Has Oxford finally gatecrashed into elite list?

I donno what to percieve, cos i've been talking to a lot of people and each had dissonant opinions...(these are the alums opinion, and i feel it is better than BW, or Forbes or ft etc...
one Ox alum said that the career services was bakwaas... and that it did not help much....
In fact another alum i spoke to said that OX Brand helped, but he did not say much about the bschool ......
The only area i see of advantage is that a lot many guys have heard of the brand and are thus headed in taht direction,rather than to any other school....
guys... i believe one thing... convince yourself rather than someone else's view.....
i have done a good amount of research and other school alum are of the opinioin that there are even better schools in the region.....
devil has given some useful data on top..... but the thing is that there are other schools also having similar features.....,so the question we want to ask is this....
why Ox?and why not some other school , which is already established and old and has similar things to boast abt

Hi Devil,

It’s great that you started this topic. Sorry that I did not respond earlier: it took me some time to write this (way too long) reply.

In my opinion, Oxbridge b-schools (I will not make Ox/Cam distinction at this point) are already comparable with US Elite – that is, if we look at this issue from general perspective.

But you know that the perception really varies among regions and industries. For traditional industries, as Prashok noted, Oxbridge is in fact perceived higher than US Elite. However, for typical MBA-related jobs (big consulting, finance) Oxbridge schools are not considered strong enough yet. As to geographical factor - I guess that the majority will agree that in the UK, Oxbridge schools have an advantage over US Elite. But again, even there their reputation is different for different companies.

What Oxbridge schools need to do in order to win respect not only as part of great universities, but as strong b-schools by themselves is a very interesting question. Nice buildings and state-of-the-art facilities are good, but in the end, its people who make the difference. After all, the reputation of school depends on whether its graduates are valued by job market. You certainly came across the opinions of those who complain that the career service at Oxford was not of much help. But the reason for that, IMO, is not that the career service is weak per se – but that the school’s reputation among recruiters is not good enough yet.

No secret that Oxford b-school is relatively young, and people tend to be rather conservative in their opinions, so it takes some time to establish a strong reputation. But we also can’t ignore the fact the recruiters at the moment just don’t think that the school graduates are ‘of high enough quality’. Well, I can see that this position is to some extent grounded: Oxford b-school is still generally perceived as a safety to Europe Top3, and so we can expect that the students’ stats there are less impressive compared to, say, those of LBS ones.

Unfortunately, the most efficient way for the school to change the situation is to increase its selectivity. I guess Yale SOM is the school that takes this approach almost to the extreme – to the extent they often disregard the candidate’s true fit in favour of, let’s say, ‘marketability’. I know that many people blame Cambridge for the same, but from what I saw, they manage to keep the balance so far (and it’s not easy). Still, they are very selective.

To say the truth, it surprises me why Oxford b-school didn’t go that way. Don’t take me wrong. I’m glad that they are not as crazy-selective, so we all have a realistic chance there, and that those whose goals are really relevant to the school strengths get in regardless of certain weaknesses in their stats. But building solid market reputation is very complex and time-consuming process, and, unfortunately, there are not so many ways available to achieve this goal. I really hope that they’ll succeed in this.

+1 for a top quality post. I have no doubt that with admits such as greenoak, the recruiters' opinions of the quality of Oxford students is only going to go UP.

The interesting thing is that I don't think that stats wise LBS is that hot. The GMAT average was mid-690 where most American elites and UEs average 700-720. However, I believe that pure numbers (GMAT average etc.) are a NOT good way to assess the quality of student body.

Buffdaddy, the thread awaits your esteemed opinion on the issue

i don't want to jinx my application that is will read by the Oxford Adcom in the next few days.

All I can say that it is a top 10 EU school and the Oxford name gets bigger as one gets further away from Oxford. Given my intentions of going back to New Zealand in a few years time, this can only be a good thing. The last time I checked NZ was about 18000km away.

Hmm. And I was planning to remain in the UK. Too close, I'm afraid
Btw, how about to say smth about Cambridge? I'm almost sure that their adcom didn't read this forum (otherwise they'd have included the name into the marketing section of their app)...

There was a presentation on Lovemark - a relatively new concept of brands- at SBS a few weeks back.

It was done by the orginator of the Lovemark and he is on the board of Judge Business School.

In USA, only three were considered to be eligible for the lovemark, the UEs. Out of the H/S/W, he considered only the "S" to possess the quality to have a lovemark.

As per his idea of brands, in Europe, it was only the Oxford's SBS which had the lovemark!