Top Sub-Cluster for the Ultra Elite

Question

Several applicants have asked me to compile a sub-cluster of the top three or so schools of the ultraelites. Intrigued by the challenge, I have endeavored to come up with a stable subcluster of the three top schools. Nonetheless, a stable sub-cluster has not been forthcoming. 

The problem is that more than three schools make up the top schools across the most important domains (e.g. finance, marketing, general management, technology, etc.). For instance, it would be difficult to make a sub-cluster that excluded Northwestern as a result of its strengths in marketing and general management. Likewise, it would be difficult to exclude Harvard based on its ability to produce CEOs of major firms. Chicago would be difficult to exclude since it is so strong in finance and quant analysis. A sub-cluster that left out such an outstanding leader in technology as MIT would be difficult to take seriously. Likewise, a sub-cluster that failed to include the impressive learning environment of Stanford would be subject to widespread and valid criticism. In a similar manner, it would be difficult to make a top sub-cluster that failed to include Pennsylvania as a result of the schoolâ€™s many strengths across domains and its legacy of producing managers. Finally, Columbia is hard to exclude since it offers an ultraelite education with access to what is (arguably) the most important business city in the world.

 I invite others to suggest their nominees for a stable sub-cluster but I warn you that it is not easy.

carsen · Answer

Hi Hjort

If I were to ask to pick 3 schools that would go in to hall of fame or top cluster, they wud be

Harvard.
Kellogs.
Warton.

Reasons supporting them: reputation, production of CEOs, jobs offered (globally). There are other programs that may come in the list, but I feel these 3 schools beat them in one or the other way.

Stanford - yeah : pricy, loosing its grounds nowadays
MIT - Techo commercial school. Reputation build on base of tech school and high quant based.
Chicago - good placements, good city but lack of global reputation.

These are my reasons and they are open for opposition :-)

Regards

Regards

Hjort · Answer

The problem with Northwestern/Kellogg is that it is relatively weak in finance. Thus, if we include Kellogg we exclude two schools that are far stronger in this domain: Columbia and Chicago. Kellogg share this problem (of sorts) with Stanford in that the are both very strong on the general and soft skills but cannot match the Finance trio (CoChP).

Hjort · Answer

Another choice of subcluster that comes up relatively frequently is Harvard, Penn, and Stanford (usually rendered as "HSW" or something similar). I have yet to discover why this particularl subcluster seems to hold it "true believers" in such a state of awe. 

Remember, if we include three schools it means we have necessarily excluced the others of the seven. Accordingly, Northwestern/Kellogg, Columbia, Chicago, and MIT are all available to unseat any of these three schools. 

Stanford, an outstanding school by any measure, is still probably the easiest to unseat (as described in the post above Kellogg can match it in finance and strategy, Ch/Co can handily beat Stanford in finance and hold their own in the softer skills).

Penn/Wharton is a bit tougher since it has so many strengths. However, Northwestern would provide extremely tough competion on the softer skills and Ch/Co are at least as strong in finance. Either way, it is probably not far enough away from the others to justify grouping it separately. 

Harvard is a tough case. First, no school can come close to matching its CEO production. Further, the gigantic FT class size means that one has a large number of network opportunities. A perhaps even greater problem in unseating Harvard is that Harvard reveals so little information about its graduates. Thus, it is hard to perform much of any comparative analysis between Harvard and any of its competitors.

Tyr · Answer

When you are ready to shell out $100,000 to get your MBA what brand would you pick?
Keep in mind that you are going to carry this brand through your entire professional career.
Can you really compare HSW brand to anything else?
I don't think so. They are way above in their own dimension.
You might say that you don't care about the brand, but consider this - brand is the single most important criteria in marketing and your career is all about selling yourself. The better you can sell, the more you get.
Some people don't understand what is up with Stanford. I don't think those people have ever been to California and Silicon Valley.
Stanford's brand dominates economy of the entire west coast - FYI California alone is the fifth largest economy in the world after US, Japan, Germany and United Kingdom.
Other schools can brag all day long, but in the end HSW graduates get more opportunities than anyone else.

Hjort · Answer

I respect Tyr's comments and agree on several points:

1) Brand is important 

2) Stanford does dominate the West Coast, or at least the "higher end" of it

Now on to the points of contention:

1) We agree that brand is important. The point of contention is whether we can meaningfully define a stable set of schools that have a â€œstrongerâ€

Puilunchristin · Answer

Hjort:

What other cities are great to live in aside from California? Is New York good? What about outside of the U.S?

lepium · Answer

Hi Hjort, 

To add a metric to your quest of defining a sub-cluster I would mention yield. As you probably know (but to clarify for other readers that may not) yield   is the proportion of students that get admitted which actually go to such school. I recall both Harvard and Stanford are consistently in the 80% region (and most of the remaining 20% is from applicants admitted to the other school or not attending school for some other reason), while Wharton is a little bit behind but confortable 3rd. Kellogg is around 50 - 60% if I remember correctly and the rest comes after.

I know it's only one metric and as so will measure a minor part of the program. However, a conclusion would be that if lots of applicants assess the various schools from which they get offers each year and choose in that order, they may be considering lots of data in the process. A caveat could be that most applicants in the applicant pool wish to pursue career in which those schools are strong (consulting, finance, etc.) but just consider the differences among the three and you'll see the room for that kind of bias is small. It's probably mostly related to the brand mentioned before (when comparing with other schools in the ultra-elite group).

I understand that when analyzing objectively any program one could fail to define conclusively, for eg, why Wharton is better than Chicago (if it is so), but in the end, applicants consistently put their money at Wharton rather than Chicago if given the chance and that's an indicator of some sort.

Anyway, just hinting at another metric to look into and define why these schools could make the top 3 sub-cluster. 

Cheers. L.

Hjort · Answer

Glad to see there is still interest in this topic. Yes, I certainly agree that yield is a good metric to examine. But this is where things start to get interesting.

In terms of yield, HBS is the easy winner with yield hovering around the high 80s. Stanford comes next with a yield in the high 70s or so.The lucky number 3 position is much less clear. In three recent years number 3 has not been Penn/Wharton but Columbia(winning on both yield and the acceptance rate). Even when Wharton "won" it either shared the honors (tied with MIT in 2001) or won with a tiny spread (only 2 points ahead of Columbia in 2002). In other words, the market for #3 is highly contested. 

In at least two recent years, Northwestern/Kellogg had the lowest yield of the ultra elites.

helg · Answer

I would dispute the statement that U of C GSB has weaker international reputation than Kellogg. In Russia for example the alumni network of GSB is much bigger than that of K. In fact one of K's initiatives in the recent years was to get it more well known in Europe - they did acknowledged that K's position in Europe is not that strong.

lepium · Answer

OK, so we've managed to pick the top 2, right? About Columbia's yield, I wonder what that figure would be if they did not have their "early decision" program in place. Maybe back to 4th / 5th?

Anyways, nothing is conclusive as explained throughout this post.

Cheers. L.

Hjort · Answer

When it comes to general management it is pretty easy to identify a top single-school subcluster top school (HBS). HBS has far and away been the most successful producer of major CEOs (although the vast majority of top CEOs did not attend HBS). The other schools are not even remotely close. 

Once we move to other domains, such as finance, it is harder to identify a clear leader.

bono · Answer

IMHO, we schould sluster schools based on the strengthety of their brands. Though we can use only relative measures, they might work good in this case. 

For example, a person who gets to Wharton and Chicago, is more likely to prefer Wharton. A person, who gets to Chicago and Kellogg, is more likely to prefer Chicago, etc.

Based on the above, the proposed cluster are (with no particular order within the clusters):

Cluster 1
 - Wharton
 - Stanford
 - Harvard

Cluster 2
 - Chicago GSB
 - Columbia

Cluster 3
 - Kellogg
 - MIT Sloan

Hjort · Answer

If by brand we mean "general management", we are largely in agreement save from how we treat the top three schools. HBS is just too far ahead of Wharton and Stanford to be grouped in the same cluster. 

Subcluster 1 HBS
Subcluster 2 Penn/Wharton, Stanford
Subcluster 3 Chicago, Columbia 
Subcluster 4 MIT, Northwestern/Kellogg 

However, overall reputation almost certainly includes more than just GM. Once these other domains are included, it becomes difficult to subdivide the UE cluster. Schools like MIT and Chicago are particularly challenging- a system that places them outside of the top subclusters for tech and finance respectively would have severe facial validity problems.

lepium · Answer

Agree
 
Strongly disagree, although based on anecdotal evidence. I think the Chicago vs. Kellogg question would probably come down to the applicant's main interests. 

L.

helg · Answer

Agree with you, L. Our friend R. here was seriously contemplating GSB vs K choice. Too bad K dinged him.

elhajoui · Answer

I think it's actually pretty easy:

1. H/S
2. W
3. K, Chi, Sloan, Col

1. Very few people turn down H/S for any other school (occasionnally, though rarely, Wharton)
2. Very few people turn down Wharton for other schools than H/S (yield is low b/c lots of people - including yours truly - only apply to HSW)
3. I see no clear trend here, with perhaps a slight advantage to Sloan

bipolarbear · Answer

I would agree with that, although I think the difference between H/S and W is so small that I don't think it's worth giving W its own tier.

dreambigmba2011 · Answer

Here's my two cents:

If you are on the west coast, Stanford holds a higher prestige than Harvard or Wharton. I think this partly derives from the selectivity and small class size. The Stanford GSB is the hardest of the 3 to get into. Thus, holding a degree from the school holds a certain stamp of approval that doesn't exist with H/W.

However, Harvard has more famous alumni and a stronger layman name than S/W. There are many Fortune 500 CEOs which come from HBS. This is for 3 reasons: 
1.) HBS is an outstanding school with a great network. 
2.) Many kids go to HBS who are already and well positioned to take over an empire regardless of their network (ala George Bush). This is also true at S/W, but more true at HBS
3.) HBS class is huge so there is 2-3x higher probability of producing *famous* grads

Here's my ranking:
1.) Stanford
2.) Harvard
3.) Wharton
4.) Booth
5.) MIT
6.) Kellog

maki04q · Answer

Here is my ranking based on P&Q methodology updated for all published rankings as of April 2nd, 2012.

1) Harvard
2) Stanford
3) U of Chicago (Booth)
4) U Penn (Wharton)
5) Northwestern (Kellogg)
6) Columbia
7) MIT (Sloan)
8) UC Berkeley (Haas)
9) Dartmouth (Tuck)

*Booth entered into top 3 but not sure how much longer it can hold that spot
*From #4 to #9 (including Booth), all great schools and rankings change all the time. One should choose on fit and location unless they got into Harvard or Stanford or maybe Wharton. 
*I personally think Tuck is better than Haas, Sloan, and CBS.

Disclaimer: I do not goto Tuck.

Top Sub-Cluster for the Ultra Elite

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards