What In-Hand Salaries Do MBA Students At India's Top B-Schools Expect?

One of the most pressing matters for any MBA student is being able to receive a good return on investment, both in terms of money and time. Having spent a good number of months (if not years) working towards getting admission to a top institute, students expect a certain remuneration to start-off their management careers with. Since placement reports usually provide limited salary data, we made use of the extensive InsideIIM Recruitment Survey to dive deeper into the kind of salaries that students realistically expect in their first post-MBA jobs.

This is the second part of a two-part report in our 2020 Recruitment Survey series. In the first part, we explore remuneration expectations across India's top-10 management institutes as per the latest InsideIIM rankings. In this part, we explore overall trends based on responses received from students of over 45 business schools. We will also explore trends for New IIMs, Baby IIMs, NMIMS, NITIE, SIBM, SCMHRD, IMT, and TISS.

Please note:

All salary figures are monthly.
All the charts below are interactive in nature. Tap/Hover anywhere on the chart to interact with it.

The Recruitment Survey of 2020 conducted by InsideIIM at over 45 business schools in the country revealed that of the respondents, 64% expect monthly salary in the range of 1.1-2.0 lakhs, with only about 2% of all respondents expecting a salary of more than 3 lakhs per month post-MBA. This is largely in alignment with results observed in the previous report. This suggests that the average MBA student in India, regardless of which business school they are from, expects at least a yearly in-hand salary of INR 13 lakhs. Please note that the results in the graph above include responses from students at the top-ranked IIMs as well.

The survey revealed that of the respondents from the new IIMs in India, 3 out of every 5 students at most of the new IIMs expect a monthly in-hand salary in the range of Rs. 1.1 lakhs to Rs. 2.00 lakhs. To compare, 1 in 5 students at the top ranked IIMs expect salaries in the same range. Only 5% respondents expect salaries above Rs. 2.5 lakhs. 1 out of 4 respondents to the survey also expect salaries equal to or below Rs. 1.1 lakhs a month.

Salary expectations at IIM Trichy and IIM Raipur are generally lower as compared to the other new IIMs, with 53% and 40% of the batch expecting salaries in the range of INR 0.7 to INR 0.9 lakhs respectively.

23% of respondents from baby IIMs expect a salary in the range of INR 1.5-2 lakhs per month whereas their counterparts at IIMs like Trichy and Raipur expect a monthly salary in the lower range of INR 0.9-1.1 lakhs.

Interestingly, the majority monthly salary expectations at baby IIMs exceed those at new IIMs. Whereas 22% of respondents from new IIMs expect a monthly salary in the range of 1.1 - 1.3 lakhs, 24% of respondents from baby IIMs expect a higher monthly salary of 1.5 - 2 lakhs.

1 in 4 students at the above mentioned non-IIM business schools expects a monthly salary in the range of INR 1.3-1.5 lakhs.

How We Made This Report - Methodology

In August 2020, we reached out to first and second year MBA students across India's top business schools to tell us about their thoughts on the b-school recruitment process. Amongst the many questions in the survey that was floated, one question asked MBA students to share their expected monthly in-hand salaries in their first jobs after an MBA. Respondents to the InsideIIM Recruitment Survey include a good mix of 1st and 2nd year MBA students.

Students responding to this survey belong to business schools like IIMs Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Calcutta, Lucknow, Indore, Kozhikode, as well as second and third generation IIMs. Respondents also belong to campuses such as FMS Delhi, XLRI Jamshedpur, SPJIMR Mumbai, ISB, MDI Gurgaon, SIBM Pune, IIFT, and NMIMS Mumbai amongst others. Other campuses include IMT Ghaziabad, SCMHRD, Welingkar, KJSIMSR, XIMB, IMI New Delhi, and the IITs.

Comments

ashutosh gupta

The data in this article doesn't help preparing students. These are just expectations. Please do a survey on actual in hand salary received post placements. And career progression(promotions or yearly appraisals) over a period of 5 years. If you fancy graphs then these might help: 1. Number of promotions/company switches in 5 years post placement 2. Yearly Appraisal % over 5 years. And please show the data for other colleges as well. This way a student can match his expectations with the college while choosing one.

13 May 2021, 07.12 PM