MBA Job Report: Kellogg

Tech industry jobs beat out finance at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, according to Kellogg’s 2014 MBA Employment Statistics.

Employment rate stays the same

The 94% of Kellogg MBAs who received a job offer within three months of graduation in 2014 replicates 2013’s figure. However, this year 91% of the Kellogg MBA class got an offer they deemed worthy of accepting, up from 88% last year.

By the time they graduated, 85% of Kellogg’s class of 2014 had a job offer, and 80% graduated having already accepted a job offer. The figures for the graduation job offer and acceptance represented a 1% increase over last year’s year equivalents.

Tech more popular than finance with Kellogg MBAs

The big news in this year’s report from Kellogg is that tech rose above finance to become the second most popular industry. This year, 18% of Kellogg MBAs went to work in technology and only 14% went to work in finance.

This is the first time since 2010 (Kellogg’s available employment data only goes back five years),  that technology has made it into the second spot, typically occupied by finance and which accounted for a fifth of all Kellogg MBA jobs in both 2013 and 2012.

The top two tech employers were Apple and Amazon which each hired at least 12 MBAs. Other top tech employers included Google, Microsoft and Adobe.

By comparison, the most popular finance employer, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, hired five Kellogg MBAs. As for the other two top finance employers listed in the report, Goldman Sachs hired four Kellogg graduates and JP Morgan hired three.

It’s no secret that consulting and finance are the typically the most popular industries when it comes to MBA jobs. It was certainly the case among a number of schools this year - demonstrated by the employment reports from Tuck, Columbia, NYU Stern and that other top Illinois business school, Chicago Booth. 

What’s happening at Kellogg is in direct contrast with Stanford GSB where the number of graduates taking MBA jobs in finance increased as the number of graduates taking tech jobs decreased.  At the same time however, the rise in tech jobs is a trend we’ve been seeing at other top business schools.  Tech was the second most popular industry at both MIT Sloan and Michigan Ross. The tech industry may also be responsible for the decrease in finance jobs at Wharton.

Consulting is Still Number One

Consulting is still the most popular industry with Kellogg graduates, accounting for 35.4% of MBA jobs for Kellogg’s MBA class of 2014. Consulting has also been the number one industry for at least five years running, reaching a high of 37% in 2011. While consulting is still the most popular, this year’s figure represents a (very) slight decline of a little over half a percent compared to last year.

The majority of consultants from Kellogg’s 2014 graduating class went to work at the MBB consulting firms (aka McKinsey, Bain and BCG), which all hired over 20 graduates. Of the 3 MBB firms, McKinsey was the most popular, hiring 29 Kellogg MBAs.

Average Kellogg MBA Salary Stays the Same

Despite the decline in finance jobs (which usually pay more than tech), this year’s median base MBA salary of US$120,000 was the same as last year’s. This figure puts Kellogg in fifth place in the MBA salary stakes, since only four other schools (HBS, Stanford GSB, Wharton and MIT Sloan) reported higher average MBA salaries this year.

The average MBA salary for all industries exceeded US$100,000. Consulting was the industry with the highest average base MBA salary of US$132,447. Manufacturing was the industry with the lowest average salary of US$102,866.