How to: Choose the right set of schools to apply to

The decision to opt for a graduate business school is a life-changing decision. The choice essentially moulds your life after graduation, and unless you want to spend the gargantuan amount of money all over again, you better have made that decision after some thought, unless you are adventurous!

There are many aspects to an MBA that you need to consider. For e.g. there are some basic questions that you _just_ have to have a compelling and honest answer for!

1. Why are you pursuing your MBA?
2. Why do you want to do your MBA now?
3. Is there are any area of specialization that you want to pursue?

We can further complicate / move down the ladder once we have the basics cleared.

Furthermore, answering these questions will help you narrow down your choices from the plethora of business schools that are there in the market. They also help you write some of the cliched questions that are asked by the MBA institutes. :D

Rankings
There are many ranking institutions that regularly rank all the MBA schools based on many criteria. You have
- Financial Times
- US MBA rankings
- Business week rankings

There are many more ranking systems as well. From what I have observed though, there are typically the high-fliers, prestigious graduate business schools of the likes of Harvard, Wharton, Stanford, London School of Business, INSEAD etc that always top the charts.

My take is that while these rankings definitely help in choosing the colleges, you shouldn't rely _just_ on them. For e.g. these are all rankings based on various factors! They are pertinent factors, however, they cannot be the only factors as far as choosing the colleges go.

They are not beyond propaganda and are not completely impartial. You should also talk to the admissions committee of each college, interact with the students there and only then make up your decision.

For e.g. the college that I chose - Thunderbird School of Global Management, which I will be attending from Fall 2008, is not ranked high in these rankings. However, it's ranked _the_ best college for International Management. Furthermore, talking to the students and the AdComm, was a completely different experience as compared to various other top institutes including Duke, Darden and a few more. The warmth of response was something that I was looking for and I found that in Thunderbird.

Similarly, you may have a region choice, a major choice, even a paper choice, let alone recruitment choices, international exposure, languages etc! Consequently utilize the rankings to check up on the colleges and then make conscious efforts to talk to the colleges to see if you are indeed a fit there.

I call it the 3-step-process
1. Decide on the area of study
2. Go through the rankings
3. Talk to the colleges you have chosen based on your preferences and then apply!

It saves you a lot of time later when deciding between colleges and furthermore helps you present an honest and earnest file to the Admissions Committee of the various colleges!

Share your thoughts on the process and how *you* chose your graduate business school or how you are going about doing it! And check out later posts on "Deciding on the various offers from Graduate Business Schools"!