vd9 wrote:
I've returned from the assessment day on April 3rd. There were 7 of us, all male. As for the nationalities - two from France, three from China, one from India and one from Ukraine. Engineering background was prevalent in our group (only one of us was with finance background), many of the fellows had significant int'l experience. Everything went quite good in my opinion, the day was an excellent and pleasant experience, Lisa told us that we should expect the reply not earlier than in two weeks due to the Easter holidays. Let me know if you have any particular questions - I'll be happy to answer them in case I can.
PS
libraal, thank you for the kind words, and please be informed that IMD brand is not very well known within Ukraine (most of the high-level executives I know about here are associated with another school)
Best of luck vd9, I hope you get the phone call! The fact you're from the Ukraine works in your favour!
I had an interesting phone call today with an IMD alum working in my company. Here's the summary (comparing IMD vs. LBS):
1. The internships at LBS may give a real smell of the place, but on the other hand the quality depends on who is your coach/buddy in the company and what tasks you're entrusted. With IMD, an alternative to internship is the consulting project. Because companies pay tens of thousands CHF for the project, these projects normally get support from the senior management and they expect results. So, the consulting project is an intense 2(?) weeks with a (high profile) deliverable. On the other hand, LBS gives you the opportunity to experience the day-to-day work in a company/sector + you get paid for it. I suppose an equivalent of the IMD consulting project would be to get on to the LBS consulting team, however, competition may be quite tough.
2. With regards to the alumni network, IMD's smaller class might be compensated by IMD's bigger executive education programs. Here, IMD has better standing than LBS, although I can't judge how much better. It does rank quite highly in most rankings though. If we trust wikipedia, IMD puts through 8000 executives in one year, LBS puts through 3000. Students may get access to executives when their on-campus, e.g. during lunches. However, this needs to be carefully managed through Career Services as sometimes some students who don't know what they are after may abuse this option, thus, creating potential hassle for the executives and also depriving other students of opportunity. The reasoning in favour of IMD is that it is executives who may make the recruitment decisions, so if IMD is better known with them than LBS, obviously you may have better chances. Having said that, LBS has circa 10,000 living alums, whereas IMD has circa 3000. However, where LBS alums may be equally spread between financial services, consulting and industry, IMD is heavy on industry. Web2.0 (Facebook and Youtube) statistics show an interesting picture in favour of IMD vs. LBS.
3. With regards to the class bonding, at the end of the year in IMD you do get to know all 90 people in the class very well. This is because you change the study groups 4 times a year, each month you change the places in the lecture theatres + you get to know each other in interest clubs. As to the interest clubs, I get the impression that they are not necessarily as big in IMD compared to LBS due to the number of students + in LBS you get better access to guest speakers and companies due to the location.
4. As to the personal development, leadership and self-awareness, it's achieved through 8 psychoanalytical assignments in 1 year (these are reviewed and commented by a psychological coach), 12 regular feedback, 20 hours of Jungian psychoanalytical coach + each group is assigned with a coach who looks after the group dynamics. I believe in LBS, you also get regular feedbacks and are assessed for the group activities. However, psychoanalytical assignments and 20 hours of coach could be unique to IMD. In LBS, you don't get to choose your first year study group, but you do get to choose all others. I suppose in LBS you can also get subjected to various group work activities through club participation and leadership.
5. In terms of jobs seniority on exit, the alum's impression was that it was easier to land a more senior position at exit at IMD if you are older and have a profile to substantiate higher expectations. His impression was also that recruiters' expectations at IMD or perception of the students is a bit different from INSEAD or LBS. I don't know if I fully agree with it. There may be some truth in it, but I've also been told that whatever the school those with outlying profiles will have to do a bit more work to find a job of their dream. It may be easier at IMD since they are used to dealing with more mature students, however, my LBS interviewer also mentioned that LBS's Career Services have such experience through placing Executive MBAs.
6. In terms of cost, IMD MBA is obviously more expensive than it used to be. My comparison render the cost of the 11 month program similar to 15 month program in LBS. Lausanne rental prices are comparable with London and food prices may even be more expensive. However, IMD's MBA program is actually subsidized with revenues from exec. education, so if they were to recoup all of their costs or run it at a profit it would have cost even more.
Well, I wish I could summarise the above with my conclusion and choice in favour of one school vs. the other, but I'm afraid I'm still thinking. But then each and everyone's personal situation is different, so you may not have the same constraints as I.
04 Apr 2012, 03:19
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