The 6 Stages of Rankings Understanding

Since this is the time of year that prospective B-School applicants might start looking for resources on the web, I thought I'd try to save them some time in understanding business school rankings:

Stage 1. You're a new applicant, just starting to research schools. You discover that there are several sets of rankings available to help. You also discover the BusinessWeek forums. Harnassing the power of Excel, you create hybrid rankings, averaging the FT, BW, USNews, and WSJ rankings. "It's genius!" you think. Debate ensues on the forums.

Stage 2. You realize that the WSJ and FT rankings are based on bizarre, single-factor criteria. Better to stick to the more reasonable Business Week and US News rankings.

Stage 3. Further reading of forums convinces you that "H/S/W" and "the M7" are the immutable hierarchy of the business school world, given from upon high.

Stage 4. At some point, you begin to realize that the forums and websites are mostly populated by overseas applicants and obsessive-compulsive types. You begin to doubt the wisdom of 24 year olds who have never actually seen the inside of a B-school.

Stage 5. You actually visit some schools and realize that there is so much more to their personality than rankings. Further, you realize that there are material differences that would make certain schools a better fit for you and your goals, despite their lower rankings.

Stage 6. You happily accept an offer from your school of choice. After attending for a while, you can't even remember what the school's rankings are. You meet with prospective students, and marvel at their obsession with rankings. One of them shows you his spreadsheet with weighted averages of different published rankings. You knowingly pat him on the back, then head off to a job interview.

Am I missing any stages?

MIT Sloan Visit and Interview

Some observations from my recent visit to MIT Sloan:

The Culture
MIT Sloan is a unique MBA program. Not so much because of their curriculum, but because of the attitude and feel of the school. MIT feels different, and I had to think about it for a couple of days before I was able to put my finger on what it is that's so unique. Once I'd thought about it, there were two main things that set Sloan apart. One, they seem to work harder than most B-school students. Sloanies are serious about getting a lot done. Two, they are really smart. I'm not easily impressed by smarts, but there are some super-intelligent people at Sloan. And not in the narrow, nerdy sense, but in a very well-rounded way.

Another surprise was the "make a difference" attitude among students and faculty. There are a lot of projects involving the third world in some sort of big-thinking way. (This is true of MIT as a whole, as demonstrated by their new $100 laptop for the third world.) This has a lot to do with the fact that MIT is so strongly entrepreneurship-oriented, but the desire to make a difference is a strong part of the school's personality.

The faculty at Sloan is also incredible. While most other schools talk about the one star professor they have in each department, MIT has nothing but superstar profs. It's taken for granted at Sloan.

The facilities were not as bad as I'd been led to believe. They just seemed like average classrooms to me. It seems there is a lack of space for students to gather, though.

The Interview
The interview was not as special as I'd expected, either. MIT sends you a 2 page guide to their "Behavioral Event-based Interview" (BEI) before you visit. The key difference is that they do NOT ask you "Why an MBA? Why now? and Why here?" They simply take your resume and application and ask two or three main questions, each with several follow up questions. It is not a blind interview.

It's not as unique as some people claim. It is odd, however, to have an interviewer ask you "...and how did that make you feel?" You feel a bit like you're on a psychiatrist's couch then. The interviewer is also studiously poker-faced. It's not confrontational, but it's also not as warm and congenial as other schools. I tried to make my interviewer laugh, but he just smiled patiently. I agree with others who have observed that they are also trying to get a sense of how strong your committment to attending Sloan is.

Soft Sell
In all my interactions with Sloan, I've noticed that they aren't as interested in "selling" the school to you as much as other programs. Their bright green brochure is typographically bold, but seems to have less content than most. The admissions office personnel are more stoic than any I've seen. Sloan is not a Smiley Gladhands kind of place. They are what they are, and they want you to evaluate whether you'd fit in.

If they're not careful, this can come across as arrogance. Sloan doesn't seem to "need" its prospective students. They have a line of people around the block who would kill to pay $40+k a year to be there, and they know it.

If you're applying, it's definitely a school you have to visit and evaluate for yourself -- I found the reality of the school to be different from what I'd expected, and certainly different from other schools I've visited.

Summary
If accepted, I would have a hard time turning Sloan down. Walking around and talking to people, I could feel the opportunities in the air. It seems that Sloanies have enormous access to companies, professors, and ideas. It was truly unique, and still a bit hard to describe. I also got the impression that most of the students were already successes before they came to B-school. Everyone was of a very high calibre.

The downside: the first time I looked at craigslist to see how much apartments go for in Cambridge! Ugh.