This year too BWorld has unfurled its B school survey...The others will promptly follow and before the confusion mounts like it usually does...Let me attempt a blog entry on this...
The B School Ranking Game never ceases to amaze me...
I for one find it next to ridiculous that all these reputed magazines year after year agree to disagree in their quest to order the top b schools in the country...
Is it infact the monetary undercurrent that finally decides the rankings...or am i being too cynical..
This brings me to the vital question, Are these rankings worthy of being yardsticks by which the mal-informed can decide their schools of pursuit?
After some mulling over on this issue...I have come up with my take on this entire process...Ofcourse this comes with the standard disclaimers and the conditions apply tag...
The rankings game needs to be viewed as a good source of information of the structure, approach, opportunities, unique features etc, of the top b schools in the country...They are more like bulletins of the b schools encapstulated into one...
Here again, one needs to take into account the fact that the various mags dont necessarily focus on the same schools, and even if the spotlight falls on the same school the aspects that they highlight are not the same...So in that way there is a lot of information from these sources. It is pretty much like how the opinion polls end up being sources of knowledge regarding the candidates in the fray rather than clear indicators of the favourites in the elections.
The other point of consolation is that, the survey also atleast gives us parameters to base our judgement, Even if we dont necessarily have to give any credence to the ratings ON those parameters.. And again some of the parameters are unique to each of the mags...So...we might be better off concentrating on the parameters and their relevance to our career.
My take on the whole exercise is that it would be prudent to take the rankings per se with a pinch of salt..and to focus on the details that the ranking methodology has brought to light.What might connect to one person will seem to be of perfunctory interest to the other ...And the familiarity that one gains about the institute and its way of functioning through these surveys might help prospective b schoolers throughout their 2 years there...One point though..The generally conflicting surveys though seem to agree on a group of schools being better than another group and so on..Those points can be taken..
I still am an avid reader of these rankings only cus they provide without fail..Information..and to quote a tamil movie...Information is wealth...
Alteast when intrepreted properly and in a way that suits the individual...
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Absolutely. Exactly what i have been doing with that issue of BW, lookin thro to spot some bit of interestin news about some univ that might interest or favor me. Came to know that IIM-B is the one that spends max on co-curricular activities and has lotsa non-acad work, and stuff like IIM-A topping foreign placements.
Going by the latest mock cat results though, all that is none of my business i guess. ;)
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