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Comment by thehappypm | Hacker News Reader

I don't know. I have several friends who went to Harvard Business School and it seems like a degree from HBS or equivalent is a requirement to get into certain fields. It's hard to get into private equity for example. I'm sure someone will reply and say "I ran a lemonade stand, now work at a top PE firm." But top schools are a core feeder. Likewise into consulting -- hard to get a job at Bain or BCG without a degree from HBS.

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I work in banking. I dated a woman with a global MBA from a name brand university. In both scenarios, you dismiss the value of a blue chip MBA at your peril. A lower tier MBA from a regular school? Might be a different story.

If you want to know how successful an MBA program is, look at how many people the school employs to raise donations from alumni. The bigger the alumni fundraising team, the bigger the pockets of their graduates.

I'm not from the US, so I never got it - why do people donate to schools they got degree from? The degree wasn't free (usually very far from it), they weren't done a favor that they now need to repay. Anyone care to enlighten me? Do the donations open doors to some elite alumni club?

At most private schools donations are a way to ensure your children have a better chance of getting into the same school. Legacy students at Harvard for example have about 33% chance of being admitted vs the overall acceptance rate of 4.6%.

Ah! Also not from the US... now that makes sense!

But from your numbers, what's the split in child acceptance rate between "former student" vs "former student who donates"?

And now I'm even more curious, what's an average rough donation amount to hold onto this "reserved spot"?

Even more than that - want to evaluate two MBA programs? See where the students landed for internships and full time roles.

That’s where you see the difference. Not necessarily “better”, but certain schools will get you into certain roles.

"Management consultants are no longer relevant". But seriously, I encountered MCs at an old-school Fortune-100 recently, and they seemed painfully incompetent at anything software and machine learning related. I had many meetings hashing out strategies related to recommendations and search, and I still scratch my head wondering what came of all their efforts. Maybe they are more relevant in less technical areas?

All of the consulting gigs my friends do are in non-software.

Bain is way too big to only take HBS. I went to michigan and they were hiring 50+ undergrads a year. The MBA grads seemed to mostly be going into consulting with Bain one of the main recruiters. Maybe you won't make partner unless you have the Harvard MBA though.

Nahh… the MBA gets your foot in the door. Believe it or not, actual ability determines your career path after that.

There are plenty of Ivey league MBAs who never get very high on the ladder. Plenty.

Sure, but only a fraction of those with an MBA go into said fields and I would argue an internal corporate rigorous training program for high potential leaders would be more suitable.

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