UT Austin (McCombs) vs CMU (Tepper)

Question

Hello folks so I will soon have to put in deposit for CMU and while I haven't heard from my favored school yet (Cornell), I might have to make a decision between these two schools.

City wise, I have traveled to Austin and love the atmosphere there and I have never travelled to Pittsburgh so I can't say how the city is. Post-MBA location can be anywhere, I don't really care too much. Career wise, I want to tackle Consulting recruiting as it happens first and try for McK Digital, BCG Tech Advantage, or Bain Tech; if these companies don't work out then I am planning to try for Tech Product Management at a Tech firm. I've done research but I couldn't put one school over the other, could you guys please offer some advice?

Also, how would your choice change if I got into Cornell? Thank you in advance.

bb · Answer

Congratulations!

The 3 schools are close. I believe however, Johnson is the only one that has MBB recruit on campus.
However, you are in the middle of nowhere.

souvik101990 · Answer

I would pick McCombs even if you end up getting into Cornell. Sure Cornell has a (only slightly) better overall brand, Texas Austin is one of the top schools in the country for engineering and tech. However, the companies that you mentioned are tricky in both McCombs and Tepper. I saw the numbers at Austin last year and not a whole lot of people recruited MBB and most of them happened to do it on their own (which means additional travel, recruiting related networking etc), so Johnson might make more sense there.

Lastly, have you had any conversations with current students about consulting recruiting at these schools? It seems like you will probably start in a generalist role as opposed to the tech arm of these firms like you mentioned.

alias11 · Answer

Thanks for commenting, is McCombs really that good at tech compared to Tepper? CMU is a very strong tech school so I assumed it would be a strong school for tech placements. To your point about Consulting, yeah, the students i've spoken to thus far have mentioned that MBB typically only recruit for general positions but there are some cases where people do get into those roles if you do sufficient extra-recruitment.

bb · Answer

The answer to your question is... Not really.

Part of the UT's Tech placements is geography and Austin. It attracts tech folks and the Austin employers are tech heavy. It is not always about where the school places people well but also their backgrounds and where would they find a job on their own. Tepper just does not have the Tech employment base, McCombs does.

Regional schools usually have connections with local businesses, alums hiring and reaching out to the school. However, in general you are expected to do your own legwork looking for a job. It is not like a person hiring at Amazon will scoff at some one from UT but smile at the resume from Tepper, all while sitting on Ross campus interviewing candidates there.

UT Austin (McCombs) vs CMU (Tepper)

UT Austin (McCombs) vs CMU (Tepper)

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