AMBITION | BE IN BRILLIANT COMPANY
s a reader of AMBITION , you will almost certainly be aware that AMBA accreditation is the global standard for all MBA, DBA and master’s in management degrees. Only around 2% of the world’s Business
demand for MBA programmes across the AMBA network grew between 2018 and 2019. The region with the most significant increase in applications was Oceania, with an increase in applications of 54% per School and 41% per programme. The second- largest increase in applications, per programme, was in Africa, where applications rose by 35%. 2. Enrolments The average number of enrolments at AMBA-accredited MBA programmes globally was similar between 2018 and 2019, with no change at a School or programme level. Regionally, however, there was movement. Africa had the largest increase in enrolments per programme with an increase of 22% while the UK had the largest increase in enrolments, at 16%, at the School level. The global picture of increased applications and a stable level of enrolments suggests a potential increase in competition for places at elite
Schools, spread across 75 countries, hold this mark of quality for their portfolio of postgraduate management
education programmes. The AMBA network of accredited Business Schools is therefore an illuminating resource for insights into the progress of providers of high-quality management education and the health of the sector as a whole. With this in mind, AMBA’s flagship annual report, the AMBA Application and Enrolment Report , endeavours to track the number of applications and enrolments to AMBA- accredited programmes, and other vital programme statistics. Focusing solely on MBA programmes – which so often
provide an institution’s flagship programme – this year’s report is the organisation’s largest ever and covers a total of 897 programmes worldwide. In so doing, its data spans 134,271 applications and 47,340 enrolments – indicative of the huge volume of individuals seeking to maximise their career potential by enrolling in a world-leading business education programme. This year’s research intends to provide two distinct pieces of analysis, offering different analytical perspectives: 1. The first provides a snapshot of the composition of 233 AMBA-accredited Schools that ran an MBA in 2019 and which participated in the study. This explores their application, enrolment and programme delivery trends.
Business Schools, with conversion rates also dropping from 38% in 2018 to 35% in 2019. However, it is also possible that individual candidates have been applying to a greater number of programmes to boost their chances of getting into a reputable MBA programme. 3. Gender diversity Globally, there was an increase in the proportion of women applying to AMBA-accredited MBA programmes
‘Globally, 40% of those applying and 38% of those enrolling onto MBA programmes in 2019 were women’
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between 2018 and 2019, by two percentage points. Regionally, the largest proportional increase in female applications was by three percentage points in Oceania. There was only one region where the proportion of female applicants decreased between 2018 and 2019 – in Asia and the Middle East there was a decrease of three percentage points in the proportion of female applicants. In terms of enrolments, there was a one percentage point increase in female representation globally, from 2018 to 2019. The largest increase, by four percentage points, was in China (including Hong Kong, China), while there were increases of three percentage points from 2018 in Oceania and India. The conversion rate dropped for both female and male applicants, by five percentage points (to 34%) and four percentage points (to 37%) respectively. In this way, the gap in conversation rates applicable to men and women widened by a single percentage point.
2. The second offers trends of 217 Business Schools which participated both in the current study and its equivalent last year. This analysis therefore offers a comparative year-on-year analysis of 2019 and 2018 cohorts for a large sample of AMBA-accredited Schools. The findings provide an essential snapshot of the market ahead of the start of a year characterised by restrictions and limitations brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic and a year for which figures for any industry will need to be recorded with a lengthy asterisk. Section A: year-on-year comparisons between 217 AMBA-accredited Business Schools that provided their application and enrolment data for both 2018 and 2019 1. Applications Globally, there was an increase of 7% in applications both per School and per individual programme indicating that
4. International applications and enrolments On a global scale, the share of applications from
international prospects was down between 2018 and 2019, by three percentage points. However, the equivalent volume of enrolments remained consistent. Regions reporting rises in their share of applications from overseas candidates were Oceania, with a rise of 16
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