hsWang

The perfect MBA

So you are clear in your mind which B-school is the best for you? Do not send off that application form (and pay the application fee) just yet. Make sure you have considered all the factors in your search for the perfect MBA. Here is a checklist to help you make the final decision.

Do you have the basic qualifications? As a rule, the top B-schools require a college (Graduate Management Admissions Test, or GMAT) score. You will also need two or more referees (typically your superiors or senior colleagues at work) to write confidential essays about your character, achievements, shortcomings and leadership qualities. You will be asked to submit essays about why you want to earn an MBA, what you want to do with your life, and what you expect from B-school. You will also be interviewed.

Is your GMAT score high enough? GMAT is supposed to be a standard test of your ability to handle graduate studies regardless of whether you attended college in Australia, Bangladesh, China or Zimbabwe. The closer your result is to the maximum score of 800 points, the more impressed the admissions panel will be. The average GMAT of MBA students at Stanford is 724, Kellogg and MIT Sloan 710, and Columbia 705. The average at France's Insead is 696 points, and that at NUS Business School in Singapore is 680. In Australia, the Australian Graduate School of Management average is 635, Melbourne Business School 620 and Curtin 610. For tips on how to prepare for the GMAT, check out  www.mba.com/mba/TaketheGMAT , a Web site run by GMAC, the United States body that oversees the test.

Do you have a fighting chance of getting in? So your qualifications impress the admissions committee. But you still might not be admitted because B-schools lay out different-size welcome mats for Asia-Pacific candidates. Four out of 10 students at Thunderbird in Arizona come from the region. It admits more than 1000 students a year, which means there are 400 places for Asia-Pacific candidates. On the other hand, only 4% of the student population at IESE Business School in Spain is Australian and Asian. Its annual intake is 216 students, so the effective number of places for the Asia-Pacific region is just nine. But do not automatically reject a top school just because it has too few places or too many applicants. Even the smallest institution has room for a really outstanding student. To maximise your chances of snagging a place, however, make sure you have fallbacks. The table on page 61 lists well-regarded B-schools that accept at least 70 students from the Asia-Pacific region every year.

Are you comfortable with the culture? Some European schools expect students to design their own curriculum from a wide variety of electives. Most US institutes are more structured, with compulsory core courses in the first year and electives in the second. Manchester Business School puts emphasis on project work. Harvard Business School pioneered the case method. You need to write a 12,000-word dissertation for the University of Cambridge's Judge Institute of Management. You are expected to be fluent in English and Italian at SDA Bocconi. Find out how things are done in the B-school you are considering and decide whether it is a good fit for your work habits and your approach to learning. Interview alumni, or better still, visit the campus and sit in on some classes.

Can you afford not only the fees but also the living expenses? Not only do you need to fork out a lot of cash for a full-time MBA, you also forgo wages and bonuses you could have earned while you were in school. American B-schools tend to charge the highest fees and have the longest programs, at two years. Budget  at least $150,000 in total expenses if you intend to study at a top-notch institution there. Europeans do not place as strong an emphasis on core courses,  so their MBA programs typically last from 10 to 18 months. Set aside the equivalent of $105,000 for tuition, living expenses and other fees. Asian B-schools are the cheapest, from $33,000 (Asian Institute of Management in Manila) to $75,000 (AGSM in Sydney), about the same range as Canadian MBA providers (Richard Ivey School of Business, the equivalent of $67,000). If you intend to stay in Australia, there is really no point in paying so much to study in the US or Europe because local companies are generally happy with the quality of B-schools here. But if you want to work with a US investment bank, or move to New York, an American MBA is a must.  Cesar Bacani
worldwide campus  As the globalisation of business takes hold, the world's brand-name B-schools are making sure their classes reflect the diversity of races in the workplace.
Some B-schools, such as Columbia, Harvard and Wharton in the United States, accept more than 600 students a year, so they can allocate a large number of places to applicants from the Asia-Pacific region. Others such as Canada's Schulich are not as big, but still take as much as 40% of their annual intake from the region. Four out of 10 students at Thunderbird in the US, which admits more than 1000 MBA students annually, come from Asia and Australia. Insead in France, Richard Ivey School of Business in Canada and the University of Chicago have campuses in Hong Kong and Singapore, while Britain's Birmingham and America's Kellogg have teamed up with local partners. The schools below each admitted 70 or more full-time MBA students from Australasia in 2002.

  
international options for MBA study   Key Strengths    Tuition website
Birmingham Business School  Finance, manufacturing, marketing                               $28,300 mba.bham.ac.uk
Columbia Business School  Entrepreneurship, finance, int'l business
$103,500      www.gsb.columbia.edu
Harvard Business School Entrepreneurship, general mgt, leadership
$96,600  www.hbs.edu  
Insead    Consulting, general mgt, int'l business $74,600  www.insead.edu  
Kelley School of Business at Indiana University  Finance, marketing,
strategy    $68,000  www.bus.indiana.edu  
Kellogg School of Mgt at Northwestern University Finance, general mgt,
marketing    $104,250                                                         www.kellogg.northwestern.edu  
London Business School   Entrepreneurship, finance, int'l business
$98,250  www.london.edu
Richard Ivey School of Business      Entrepreneurship, general mgt, int'l
business     $56,000  www.ivey.uwo.ca  
Schulich School of Business at York University Finance, int'l business,
marketing    $41,400  www.schulich.yorku.ca  
Thunderbird (American Graduate School of Int'l Mgt) Finance, int'l business, marketing                                         $81,400  www.t-bird.edu  
University of Chicago Graduate School of Business Entrepreneurship,
finance, strategy        $104,500     gsb.uchicago.edu
Wharton School at University of Pennsylvania Entrepreneurship, finance, strategy  $106,200   www.wharton.upenn.edu .

hsWang

The Asia specialist

If you intend to specialise in Asian business, it makes sense to attend a school that operates in the region, teaches from a constantly updated cache of Asian case studies and deploys Asian CEOs and other senior executives as professors and resources. Welcome to the Asian Institute of Management in Manila. AIM's two-year Master of Business Management program seeks to develop "professional, entrepreneurial and socially responsible leaders who are experts in Asian cultures and management styles". For experienced managers, the school has designed an 11-month Master of Management program. Executive recruiter R. Suresh says AIM is a magnet for companies in the region.

In Singapore, the NUS Business School focuses on the region in core classes such as Asia in a Global Economy, case studies of companies such as Cathay Pacific Airways and Sony, and award-winning research such as Ishtiaq Mahmood's The Two Faces of Group Structure, an analysis of the effect of family-owned firms on innovation in Korea and Taiwan. The 18-month APEX-MBA program for senior executives holds two of its 12-day residential modules in China and India. Seventeen participants, seven of them from Singapore, were accepted in 2002. Companies that send managers to the program include Citibank, HBO Asia, NEC Solutions and Vivendi.

Also in Singapore, the Nanyang Business School adopts "a global perspectivewith a strong Asian focus," says Choo Teck Min, the director of the MBA program. Courses include Sun Tzu Business Warcraft, which looks at business strategy through the Chinese classic Art of War. Nanyang also has an Asian Business Case Centre. The regional focus was important to Malaysian actuary Joanne Chan, who says practical course work, diversity and reputation also were reasons for choosing Nanyang. "I was pleasantly surprised at the mix of classmates," she says. "The most valuable experience is the interaction with smart, dynamic individuals from all over the world."

The Monash Graduate School of Business has strong Asian credentials. The school's director of MBA operations, Peter Reed, says: "We have very close relationships with Asian businesses going back to the early days of the Colombo Plan." The regional initiative, created in 1950, granted scholarships to young people across the region to study at Monash and other schools. A partner at the Australian law firm Middletons, Cameron Abbott, says: "Monash has an excellent mix of nationalities. I recently hosted a delegation from Shanghai and my multicultural exposure helped make the event work seamlessly." The school's links with Monash University allowed him to cross-enrol in legal classes and graduate with an MBA and a Master of Laws.

Other schools to consider: Birmingham Business School, Curtin Graduate School of Business (Australia), International University of Japan, Melbourne Business School, Richard Ivey School of Business (Canada), Sasin Graduate Institute of Management Administration (Thailand), University of Hong Kong

braveheart

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Errick

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crossmoon

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migei

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celinapple

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shje

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lanccy

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bloomingdales

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