Is the money better with Masters in Management or MBA?
More data for business school aspirants. Source: Shutterstock.

Masters in Management (MiM) graduates are getting the same salary boost from their postgrad degree as do their peers in the more popular Masters in Business Administration (MBA), according to Financial Times.

Graduates from both postgrad degrees see an average salary hike of US$30,000 a year after completing the courses, according to data from former students compiled by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), which administers the GMAT business school entrance exam.

One such graduate is Paola Bellis who completed her MiM at Politecnico di Milano, who says: “I have nothing to complain about”.

Thanks to an internship she was required to take during her MiM course, Bellis later got a job at her dream company, Illycaffè. Now, the 26-year-old’s salary has increased by 60 percent to a high five-figure sum three years and two promotions later.

MiM graduates are also able to recoup their living expenses and tuition fees incurred with their first year’s salary, GMAC says. This is faster compared to graduates of a two-year MBA course take three and a half years to recover.

But beyond money, MiM students value their postgrad degree most in its ability to help them get well-paid jobs after completing their formal education.

“Having that masters degree on your curriculum vitae gives you an edge to get the interview,” Gregg Schoenfeld, GMAC research director said, adding that many companies will only consider business school graduates for the types of roles MiM students are seeking.

Berlin, Germany has a thriving start-up scene. Source: Shutterstock.

To Bar Schwartz, a MiM graduate from Berlin’s ESMT business school in Germany,  looking at salaries alone misses the point. Though she did get a 30 percent pay rise as a senior consultant at McKinsey, Schwartz said she may even have doubled her salary by staying at her old job as a code writer for companies in Berlin’s tech start-up sector.

“I could have got more in salary because of the type of person I am, an overachiever, but I would have been much less happy,” Schwartz says.

“As an engineer, I was always trying to do more in the business area, but I lacked the skills to progress. So I chose the masters in management degree to open doors.”

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