Wondering how is life after ISB?

Life after ISB: an alumna's view of the first twenty years

I graduated from the Indian School of Business with the PGP Class of 2006. This April, ISB graduated its 25th PGP cohort — almost a thousand students across the Hyderabad and Mohali campuses in twin ceremonies on the same weekend. Watching the silver jubilee batch step off the stage felt like a useful moment to write down what the two decades after my own ISB year have actually looked like, and what life after ISB looks like now for the women and men joining the alumni roll today.

ISB Campus : My version after 20 years post graduation :-)

If you are mid-application, or weighing whether the ISB PGP is worth the fees before you start writing your essays, most of what gets discussed online is the year on campus. Almost no one writes about year three, year ten, year twenty. That is the part I want to talk about, because the value of the ISB degree compounds long after graduation in ways that are hard to see from the outside, and in ways the ISB rankings only partially capture.

ISB: A network that has crossed 21,700, and quietly rewired Indian business

When I was a student, the alumni base was small enough that you could meet a meaningful share of it at one Solstice weekend. Today, ISB's alumni page records more than 21,700 alumni across 65+ countries, with over 800 in CXO and top-leadership roles and more than 1,200 entrepreneurs, a community that includes founders of 13-plus unicorns and 175-plus startups. The Financial Times' MBA Rankings 2026 placed ISB's alumni network at rank 6 globally, among the top six business school networks in the world, while LinkedIn's 2025 list of top MBA programmes ranked ISB rank 5 globally, behind only Stanford, Harvard, INSEAD and Wharton — the kind of company that changes how an ISB MBA compares to Harvard or to Wharton in the conversations I now have with applicants weighing global options. That is the company ISB now keeps when career outcomes and network strength are measured by actual graduate data rather than survey opinion.

What this looks like in practice: when I pick up the phone to find a healthcare strategist for a client, or a head of analytics for a Tier-1 city startup, or a public-policy specialist for an interview panel, the first three names I think of are usually ISB alumni I either studied with or have met through the interview process for the incoming class. The degree gave me a one-year experience. The network is what gave me the next twenty.

For applicants from non-traditional backgrounds, and I work with a lot of them, the network effect is even more pronounced. Whether you're applying from infrastructure, from oil and gas, from healthcare, or as an entrepreneur with your own venture already running, ISB's alumni base gives you a ready set of senior people who have already made the same crossing.

The ISB Special Interest Groups you actually use after graduation

ISB launched its alumni Special Interest Groups in 2016 with a small founding set. There are now eleven active alumni SIGs, Entrepreneurs and Startups, Technology, ISB for Good, the Family Business Network (mentored from inception by Adi Godrej and Sunil Munjal), Healthcare and Pharma, Human Capital, Manufacturing and Operations, Real Estate and Infrastructure, Public Policy, Business Analytics, and Finance.

Roughly fifty-five alumni run them as moderators and advisors, and each SIG anchors itself to one of ISB's research institutes — Public Policy with Bharti Institute, Manufacturing with Munjal Institute, Finance with the Centre for Analytical Finance, and so on. The detail matters because it means an SIG event isn't a generic networking evening — it is an alumni group sitting inside a research centre, with faculty and policy-makers in the room.

If you are reading this as a current applicant, this is the bit that people underestimate. The ISB alumni group you join after graduation is not Facebook. It is a working community organised around the way Indian business is structured — by sector and by function — and you walk into it on day one with the right to call any moderator and ask for an introduction.

The Family Business Network is worth dwelling on for a moment, because it connects to one of ISB's most distinctive offerings: the PGP MFAB programme for family business management, which graduates a steady stream of next-generation family enterprise leaders into a lifetime SIG already populated by the families running some of India's largest groups.

There are also fourteen alumni chapters — nine across India and five international — with confirmed Indian chapters in Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Bengaluru and Kolkata. Each runs its own calendar of events, panels and family gatherings. The annual flagships are Solstice at Hyderabad and Equinox at Mohali — Equinox 2026 ran 27 February to 1 March — plus LATITUDE, the international alumni meet that started in California in 2023, and the WISE Conclave for women alumni, which last met at the National Stock Exchange in Mumbai in November 2025 with the theme "Own Your Version".

ISB Lifetime learning: the audit-a-course right that nobody uses enough

This is the alumni benefit I most wish I had used more aggressively in my first years out of ISB. Every PGP alumnus has the right to audit elective courses across PGP, PGP PRO, PGPMAX, PGP MFAB and the AMP suite, meaning that if a new elective on AI strategy or sustainable finance is launched five years after you graduate, you can sit in on it. Most alumni I know who run their own businesses or have crossed into a new function in their thirties have used this right at least once. It is one of the most underrated assets of doing the ISB MBA versus a one-year programme that ends the day you graduate.

Beyond audit rights, alumni keep lifetime access to the Bajaj Auto Learning Resource Centre, sixty thousand printed books, eighty-plus databases, two thousand-plus e-journals, and borrowing rights of two books at a time on a refundable security deposit, with no annual fee. Lifelong Learning Services runs the Thrive platform for peer mentoring, an Alumni Mentor Directory, and exclusive learning events with industry experts on and off campus. Alumni who graduated within the last five years get an additional benefit through the TIYA initiative — fifty per cent off ISB Online programmes and a dedicated mentoring track. Older alumni get a twenty per cent discount on ISB Executive Education programmes.

ISB Scholarships funded by alumni, for the next class of students

One of the things I find most moving about life after ISB is how directly alumni support the students who come after them. The Alumni Endowment Fund, seeded by my own contemporaries in PGP Co 2004, has supported around seventy tuition waivers and seven research fellows to date. ISB's stated "25-for-25" goal is to give a minimum of twenty-five per cent tuition support to twenty-five per cent of incoming students across PGP, PGPMAX, PGP PRO and the AMP suite — a target that requires roughly twenty-five crore rupees a year and sits squarely on alumni shoulders. As of the latest data, around twenty-one per cent of the PGP class receives some form of scholarship, up from seventeen per cent in 2023.

The named scholarships funded by alumni and partners have grown in both number and ambition. The Vidula Jalan Scholarship, introduced from Co'2025 onward, covers the full tuition fee for two students each year — one woman and one man. The PGP Co 2005 Tuition Fee Waiver was announced by my batchmates in October 2025. The Aakash Tuition Grant, the Ramesh C. Khanna Nurture India Scholarship, the Aditya Shembekar Scholarship, the Indira-Vasudha Scholarship for women, the Deepak Parayanken Tuition Waiver — every one of these traces back to a single ISB alumna or alumnus deciding that someone with the right talent should not be priced out. If you are weighing the ₹38.67 lakh PGP fee for 2026–27 against your savings, this is the part to read carefully on ISB's official scholarships page before you assume you cannot afford the programme.

Career outcomes after graduation, and what they mean for your fifth year?

ISB's most recent placement data is from PGP Class of 2025: 816 students, 364 companies, 1,164 offers generated — roughly 1.43 offers per student — with sixty-plus first-time recruiters and 44 international offers across South-East Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Sixty-three per cent of the class changed industries, fifty-nine per cent changed function. Consulting, Technology and BFSI together took home over seventy-eight per cent of the offers, with McKinsey, BCG, Deloitte, PwC, Nagarro, PhonePe, Indus Insights and Mastercard each hiring twenty or more students. Eighty per cent of the previous Co'2024 cohort received compensation above ₹35 lakh per annum.

The longer-horizon number is the one that should matter most to anyone applying. The Financial Times MBA Rankings 2026 placed ISB #1 globally for salary percentage increase — a verified 227 per cent increase in salaries for graduating students three years after the programme, averaged across cohorts. That is the FT's headline number, not ISB marketing copy, and it is the closest thing the rankings world has to an honest measure of what a programme actually does to your earning trajectory.

In my own client work, I see this play out repeatedly. The PGP graduate's salary in year one is rarely the interesting story; it is the role they have moved into by year five — Chief of Staff, Senior Director, Vice President, founder — that demonstrates the compounding effect of the network and the brand. ISB's 2025 placement report explicitly notes the surge in leadership-track roles being offered straight out of the programme: Chief of Staff, Senior Director and CEO positions are now part of the recruitment slate, not aspirations for later.

What changed in the ISB I graduated from, and what didn't?

When I was a student, the PGP Class was around 30 per cent female. The PGP Class of 2026, currently on campus, is 47 per cent female. The average age is 26, average work experience four years, average GMAT 719. ISB has not just talked about gender diversity, it has built it into the class composition, with named scholarships earmarked for women candidates and a deliberate admissions effort that I have watched evolve year on year through the ISB application process.

The infrastructure has grown. The Motilal Oswal Executive Centre, inaugurated on the Hyderabad campus in September 2025 with a ₹100-crore philanthropic gift, added 1.91 lakh square feet of teaching and conference space. ISB launched its AI Factory in October 2025 with partners including AWS, NASSCOM and IIIT Hyderabad. The I-Venture Immersive programme for entrepreneurs graduated its second cohort of fifty startups in early 2026, with thirty-five per cent women founders. And in September 2024, ISB launched the PGP YL — the Young Leaders programme — a 20-month MBA for fresh graduates and early-career professionals, with no GMAT requirement and an inaugural cohort of 130 students. For applicants in the final year of undergrad, the choice between ISB PGP YL and Berkeley Haas's deferred MBA — or Columbia's deferred programme, or Wharton's — is now a real one, in a way it simply wasn't before this programme existed.

What hasn't changed is the texture of the year on campus, the quality of teaching, and the speed at which a class becomes a community. The reason the alumni network functions the way it does is that the year before graduation is intense, residential, and small enough for everyone to know everyone. The 25th cohort that graduated this April will spend the next twenty years drawing on the same things my class did.

So, what does life after ISB actually look like?

It looks like a working network you can call. It looks like the right to walk back into the classroom and audit a course on a topic that didn't exist when you graduated. It looks like watching the scholarships you contribute to put a young woman from a small town through a programme that will rewire her career. It looks like sitting on an alumni interview panel for the incoming class, year after year, and recognising the same nervous excitement you felt yourself.

It also looks, for those of us who have built businesses around higher education, like an unfair advantage. When I founded GOALisB to help applicants navigate the ISB application, my single biggest credibility asset wasn't a marketing budget. It was that I could honestly say "I've sat where you are sitting, I know what the next twenty years look like, and I will tell you the truth about whether the ISB PGP is the right move for your particular profile."

If you are reading this in the middle of writing your application, that is the question I would rather help you answer. Not "is ISB worth it" in the abstract — but "is it worth it for you", with your specific experience, goals, and stage of career.

Frequently asked questions

How big is the ISB alumni network in 2026? ISB's alumni community has crossed 21,700 members across more than 65 countries, with over 800 alumni in CXO and senior leadership roles and more than 1,200 entrepreneurs, including founders of 13-plus unicorns. The Financial Times ranks the ISB alumni network sixth globally in its 2026 MBA rankings.

What does ISB rank globally in 2026? ISB ranks #12 globally in the Financial Times Global MBA Rankings 2026, up fifteen places from #27 the previous year. It is ranked #1 in India for the third consecutive year, #2 in Asia, and #1 in the world for salary percentage increase, with a verified 227% rise in graduate salaries three years after the programme.

Can ISB alumni audit courses after they graduate? Yes. Alumni of all ISB postgraduate programmes, ISB PGP, PGP PRO, PGPMAX, PGP MFAB and AMP, can audit elective courses after graduation.

What is the female ratio in the current ISB PGP class? The PGP Class of 2026 is 47% female, the highest gender ratio in ISB's history. This is up from approximately 40% in the Class of 2025 and around 30% in the cohorts that graduated before 2020.

How many alumni-funded scholarships does ISB offer? ISB's PGP scholarships page currently lists more than fifteen scholarships funded by alumni, families and corporate partners, including several that cover 100% of tuition fees — among them the Vidula Jalan Scholarship, the Bajaj Auto Scholarship and the J.C. Flowers ARC Scholarship. The Alumni Endowment Fund alone has supported around seventy tuition waivers to date.

Do ISB alumni get career support after graduation? Yes. ISB offers an exclusive Alumni Job Portal where companies post roles for alumni only, lifelong access to career webinars, and a structured mentoring directory through Lifelong Learning Services. Alumni who graduated within the last five years get additional career support through the TIYA (The ISB Young Alumni) initiative.

What is the difference between Solstice and Equinox at ISB? Solstice is the annual alumni homecoming on the ISB Hyderabad campus, and Equinox is the corresponding three-day annual homecoming on the ISB Mohali campus. Equinox 2026 was held from 27 February to 1 March 2026.

Plan your own ISB story

If you are thinking through whether the ISB PGP, PGP YL, PGP PRO or PGPMAX is the right next step for your career, I'd be glad to look at your profile personally. GOALisB's comprehensive ISB consulting covers profile evaluation, essay strategy, application review and interview preparation — and you can read what previous ISB admits have said about the process before you decide. To set up a profile evaluation call, write to contact@goalisb.com or reach us on +91 77194 97187.