BW Communities

The Future Of MBA

BW Online Bureau Nov 08, 2014

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><root available-locales="en_US," default-locale="en_US"><static-content language-id="en_US"><![CDATA[Business education has changed and evolved since Tuck started world's first MBA program over a 100 years back. Business however, has evolved much faster. Business schools carry an ever-greater burden of keeping up with the industry demand for leadership in number and quality - readiness to perform. This requires business schools to innovate and keep up with the pace of change. There are 3 key things that are affecting the future of MBA now more than ever - the easy availability of information because of Internet, changing face of the workplace and high cost of a quality MBA. Easy Availability Of Information Even until the 90's several people carried their notes with them when they graduated from top schools, for reference! Information was really only available in expensive books, and hand-written journals. However, today one can find most information for free or very inexpensively. This is putting more and more pressure on reversing the traditional focus of "Knowing"->"Applying" ->"Being" to "Being"->"Applying"->"Knowing". The adoption of case based learning has been a step in this direction over the last two decades. The Changing Face Of Workplace The proliferation of manufacturing led to "campus" like companies in the first half of 20th century. Everybody lived together and worked together. With "knowledge industry" being the main growth driver now and rapid globalization, typical businesses tend to be much more distributed. I remember negotiating an M&A deal with a Ukrainian on phone with lawyers joining in from the US. A Google product manager might be working with teams in Bengaluru, Shanghai and Sao Paolo. Business schools however are still pre-dominantly "campus-based" with little use of technology. Attempts of distribution still remain focused on "extending" classrooms either physically or through video. High Cost Of Quality MBA There are two opposite forces at work for business schools. On one hand, there is a value in getting more experienced students since they have greater appreciation of "real" work; on the other hand the opportunity cost of quitting their jobs for these individuals goes up as well. Many schools have started 1 years executive MBA programs for the same reason however most are "extensions" of existing campus programs and trying to balance quality vs. capacity. We believe the future of MBA lies in solving these challenges and leveraging these opportunities to focus on "Being"->"Applying"->"Knowing". This might mean a ground up design of curriculum that helps students see the big picture. It might means transferring the traditional burden of "lecturing" to technology while faculty plays a much greater role as a coach. It might mean making a business school to look more like the distributed "knowledge-based" company using technology for greater collaboration. And it might mean bringing down the cost of MBA for high quality working professionals by keeping them in their jobs while they study. Its not easy by any means but has the potential of very high impact if it can be done. "The need is not just strategy, but strategy and execution. I wish business schools produced more people who can combine the two." Comment from Dilip Modi The author is Director of Sunstone Business School