The Chosen Eight

1. IIM Ahmedabad

IIM A has been the top-ranked MBA school in India and probably the most difficult to get a call from and get admission into. The cohort is younger compared to that of IIMB, with higher numbers of freshers in a class, nearly 140 students(almost 35% of class) out of the class size of nearly 400 students.

If you want to understand admission criteria for IIMA (based on CAT 2020 results) you can check out how they calculate the cumulative score. It takes into account previous degree type, grades school, college and work-experience here. Each institute gives different weights to different parameters. This information can be found on their respective websites. It is recommended that you check these parameters for your target schools to estimate your chances of selection.

As per our interviews, we found that A is more academically rigorous than B and C. Some may say it is better to be a big fish in a small pond than a small fish in a larger one. Given the higher ranking of IIM A, it attracts many highly talented individuals which in turn means higher competition during placements. Thus, the same person can get slightly better placement opportunities at B and C because of marginally less competition.

Talking about IIM-A, the stiff competition does nothing but enriches your experience. Opportunities are not to be offered but created for yourself. As they say, if you can survive at IIM-A, you can survive anywhere in the world.

Almost all your peers at IIMs are destined to be at the top position of any corporate firm or of their own firm. Hence networking opportunities are immense at IIMA and can really help you out in your future as well. Placement opportunities at IIMA are immense. Over 160+ companies come to recruit 400 people.

2. IIM Bangalore

Average work experience of students at IIM-B is slightly higher than that of A since B is more inclined to get candidates with some work experience than A and C. Number of students in the batch is nearly 400. IIM-B uniquely provides a student with foreign opportunities compared to other IIMs that tend to have fewer placements abroad. IIM-B has almost 5% foreign placements, which may seem low, but when compared to other IIMs that have less than 1% foreign placements, the proportion is high for IIM-B.

Also, IIM-B asks for two LORs and one SOP also at the time of admission, which is not asked by A and C, the referencer will have to give the information before the interview round. LOR can be from your employer or professor: professors will give good LORs. The advice here is to maintain good relationships with IIT professors.

IIM-B has also started PGP in business Analytics this year, it is a 2 years program with batch size of 46 people.

3. IIM Calcutta

IIM Calcutta is renowned for its finance specialisation. That is not to say that it lacks in its other specialisations. The top 3 IIMs, namely IIM A, B and C offer similar placement opportunities. They have an equally good reputation in the industry. The number of students in the batch is approximately 460.

The opportunities are similar across the top three IIMs. With IIM B eyeing primarily students with work experience, you as a fresh graduate will likely be deciding whether to choose IIM Ahmedabad or Calcutta.

Rachil Maliwal who had job experience in Citi Bank decided to go to IIM-C because:

One thing unique to IIM Calcutta is the PGD in Business Analytics, a course that is jointly offered by ISI, IIT Kharagpur and IIM C; you can get to know more about the program through their official website.

4. IIM Kozhikode

Sure, IIMK is not seen at par with IIM A, B, C, Lucknow and ISB in terms of reputation and opportunities by IIT students. Still, being one of the older IIMs, its vast alumni network ensures excellent placements which can’t be called, “not good”, by any standards. The number of students in the batch is nearly 480.

• IIMK has recently started attracting some leading private equity and multiple Alternate Asset Management firms like the Rohatyn Group and the Duff and Phelps, HSBC, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase and State Street among others.
• IIMK has always been renowned for the quality job offers in the marketing vertical. And on top of that, the serene campus nestled between the Arabian sea and the Western ghats won’t make you regret your 2 years stay even if you couldn’t crack the sought after top IIMs or ISB.

5. IIM Lucknow

If you look at the NIRF (National Institutional Ranking Framework) rating, IIM-L is at the 4th position, so it has got a good reputation. It is pretty good, but the proportion of students from the top IITs is small, which has its pros and cons though IITians are given special treatment here.

It is the 4th oldest IIM and most companies that go to ABC come to L too, so placement chances are relatively better for the same roles. The number of students in the batch is roughly 400.

6. IIM Indore

The number of students in the batch is roughly 650 with a very decent average placement CTC despite the fees of the programme being least amongst these 8 B-schools. It also has the highest proportion of freshers in their batch amongst these top schools.

Some pieces of the MBA programme that are unique to IIM I:

• Experiential learning: Students visit a company once a week in the first year of the Programme. They are required to carry out a study on various industries and key players in the industry. This enhances their exposure to organisations and provides them with a backdrop for analysing the managerial contexts of different cases.
• Unique rural immersion programme: To enable the participants to understand the social context in which organisations work and exist; exposure to the rural settings of Madhya Pradesh to give graduates contextual connection.
• Himalayan outbound program: In the second year, there is an Himalayan outbound program, which is a 2 credit course. It involves trekking in the Himalayas.

7. Indian School of Business (ISB)

The fee for the one year MBA program comes to around 33 – 35 lakhs. The intake capacity increased significantly to more than 800 with its new campus at Mohali (functional since 2012) along with Hyderabad (more famous and older).

The intense one-year program has the core courses, electives as well as an opportunity to pursue areas of your interest under a faculty member under the ISP (Independent Study Programme). ISB only takes applicants with 2+ years’ experience. GMAT score is mandatory while applying to ISB. While there is no minimum score requirement, a score above 700 is considered very impressive.

8. Xavier School of Management (XLRI)

XLRI is considered the best institute for HR studies in Asia, and it also offers a General Management (GM) MBA program which has relatively more IITians. The campus location is in Jamshedpur. XLRI offers specialisations in finance, operations, marketing, strategy, although in the degree this is not mentioned, rather like IIMs and other B-schools, it depends on which courses you choose. One of our alums in XLRI says “XLRI operations and marketing placements are better than others in terms of types and pay scale of companies which come for placements.” Cohorts for GM (General Management MBA Program) generally have 2 years of experience.

XLRI Admissions: XAT exam happens once a year, just like CAT.

Comparative Analysis by Numbers (For the Chosen Eight)

Infographic-4: Comparison of the entire PGP programme fees in INR Lakhs (this infographic also showed in ‘Why MBA’ section, marked as infographic-2) ^[1]

Infographic-5: Average Domestic Cost-to-company for final placements in INR lakhs

Infographic-6: Batch Size and gender-wise split across these B-Schools

Infographic-7: Varying proportions of the number of engineers to the batch size

Infographic-8: The percentage of freshers across the batches of these 8 schools

Deferred MBA Programs

• What is it?

  This facility enables applicants to postpone their admission by upto 2 years after being offered the admit, currently, in India, IIMA and ISB allows select eligible candidates to defer their admission. Applicants have to give CAT and GMAT like standard applications but those who have work experience less than one year are eligible for deferral at IIMA, and last year students for ISB.

  
  

• How does one apply for deferral at IIMA?

  Applicants have to give CAT like standard applications and selected in the interviews and be offered an admit like normal. Once you get admission results, you can contact the admission committee for a deferral, and if your application is approved, then you are good to go. So if your deferral request is accepted then you need NOT give CAT again and should work for 1 or 2 years before eventually joining the MBA program.

  
  

• Eligibility criteria and acceptable grounds for deferral

  • Candidates should have less than 1 year of experience (in May when results come out), so either you are in the last semester or you are within the first year of job.
  • They grant it to at max 10% of the batch (max 40 students for a batch of 400), and preference is given to freshers.
  • The acceptable reasons are getting more professional experience, starting-up etc.
  • Deferment requests on grounds of medical, financial, family emergencies or to pursue higher studies are not entertained.
  • Period of deferment is maximum of two years.

I think the committee expects the applicant to work in good places, and come to the program with considerable on-ground insights about various topics such as finance, strategy, operations etc. As far as I know, there is no negotiation. It is fixed, based on the amount of work experience that you have.

• How does one apply for deferral at ISB?

  YLP Program (ISB’s deferral program): Young Leaders Program(YLP) at ISB is a foundation program for final or pre-final year students of UG or PG education. The purpose of ISB YLP is to groom and train students who plan to pursue business management education but do not have required work experience or academic credentials to get entry into a full-time MBA, i.e. it is a deferral MBA program for ISB. (link of YLP)

  
  

  
  

Special mention to FMS

• Offers a 2 years MBA program.
• Admits students based on CAT scores. The usual CAT cut off is more than 97 percentile.
• What is so unique about FMS?
  • Their high quality of education, cohort and exceptional placement opportunities with a 2-year program fee under INR 2 lakh altogether.
• If someone has a constraint of finances and is looking for a quality MBA, they can apply to FMS. More details can be found here.