Stern ($$) vs LBS vs Re-apply top 5

I meant only to say second guessing yourself isn't worth it. As for the money side - the firms you want to recruit for pay the same whether you went to Wharton or Washington State - the difference is the odds of getting the Oportunity based on where they recruit and how heavily.

Being sat next to someone who earns 35k more in the future means little to you and your career. Add to that whether you are looking at 1, 3, 5 year out salaries. It is a hugely multivariate model.

Of course LBS has better people. There are way fewer Brits at Stern.

Looking back at admits after applying to places you decided on is in my mind akin to any retrospective assessment. Too much hindsight and a lot of risk from rebasing assumptions.

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Apologies if you didn't like my tone - not really intentional, just posting late in a day of a really long week.

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No worries, appreciate you taking the time to post.

I agree about the second-guessing. I'm more than likely to go with one of these two than to re-apply for that reason. But I don't want to rule that option out of hand without giving it fair due. That's the best way to avoid regret later down the line, in my opinion.

Agreed also about pay post-MBA. I'm not concerned about my salary in a consulting firm being different coming out of school A or school B. But I still think the average salaries of my peers coming out of school are indicative of something. Why are they earning $35k more on average than the next guy? If there was no reason we'd all take the extra $35k. I would guess that the stat would be driven by a much smaller low end (fewer people missing the traditional post-MBA paths entirely and landing in much lower-paid roles) and a fair few extra real high-end achievers in the class (people pulling in huge salaries that count for a couple of people in the averages). The bulk would probably still be getting the same mid-level consulting and finance jobs that so many MBAs in all schools are going for. But that doesn't mean there's no value in knowing/associating with that bigger pool of high-achievers over that 2 years, or in not having to sift through so much at the lower end.

LBS vs Stern for Brits? Well, LBS is only 8% British. And personally I think Americans are generally way better at business than Brits, for a whole load of reasons. Still, I'll find out at the LBS admit weekend. Shame I couldn't make the Stern one, makes it a less fair comparison.

I take the point about excessive hindsight and introducing risk through modified assumptions... it's an interesting way of thinking about it.

Cheers

Perhaps I should be clearer:

On the 'quality' of classmates - I'm thinking really long-term, where I expect the value of the networks to really play out. I think any of the top 20-30 or more schools could get me the consulting interviews I need, but I suspect there's a much bigger difference between the top few and the rest from a network point of view. When I'm 45 and thinking about my next big venture, who can I call? A middle manager who's well-paid but who has taken a fairly conventional and unspectacular path, or someone who's out doing something really innovative or operating at a really high level? To me that's roughly what the difference looks like.

On the applications - I started out this process looking at the Monterey Institute, Sauder (Vancouver UBC), before scaling up my ambitions to Rotman (Toronto) and starting to think about second-tier European schools. I didn't understand the value of my experiences, now I do. I had no understanding of the business world and, frankly, viewed it as something a bit beyond me. At one point Stern looked completely out of reach for me, the way I was looking at things. Also, I decided very late to do an MBA and was in a real hurry to get the applications done. Given that I was part-way through this process of learning the value of my experience in a mainstream business context (which I now think is a good sell at most schools... I don't think it's a coincidence that Yale - which is overflowing with worthy nonprofit types - was the one not to buy into my story... could be wrong, but it feels that way), and was very mindful of the need to get scholarships (international development doesn't pay all that well... unsurprisingly), it was a tough time knowing how high to shoot. I made what I think was a good judgement that 3 schools was a realistic amount to be able to visit the school, do the right amount of research, and put in a quality application. If I'd had more time I'd have included HBS and MIT at least. Maybe not Wharton, but possibly Chicago and/or Columbia. But if I went for one of those I'd have had to drop an option that was already a bit of a coin-toss in terms of how likely I was to get an offer. So I chose 3 schools that I liked and which I felt I had a good chance with. The fact I didn't apply to the very top schools is quite substantially down to the time available, and the limitations that this put on how ambitious I could be. I also under-estimated, I think, the extent to which it's a bit of a crap-shoot in some ways, and the extent to which scholarships can be as much about profiling as merit per se. So I think I could have aimed higher with more time and possibly been successful, hence the doubt.

Maybe that makes a little more sense.

Fair disclosure: I am British and went to Stern.

You know, you will meet great people wherever you go. The salary can reflect as little as more people going into I-Banking, less Non-profit people, loads of folk going to google where they get paid out of the wazoo to the point they do (10% payrise ahoy!). I get what you are saying, but - from experience - you will meet some extraordinary people wherever you go.

I can easily detail London vs New York. Winter in the UK is terrible, in New York it is cold. London has pubs, New York has bars. Both have similar jobs. I really think it comes down more to that than anything else. The reason I would say go to Stern is the chunk it takes out of having to pay for school. It is going to be great wherever you go, so try not to stress it too much. Plus you can do an exchange between LBS and Stern if you so want.

After reading through the thread it seems like you have a pretty good thought process going on here. I just wanted to chime in in terms of the perceived salary differentials between a couple of the elites versus, say, some lower in the top 10-ish schools. As already noted, part of it is likely a higher percentage going into finance, versus going to work at a F500 company (where you might only make 100k base to start, but you won't be worked to death). I'm going to a top 20 school and with my background I could probably make quite a bit more in consulting or ibanking,but instead plan on doing CPG marketing with a starting salary of 100k-ish (funny enough, that's a 50% pay cut). Why? Because money isn't everything and i've already had one marriage fail from the hard work "lifestyle", and don't plan to lose another one on account of it. I have a feeling that you might have a lot more folks content with just working at a good company, and having a life, while still getting compensated well (but not spectacularly) at schools a bit further down the list. Also, I know that at a few schools like HWS, there are a handful each year that get some crazy salaries, based more on who they were prior to attending biz school then the name on their MBA diploma. I've heard of folks getting offers north of $300,000. Those will clearly skew the lines.

In any event, if it was me, I would go with Stern, assuming that you like NYC. I would rather shoot my self in the leg than live in NYC, but admit i'm likely in the minority on that.

Cheers,
Tom

Yeah I think it's safe to assume I like NYC, my application process was a little scattergun but not quite that bad. I reckon I have a few more years in big cities left in me but a couple of years of consulting might knock that right out of me! I'm looking forward to getting to know another great city (New York - I already know London well), but definitely understand how you feel. That quality of life stuff is already kicking in a little bit for me too, it's part of my motivation for getting on with the MBA while I can still face all that it - and the resultant career - entails. I haven't lost a marriage over it, but the thought of perpetual singledom while I devote myself to a career is not particularly appealing either.

It was quite sobering to chat with a Stern alum here about the effect the MBA has on relationships. Divorces, broken-off engagements, undergrad-style drunken parties with people pairing off on the dance floor... as a single guy I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, but it is surely indicative of some unhealthy level of strain. I can't help but look at my fellow incoming classmates and think 'right, which of these long-term relationships is going to fail then'... harsh I know, but at least I stopped short of opening a book on it...

Ha, okay, I'll try not to be too negative about Brits in business then ('Brits in Business', sounds like a bad reality show). I'm sure you're right though, there will be great people everywhere.

So, what did you decide eventually ?

I decided on Stern. If there had been comparable financial offers on the table it would have been a much tougher choice, and if I wasn't from the UK and looking for a change somewhat it would have been even tougher still.

I went to the LBS admits weekend and met some great people. The faculty seems great, and there's a real sense of quality about a lot of what they do. That said, the depth and variety of student activity for example doesn't seem comparable to somewhere like Stern, plus the fact that LBS is not really connected to a university is a big drawback for me. In contrast, NYU seems to be taking some really interesting steps to become a genuinely global university with all that entails, and Stern itself is positioning itself in an interesting way in response to the financial crisis. And then of course there's the New York vs London debate. For me New York has the edge, not just for being new to me, but as a much bigger economy with more diversity of business. For someone who hasn't completely made up their mind what they want to do, this is a big draw for me - I think New York has a lot of everything, London less so.

More than that though, I actually think the schools are of comparable quality on all but a few measures. LBS does extremely well in the FT mainly because it scores off the chart in terms of the international nature of its programme, which the FT puts a lot of weight on. Take that away and the difference would more or less disappear in my view. Having a highly international student body is a great thing, and I really experienced what that means in practice at the admits weekend, which surprised me a bit actually in terms of how meaningful it was. The prospect of getting to know all of those people so well was genuinely exciting and I could see how it could enrich my career and my life. But does it mean that LBS is a much better school in other respects? I don't think so.

One thing I would say in its favour is that LBS students are - from what I can tell - probably a bit more senior in what they've done before and there is a higher proportion of people coming from the very top companies. In part because of the FT ranking, and in part because the competition in Europe is less tough (in my opinion), LBS is rightly regarded as the best business school in Europe - or at least comparable to any other. That means that you get a lot of the best people from around the world who want to study and/or live in Europe, which adds up to an impressive student body (although I met a few fairly unimpressive people too - as with any school I guess). While at LBS you will still get a good chunk of people who tried and failed to get into HBS, Wharton, Stanford, etc., I think you will get more of that at Stern. So the calibre is, loosely speaking, in my opinion a little bit lower in general at Stern, as I believe that the admissions process - while imperfect and a bit of a crapshoot at times - is broadly able to filter quality. But that's the only real thing I can say that I believe is definitively in LBS's favour. And as we've discussed on this thread, there will be more than enough great people at Stern to be getting on with, so it's not a deal breaker.

Stern genuinely feels much more down to earth to me, which is important for how much I will enjoy the experience and consequently how well I'll do on the programme. LBS is a little bit pretentious in a characteristically British way, but at the same time it feels a little bit insecure, as though slightly aware that it doesn't quite deserve its #1 global status. It seems like a really great school, and they outlined a really interesting direction for the future during admits weekend. As one of the most globally-minded business schools I'm sure they will continue to do well. But for me I've realised that it just doesn't feel right. It's hard to put into words but there's a richness and depth to Stern that doesn't seem to exist at LBS as a relatively small and isolated institution.

I'm happy with the choice of Stern over LBS. I do slightly regret not pitching for HBS, Sloan and Chicago, at least to find out more about the fit, but I just didn't have time and had no idea of my chances of getting in. I didn't want to have to wait another year. With the options I have in hand, I think this is the right choice, and I would certainly have taken this outcome at the start of the process.

I hope that sharing my experience is helpful for someone and good luck to anyone still applying/deciding.

Cheers

Thank you for your genuine response. It might be really helpful for people that cannot decide not only between Stern and LBS but also between the UK and the USA in general. It seems like you have made the right choice as you mentioned you needed a change and Stern offered a scholarship and somehow a more friendly atmosphere.

Congrats doolittle - I don't think you would have regretted either choice, but am certain you will be happy with this one. Drop me a message when you are in NYC and we can try to catch up some time. I am sure I can offer some helpful course insights for the first round of choices at least (later you will know all the right people for the info anyhow).

Cheers Ivan - p.s. here's hoping for a bit more from Berbatov this year... he was amazing at Spurs, seems to play better when he's the main man

3underscore - will give you a shout when I make it over! Thanks for all your feedback.