Yes, FT rankings are indeed trust worthy. Its even great that this year FT issued Online MBA rankings, as opposed to online MBA Listings FT used to issue in past years.

I am still not decided between (Bradford, Durham, WBS). To me the cost is the big factor so as is the F2F element. At the moment Bradford seems to me the most economical of these 3. Further Bradford is now triple accredited as well. The only thing that bothers is which school is offering best online learning experience? By this i mean the possibility to have some element of synchronous learning, the online group work , collaboration , the use of technology such as mobile applications, ipad based learning , use of team viewer or any other software for online screen sharing, collaboration, the possibility of having audio lectures in mp3 format so that we can learn on the move.

Hi there Ahtisham
Like Duncan says there is no replacement for FT face-to-face attendance, so judging an MBA program by ?quality of online? experience could be a rather pointless exercise. But I understand it?s a legitimate question to ask, and I will answer it to the best of my ability.
Here I speak of Warwick, but I would be surprised if it is any different from all the schools you have mentioned, they should more or less the same system. At WBS every module has online live lectures, starting from the introductory lecture right up to the end. Typically there are 10 lessons per module, but the online lectures tend to condense the lessons so you won?t have as many. Students are encouraged to attend live, but the lessons are also recorded so you can watch later even if you miss it. Because of this the attendance levels for the live lectures tend to be very low, you will be lucky to get more than 10 participants, especially after the first semester (in the first semester everyone is excited about the MBA so many attend). In addition to the live lectures, you also have videos by the lecturers themselves within the lessons, explaining the key concepts. You also have videos from other experts, including some links to some very good YouTube videos. In addition, there are some modules which require group work, and there is a Skype-like facility which we can use to set up online conferences. All lecture notes are also available online, and you have access to thousands of online material from leading academic sources. Books are also now posted in hard copy and also electronic copy.
Basically, you have everything you need online and it?s hard to find anything lacking. But I bet all these are available at most UK universities anyway. So I end where I started. The ?online experience? doesn?t really provide the ?Wow? factor for a DL MBA. Also even if you meet some of your fellow comrades, the experience isn?t quite the same if you will never meet in person.

I really appreciate your beautiful insight to the learning experience at WBS. I wish i could join WBS but affordability is the only obstacle for me at the moment.

I know the importance of f2f element in learning and that's why kind of pushing to get touch of it through other means, one of the means was the communication technology it discussed above.. The other thing might be the immediate application of knowledge that i learnt though studies in my workplace. I work in a telecom sector in a project management role,and it's already a multinational environment, we work in collaboration, although their is room of improvement but the point is i have a field open to implement ideas after learning them....

Just to clarify though; I hope I am not coming across as if I am promoting Warwick, it's just that people only speak about their own experiences and since people usually don't so two MBAs it's hard to find anyone who has experience of both. But for me Warwick, Henley, Bradford and Durham and a few others are all good schools and if your budget is really tight and you can't travel you wouldn't have made a bad choice at all if you choose any one of them. When I started looking Bradford was the only one without triple accreditation, but now they have so the only issue to consider is fees and overall cost. The quality of learning will be very good in all of them, I am sure of that.

I dont know if it's appropriate to ask , but Hudson i remember you got some fee reduction when you applied at WBS, did you applied for it,, Who knows if anyone from us have a luck too.. so kindly advise

Yes I did get a 50% reduction in first year fees, it helped in swaying my decision heavily in favour of Warwick. Everyone who applies for WBS qualifies for that, just write a good personal statement on why you want to do your MBA, you might be lucky! All the best whatever you choose to do.

Duncan ! you rightly pointed me to focus on the outcomes. So here i state that my main goal to earn an MBA is to broaden my business acumen.. I work for a telecom company in consumer sales and support department. We plan and drive management initiatives to keep improving our customers experience. We support and facilitate internal departments (like internal audit , risk management , business continuity , Human resource ).... and so on...... but although i am managing my self but struggling at the same time,, as my bachelors is in engineering. So i need formal business education ... From the business acumen point of view, my focus would be to get financial management skills so that i could put my hands in budgeting and costing and higher program management roles.

As i have identified my career prospects after the MBA to be as Management Analyst /Consultant, now the question is that, which Distance learning MBA could brush up my Management and analytic skills out of (Bradford, Durham or Warwick ) and prepare me to prosper in my current job and to increase my job prospects.I have reviewed the curriculum of Durham and compared it with Bradford and it looks to me that Durham curriculum is more interesting and focused on Management of ones own business. Another thing that attracts me to Durham is the fee structure is pay as you go - as George has mentioned in some other posts. Because Bradford has told me that they do not extend payment beyond 2 years, even if you extend your schedule to complete the program in more than 2 years.

Hello knowledgeable people,

I was looking at Open University's online MBA program, and I'm pretty interested in it, given that it's triple accredited and has reasonable tuition for UK students (which I am)

Question is how does it compare to the other online MBAs in this thread (Warwick/Bradford/Durham specifically)?

It will have similar core course content. Otherwise, the quality of students, resources, alumni network, faculty etc will be greatly inferior. Try http://rankings.ft.com/businessschoolrankings/online-mba-ranking-2015

Hi guys,

do somebody have info about the new Imperial Global MBA? Reading about on the net I know that the old program was not so engaging, but what about this new hub technology? I can't find for students opinions neither discussions. My choice is between IE, Manchester and Imperial (via distance learning only, with the compulsory 2-3 weeks on campus and maybe last 1-2 electives on campus, maybe). IE'one seems very engaging, and the rankings confirm it's value, but I'm going to consider a UK (London for first) program for the location (as business environment), and Imperial's teaching and research quality deserves a look at. Now that it has a new program I would like to reach more info about.

Thank you!

Unfortunately, I don't have any concrete feedback in terms of the Imperial program, but why not ask them directly? I once expressed interest in the IE program, and asked some questions about the technology behind it, and they were kind enough to give me a live demonstration of how the platform worked.

I didn't end up doing the program, but was impressed that they went through the steps with me. Really illuminated how the thing actually worked. Maybe ask Imperial if they could arrange this kind of demo?

I did, but they couldn't offer me more so nothing about technology, method and delivery experience than the hub demo (which is not a demo but a presentation). I searched deeply on google and yuotube...for days and days...nothing! No one speaks about. IE offered me much more information and was impressed by the technology: everything is clear about the delivery method (did you see this? http://openmultimedia.ie.edu/Openmultimedia/fichas/_dr_estr_i.php)

Every school should understand this, as every student has to invest a lot of money and 2 years of sacrifices, so they want to know what to expect. Thinking about this, I would more details as possible, it's normal I suppose.

So I'm desperate, can't reach the information I need.

In my opinion...
a] You should not choose primarily on the basis of the learning technology. All of these systems will have frustrations, and you will work around them just as people do in the workplace. It would be mistaken to select the wrong programme because it has the right technology.
b] The quality of the user experience is driven by the number of students using the platform, the cost of it, the quality of the school, and the customer-orientation of the school. That means that most students would say that Henley and Warwick, with almost 2000 students, will almost certainly have better systems than Durham and Bradford, each with around 300. The previous Imperial distance-learning MBA never got so large, even though it had a modest 24k tuition. The new Global MBA is around 32K: that is enough to ensure that it probably won't be larger, but not such a huge amount that the school will have a lot of money to invest in IT.

Thank you Duncan, you mean don't look at the technology as the sole factor. So in general, what's your opinion about this Imperial Global MBA and the Imperial in general comparing it to the IE and Manchester (somebody says that IE is more engaging than Manchester), and why in your opinion the Imperial distance program still doesn't appear in the rankings?

In general, I'm interested in understanding the differences between Imperial new GMBA, IE GMBA and Manchester GMBA, to do the right choice. Brand and location is also important for me, that's why I'm going to prefere UK's programs (and London's programs for first) to others, and Imperial gives the possibility to follow up to two electives on campus with no added costs..this can be, if it's possible to join it, a great added value.

Talking about electives, many executives says that it is better to choose long term value courses instead of immediately spendable courses...such as strategic and leadership vs marketing for example, as in the long run they will be more useful comparing to those which can work immediately but not in the long run. IE has no electives, Imperial gives much importance to electives you can choose. What's your idea about?

Thank you again

The imperial programme has no alumni, so of course it cannot appear in the rankings.

The Manchester and IE programmes are well discussed, especially the Manchester programme, on this site. There's not much to add. I would certainly look at the alumni networks of the school as a major variable: How to use LinkedIn to find the best school www.find-mba.com/board/33571 Fit with your career goals should be more important than brand, since brand is contextual: IE has a better brand in Spain, and Manchester does in the UK. I would be careful about joining such a new programme as Imperial, but if you live in London then it's a huge asset to be able to access a campus.

Why are you not considering EMBA classes?

Thank you Duncan. I'm not in London neither in the UK, so no possibility to reach the extra value of the on campus weekends of an EMBA. There are about 70 students at the Imperial GMBA at the moment, so I thought to open a dedicated thread searching for students informations and experiences sharing. I used your suggests about linkedin: is it possible that IE has 20.000 MBA alumni and students over the world while Imperial only 258?

Not every MBA alumnus in the world uses LinkedIn, but it is the case that IE has a huge MBA programme, and has run that for generations. Imperial has a much younger business school, and a very small MBA programme.

So your idea is IE > Manchester > Imperial ?

No, I think you should start from your career goals.