Elena Nock: “The Smurfit MBA has a very good reputation both in Ireland and abroad.”

Elena Nock weighed up a number of different factors before choosing the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School MBA. “The Smurfit MBA has a very good reputation both in Ireland and abroad,” she says. “Its FT ranking is very important. It is also very good value for money – it is ranked 17th for this by the FT. And it has a good scholarship programme. The international dimension was very important as well. I have been to Yale, Japan, Korea and Iceland this year alone. Also, two thirds of the full-time MBA class come from overseas. Those were the three big factors for me.”

Nock’s team came up with a marketing strategy for a biotech start-up. “It was a brilliant experience. I come from a marketing and sales background but had never been exposed to the biotech industry before. It was great to be able to apply our learning to a project in such a condensed way. We had only a week to deliver value. I also got a glimpse of what it’s like to be a consultant, how to project manage it, how to deliver value, how to build a relationship with the client, and how to bring it all together at the end.”