Kenan-Flagler rank nosedives

This story has been corrected from an earlier version to fix a reporting error regarding John Byrne’s title. He is the chairman and CEO of C-Change Media Inc.

The Kenan-Flagler Business School plummeted in this year’s Financial Times Global Master of Business Administration rankings, dropping 16 spots, from 46 to 62.

It was a plunge that surprised leaders at the business school as they tried to determine the reason for the drop.

“These kind of wild swings in ranking are very hard to understand when we haven’t reduced the quality of anything,” said Jim Dean, dean of the business school.

Dean said he was worried by the ranking, but would have been concerned even if the school’s ranking climbed 20 slots.

“Universities just don’t change that dramatically,” Dean said.

Allison Adams, media relations director at the school, said she has observed the Financial Times rankings since they began in 1999. She said she has never seen such a severe fluctuation in the school’s rank.

The schools are judged based on three criteria: alumni salaries and career development, the diversity and international reach of the school and the research capabilities of each school, Adams said.

John Byrne, the chairman and CEO of C-Change Media Inc. and former BusinessWeek editor, said at least 40 schools had double-digit increases or decreases in their ranks in 2011.

“One of the problems with the Financial Times methodology is that it really doesn’t measure the quality of the business school,” Byrne said, adding that countries in good economic locations experience the biggest payoffs, given the influence of alumni salary on rankings.

The salary component makes up 40 percent of the ranking, giving some international schools an advantage.

“A $40,000 salary in India transfers to $200,000 here,” said Sridhar Balasubramanian, associate dean of the MBA program at UNC.

Byrne said the rating does not accurately represent the University’s business school.

“Sixty-two is a complete and total anomaly,” Byrne said. “There’s no credibility whatsoever. No one can tell me that the University of Cape Town is better than Kenan-Flagler.”

Kendra Crawford, an MBA student in the class of 2011, was initially unaware of the drop.

“I was drawn to Kenan-Flagler because of the UNC network, and that doesn’t change on a year-to-year basis,” she said.

But Crawford said she would have second-guessed attending Kenan-Flagler had it been ranked 62nd when she applied.

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