Prospects for European Placement for American MBAs

Question

I'm applying to Insead, LBS, IE, and IESE. I've heard conflicting reports on employment prospects for MBAs, especially for non-EU citizens. I'd love to work in Europe or South America after graduation, but I've heard lots of bad reports about restriction of working visas and a poor job market, especially in the UK and Western Europe. I've also seen optimistic placement reports from these schools, each at or above 90% placement within 3 months.

Does anyone have any information on how American graduates from the US are faring in the international job markets these days? Perhaps you've seen a blog post from American students or better statistical breakdowns detailing American placement in international offices?

Thanks!

*Update*

OK, I've been doing some research. First stop, the school's self published career reports. Here are my findings (Still a work in progress):

IE 
Source: 2012 Placement Report
Of those from North America, students accepted positions in the following regions:
72%- North America
14%- Europe
12%- Latin America and Carribbean
2%- Asia

Notes: The school acknowledges in their report the challenges that tighter Visa restrictions are having on those wishing to find a job in Europe. But the fact that a vast majority of North Americans come back home worries me. Disappointingly, there are no statistics for career switchers showing how many students change job functions or industries.

IESE 
Source: 2012 Placement Report
So, no breakdown detailing international mobility. However, they did list placement locations for the entire class:
37%- Europe
31%- Spain
12%- Latin America
11%- Asia
6%- North America
2%- Eastern Europe 
1%- Africa

Notes: These numbers, while promising on the surface, are meaningless for our purposes unless we have more data to compare them against.

London Business School 
Source: 2012 Placement Report
Wow! A whopping 71% of North Americans find a job abroad. There are no statistics here for job switchers.

wouldbecrazy · Answer

Placement is a big question everywhere. And unfortunately, you should not pay too much importance to published placement reports. Those are created for purpose and present very little fact than hiding more. Other avenues to sense placement mood is very limited and not really trusted.

Do you think a 90% placement means a good indicator? What about quality of the jobs? what about distribution of placements by diversity? I have one of my close friend in a top US school and they too are not so positive. But, none can guarantee tomorrow and you may be just lucky, who knows.

Having said that, recently I was evaluating one school in UK and that school by mistake exposed (oh yes, with so much personal information) all their students who are still looking for a job. And it gave a very disturbing picture. There were about 35 students still looking for job and out of that 25+ are from Asia. And a further scan of their resume gives a very disturbing trend ... almost all are from IT background!! And the school is not a 2nd tier B-school in UK. I don't know whether I should blame the quality of the class or job scarcity in the market. Interestingly, the school claims 90%+ placement in 3 months.

So my approach is try to sense the ground, rather than giving importance to stats published by schools.

westsidah408 · Answer

Your best bet would probably be to reach out to current students.

DukeCityMBA · Answer

Thank you both for your views. I think I may turn this post into an aggregate of my research on the subject. If anyone else is interest or has information, please post to this thread also. I think this may be an overlooked aspect of the b-school equation, especially for career-switchers like myself. We take at face value the placement data offered by the respective schools to which we're applying, without giving much thought to how people like themselves fare after graduation.

Admissionado · Answer

Hmmm, I wonder if these numbers are relevant at all. Because these numbers mention what actually happened. But to find out if you can do what you want you, you need to find out how many Americans WANTED to stay in Europe and could or couldn't. And I'm guessing you won't find any stats on that but only anecdotal evidence.

If it helps, I know quite a few Americans who work in Europe with no problem at all. Also, keep in mind two things 1. If you land a decent professional job you are basically guaranteed to get a visa 2. Americans have a privileged situation when it comes to asking for Visas from European countries,

asimov · Answer

JonAdmissionado has a great point about factoring in those who wants a job in Europe. Besides that, you can improve your chances of getting a visa by going to a HSMP school (https://www.skillclear.co.uk/hsmp-mba-provision.asp). All of the schools you listed qualify.

You also mentioned that you are a career switcher. European MBA makes career switching more difficult, since it is harder to work a meaning internship during your MBA.

You also need to watch out for the quality of the job placement, and the difficulty in job placement. Anecdotally, I hear that it is difficult for non-EU citizens to place in Europe, from recent alum at elite-level European b-school. You will be on your own if you are looking to work in South America as an American (easier if you have fluent language skills and willing to take a pay cut).

wouldbecrazy · Answer

HSMP? Really?

Admissionado · Answer

I'd also point out that if you are planning on working in any country, and having a moderately successful career in the long term, you HAVE TO learn the language, and the quicker you do so, the better. Holland Germany and the Scandinavian countries seem to be rather forgiving on this point, but still, when you learn the language it WILL help a lot.

Ducksworth · Answer

Exactly. HSMP is long gone. So is its pseudo-replacement, Tier 1.

DukeCityMBA · Answer

To John's point about language fluency, I wonder if a big difference between these schools in international placement has much to do with each school's language requirement? Is the reason for lack of international mobility more a function of placement opportunities post-grad, or an MBA student limiting themselves by not knowing a second language?

Insead requires a student know a second language rather well, so does LBS. IE and IESE, however, have no such requirements. There seems to be a correlation, now as for causation....

Insead requires a student know a second language rather well, so does LBS. IE and IESE, however, have no such requirements. There seems to be a correlation, now as for causation....

MBAbot · Answer

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Prospects for European Placement for American MBAs

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