NUS Business School MBA ranked No. 1 in Asia for third consecutive year

Source: NUS. The NUS Business School.

The National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School’s Master of Business Administration (MBA) is ranked first in Asia for the third year in a row in the Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) Global MBA Rankings 2026.

The 2026 edition of the QS Global MBA and Business Masters Rankings evaluates programmes based on key performance indicators, including Employability, Return on Investment, Entrepreneurship and Alumni Outcomes, Thought Leadership, as well as Class and Faculty Diversity. The NUS MBA programme rose two places to 23rd worldwide, achieving its highest-ever global position in an evaluation pool that expanded by almost 15% from last year. It now ranks among the top 6% of 390 MBA programmes assessed globally by QS.

According to NUS, the latest results underscore the NUS MBA programme’s educational rigour, commitment to global competitiveness, and definitive impact on its graduates’ professional development and long-term career success.

In the latest rankings, the NUS MBA achieved an overall score of 87.0 out of 100. The programme scored at least 30% above the global average for key indicators such as Thought Leadership (82.5), Employability (83.9), and Return on Investment (94.2).

Employability remains a standout as the programme led the rankings in Asia with an improved employment rate of 95.0% for the class of 2024, compared with 83.3% in the previous year. Class and Faculty Diversity also advanced, with the programme improving 27 places to 56th globally with greater representation of women and international members across both faculty and student cohorts.

Distinguished Professor Andrew Rose, Dean of NUS Business School said: “Our position as Asia’s top MBA for the third consecutive year, alongside our historic rise to 23rd globally, reflects the School’s commitment to academic excellence, innovative research, and developing dynamic, adaptive leaders who can navigate complexity in a rapidly evolving global economy. While rankings are just one measure, they demonstrate the tangible positive impact our faculty, students, and alumni are having on business and community worldwide.”

The NUS MBA is designed to equip future leaders with a global toolkit and cross-cultural insight to thrive in a fast-changing world. Anchored in Singapore, the programme delivers a rigourous yet customisable curriculum. There is a deep focus on Asia, coupled with strong global exposure through international study trips and exchange opportunities with top partner universities worldwide.

Students can tailor their learning journey by choosing from over 50 electives across nine areas of specialisation. Through experiential learning, industry engagement, and a diverse international cohort, NUS MBA students gain the tools and perspectives needed to lead with impact, within Asia and beyond.

Details

View the QS Global MBA rankings can be found at: https://www.topuniversities.com/

Rutgers Business School Asia Pacific to relocate to coworking space in Singapore

Rutgers Business School Asia Pacific (RBSAP), a provider of Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA) degrees, is relocating to coworking space The Working Capitol on Keong Saik Road in Singapore.

The decision is motivated by the need to keep in pace with the evolving demands of the business world. Both traditional and executive education are looking beyond lectures, readings, case studies and team activities to ensure relevancy to current business needs while keeping an eye to the horizon in terms of innovation and competitiveness. The new location will serve as home to a unique 14.5-month long Executive MBA as well as RBS’ week-long Mini-MBAs.

Stephanie Krishnan, the Executive Director of Rutgers Business School Asia Pacific, said, “There is impetus in industry for both leaders and personnel to break through barriers in siloed thinking. This function-focused thinking starts with the way people are educated, in terms of their majors or specialisation. There have been some inroads in changing this, however exposure to a more entrepreneurial, collaborative way of thinking and working is required at the top of organisations. This is what we are aiming to show to our Executive MBA students through being part of a coworking space and being able to benefit from built-in networking opportunities and a professional atmosphere.”

“Today’s digital economy is driving tremendous change within organisations. It is easier to enter and disrupt other industries than to change your own. Any value chain with significant inefficiency offers an opportunity for new players to enter and disrupt. Companies need to be extremely agile and prepared for any disruption. This requires real-time collaboration that cuts across organisation hierarchies and rigid processes. (The) Rutgers Executive MBA programme will prepare executives to handle challenges in this digital economy, and I believe that this new environment within a coworking space will motivate them to think differently and drive digital transformation within their organisations,” said Saj Kumar, VP - Digital Transformation and IoT, SAP, and a RBS alumus.

With this in mind, Rutgers Business School Asia Pacific aims to drive a learning experience through exposure to collaboration, creativity and innovation in its new location. "We chose The Working Capitol because there are a number of ways we think alike - we believe in the intersection of tech, creative and service industries, we believe that a variety of ages and experience are needed to contribute to a meaningful enterprise – whether technical, managerial, creative, business or any other myriad of valid skills and perspectives that are required to make organizations thrive in today's uber-competitive environment," said Krishnan.

A proud RBS Alumnus and Chief Technology Officer, Asia Pacific & Japan Cisco Systems, Mathew Varghese, lauds the RBS decision. “This initiative from RBSAP to conduct future Business Programs in a 'coworking space' is an excellent one that will accelerate innovation and entrepreneurship. Coworking spaces in education provide a platform to interact and collaborate between educators, students and entrepreneurs leading to the development of a local ecosystem which to-date is unheard of in education space, “said Varghese.

“As I see it, the platform can be further enhanced to serve as a meeting space, community forum, networking venue, mentor and investor destination, co-founder dating place, incubator, accelerator, co-working venue, and educational resource for programmes and content ranging from how to develop a business plan, to say how to use a Facebook API in building a business to consumer marketplace among many other topics of interest. RBSAP alumni can play an active role in this community by being 'mentors, influencers, or connectors'."

Interested?

Read the WorkSmart Asia blog post about The Working Capitol's expansion into Singapore's central business district

Manchester Business School prepares Global MBA students to lead businesses around the world

Top global businesses such as American Express, Citigroup, KPMG, Rolls Royce, SITA and Johnson & Johnson are interested in Global MBA graduates from Manchester Business School (MBS), says the education institution. 

MBS, founded in 1965, is the second oldest business school in the United Kingdom and is today the largest campus-based school in the country, with around 2,000 students. MBS has a further 3,500 students worldwide based in centres in Singapore, Sao Paulo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Dubai and Miami.

“I really believe that studying for an MBA at Manchester Business School equips business professionals with the tools and confidence they need to become business leaders. This is a development I have experienced personally and also seen in MBA colleagues,” said Glenn Carney, Head of Customer Business – Energy, Asia Pacific at Rolls Royce.

The attraction, is that MBS produces highly skilled graduates with experience in meeting real business challenges. Under the MBS Talent Management Partnership (TMP) programme, students work with high profile companies across the world, such as Daimler SEA, Deloitte and Huawei.

A typical semester will include up to three face-to-face workshops, delivered back-to-back at one of the MBS centres worldwide. Alongside this, students will attend online tutorials with e-tutors and classmates. 

Residential workshops provide at least 24 hours of face-to-face teaching per course (excluding online courses). During the academic year, these residential/intensive workshops are delivered in MBS' network of centres in the seven cities, over blocks of two to three months at a time. In Singapore, the workshops for 2014 were conducted from February to April and again from August to October.

The school recently held a gala dinner in Singapore to celebrate its 50th anniversary. Professor Fiona Devine, Head of Manchester Business School, commented at the occasion: “It is fitting that Singapore and Manchester Business School are both celebrating their Golden Jubilee in the same year given MBS’ strong and enduring partnership with Singapore. We look forward to sustaining and building upon this partnership into the next 50 years.” 

"The UK has a tradition of good quality education and is home to four of the top six universities in the world," Judi Leon, Director of UK Trade & Investment, Singapore added, noting that around 50,000 students in Singapore are studying for a UK qualification at the moment. "Manchester Business School is representative of the competitiveness, dynamism and global outlook of the UK education sector as a whole.”

Singapore is one of the top countries of origin for international students studying in the UK. Nearly 7,000 Singapore students are pursuing their higher education in the UK, and a further 52,000 students in Singapore are enrolled in UK distance learning courses. Each year, hundreds of students from Singapore enrol at the University of Manchester, and more than 400 students are currently pursuing their Global MBA at the MBS Singapore Centre. The MBA programme is the only UK qualification to be accredited by SPRING Singapore under the Capability Development Grant (CDG). 

MBS also has an ongoing partnership with the Singapore Institute of Management, which provides a two-year part-time management degree programme, which enrols approximately 70 students per year. The University Manchester also offers joint programmes with the Singapore Institute of Technology, NUS and A*STAR in a wide range of disciplines including nursing and engineering.

Temple University in Singapore hosts two class previews in mid-November

Temple University is offering introductions to two graduate programmes on 15 November in Singapore for those interested in human resource management and executive MBAs respectively.

The Master of Science in Human Resource Management (MSHRM) is designed for HR professionals who wish to be real business partners geared towards managing the "human capital within the enterprise".

The MSHRM covers aspects of HR like leadership, communications, strategic challenges in HR, managing rewards, best practices in HR, and negotiations, among others. The course comprises 10 modules in 10 months. All courses are taught by faculty who are US-based. 

Temple University is offering a scholarship of up to US$10,000 for qualified applicants to attend the next cohort. Click here to complete a free initial application.

A second class preview for the part time Fox School of Business executive MBA (EMBA) programme will run concurrently with the MSHRM presentation. Sixteen modules can be completed in 15 months. The EMBA is taught by US professors from Temple University in Philadelphia. 

Click here to register for the MSHRM session, and here for the EMBA session. Both sessions will run from 10am to 11am at the ERC Institute Campus at 30 Prinsep Street, Singapore.

India's IIMC gets AMBA accreditation

The Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIMC) has been awarded a five-year accreditation for its MBA and MBM programmes by the Association of MBAs (AMBA).

Anindya Sen, IIMC Dean, said that the Institute is looking at a global niche. "AMBA accreditation will help us improve international visibility and position ourselves as a global institute, so that we can attract more foreign students. We will also gain valuable advice on our continuous improvement," he said.

Andrew Main Wilson, AMBA's Chief Executive, said: "It is very rare for a first-time applicant to get AMBA accreditation for 5 years and this only shows the level of excellence of the programme and the school. 

"India's higher education sector is one of the largest in the world, catering to 26 million students, and we are happy to help the best quality MBA and Masters in Management programmes differentiate themselves with an AMBA accreditation." 

According to a February British Council report, 'Understanding India - the future of higher education and opportunities for international co-operation', India will soon overtake China as the world's largest population, and a growing middle class, will swelling demand for higher education over the next 10 years.
 
AMBA has accredited 6 business schools in India, and a total of 213 globally. In addition to IIM Calcutta, AMBA has accredited the Indian Institute of Management Lucknow, Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode, International Management Institute Delhi, Management Development Institute India and SPJain Institute of Management and Research. 

Asian students zero in on LHE hospitality management programmes

Students from Asia represent a considerable percentage of the student body at the various schools run by Laureate Hospitality Education (LHE), which comprises four institutions: Glion Institute of Higher Education, Les Roches International School of Hotel Management, Kendall College, and Blue Mountains International Hotel Management School. 

Source: LHE. From left, Hou, Tatar, Williams Knight.

“We continue to see traction and interest in the region for our programmes in Switzerland, the US and our branch campuses," said Judy Hou, CEO of Glion Institute of Higher Education.

Hou, who was in Singapore with other LHE CEOs to speak at the inaugural Women in Hospitality and Tourism in Asia conference, added: "Our presence in this conference acknowledges the roles of Singapore and China, among others, as pivotal to the hospitality industry growth, not only in the region but worldwide.”
Glion is the only institution to offer an internationally accredited 100% online Hospitality MBA. The online MBA in International Hospitality and Service Industries Management, designed and delivered by an international faculty of industry experts, and spanning about 2.5 years, is accredited at university master’s level by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) and saw its first batch of graduates in December 2013.

"In creating an online classroom we are giving our students the opportunity to continue to grow professionally without putting their career on hold. Our interactive learning approach means students debate with classmates from around the world and can apply the concepts and skills learned immediately into their working environments, offering far more to both student and employer than a more traditional distance learning programme," said a Glion spokesperson. 

"The nature of virtual learning means that we’re attracting hospitality professionals who already have established careers but recognise the need for continual development. We have also forged partnerships with a number of major hotel groups who are keen to put employees into our programmes," the spokesperson added, naming Accor, Hyatt, Rotana, Taj Hotels, Ritz, Banyan Tree and the IHG group as some of the students' employers.

According to a 2014 backgrounder from Glion, the institution currently has 297 students from across 70 countries learning online, with an average age of 37 and over 15 years work experience each. Nearly four in ten (39%) of Glion Online MBA students come from Asia Pacific countries, with a further 20% from Africa and the Middle East.

Glion has students from Marina Bay Sands and Sofitel in Singapore participating in the online course. Hou says, “These students are well supported by their management teams at work, and we expect the degree to position them to fast track their career in hospitality management.”

Kendall College, based in Chicago, USA, and known for expertise in hospitality and culinary arts, has also seen increased interest from Asian students due in part to the vibrancy and promise of the tourist and culinary scene of Chicago. “Kendall has seen a 60% increase in culinary arts students from Asia, with women representing more than 80% of those new students,” said Emily Williams Knight, President of Kendall College. “This diverse pool adds to the unique and global experience of our academic approach.”

Sister institution Les Roches’ Global BBA programme is also popular as it allows students to pursue their academic studies in China, Spain and Switzerland.

“International hotel companies – which have excellent potential for growth, especially in Asia – are looking to hire graduates who are not only used to a multicultural work environment, but who also have expertise acquired in different parts of the world,” said Sonia Tatar, Director General/CEO of Les Roches Worldwide. 

“The Global BBA programme gives students a unique and differentiated exposure to countries where the hospitality sector is in full and rapid expansion, providing them a competitive edge to enter this professional market.”
 
LHE is a member of the Laureate International Universities network, which is made up of more than 75 accredited campus-based and online institutions of higher education, serving more than 800,000 students in 30 countries. 

Sixteen percent of top 100 MBAs from Asia Pacific

Asian business schools might be missing out on the online MBA opportunity. FT.com's inaugural Online MBA Rankings 2014, released in March, has no Asian business schools at all in their list of 15.

The region fares better with conventional MBAs. The Global MBA Rankings 2014 from FT.com, released in January 2014, has a sprinkling of Asian schools in the top 50. While Harvard, Stanford and the London Business School make up the top three as expected, INSEAD, which has campuses in France and Singapore, is ranked no. 5.

Both the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) Business School and China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) in Shanghai are ranked in the top 20, at no. 14 and no. 17 respectively.

The University of Hong Kong Business School is at no. 29, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad close at no. 30, followed by the National University of Singapore Business School at no. 32, and the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad at no. 36. Singapore's Nanyang Business School is at no. 38, and Korea's Sungkyunkwan University Graduate School of Business is at no. 45.

The top-ranked school in the UAE is represented by Hult International Business School, which has campuses in UAE as well as China, the US and the UK. It is ranked no. 61, while Australia's top business school, at no. 62, is the University of New South Wales' Australian Graduate School of Management.

2014 rank (2013 rank) - annual salary in US$, rounded to nearest thousand
1. (1)     Harvard - 176,000
2. (2)     Stanford - 182,000
3. (4)     London Business School - 156,000
5. (6)     INSEAD - 148,000
14. (8)   HKUST Business School - 125,000
17. (15) CEIBS - 128,000
29. (31) The University of Hong Kong - 112,000
30. (26) Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad - 155,000
32. (36) National University of Singapore Business School - 92,000
36. (34) Indian School of Business - 116,000
38. (32) Nanyang Business School - 95,000
45. (51) Sungkyunkwan University GSB - 111,000
:
- Top 50 -
:
57. (66) Peking University (Guanghua School of Management) - 83,000
61. (57) Hult International Business School - 105,000
62. (48) Australian Graduate School of Management - 109,000
68. (61) Melbourne Business School - 101,000
68. (unplaced) Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore - 125,000
77. (unplaced) Shanghai Jiaotong University (Antai College of Economics & Management) - 85,000
83. (89) Fudan University School of Management - 76,000
 
The detailed Global MBA Rankings 2014 can be viewed here and the detailed Online MBA Rankings 2014 here.