Accepted: Financial Times Releases 2019 Global MBA Rankings

Financial Tiimes Releases 2019 MBA Rankings

This year’s Financial Times’ Top 10 Business Schools is made up of the same names as last year’s list. Although Stanford Graduate School of Business has stayed in the top spot, there was a lot of shuffling around of the other top 9. Most notably, Harvard Business School rose to the #2 spot after falling to 5th place last year.

Despite a lot of movement in the FT ranking, the mix of countries in the list has stayed stable. The UK continues to be a strong force. The number of schools from Australia, India, and Singapore is comparable to 2017 or 2016.

Top 100 Schools by Country

Country	Schools Per Country (Based on School's Primary Campus)
Total	100
United States	51
United Kingdon	11
China	6
France	5
India	4
Singapore	3
Australia	3
Canada	3
Germany	3
Spain	3
Switzerland	2
Costa Rico	1
Ireland	1
Italy	1
Netherlands	1
Portugal	1
South Korea	1

The FT began its business school rankings in the late 1990s. Twenty years later, a total of 150 schools participated in this year’s FT survey. All participating schools met the FT’s entry criteria. For the 2019 edition, alumni of the class of 2015 were surveyed. Approximately 8,000 alumni completed the survey (38% response rate).

The ranking was comprised of 20 different criteria. Alumni responses were responsible for 8 criteria, with a total weight of 61%. School data accounted for 11 criteria, with a total weight of 29%. The research rank counted for the final 10%.

Here are some of the highlights from the rankings:

This is the second year in a row that Stanford GSB not only takes the top overall spot, but also had alumni with the highest weighted average salary ($228,074, increased from $214,742) and career progress.
HBS ranked 1st as the school alumni would recruit graduates from. They also had the second highest weighted salary ($205,486) and rose 15 places to a joint 1st place in the research rank.
INSEAD, at #3, is the highest ranked MBA program in Europe. Their weighted salary of $179,661 was the highest for European schools and above the average of $137,900.
China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) rose from 8th to 5th place this year. This is the school’s highest position ever, and the highest FT rank ever attained by an Asian school.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a criterion for the first time this year. University of Virginia, Darden has taken the top spot for having a large portion of its core curriculum on the subject.
Fudan University School of Management (Shanghai) had the largest increase over pre-MBA salaries. There was a whopping 195% increase after graduation, with an average salary of $110,062.
University of Florida-Warrington was ranked top in value for money based on alumni salary, course length, tuition costs, and income lost during the MBA.

Top 10 B-Schools

2019 Rank	3 yr. Rank	School Name	Country	Weighted Salary ($)	Salary Increase (%)
1	1	Stanford Graduate School of Business	US	228,074	129
2	4	Harvard Business School	US	205,486	112
3	2	INSEAD	France/Singapore	179,661	104
4	3	UPenn Wharton	US	197,267	114
5	8	CEIBS	China	174,115	183
6	5	London Business School	UK	169,675	102
7	7	Chicago Booth	US	185,861	126
8	10	MIT Sloan	US	188,173	107
9	8	Columbia Business School	US	184,099	114
10	11	UC Berkeley Haas	US	188,746	104

The Financial Time Work & Careers editor, Isabel Berwick, is promising to “re-examine” the FT rankings for relevance and also possibly develop additional rankings. Stay tuned for next year’s Financial Time Rankings and anticipate changes.

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