Research MBA Programs

Hi all

I'm graduating from Cegep and applying to university this year, and my first choice is McGill's Desautels. That being said, I am not 100% sure of being admitted, so it comes down to HEC vs. JMSB. I will be applying to all three, but just wanted some guidance from people who may have been in the same position as I currently am, as to which school to go for if Desautels doesn't work out. I know this is more of a forum for MBA schools, but I'd love to hear from people who have done it, and could perhaps give me a different and more long-term perspective to people currently attending, but then again, any words of advice is welcomed!

A little bit about me: I am a honour roll student at Dawson College with an average, so far, of over 90 in most of my classes. I am interested, after my studies, in working in consulting or strategic management, working in areas of sustainability and development preferably internationally (preference in Europe, more precisely, the UK). I will most likely do an MBA after my BComm, but I will worry about that later. I am perfectly bilingual, so language would not be an issue for HEC. Also, aside from the school quality & recognition, I am also looking for a school with a great network, great networking opportunities with other students, potential employers and internship opportunities, and also a good overall experience. Anyways, I just want your (as much as possible) unbiased opinion on both HEC and JMSB along with any real-life stories you may have seen or experienced yourself in terms of these schools. If any of you coud help me, that'd be really appreciated.

Finally, if anyone could also advise me on this issue: I made the mistake over the summer of taking Science Cal 1 and Linear Algebra, which made my r score fall considerably (which is why I'm now unsure whether I stand a chance to be accepted at Mcgill). I still passed, but I definitely didn't do too well. I am currently taking Cal 2 in Social Science, and so far, my grade is 99%. I was told by the academic advisors at Dawson that I could retake these classes this summer, so if anyone has experience with this, do you think I could be accepted to Desautels if I take the classes again and do really well this time around? If not, what would be my chances of being accepted as a transfer if I manage to get a good GPA within my first year? Thank you so much for your time, and sorry I made this post so long!!!

Hey,
I was in a similar position a few years ago, but it was between HEC, John Molson and Desautels and picked HEC.
They are all good and you can do fine in all of them - your GPA is going to be a big differentiator in all casses.
At the time I saw JMSB as my clear 'safety option', and honestly didn't really think much about it after getting my other offers: their approach just didn't seem very academic/brainy, and I wanted a true 'university' experience as opposed to a practical business training.

Between HEC and McGill, it comes down to the culture and language. The biggest advantage McGill has is the fact that it's easier to 'get out' of business if you change your mind after a few semesters (a lot of courses can count towards other majors), so many people start in BCom and then move on to do other majors (Econ, Poli Sci, Math, Philosophy...)
HEC is a bit less flexible, but you can still major in Economics and potentially in some form of Math. On the other hand, I really like HEC's perspective, with one foot in North America and one foot in Europe, and I think the value of the multi-lingual education is incredible (you can also do English-Spanish-French, but that's harder to get into than McGill's program). I also appreciated the fact that you never have classes with more than 60 classmates (vs. hundreds for some McGill classes) - at HEC in some 3rd year major courses you'll have 10-15 classmates sometimes.

Classes at HEC will certainly be more academic than those at JMSB (e.g. more actual econ courses, more math, and then courses like psychology, sociology where you will have readings by Freud, Marx, Weber, etc.). At JMSB, you have more courses based on case studies, and everything feels a bit more 'applied' (this is also true of Desautels, but you could take outside options at McGill too).

Culturally, HEC is probably about 30% French (actual French, not French Canadian), maybe 50% either French Canadian or some mix of it (e.g. half English, half French Montrealer and so on) and the other 20% is mostly a mix of African, Middle Eastern and Latin American...with an increasing number of Chinese and English Canadians. The majority of people go on exchanges to South America, Europe or Asia (you really get pushed to go, it's seen as a major part of your degree much more than in the other Montreal schools), and students who are very language-oriented select themselves into the school: it's almost standard for people to speak 3 languages, and a good chunk speak 4, 5, etc. A lot of the French students are expat French (e.g. French parents, but went to school at the New York lycee, or Singapore, or Rio, or wherever).

Career-wise, I think in Montreal itself McGill and HEC are about the same, with JMSB a bit behind (but you can do well with the right grades and internships!). Elsewhere, McGill is obviously very well-known.
Given that about 1/3 of HEC students have European passports, there are big networks (thousands) in Paris and London (to a lesser extent Geneva, Brussels) and there are quite a few in Toronto and some in NY. I think JMSB is clearly less well known internationally.

I don't think many JMSB students go into consulting - in Montreal, I'd say almost all junior consultants went either to McGill, HEC or Polytechnique Montreal. I know that McKinsey, BCG, Roland Berger run sessions at HEC and McGill, I doubt you'd have that at JMSB. Still, the numbers of management consultants are so small anyways that 90%+ of graduates do something else.

The European students at HEC either stay, or get a job in Europe, or do a master's - there's a few every year going to LSE, HEC Paris, Imperial College, ESSEC, and I know some at Bocconi, MIT, ESADE, etc. A few also stay at HEC Montreal for their masters: it's very cheap and the quality is good.

I hope you get some more comments from other people here, esp. people who went to JMSB as well or McGill, so you get a more balanced view. I would pick HEC Montreal again - I had a chance to study, work and compete in academic competitions against JMSB and McGill students and I thought the education at HEC was of very high quality in comparison. I also would go to McGill, it's a good school. And almost everyone I've met from Concordia liked it a lot. Good luck!