Canadian MBA Thread

Cousin just graduated from McGill and landed in banking in Montreal.

McGill's MBA is good for Montreal and the rest of Quebec but it has no reach outside of the province (regardless of what their admissions office says). I would probably go with HEC Montreal in any case -- better ranked and way cheaper.

He's quite satisfied with McGill and says good thing about them.

Yes, because he's working in Montreal. McGill is fantastic if you want to work in finance in Montreal. Great name and good students.

I think Ivy has pretty good reach all over Canada and in the rest of North America, moreso than Queens for sure.

The thing with MBAs in Canada is that they are a lot like MBA programs in most other countries -- there's some excellent options for students looking to stay in the country but the overall reach of even the best schools is limited. I think it's reflected by the general makeup of their classes which consists mostly of Canadians.

I'm sure it depends but in general I get the impression that it doesn't matter that much. I'm sure Canadian recruiters have heard of Wharton/HBS etc and will be duly impressed by your degree but they most likely don't recruit at any of the elite schools and are mostly looking to fill their ranks with Ivy/Rotman grads. If you look at the makeup of many Canadian banks and throughout industry it's really dominated by Ivy/Rotman and to a lesser extent Queens/Sauder grads.

This could also be, of course, because graduates of elite MBA programs don't want to work in Canada. I think it's a bit of both.

Even Ivey seems to place a disproportionate % of its grads in Toronto, and only 6% outside Canada. http://www.ivey.uwo.ca/mba/docs/Ivey...ent_Report.pdf Rotman only 8% outside Canada (89% in Toronto): http://issuu.com/rotmanmag/docs/jobreport McGill, otoh, seems to place better internationally, with 24% outside Canada, and only 44% within Quebec: http://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/mba/c...loyment-stats/

McGill is a notorious gooser of its employment/admissions stats, so take that for what it's worth. For anyone with knowledge of the Canadian business world those stats absolutely defy belief (and not in a good way). The bottom line is that Ivy and Rotman are the only two Canadian MBAs I would pay full price for. Before their price hike McGill was actually a great deal though.

I went to Ivey for undergrad, the program is essentially the same as the MBA, only the quality of your MBA peers is (presumably) higher. And the 1-yr program is an advantage in my eyes.

It has limited reach outside Canada unless you are a superstar, though superstar status is more or less predetermined in an MBA than it is in undergrad.

I would highly recommend going to a US or EU Top 10 for an MBA if you had a choice.

I think it depends on what your plan is. If you want to work on bay street/wall street or management consulting, I think you are right on the money. If you're looking to return to your current employer, or gain the basic skill sets required to manage your business, etc...the Canadian programs are pretty decent and are all fairly affordable.