MBA students in the US rank Google as top employer

MBA students chose Google as the most ideal employer (23.65 per cent of respondents) for the second year in a row, after it trumped powerhouse consulting firm McKinsey & Company's (15.84 per cent) 12-year reign at the top.

Goldman Sachs (14.98 per cent) maintained its status at No3; Apple (13.68 per cent) jumped to No4, and The Boston Consulting Group (12.12 per cent) came in at No5 in the Universum Survey.

This year, 5,769 students from the top 52 MBA programmes in the US participated in the 14th MBA Edition of the Universum IDEAL Employer Survey, making it the largest survey of its kind in the US. In the survey, students answered questions about their career expectations such as top industries, career goals, communication preferences, salary expectations, IDEAL employers and more.

Dot-coms felt the punch of a recession in 2001, but that isn't stopping Google from breaking a record for holding the highest  per cent  age (23.54) of students who chose it as an 'ideal employer' in the survey's history, breaking McKinsey's 23.44  per cent  record in 1999.

Google's image as an 'ideal employer' resonates among talented millennials due to their workplace perks, industry dominance, innovation and natural attraction of diverse talent.

"Smart MBAs know where they want to be in 5-10 years," says Claudia Tattanelli, CEO of Universum USA. "They look to strong companies like Google, McKinsey and Goldman Sachs to give them the experience and references needed to lay the path for their future career success, even with threats of a recession. At the same time, as true Millennials, they chose organisations that will offer a flexible and fun work environment, innovation and a good work/life balance."

Highlights:

• Management consulting (20  per cent) remains the most desired industry, followed by financial services (19  per cent), marketing / advertising (13  per cent), consumer goods (12  per cent) and investment banking (8  per cent), which dropped from 12  per cent  in 2007.
• MBA's top career goal is a tie (58  per cent) between "being competitively or intellectually challenged" and "having a work-life balance" followed by "being a leader or manager of people" (55  per cent), "being entrepreneurial or creative/innovative" (37  per cent) and "being dedicated to a cause or to feel that they are serving the greater good" (28  per cent).
• A year after graduation, MBAs are expecting, on average, a $90,232 salary and $180,030 after five years.