Guide To EMBA Ranking Methodology

Poets&QuantsforExecs’ composite ranking gives equal weight to the four most influential lists of the best Executive MBA programs published by U.S. News & World Report, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, The Financial Times, and The Economist. 

A school’s rank in any one of the surveys determines the score it gets: A rank of No. 1 is equal to 100 points, a rank of No. 2 is equal to 99 points, etc. The scores for each school are then added up in total and divided by the number of surveys in which the school was ranked to get an average score. Schools were then awarded an extra point for each of the four lists that assigned them a numerical rank.

The methodology therefore favors EMBA programs that tend to be ranked highly and by as many of the four organizations as possible. The reason: A school that shows up in all four rankings is generally more well regarded than a school that shows up in only one or two. This system awards programs that are open to evaluation by all four ranking organizations. Schools that fail to make a list can be at a disadvantage as a result. This is to discourage the practice of some schools to “pick and choose” rankings because they know some methodologies may favor their programs, while others don’t.

The index score was devised by taking the school with the highest score—Chicago Booth—and using that number as a denominator for the average of all the other schools that were ranked by P&Q. Only schools ranked by at least two of the four ranking organizations are included on the P&Q list.