French business school HEC wins the FT executive MBA ranking 2019

The Financial Times (FT) executive MBA ranking delivered a surprise this year with French business school HEC Paris taking the top spot, up from sixth place last year. Reason for this big jump are the graduates’ career progress and work experience.

Top school overall was HEC Paris and the FT reasons that the French business school has “built on last year’s strong performance when it was the highest new entrant, in joint sixth place”. The success of its international EMBA programme can be explained by the excellent career progression and a sharp rise in its work experience performance according to the paper, which quoted an alumnus, who was inspired to found a business after the course: “The strong HEC entrepreneurship culture gave me the self-confidence and courage to move ahead,” he was quoted by the financial paper.

The French programme was followed by Kellogg/HKUST which stood out with the highest salaries afterwards. The average salary came to 513,014 US dollar, three years after completion of studies.

The top five were made up by more joined programmes. Trium: HEC Paris/LSE/NYU: Stern combines the power of France, the UK, the U.S. and China. The programme came third – just before the EMBA-Global Asia from Columbia/HKU/LBS. Trium was praised for its best work/international course experience whilst the EMBA-Global Asia course was one of the best in the alumni aims achieved category. This included improved earnings and a professional network. The Chinese business school Ceibs achieved fifth place making it the highest-ranking solo programme in Asia. A particular standout at Ceibs is that the school’s alumni have a strong career progression.

It’s worthwhile mentioning that the London Business School is back in the top ten for the first time since 2011 again – thanks to a strong increase in salary, up from 243,250 last year to 292,023 US dollar for 2019.

FT’s EMBA Ranking 2019

1 HEC Paris, France / Qatar / China

2 Kellogg/HKUST Business School, China

3 Trium: HEC Paris/LSE/NYU: Stern, France / UK / US / China

4 EMBA-Global Asia: Columbia/HKU/LBS, US / China / UK

5 Ceibs, China / Switzerland / Ghana

6 EMBA-Global: Columbia/LBS, US / UK

7 Washington University: Olin, US / China

8 London Business School, UK / UAE

9 Tsinghua University/Insead, China/ Singapore/ France/ Abu Dhabi

10 University of Oxford: Saïd, UK

Read more on ft.com and rankings.ft.com