The Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB)’s MBA program is underlined by their motto: “Change lives. Change organizations. Change the world.”
The motto captures the essence of the school—its ground-breaking, change-making, innovative culture. The GSB MBA program’s worldwide fame is grounded in the unique academic atmosphere that results from this, and it is against this backdrop that the program excels.
And excel it most certainly does, since GSB is widely considered to offer the gold standard in MBAs. Classes are small, and admission is tough—mean candidate GMAT scores sit at 738 and more than 6,000 applicants vie for just over 400 spots.
So why is an MBA from Stanford GSB such a spectacular thing? The answer lies in its curriculum, its faculty, its results and its culture. Read on to find out more.
The Stanford Culture
Innovation
Stanford has long been famed for its innovative culture. Marked by its ties to Silicon Valley, GSB nurtures an environment in which change is celebrated, original ideation is centered and failure is leveraged for learning.
All this cultivates a ground-breaking and entrepreneurial spirit amongst students—and it extends to the curriculum, too. GSB continuously updates and refreshes its pedagogy and learning content, ensuring that students are constantly engaged in industry-relevant topics at the cutting-edge of business.
Collaboration
The GSB class size is small, clocking in at just over 400 students. This results in tight-knit networks, high levels of collaboration and a strong sense of community. This is bolstered by the presence of over 50 student clubs, campus-based living and collaborative learning spaces.
The GSB Faculty
Stanford believes that “Who Teaches You Really Matters”—and they show it. Their faculty are world-class, starring members of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Arts, John Bates Clark medal winners and even Nobel laureates.
The global reputation of the Stanford MBA Program is rooted in this collection of dedicated, highly qualified, committed faculty. Student-to-faculty ratio is six-to-one, increasing student access to and interaction with the impressive names that teach them.
A snapshot of the faculty at GSB
The GSB faculty are world-renowned business experts. A select few among them are:
- Peter Wendell, co-professor of Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital, founder and managing director of Sierra Ventures.
- Baba Shiv, teacher of “The Frinky Science of the Human Mind,” expert on the role of emotions and psychology in shaping business decisions and experiences.
- Jennifer Aaker, leading expert on the role of purpose and meaning and the positive impact of technology. Aaker has been published in scientific journals and featured in The Economist and The New York Times.
The Stanford Curriculum
The Stanford GSB MBA program is full-time and lasts two years. It boasts a global, expansive, and engaging curriculum, weaving various academic approaches together to offer diverse and unique learning experiences.
Personalization
At the core of GSB’s MBA curriculum is personalization. The entire curriculum operates under Stanford’s belief that learning must be “Right for the Subject, Right for You.” In practice, this means that both faculty and students are able to adapt learning content and styles to best fit their own goals, preferences and needs.
For faculty, this looks like the freedom to tailor course content and teaching methods to the students with whom they work. For students, this looks like the ability to mold a curriculum to their personal goals, supported by academic coaches to do so.
Global experiences
Stanford GSB fosters a truly international outlook in its MBA students by requiring that they all complete a global experience. There are four options for how they might do this.
- Students can participate in the GMIX, whereby they spend four weeks working on an international project. The program allows students to experience a new culture and business environment.
- Students can join the Global Exploration program, partaking in a student-led intensive group-learning experience. In groups of 20-30 peers, students investigate a challenging global issue.
- Students can participate in the Stanford-Tsinghua Exchange Program (STEP). Here, they partner with the Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management in Beijing, collaborate with Tsinghua MBA students on academic projects and gain knowledge and experience of doing business in China.
- Students can create a tailored global experience, such as an international internship, supported by GSB along the way.
Teaching style
Stanford GSB’s MBA program draws from teaching methods that span case studies, experiential learning and lecture-based learning. Faculty have the freedom to select and adapt these methods of instruction according to the subject they are teaching and the class they’re working with. Once again—“right for the subject, right for you.”
Woven into Stanford GSB’s lectures are invitations to guest speakers, global thought leaders and innovative executives. And amongst the experiential learning are the aforementioned global experiences, as well as the Social Entrepreneurship Program and Stanford GSB Impact Fund.
Labs and research
Students are able to investigate their own areas of interest through the diverse research initiatives and labs that GSB offers. The Behavioral Lab, for example, facilitates research conducted with human participants, while the Golub Capital Social Impact Lab focuses on social science research to increase effectiveness in social science leadership.
Two-year split
During students’ first year at GSB, they focus on two things. The first is gaining general management knowledge, bolstered by practical experience and feedback from classmates and leadership coaches. The second is global exposure, fulfilled via mandatory participation in the Global Experience Requirement (GER), and which we detailed above.
The second year at GSB is where personalization really kicks in. Almost all courses in this year are electives, enabling students to create the perfect second year for them. Elective topics are continuously reviewed and updated in order to reflect industry trends and developments. Some examples include entrepreneurship, global/strategic management, political economics, healthcare, education, and energy.
GSB’s joint programs
For students who take particular interest in the complex leadership challenges that arise when business and other industries converge, Stanford offers six joint degree programs. The programs include the MS Computer Science/MBA, the MS Electrical Engineering/MBA, and the MS Environment and Resources/MBA. Around 20% of GSB students pursue joint degrees.
After the Stanford MBA
Job offers for graduates
For the graduating MBA Class of 2023, job offers were high; 89% of grads looking for a job were offered one within three months of graduating. More than a third of these job offers were in finance, and 93% were in North America.
Median base salary
The median base salary for Stanford MBA graduates in 2023 was a lofty $182,500; in addition to that, nearly half received a signing bonus that averaged at $30,000. A high base salary is more than just a financial reward—it is an employer’s vote of confidence in an MBA program, indicating trust in the foundational skills which that program has built.
Support and resources during the job search
Stanford GSB offers both students and alumni comprehensive and customizable support when looking for employment. Their Career Management Center assists with strategic decisions, skill-development and career planning, as well as offering many different workshops.
The Stanford network
Business school networks are crucial resources for MBA students, offering support in job-searches and career progression as well as access to an excellent community. The GSB network is nothing short of excellent. It encompasses more than 30,000 members across the world, described by the school as “generous with their time, supportive of your efforts, and famously responsive.”
All these factors combine—the personalized curriculum, the world class faculty, the undeniable post-graduation success and the unique academic culture—to create Stanford GSB’s MBA program. It is these factors that allow GSB to fulfill its mission, that make the MBA program so fantastic, and which “develop innovative, principled, and insightful leaders.”
