The masters in management degree, once the best-kept secret of European business schools, is becoming the star of 21st-century business education. Though still a passport to the boardrooms of France and northern Europe, it is also proving to be the saviour of many North American business schools and a tool to build international reputations in countries as far afield as China.
In the US, where applications to MBA programmes have fallen, masters degrees have provided a welcome source of revenue while giving those leaving undergraduate degrees a leg-up in the job market during the great recession. As such, masters in management (MiM) in the US were frequently designed for liberal arts graduates from the parent university.
At Mendoza College in Indiana, for example, which started its programme two years ago, 40 per cent of students are still graduates of the parent University of Notre Dame, says Mary Goss, senior director of graduate business programmes. “What the MiM has done is open up those undergraduate recruiters to other students on campus.”