Kellogg School of Management
Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management has firmly secured a spot as a school to watch in terms of growing tech hiring. With the Class of 2016, the percentage of students heading into technology jumped to 22 percent, up from 15 percent a year earlier. And unlike the schools mentioned above, which have yet to release Class of 2017 employment statistics, Kellogg’s latest stats came out earlier this month, revealing additional gains. One in four of this most recent graduating class—a full 25 percent—headed into tech.
Amazon hired 32 Kellogg grads, making it the third largest recruiter in 2017, behind only McKinsey and Boston Consulting Group (BCG). But Amazon was far from the only tech firm to hire at the school. According to Liza Kirkpatrick, senior director of the full-time MBA program at Kellogg’s Career Management Center, more than 50 unique tech employers hired Kellogg students this past year in a range of functions, including product management, sales, marketing, business operations, supply chain, product development, and others.
Multiple factors have contributed to Kellogg’s gains in tech hiring, including tech firms’ increasing recognition of the value of the MBA skill set, more students coming into Kellogg with tech backgrounds, and efforts on the part of the Kellogg Career Management Center team to develop relationships with tech firms. As a school, Kellogg has also placed more of an emphasis on students visiting and networking with West Coast tech firms.
As far as curriculum is concerned, the Program on Data Analytics at Kellogg (PDAK) features a range of foundational, competitive advantage, deep dive, and experiential courses. Taken together, these courses comprise Kellogg’s data analytics “pathway,” an integrated, cross-functional sequence of courses designed to address student and recruiter demand for data analytics fluency. Kellogg also features a range of faculty experts in the area of technology information management, including specialists in blockchain, information technology, information systems, and technology infrastructure. The school is also home to the Center for Research in Technology and Innovation, which provides education, advisory, and advocacy services and initiatives related to technology and innovation.
Advances in Technology Hiring, Curricular Offerings at Other Schools
Though trailing the aforementioned schools in terms of the percentage of graduates pursuing post-MBA careers in technology, both the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business also warrant mention here. At Ross, one in five graduates—20.4 percent—in the Class of 2016 headed into the technology industry, and Amazon hired 31 full-time MBA graduates and 29 summer interns to become the largest recruiter for both classes.
UVA’s Darden School of Business sent 17 percent of its 2016 MBA grads into tech and 20 percent of its Class of 2017 students into internships at technology firms, representing a steady increase in recent years. Darden also last March announced the launch of a new MBA+MSDS dual-degree program, which grants a Master of Data Science degree from UVA’s Data Science Institute and an MBA from Darden in 24 months. The program welcomed a pilot cohort this past summer, and Darden is currently accepting applications for the full program, which will launch in 2018.
Finally, NYU Stern School of Business and Cornell’s S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management are also worth considering when targeting future careers in tech. The tech industry drew 16.8 of 2017 grads from Stern, where the latest employment data was recently released. At Johnson, 12 percent of 2016 grads headed into technology. (Stats for 2017 were not yet available at the time of this writing.) Both schools also have placed considerable focus on preparing their graduates for careers in tech through the launch of new programs and, in Cornell’s case, a new Cornell Tech campus in New York City.
Amazon hired more Stern graduates in the Class of 2017 than any other company, marking the first time that a technology company topped the list of leading employers. In the past five years, technology placements have more than doubled, and they jumped almost 7 percentage points in the past year alone. Stern also last spring announced the launch of a new specialized one-year Tech MBA program and is currently accepting applications for its inaugural class.
And Cornell in September opened its stunning new Cornell Tech campus on New York’s Roosevelt Island, which will serve as the permanent home of the one-year Cornell Tech MBA program that launched in 2014. The new campus will also benefit students in the Ithaca-based two-year MBA program, who can take part virtually in classes in New York via technologically linked classrooms, attend weekend workshops, or opt to spend a semester or their entire second year at Cornell Tech. And for those who choose to remain in Ithaca for both years, the latest addition to the school’s signature series of Immersions—intense, hands-on semesters in a specific industry or career interest designed to help prepare students for their summer internships—is the Digital Tech Immersion.
As technology firms increasingly recognize the value of the MBA skill set within their organizations—and business school students increasingly are drawn to the expanding opportunities in the industry—more leading schools are also likely to expand curricular offerings that combine data science expertise with foundational graduate management education. We’ll keep you posted!
ICYMI: Best Schools to Jumpstart Your Career in Tech—or Advance It
