sent via letter to Bloomberg Businessweek, The Economist, Forbes, Financial Times, QS, and US News & World Report, asked for the delay on the grounds that business schools are working to meet the needs of their students and communities and need support rather than additional responsibilities during this period.

The letter also pointed out the pandemic’s likely effect on metrics, speculating that survey results from this period may do more to reveal current stress than a business school’s effectiveness, with graduating students, alumni, and companies who recruit MBA graduates all facing significant challenges of their own.

The request concluded with a call for dialogue between the ranking organizations and the business school community. GMAC hopes to work in partnership with business education industry groups (AACSB, EFMD, and MBA CSEA) and the ranking organizations to consider the short and long-term implications of COVID-19 on business school education, including student mobility restrictions, test center closures, corporations’ hiring plans, and the challenge ranking organizations face in updating metrics during this period that will accurately measure a business school’s effectiveness. For example, schools’ responses during the pandemic regarding their ability to innovate to meet the needs of their stakeholders may more accurately reflect their value to prospective students than previously relied upon metrics.

The response to the request has been mixed.

• Bloomberg Businessweek announced earlier this month that it would suspend its rankings. In addition to the request put forth by GMAC and schools, Bloomberg News Senior Editor Caleb Solomon added that it “felt inappropriate” to ask students, alumni, and recruiters to fill out a survey in an already overwhelming time. He also pointed out that the data collected would likely be overwhelmed by the pandemic and may not accurately show differences between schools.

• Forbes, which publishes a biennial ranking of business schools, ranked the programs in 2019 and is not due to have another ranking published until 2021.

• The Economist and QS have not published statements on their intentions to publish MBA rankings this year. Typically, The Economist and QS publish their Global FT MBA rankings in the fall.

• The Financial Times, which produces the most influential business school ranking in Europe and Asia, published its Global MBA 2020 ranking in January, and just last week published its 2020 Global Executive Education MBA Ranking. Despite the pandemic and global uncertainty, their latest ranking shows change at the top, but it mostly consists of a reshuffling of established front-runner schools.

• The most highly anticipated response, however, is from U.S. News and World Report, whose business school ranking garners the most attention within the U.S. Their Chief Data Strategist, Bob Morse, told Poets & Quants that, “the team at U.S. News continues to monitor the unprecedented disruptions caused by COVID-19 to business schools themselves, and their current and prospective students. As a result, we’re still reviewing our strategies for our upcoming Full-time and Part-time Best Business Schools rankings, as well as our fall 2020 data collection.”

While it remains to be seen how each ranking organization will move forward with compiling and publishing rankings, the GMAC letter provides valuable input for prospective business school students to keep in mind when reviewing available rankings and considering schools for the upcoming year.

• While most surveys combine more than one year of data, to smooth sudden changes, carefully consider if a school of interest has dropped or risen suddenly to determine what metrics may be driving the change. Are certain metrics likely affected by the pandemic and likely to rebound? Or do you think they accurately reflect the schools’ ability to meet the needs of its students?

• Look at each metric individually for a more complete view. Many of the ranking websites even allow you to sort schools based on the component metrics. You can then see how the schools rank based on what you are most interested in (quality of alumni network, starting salary, research opportunities, experience with faculty, etc.). This may also help you to understand what may be most affected by the lack of student mobility, testing cancellations, etc.

While the appeal of rankings is strong, we urge you to carefully consider how you can use them to find the best experience for you. Our advice has always been, and remains, to use them as only one component of your decision-making. During this period, more than ever, they should be a method to inform, but not drive your business school selection.

Even Elite U.S. MBA Programs Experience Application Drop as International Students Look to Study Elsewhere

Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that even elite U.S. MBA programs experienced a steep drop in the number of applications they received in the 2018-2019 admissions cycle compared to the year before. The business schools at Dartmouth, Yale, Northwestern, and Duke each reported double-digit percentage drops in applications compared to the prior year, and even the most prestigious programs such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford, University of Pennsylvania, and Columbia were affected. The declines continue the downward trend for the MBA. The Wall Street Journal also reported new data from the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), which shows application numbers falling for the fifth straight year. The admissions cycle that ended in the spring of this year garnered 135,096 applications for programs including the MBA; a total year-over-year decrease of 9.1 percent, which is larger than the previous year’s decline of 7 percent.

Though the declining applications are attributed to many factors, of primary concern is the perceived change in environment for international students and immigrants. Currently, in the U.S., 85,000 H-1B visas are issued annually to highly-skilled workers via lottery with the demand far exceeding the supply. According to the Wall Street Journal, under the Trump Administration, there have been an increasing number of requests for H-1B visa applicants to provide supplemental information and many are still being declined.  Prospective students’ concerns about the availability of work visas post-graduation are impacting their school selection. The Wall Street Journal quotes Matthew J. Slaughter, dean of the Tuck School at Dartmouth: “A lot of individuals, a lot of terrific international applicants, they’re choosing not to apply to any U.S. schools,” he said.  

This is evident in the 13.7 percent decline in international applications seen this year for U.S. programs. According to a GMAC report released last week, Early Warning Signals: Winners and Losers in the Global Race for Talent, the U.S. experienced, “a steeper decline than any other country in the world, and a drop that came amidst largely rising or stable applications everywhere else in the world.” Both Canada and Europe reported increases in the number of international applicants in 2019. And Chinese business schools reported a 5.2 percent increase in applicant numbers, though it was driven primarily by domestic demand. While China still sends the largest number of business school students abroad, Chinese applicants are increasingly opting to attend school in Asia.

The GMAC report highlights the changes in international demand for U.S. business programs as a leading indicator for international talent mobility, suggesting that while business schools may be experiencing the negative effects now, the U.S. workforce may suffer losses in talent and productivity in future years. The report states, “Indeed, immigrants play an outsized role in innovation and entrepreneurial activity. According to a Brookings Institution study, ‘…while immigrants represent about 15 percent of the general US workforce, they account for around a quarter of entrepreneurs and a quarter of inventors in the US. Moreover, over a third of new firms have at least one immigrant entrepreneur in its initial leadership team.’ For startup firms valued at $1 billion or more, in particular, immigrants have started more than half, and they play key management and product development roles in more than 80 percent of these companies.”

The GMAC report goes on to recommend policies that the U.S. can adopt to safeguard its talent pipeline in future years, while also bolstering international applicants to U.S. business schools. These include updating the visa regulations by removing “per-country” visa caps and reforming the H-1B visa program, as well as creating a “Heartland Visa,” which encourages immigration into regions of the country that could most benefit from injections of talented individuals. Fifty business school deans and 13 CEOs have signed an accompanying open letter that endorses the policy recommendations of the GMAC report and, more broadly, calls for a change in the U.S. approach to high-skilled immigration. Bill Boulding, dean of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, while expressing optimism about the future of U.S. business schools to the Wall Street Journal, notes that schools will need to continue to change to address the current environmental challenges. “The pipeline of talent to the U.S. is being diverted elsewhere. We see a pattern that is really alarming,” Boulding said. 

Reduced International Demand for U.S. Business Schools and a Robust Economy Create a Beneficial Environment for Applicants

New data released this month from the General Management Admissions Council (GMAC) shows that U.S. graduate business schools are still suffering from a decrease in international applicants. Just under half, 48 percent, of U.S. programs reported in the GMAC Preliminary Application Trends Survey that they had received fewer international applications at this point compared to the same time last year. This survey, which collects mid-cycle application data from graduate business schools, includes data from over 700 graduate business programs around the world. Among full-time two-year MBA programs in the U.S., about 68 percent reported application declines from international students, while another 9 percent reported that applications were flat. Fewer than a quarter of the programs reported that applications were up. Among the 68 percent reporting declines, almost one-third of respondents reported that the applications were significantly down, 17 percent reported moderate declines, and 19 percent reported slight declines.

This report coincides with data that GMAC released last week from the Prospective Students’ Survey. While prospective students’ plans to apply to international programs have stayed relatively flat over the last few years, hovering around 58 percent, there have been changes in students’ location preferences. Among applicants who plan to apply to international programs (not within their country of residence), 62 percent plan to apply in Western Europe, with U.S. programs following at 61 percent. While the percentages are close, this is a switch from 2017 when the U.S. was the most named location at 63 percent followed by Western Europe at 58 percent. Prospective students were also asked to select their one most preferred location. Both the U.S. and Western Europe received equal proportions of respondents at 40 percent each. The longer-term trend, however, shows a gradual decline in preference for the U.S. between 2009 and 2016, with a sharper downturn in the last two years to 40 percent; the exact opposite trend occurs for Western Europe, which shows a gradual increase in preference with a more marked uptick to 40 percent since 2016.

Among all candidates, those applying domestically and internationally, the U.S. is still the most popular destination to apply for an MBA. However, the percentage of all applicants planning to apply to U.S. programs declined from 2017 to 2018 by three percentage points, from 68 to 65 percent, while interest in Western Europe increased from 37 percent to 42 percent. Interest in Canadian programs increased just one point, to 20 percent.

The decrease in international student applications, combined with the strong economy, and the rising cost of MBA programs, appears to be impacting overall application volume to U.S. business schools. Poets and Quants published an article last week declaring it a “buyer’s market” for admitted students. Though acknowledging that official numbers have yet to be released, according to admissions officers, there have been lower application volumes again this year, even among the top ten schools. This makes for the second year of decreasing applications, even amongst the highly competitive programs. Admitted students are reportedly receiving higher than normal numbers of acceptances from rival schools, as well as generous scholarship offers. The Poets and Quants article quotes an unnamed admissions officer from a top-ten ranked business school as saying, “When you have this many schools down and many are down for two years in a row, yield is going to be a nightmare because everyone has had to dig deeper in the pool. I would not be surprised if schools had to go deep into their waitlists or have to shrink their classes. It’s the collective impact of so many schools being down that is unique.“ Yield, which is the total number of admitted students who matriculate into a program, is important for balancing both the selectivity and revenue components of the program. 

Application Volume Drops at Top MBA Programs in US

The Financial Times reported this week that four of the most prestigious business schools in the US saw a drop in MBA application volume for 2018 matriculation. Harvard, NYU Stern, Duke Fuqua, and Berkeley Haas each reported a decrease in applications from 2017 that ranged from 4 percent to 7.5 percent.

According to Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) data, in the US full-time two-year MBA programs’ application volumes have been in decline since 2014. However, this is not consistent across programs. In 2017, those with larger classes (201 or more students) accounted for 6 percent of MBA programs, but 55 percent of applications and 32 percent of enrollments. Larger schools were more likely to report application volume increases in 2017, while smaller were more likely to have experienced decreases. This decrease now appears to have expanded to the large, prestigious MBA programs.

While the decline in applications has not yet affected Harvard’s 11 percent acceptance rate or median GMAT score of 730, it was fairly significant at 4.5 percent. Similarly, NYU Stern reported a nearly 4 percent drop, while Duke Fuqua and Berkeley Haas were at about 6 percent and 7.5 percent respectively.

In contrast, MBA application numbers globally continue to increase. “When looked at internationally, graduate business education is a growth stock. Applications to Canadian, European, and Asian schools are increasing at an enormous rate,” said Bill Boulding, Dean of Duke Fuqua. Other admissions representatives who spoke with the Financial Times pointed out a multi-faceted cause for the lower application rates in the US:

• Decreasing numbers of international applicants to US schools, due to a less welcoming political climate, as well as increasingly rigid immigration requirements.

• Increasingly competitive European and Asian MBAs, offered in English, for those wanting a global experience. Some of these well-ranked programs also offer expedited timelines.

• Increasing tuition and a robust economic climate in the US, which increases the cost of an MBA in both direct costs and wages-lost.

• Increasing interest in part-time, online, and/or one-year MBA programs.

Take-aways for prospective MBA students

• If you have dual-citizenship, don’t forget to note this on your application. It could be advantageous for you in the admissions process.

• Be sure to highlight your international experiences and interests in your application. Admissions officers want to create a diverse student body and, with fewer international applicants, these experiences are likely to stand out more.

• Consider that in strong economic climates, with low unemployment, schools are likely to receive fewer applicants. While this may not significantly change acceptance rates at all of the most prestigious programs, it can provide some benefit with regard to both admissions likelihood, as well as the possibility for substantial merit-based scholarships.

• Choose your MBA program carefully, rather than automatically selecting a full-time, two-year program. Learn from these trends, by thinking carefully about the type of MBA that will benefit you most. International programs, one-year or expedited programs, and part-time cohort-based programs can all be worthwhile for you and your career.