FACTORS AFFECTING THE PLACEMENT PROSPECTS

OF MBA STUDENTS: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY

Shreekumar K. Nair and Sadhana Ghosh

This paper presents the results of a study that attempted to link students’ placement prospects, operationalised
through student perceptions of recruiting organisations to certain academic parameters such as performance
in the entrance examination, group discussion, as well as personal interview, grade point average, internship
marks, and ratings on extra- curricular activities. The study revealed that students having prior work
experience got placement in organisations which are perceived to be better. Also, students with work
experience performed better in the personal interview as compared to freshers. Further, students with
work experience were found to be comparable with freshers in respect of their performance in the entrance
examination, group discussion and internship.

I
N recent times, business schools in the country are
giving a lot of importance to student placements. The
reason is that, to a large extent, the image and brand
value of a B-school depends on its placement record. B-
schools vie with one another to get the best companies
on their campuses. In fact, in B-school surveys, the kind
of placements offered is an important parameter
determining the rating of that school. On the other hand,
there is fierce competition among prospective students
to gain admission to the best business schools in the
country as well as abroad. These business schools really
mean business and flaunt their ratings to woo the best
talent. The fact is that while business schools are
mushrooming in the country, placements are becoming
critical to their very survival.
In most developed countries like the United States,
etc. the initial screening of candidates for admission to
the master’s programme in business administration, at
the institutes of higher learning is through GMAT and
GRE. These examinations are continuously validated to
ensure the suitability of the candidates for the specific
programmes. The educational system also provides the
flexibility to change from one programme to another
depending on the aptitude and the interest of the
candidate. In developing countries like India, the student
has to appear in many entrance examinations for a post-
graduate programme. Different agencies conduct these
entrance examinations, resulting in non-uniformity in the
screening process. Moreover, very little effort is made
to validate the entrance examinations as per scientific
methods and procedures. In fact, the concept of test
validation and development of validation methods are
almost half a century old. Thorndike (1964) and Anastasi
(1966) had recommended certain validation methods for
tests to be used in selection. Ideally, a selection
examination using a battery of validated tests should help
in maximizing the chances of selecting the right
candidates and rejecting the wrong candidates while
minimising the chances of selecting the wrong candidates
and rejecting the right candidates.
The selection process of students for almost all the
management programmes involves initial screening of
the applicants using a battery of aptitude tests, followed
by group discussion and interview. These selection
methods are somewhat stereotyped in nature and business
institutes rarely bother about their predictive validity,
which means uncertainty as to the accuracy of these
methods in selecting the best candidates for management
education. Different agencies conduct these entrance
examinations, most of which lack any evidence of a
uniform pattern for screening applicants. Ideally, the
selection tools should be able to identify potential
42 Nair and Ghosh
●
managers, who could be groomed through management
education and subsequently offered to industry. Indeed,
companies make use of a variety of selection methods
during placements to determine the students’ suitability
for managerial positions.
The written entrance examinations used at most of
the B-schools comprise an assortment of tests to assess
desirable managerial attributes such as analytical skills,
quantitative skills, language ability, business awareness,
etc. The tests are usually of the objective, multiple-choice
type format, calling for both speed and accuracy since
they are loaded with a large number of questions which
the candidates have to answer within a limited time.
There are minimum cut-off marks for each of the tests
to avoid selecting candidates with low scores in any of
the specific aptitudes. The scores on each of the tests are
aggregated to get total marks on the entrance
examination. Thus, the short-listed candidates are at the
higher end in terms of total marks and also comfortably
surpass the test-wise cut-off marks. Since managerial
aptitude tests assess managerial potential, there is reason
to assume that candidates with better performance in the
written examination get better placements.
In almost every B-school, candidates short-listed in
the written entrance examination are called for group
discussion (GD) and personal interview (PI) for which
marks are awarded separately. Finally, marks in the
entrance examination, GD, and personal interview are
added to arrive at the aggregate marks, which are
considered for selection to the programme. While making
campus recruitments, HR executives from different
companies invariably conduct group discussions and
interviews with the students. The GDs and interviews
conducted by these recruiters are usually similar to those
conducted by the B-schools for their admissions. Even
the attributes that are seen in the candidates are similar.
Therefore, those candidates who score high marks in
group discussions as well as interviews conducted by
the business schools at the time of admissions are quite
likely to find themselves placed in better companies at
the time of campus recruitments.
From the placement point of view, companies are
found to generally prefer students with 2 or 3 years of
experience in industry vis-à-vis freshers from B-schools.
Students with experience are already exposed to the
dynamics of organisational functioning and are in a better
position to adjust rapidly to the complexities and crises
that are characteristic of organisational life. With students
having adequate experience, companies can usually
bypass the need for further formalized training, putting
VISION—The Journal of Business Perspective Vol. 10 No. 1 January–March 2006
● ●
them on the job straight away. A study by Weinstein
and Srinivasan (1974), tried to link the annual
compensation of 136 alumni of a graduate management
programme with their work experience. Results of this
study showed that work experience prior to graduate
school entry was predictive of managerial compensation.
In the case of students passing out of college with
professional degrees, the single best-known indicator of
their academic achievement is the grade point average
(GPA). Particularly in business education, the GPA has
been used as one of the important pointers for students’
academic performance. Recruiters sometimes explicitly
specify the requirements for a job applicant’s GPA, and
recruiters almost always require applicants to report their
GPAs either directly or indirectly (Fang et al., 2004). It
seems that recruiters believe that students’ GPAs offer
evidence of how well students are prepared for their
careers, other things being equal.
In one study (Rosson, et al., 1973), the results based
on the 478 responses indicated no significant differences
between the GPAs of employed and unemployed
graduates. In other words, based on the evidence of this
study, the assumption that students with high grades have
a better chance of obtaining employment is not valid.
However, the Rosson et al. (1973) study included
responses from various fields of study. Subsequently,
Astin (1977) pointed out that students with higher GPAs
are more likely to complete occupational and professional
training than are students with low GPAs and therefore,
GPA can be used as an indicator of career development.
In another study (Albrecht, et al., 1994), 80.5 per cent
of all recruiters representing 664 employers reported a
preferred minimum grade point ratio. In particular,
business recruiters held true to their emphasis on grades.
The results of the study indicate that employers value
both high grades and high involvement, such as
participation in student organisation and pre-professional
activities, although the value placed on grades is
somewhat higher. Thus, it seems that students with higher
GPAs as well as those with higher involvement in extra
curricular activities enjoy better placement prospects.
Ray, et al. (1994) conducted a study to find out what
criteria are used for the screening and selection of college
and university business graduates for employment. This
research supports and further confirms other research
regarding the necessity for business students to develop
skill in all forms of communication; communication
skills are perceived by HRM professionals as the most
important criteria for evaluating business graduates.
Many researchers (e.g. Edge, 1985; Porter and
●
 Factors Affecting the Placement Prospects of MBA Students 43 ●
McKibbin, 1988; Ralston, 1989) have documented the
importance of communication skills for business
graduates. During placement time, recruiters assess the
communication skills of the students through group
discussions and interviews. This would mean that
students who score well in group discussion as well as
personal interview are likely to end up in good companies
through campus placements.
One of the important components of an MBA
programme is the internship, which in most B-schools
is for a period of 3 months. Students compete with one
another to do projects with the best companies, in their
area of choice. The internship is essentially a win–win
situation for both the institute and the industry; while
the institute finds it a means of strengthening its
interaction with industry and thereby sell its products,
the industry on its part uses the opportunity to research
and find answers to problems that would, otherwise, have
called for the services of a professional consultant. At
the time of campus recruitment, companies show keen
interest in the project being done by the student, and his
contribution normally has a significant impact on his
overall prospects of getting a job offer. Therefore,
students who do well in the internship could be expected
to get into better-rated companies. This view is supported
by a study by Knouse et al. (1999), which examined the
relationship of business college internships to college
performance and to subsequent job opportunities. Results
showed that internships were significantly co-related to
job offers received upon graduation. Recently, Callanan
and Benzing (2004) analysed the relationship between
the completion of an internship assignment prior to
graduation and subsequent employment in a career-
oriented job after graduation. This study showed a link
between completion of an internship assignment and
finding career-oriented employment after graduation.
Based on this review of literature, we identified
certain factors that were important for placement.
However, in-depth research in this area, in the Indian
context, is not available in the published literature. It was
therefore felt worthwhile to identify the factors that
actually determine the placement prospects of B-school
students in India. Accordingly, the following hypotheses
were examined.
Hypothesis 1: Candidates with experience get into a
better organisation.
Hypothesis 2: Candidates with better performance in
the entrance examination get into a better
organisation.
VISION—The Journal of Business Perspective Vol. 10 No. 1 January–March 2006
Hypothesis 3: Candidates with better performance in
the group discussion get into a better
organisation.
Hypothesis 4: Candidates with better performance in
the personal interview get into a better
organisation.
Hypothesis 5: Candidates with higher grade point
average get into a better organisation.
Hypothesis 6: Candidates with better performance in
the internship get into better
organisations.
Hypothesis 7: Candidates participating in extra-
curricular activities get into better
organisations.
Each academic year, in developed countries like the
US, numerous new management graduates emerge to
seek employment (Maher and Silverman, 2002). Despite
increases in unemployment among managers in recent
years (Barta, 2003), competition for these and other
business administration graduates, especially for those
who are highly qualified, is intense (Strout, 2000). The
prevailing situation in India is no different. Given the
buyer’s market for M.B.A. talent, business schools and
students would be well advised to satisfy the desires of
the prospective employers. Today, a science, commerce
or engineering degree alone does not help attaining faster
career growth: many realise this after being in the job a
year or more. The management institutes attract a good
number of candidates with experience, all aspiring for
fast-track career growth. On the other hand, organisations
are realising that it is ultimately people who are the
driving force in companies, and are therefore investing
substantially in hiring and grooming bright young
management graduates.
B-schools prefer to admit students with adequate
work experience, the reason being that they are more
saleable as compared to freshers. When recruiting MBA
candidates, corporate staffing specialists look at the value
and appropriateness of a candidate’s work experience
prior to graduate school (Ettorre, 1992). Indeed, students
with experience are more adept at relating classroom
learning to actual situations in organisations, and
therefore benefit more from business education. A study
by Carver and King (1994) reviewed the admission,
criteria for a non-traditional MBA programme by
investigating a group of students who were employed
full time while pursuing the MBA degree. The major
finding is that the combination of GMAT score,
undergraduate GPA and work experience is the best
predictor of success for students in an MBA programme.
● ● ●
44 Nair and Ghosh
●
Students with prior work experience have a good
blend of theory and practice as regards their technical
knowledge. The entrance examination papers contain a
mix of theory as well as application oriented questions,
which is why students with work experience can be
expected to perform better in the written examination as
compared to freshers. Moreover, students with work
experience are generally found to exude more confidence
vis-à-vis students without work experience in group
discussions and interviews. No doubt, sufficient exposure
to the workplace helps a B-school aspirant to get a feel
of organisational realities. It is also a fact that a majority
of B-schools prefer students with work experience as
they have an edge over the freshers during placements,
meaning that candidates with work experience may score
higher in the personal interview for admission to the
programme. It is also reasonable to expect students with
work experience to do well in academics, since they have
better insights into workplace realities. Therefore, they
can be expected to have a higher GPA as well as a higher
internship score. Above all, students with work
experience can be considered to be better in extra-
curricular activities as well. In almost every B-school,
there are regular events organised by students which are
either semi-academic or cultural in nature. The
experience of working in any organisation can help a
person to gain the skill set required for organising – and
even participating in – various events during the course
of the programme.
Based on this rationale and the findings of studies
quoted earlier, the following hypotheses were
formulated:
Hypothesis 8: A candidate’s performance in the
entrance examination depends on work
experience.
Hypothesis 9: A candidate’s performance in the group
discussion depends on work
experience.
Hypothesis 10: A candidate’s performance in the
personal interview depends on work
experience.
Hypothesis 11: A candidate’s grade point average
depends on work experience.
Hypothesis 12: A candidate’s performance in
internship depends on work experience.
Hypothesis 13: A candidate’s participation in extra-
curricular activities depends on work
experience.
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OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The main objective of the study was to identify and relate
factors contributing to the placement prospects of MBA
students in a B-school. The study attempted to relate
students’ academic admission-related variables with the
overall rating or brand value of the companies in which
they got placements. The factors/variables considered
to have a bearing on the placement prospects were (1)
Work Experience, (2) Entrance Examination Score, (3)
Group Discussion Score, (4) Personal Interview Score
(5) Grade Point Average, (6) Internship, and (7) Rating
on Extra-curricular Activities. The study also attempted
to relate students’ prior work experience with factors
such as (1) Entrance Examination Score, (2) Group
Discussion Score, (3) Personal Interview Score, (4)
Grade Point Average, (5) Internship, and (6) Rating on
Extra-curricular Activities.
METHODOLOGY
A sample of 154 management students who passed out
in different batches from a B-school located in Mumbai
was considered for the study. The performance of these
students in the entrance examination during the course
and for the placement was tracked and normalised. These
continuous variables were seen for their distribution
pattern and then grouped into three based on quartiles.
Placement prospect of the student was decided on the
basis of the overall rating of the company in which he/
she got placed during campus recruitment. Since
nationwide objective ratings of the companies are not
available, in this study, an attempt was made to quantify
the perceptions of the students regarding the
organisations based on five parameters, viz. (i) job
profile, (ii) company image, (iii) career growth, (iv)
salary and perks, and (v) HR policy. Student perceptions
of the companies on these five dimensions were
considered for rating the organisations. To get the
“Overall Company Rating”, perceptions of students
about the organisations were captured using a survey
questionnaire containing items pertaining to these five
dimensions. Responses of the students to the 20-item
questionnaire were obtained on a 5-point Likert scale
with the options: Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral,
Disagree, and Strongly Disagree.
Variables such as work experience, entrance
examination score, group discussion score, personal
interview score, internship score, and GPA were in ratio
scale, whereas rating on extra-curricular activities and
overall company rating were in interval scale (Likert
●
 Factors Affecting the Placement Prospects of MBA Students 45 ●

type). Rating on extra-curricular activities was based on personal interview during admission process and extra
the active involvement of the students in certain activities curricular activities during the course have an impact on
during the course of the programme. Participation of the the placement position of students.
students in extra-curricular activities was assessed by
considering the time spent by them on activities, viz., Table 2: Chi-Square Tests of Homogeneity for Overall
organising academic-cum-recreation events like summer Company Rating
internship contest, business incubation, case study
contest, business quiz, placement and project related S. Grouping Response Chi- Prob>
No. variable variable Square Chi-Square
activities, coordination with the press for the institute’s
1 Overall Work Experience 21.71 0.0014**
activities, etc. Company
Rating
DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTS 2 Score in Entrance 1.937 0.3796
Examination
A comprehensive data analysis was conducted using 3 Group Discussion 2.339 0.8860
various statistical tools to find out the factors having an 4 Personal Interview 21.12 0.0017**
impact on the campus placement of the students. Most
5 Extra Curricular 6.131 0.0466*
of the variables were regrouped into three such as Activities
Satisfactory, Good and Excellent. Work Experience was 6 Internship 1.578 0.4543
clustered into four groups, namely, <6 months, 6–12
7 GPA 9.45 0.0508
months, 12-30 months, and >30 months for doing chi-
square tests. ‘Extra-Curricular Activities’ was categorised Note: * Significant at 5 per cent level of significance; ** Significant
into three parts: “No Participation’, ‘Moderate at 1 per cent level of significance.
Participation’, and ‘Active Participation’ groups. We did
the cross-tabulation from the placement perspective for Table 3: Means of Overall Company Rating for the 'Work
the overall company rating with all the other variables, Experience' Groups
i.e. Work Experience, Score in Entrance Examination, Work Number Mean Std. Lower Upper
Group Discussion Scores, Personal Interview Scores, experience error 95% 95%
Ratings on Extra Curricular Activities, Internship, and No 46 3.28093 0.09096 3.1012 3.4606
GPA. Table 1 gives one of the cross tabulations of overall Yes 108 3.61315 0.05662 3.5013 3.7250
company rating vs. work experience in months.
Note: Z = 3.10, P = .000968
Similarly, other study variables were tabulated, overall
company rating being common to all.
Further, it was of interest to try and ascertain if
students with work experience have an edge over the
Table 1: Overall Company Rating vs. Work Experience:
Cross Tabulations
freshers in terms of better campus placement. We
clustered the data into two groups: with and without work
Work eperience
Overall company experience. Means of the overall company rating were
rating in months <6 6-12 12-30 >30 Total compared for the two groups. The means of the two
1. Satisfactory 23 4 10 3 40 groups have been tabulated in Table 3. The mean of
2. Good 15 23 27 13 78 overall company rating is 3.61 for the group with work
3. Excellent 8 13 11 4 36 experience and 3.28 for the group not having work
Total 46 40 48 20 154 experience. P-value (probability of significance) for
comparing means is 0.000968, indicating that the
candidates with prior work experience are preferred by
Chi-square tests of homogeneity were performed for
better-rated organisations.
the groups based on the category of organisations they
have been placed vs. work experience, their performance Another factor which had impact on B-school
in the entrance exam, GD, personal interview, their students’ placements was their performance in the
performance in various semesters during the course, and Personal Interview (PI). Therefore, it was of interest to
their involvement in the extra curricular activities. The know if candidates with better performance in PI get into
summary of results is given in Table 2. The chi-square better organisations. Performance in PI was clustered into
tests of homogeneity indicate that work experience, five groups, viz. Satisfactory, Fair, Good, Very Good,

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46 Nair and Ghosh
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4.5

4
Overall Company Rating

3.5

2.5

1.5

1 2 3 4 5 All Pairs
Tukey-Kramer
0.05
Figure 1 : Overall Company Rating vs. Personal Interview Performance

and Excellent. The means for the same have been that these means are significantly different for the groups.
tabulated in Table 4 along with standard error of the The Tukey-Kramer test was, therefore, applied to find
means and 95 per cent confidence intervals of the means. which pairs of means are significantly different. The test
Figure 1 shows the pictorial view of data and means of showed that the pair for which means of overall company
the overall company rating for the five groups based on rating was significantly different was the pair with ‘fair’
the personal interview scores. The means of the overall and ‘excellent’ performance in PI. This implies that the
company ratings for the five groups were compared students scoring higher in personal interview during their
through one-way analysis of variance. The F-ratio of selection for the MBA course do get placed in better-
2.4660 with df 4 and 149, and P-value of 0.0474 showed rated organisations.
The third factor that was of importance in the
Table 4: Means of Overall Company Ratings Scores for 'PI placement of B-school students is extra curricular
Performance' Levels activities. The next line of analysis was to see how
PI Perfor- Num- Mean Std Lower Upper different levels of participation in extra curricular
mance level ber error 95% 95% activities helps the students in getting better placements.
1. Satisfactory 31 3.43419 0.10806 3.2207 3.6477 The mean scores on overall company rating of the three
2. Fair 43 3.40791 0.09175 3.2266 3.5892 groups based on extra curricular activities were compared
3. Good 18 3.39333 0.14181 3.1131 3.6735 through ANOVA. The F value was found to be 5.370 at
2 and 151 df with P = 0.006. The means, standard error,
4. Very Good 28 3.54143 0.11370 3.3168 3.7661
and 95 per cent confidence intervals are given in Table
5. Excellent 34 3.79118 0.10318 3.5873 3.9951
5. Further, when Tukey-Kramer test was done to compare
Note: F= 2.4660, P=0.0474. the pairs of means, the ‘Moderate Participation’ and
‘Active Participation’ groups turned out to be
Table 5: Means of Overall Company Rating Scores for 'Extra significantly different.
Curricular Activities' Groups
Subsequently, we were interested in exploring and
Participation in Num- Mean Std. Lower Upper
finding out as to which of the factors were associated
extra curricular ber error 95% 95%
activities with work experience. All the study variables were
1. No Participation 83 3.54 0.0653 3.4118 3.6716
tabulated with respect to work experience. A student with
less than 6 months of experience was considered to be a
2. Moderate 39 3.28 0.1086 3.0678 3.5076
Participation fresher. Table 6 shows one such table of work experience
3. Active 32 3.74 0.0851 3.5752 3.9223
vs. PI performance. Chi-square tests and P-values are
Participation tabulated in Table 7. The data analysis shows that work
Note: F = 5.370, P = 0.006. experience has an impact only on personal interview and

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 Factors Affecting the Placement Prospects of MBA Students 47●

Table 6: Personal Interview Performance vs. Work recruitment. As pointed out by Ettore (1992), recruiters
experience: Cross Tabulations invariably look at the value and appropriateness of a
Work experience in months candidate’s work experience while selecting MBA
PI performance <6 6-12 12-30 >30 Total candidates. Personal interview was also found to have a
1. Satisfactory 23 6 8 7 44 bearing on student placements. That means, students
2. Good 19 23 27 7 76
obtaining more marks in the personal interview at the
time of admission to the programme got into better-rated
3. Excellent 4 11 13 6 34
organisations, and vice versa. Thus, this finding supports
Total 46 40 48 20 154
Hypothesis 4. Moreover, participation in extra-curricular
activities was found to be related to student placement.
Table 7: Chi-Square Tests of Homogeneity for Work Students who had been actively involved in extra-
Experience curricular activities during the course of their programme
S. Grouping Response Chi- Prob>
got into better organisations and vice versa. This
No. variable variable Square Chi-Square vindicates Hypothesis 7 as well.
1. Work Score in entrance 2.006 0.3667 Findings of this study, however, show that factors
experience examination
such as students’ entrance examination marks, group
2 Group discussion 0.340 0.8460 discussion marks, internship marks, and GPA do not
3 Personal interview 17.598 0.0002** affect placements. Therefore, Hypotheses 2, 3, 5, and 6
4 Internship 0.1040 0.7470 are not supported by the results obtained. The entrance
5 Extra curricular 1.897 0.387 examination seems to be acting as a screening device
activities only and is not really predicting students’ placement
6 GPA 0.855 0.652 prospects. Same is the case with group discussion. While
communication skills are considered by researchers (e.g.
Note: ** Significant at 1 per cent level of significance.
Edge, 1985; Porter and McKibbin, 1988; Ralston, 1989)
to be important for business graduates, performance in
not on the other study variables, i.e. group discussion,
group discussion is not positively related to placement
entrance examination, internship, extra-curricular
prospects. It seems that although almost all companies
activities as well as GPA. That is to say, the performance
conduct group discussions at the time of campus
of students with work experience gets differentiated only
placements, the attributes that are looked for in the
in their performance in PI. It can thus be inferred that
students are different from those sought by the B-school.
students with experience perform better in the personal
Further, as an index of students’ academic achievement
interview and get placed in better organisations.
in the programme, the GPA did not play a role in their
prospects of entering a better-rated organisation. In
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS retrospect, while looking at the GPA we found that,
Results of the study indicated the span or duration of firstly, the range in GPAs is very small across different
work experience to have an impact on the kind of batches. Secondly, some companies conduct their own
placements that students get. This supports Hypothesis tests in the subject knowledge for the initial screening,
1. In fact, it was found that students with 12 to 30 months’ ignoring the GPA. These could be the possible reasons
work experience get into better organisations in for the GPA not being statistically significant as far as
comparison with those with less than or more than this placement is concerned. As such, the study by Rosson,
range of experience. This means that the relationship et al. (1973) did not find students with high grades to
between work experience and placement is not linear. have a better chance of obtaining employment vis-à-vis
Further analysis was done to see whether students with those with low grades. Internship marks are also not seen
or without experience differ in terms of their placements. to be predictive of students’ chances of getting better
Results clearly showed that students with prior work placements. Just as in the case of GPA, students are found
experience are preferred by better-rated organisations to score very good marks in internship, making it difficult
during campus placements. This reinforces Hypothesis1. to differentiate between them. This could be attributed
Interestingly, this finding also indicates a conscious to the fact that the students who constituted the sample
attempt on the part of companies to consider work in this study represented the crème-de-la-crème of the
experience as an important parameter for campus student community in the country.

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48 Nair and Ghosh
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The next stage of the study consisted of finding out
whether the two categories of students, i.e. students with
work experience and those without prior work experience
differ in terms of variables such as entrance examination
marks, group discussion marks, personal interview
marks, internship marks, GPA, and extra-curricular
activities. Results indicated that students with work
experience perform better in the personal interview.
Hypothesis 10 gets supported by this finding. As such,
performance of the students in the personal interview
leverages their selection in the course. It is possible that
by virtue of their prior work experience, these students
are comparatively more practical, mature and confident
enough to face the interview panel. On the other hand,
freshers are probably not able to relate to the practical
problems of the industry and lack the much needed self-
confidence required to do well at interviews. It is also
likely that there is inherent bias in favour of students
with work experience for the institution as well as the
recruiting companies. Generally, B-schools take into
account the experience requirements of the recruiting
companies while selecting candidates for their
management programmes. In this study, the relationship
between the admission interviews and the placement
interviews could not be explored, as we did not have
access to the marks of the students for their placement
interviews. As such, recruiters are found to apply
different parameters and yardsticks in their recruitment
interviews, there being little similarity in their placement
processes. In respect of the other variables, students with
work experience were found to be no different from those
without work experience. Thus, Hypotheses 8, 9, 11, 12,
and 13 are not supported by the findings.
Further analysis (in the form of one-way analysis of
variance) of the relationship of candidates’ performance
in the personal interview with the overall company rating
revealed that students who were rated as ‘satisfactory’,
‘fair’, ‘good’, ‘very good’ and ‘excellent’ in the personal
interview got placed in companies with significantly
different overall ratings. In other words, these five
categories of students got employment in companies
differing in their brand image. Students who were given
employment by the better-rated organisations were the
ones who scored higher marks in the personal interview.
In fact, we observed a maximum difference in the ‘fair’
and ‘excellent’ categories of students as regards the
overall ratings of companies they have been placed.
These two categories of students were distinctly different
in terms of their standing in the personal interview and
finally ended up in two different levels of companies in
accordance with their interview performance.
VISION—The Journal of Business Perspective Vol. 10 No. 1 January–March 2006
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The findings of this study have implications for B-
schools which follow a three-step process to admit
students for their management programmes. As a
selection criterion, prior work experience should be given
sufficient weightage by the B-schools, otherwise it could
adversely affect their placements. In fact, B-schools have
to keep in mind the nature and duration of work
experience as desired by the recruiters while selecting
the students. Further, the fact that students’ marks in the
personal interview had a disproportionate impact on their
placement prospects justifies the use of the personal
interview, in its present form, as a method for selection
of students for the management programme conducted
by the B-school under study.
However, students’ performance in the written
entrance examination as well as group discussion did
not prove to have any influence on their placement
prospects. This perhaps raises questions about the utility
of these two approaches in their present form in selecting
students who can get good placements. But this would
in no way mean that selection methods, entrance
examination and group discussion do not serve the
purpose of spotting good candidates for the management
programme. It would also be worthwhile examining the
way internal assessments are made to award grade points
to the students. Likewise, it would be prudent to have
another, closer look at the way evaluations of internship/
project presentations are done in the B-school.
This study is purely exploratory in nature and the
results are based on data collected from a single
B-school. Therefore, the findings cannot be generalised
in terms of applicability to all B-schools in the country.
Indeed, data from an adequate sample of B-schools in
the country have to be drawn for arriving at definite
conclusions regarding the factors influencing the
placement prospects of MBA students. Further, it would
be of interest to all management institutes to have an
understanding of the variables that discriminate the
deserving candidates from the undeserving ones in terms
of their performance in the course. Future research should
consider other plausible academic as well as personal
variables of the students that can have an impact on
B-school placements. Most importantly, on-the-job
performance of the graduated students could be tracked
and related to the various antecedent variables.
Moreover, the validity of the placement interview in
identifying potential managers could be an added
dimension to be studied while extending this research.
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 Factors Affecting the Placement Prospects of MBA Students 49 ●

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Shreekumar K. Nair, Ph.D. (shreekumar@nitie.edu) is currently working with National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE),
Mumbai as Associate Professor in the area of Organisational Behaviour and Human Resource Management. He has more than 16 years
experience in teaching, training, and personnel selection. He has published empirical papers on topics like the job characteristics
model, managerial effectiveness, locus of control, emotional intelligence, and work values. His current areas of interests are emotional
intelligence, work values, and competency mapping.

Sadhana Ghosh, Fellow-NITIE (sadhanaghosh@nitie.edu) is currently working with National Institute of Industrial Engineering
(NITIE), Mumbai as Professor in the Operations Management area. She has more than 25 years of experience in teaching, training, and
initiating quantitative approach to problem solving in organizations. She has been a Board Member of NITIE, Academic Co-ordinator
and also the Professor-in-charge, Placements, at NITIE. Her interest areas are quality management and process improvement through
six sigma.

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