NYU Stern vs Ross

Question

Hello everyone,

I have received an acceptance offer from both NYU Stern and Michigan Ross, and have to make a decision within 2 days. I visited on-campus for the interviews of both schools.

Background:  
B.Tech from IIT Roorkee
UG CGPA: 7.2/10
GMAT: 760 (Q50 V42)
Current Sector: Consulting (Strategy consulting for US-based banks)
W/E: 3 years at Matriculation
Post MBA: Investment Management (Private Wealth Management)

After I had interviewed for Stern, I was pretty sure Stern would be my top choice amongst these schools, given the NYC location and my preferred post-MBA career. But then I visited Michigan Ross and was blown away by their culture. Community is an important factor for me and UMich is big on their community bonding. They have also been rising up the rankings recently. Ross will provide a more immersive MBA experience, while New York will definitely provide more opportunities.

All ideas and opinions are welcome!

Thank you!

Mo2men · Answer

Congrats

I will assume no scholarship in both. It is all about what you are willing to sacrifice. I think you know that from your analysis above. My view for you will depedn on the following: 1-How long have you spent in your job in consulting for banks? Have you built good network that could help you if you choose Ross? 2- Did you speak with one of your network as guidance for you? I think you may give calls to few of them. It will certainly assist you.

JohnJohnJ · Answer

Look at their employment reports, clearly the choice is obvious for IB.
Michigan is a solid program but not for IB. If your choice was CPG, you could go with Michigan-but IB, it’s Stern.

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ShivanshuMadan · Answer

Hi all!
Thank you for your responses. I have decided to go with Michigan Ross

I was dead set on NYU when I had gotten the acceptance from there. Finance and New York seemed the perfect combination (albeit I was a bit skeptical about their culture, since Stern is more of a commuter school). Then I received the invite from Ross and decided to visit the campus in Ann arbor for the interview. I really liked the whole experience of their interview day schedule. The interaction with students, the demo class, etc. It all felt very welcoming. I was sold on the cultural experience that Ross would provide.

So, when I received the acceptance offer this last Friday, I was split between the two schools. I spoke to a lot of current students and alumni from these two schools and other schools as well, and the dominating opinion was that if it is finance, it has to be New York (not from a lot of Ross students, obviously). But most of the people also agreed that the community and the diversity of the student body is better at Ross, and that Ross will provide a more immersive MBA experience.

I am not too inclined towards core IB and value the experience of the MBA over the benefits of the New York location. Hence I decided to attend Ross and spend my next two years in the town of Ann Arbor.

Cheers!

bb · Answer

Congratulations on your admits!
I think for Finance/Investment management you want to be in NYC.

ks2305 · Answer

Disclaimer: I have admits from Stern and Ross, and will be heading to Stern

I think Stern is the clear win here for your career preference. You have later mentioned that you are not super inclined towards a finance goal, in which case as well, being in NYC would give you more options. At Ross you will be highly dependent on campus initiated hiring, so unless you are heavily bent towards tech (which does not seem to be the case), Stern edges out Ross here. I agree that Ross has a great community vibe (it surely is one of the most welcoming schools among the top 15), but if you scratch beyond the surface, you would find a lot of Stern alums/ current students who absolutely love the community at Stern and life in NYC.

tracktime · Answer

I know the poster has already decided, but figure these all have posterity, so may as well throw in my analysis. My post and this analysis mainly focuses on the career side of the equation but I think it is really misguided to focus just on that! Personally, I think going to business school and just caring about career outcomes is missing the point that you need to learn and grow in other ways! The culture and experience needs to be weighed just as much (though the weighting is very personal and thus why I think no one can tell anyone what they should choose). And, the average student only keeps their first job for two years, so these other things matter a lot...

I think it is misguided to automatically say that if someone is interested in finance, Stern is the clear choice. It is important to not confuse finance or investment management or private wealth management (the poster's intended career interest) with investment banking. Stern's finance recruiting is dominated by investment banking; in the 2018 career report, 26.2% of Stern students overall went into investment banking. The poster was interested in a subcategory of investment management, which I believe is captured within the "Finance-Other" bucket within the industry classification, which is 0.9% of students or 3 students (that is the combined total for asset management, private equity, and hedge funds). Now, there are always funny things going on in these career reports in terms of classification, but if you look at the Function classification, they do have a Private Wealth Management (essentially being a financial adviser for Merrill or Morgan Stanley, etc. or working on that side of the business) breakout and that is 1.5% of students (or 5 or 6 students on my math). That said, Stern has lots of alumni that eventually end up in these other roles (but don't initially as they don't have the backgrounds and thus do banking first).

This means that it is quite rare to do something in finance outside of investment banking even at a "finance" school like Stern. As such, on campus recruiting will be very rare and you'll mainly need to be self-motivated. A lot of finding job postings, reaching out to alumni, etc. Expect the career office to not really be that helpful in these types of searches. Being in New York likely makes it marginally easier to meet people in person as otherwise you'd be getting on the phone and then flying to New York (or other cities; I know some Ross people work in PWM at GS in Chicago) to meet in person. Geography is important; for PWM, it is not solely about NYC, so if you want to end up in another office, that is something to consider (78% of Stern grads remain in the Northeast or basically the NYC-Boston corridor). For investment management (essentially the institutional side), the largest concentration of big funds is in Boston (by far the leader for the massive funds), LA, NYC, and San Francisco with big presences in cities like Kansas City, Baltimore, and Denver.

For what it is worth, Michigan gives less detail on the specific finance career paths, but it looks like 8.4% of 2018 graduates went into investment banking (they had others who went into other areas of finance but not enough to call out the specific areas). This is probably a function of less people at Ross interested in investment banking. I have also heard that they generally spend a full week in NYC and then come to NYC for a handful of Thursday/Fridays for interviews. If you're interested in investment management or private wealth management (which I think are very different things), it will be a similarly unstructured process. You'll have to network a lot and travel some, but you also have the advantage of being one of the few people actually trying to do that.

Conclusion: just because a lot of students go into finance does not mean you should necessarily go to a finance school as you need to look at the subset of finance. Investment banking is dominant at many schools and that is not relevant if you don't want to do banking.

ks2305 · Answer

You seem to have done a lot of research just to prove that what the other posters have commented, might not necessarily be the case. In unstructured recruitment processes like PWB, location plays a massive role. And having to take a flight to NY every time to network vs taking a subway, is not a "marginal disadvantage" IMO. Since IB is a pathway to PWB, you would eventually find more Stern alums in that field vs Ross. And that increases your chances, plain and simple. Yes, a school's community matters and that comes down to personal preference. Someone might like the vibe of a college town with an extremely tight knit community, while someone else might like their school to be in the big city if they want to have a social circle outside of their Bschool peers. That seems to be the driving force behind the original poster's decision and that has to be respected. But the question was geared towards career outcomes for which you have to look at the broader perspective rather than breaking down a particular year's career reports and adding your assumptions to it. An MBA costs north of $200K and hence the importance of the career outcomes outweighs other factors in case of schools in the same bracket.

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JohnJohnJ · Answer

So I interviewed two MBA students in October for internships at my firm (I work at a boutique consulting firm in New York). One from Ross and one from Stern and both were extended offers and both have accepted it. Michigan guy had some consulting pre MBA experience and the Stern girl had some non profit pre MBA experience

I usually do case interviews and this one was a market sizing and M&A case.

The Michigan guy could not stop talking about how great Ross was, their communities and sports. Myself and the rest of the interview committee thought of him to be extremely cocky. When it came to solving the case - because of his consulting pre MBA experience his approach for the case was cut and dry, he answered it in the simplest way to get most of his answers right. He concluded by saying “yes, company A should acquire B because of the changing consumer behavior and industry trends” he supported his answers with the right data.

The Stern girl did not say anything about Stern. She had non profit pre MBA experience and her conclusion to the case was “no, company A should not acquire B because of the competitive landscape, too many competitors creating a price war with limited margins”. She gave supporting data to prove her point. She was the only candidate who recommended against the acquisition while all other candidates recommended company A acquire company B - she could probably be wrong and make the worst consultant who recommended against an acquisition when all others recommended in favor of the acquisition.

Now both were right in their own place and both were given the offer.

From this story, do you think Michigan has a smarter student or does Stern have a smarter student? Would you want to be in class with either of these candidates?

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NYU Stern vs Ross

Stern vs Ross

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