UCLA Anderson School of Management Blog

Dean Judy Olian: "Virtuousness as a standard for business education? Absolutely."

In the November/December issue of Biz Ed Magazine, ten veteran management and business school deans examine the last ten years of management education and look forward to the next decade, —discussing "how business schools have changed, might change, and should change in the 21st century."

The article is called "Ten on Ten - Ten deans take a look back at trends that shaped management education over the last ten years and offer their visions for the industry in the years to come." One of the ten contributing dean's is our own dean, Judy Olian.

In looking at the past decade, Olian discusses what was a shortage of PhD candidates relative to MBA candidates a decade ago, a gap that resulted in too few new faculty and a resulting situation where the top schools competed for the best candidates. "As a result, leading business schools worldwide compete fiercely over the same tiny pool of graduates, resulting in steep salary escalation," she writes. 

One by-product of that "steep salary escalation" is an increase in the number of faculty who are "professionally qualifed" as opposed to "academically qualified." This shift in faculty hiring raised another issue. Writes Olian:

The increase in PQ faculty addresses another concern: the relevance of the business school curriculum. In response to that criticism, schools have not only hired more practitioners as faculty, but also introduced creative curricula and pedagogical innovations that are more market-focused, career-oriented, technologically supported, and globally immersive. And yet, schools continue to teach in silos, despite tight linkages among business functions. To align our programs better with business, we will need to challenge entrenched traditions related to faculty department structures and teaching traditions, or else our students will be ill-prepared for the needs of the market.

Looking to the future, Olian expresses views similar to those she delineated in "The Next 75" (a version of which will appear in the just-published 75th Anniversary issue of Anderson Assets magazine). 

Happy Thanksgiving From UCLA Anderson

 

What are you thankful for? Tell us in the comments below.

Bhagwan Chowdhry: Buddhism for Mathematicians and Scientists

Professor Bhagwan Chowdhry has been featured a few times on this blog, primarily focused on his work with Financial Access at Birth (FAB), the organization he co-founded. FAB is dedicated to social and economic innovation that seeks financial inclusion for all. We recently wrote about his appearance at the PopTech Conference and we also covered his appearance on HBO's Entourage here and here.

Chowdry, a professor of finance and faculty director of UCLA Anderson's Master of Financial Engineering program, is a man of diverse interests. In his most recent post on The Huffington Post, Chowdhry writes about his becoming a secular Buddhist seven years ago and how he first became interested in Buddhism due to the curiosity and openness with which the Dalai Lama was engaged with science.

In the post, Chowdhry writes of the Buddist concepts of emptiness and dependent arising. He writes:

Robina explained that emptiness, which is derived from the Sanskrit word sunyata where sunyaliterally means zero or nothing, does not imply Nihilism -- that nothing matters -- but in fact, quite the opposite. Emptiness implies that nothing exists independently, but is dependent on many other causes. I found it difficult to understand these ideas. I even tried to access the writings of Nagarjuna, the renowned Buddhist scholar who first wrote about emptiness in 150-250 CE. I remained confused.

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I think the reason these ideas sometimes appear impenetrable, sometimes vacuous, and sometimes contradictory, is because most Buddhist writers use the same words, the same jargon, and the same explanations over and over again. I will attempt to explain these ideas using a different language, a different vocabulary, a different methodology, that should be familiar to those who work with mathematical and statistical models.

Marshall Goldsmith (PhD '77) Named Winner of the 2011 Thinkers50 Leadership Award

Earlier this month, we blogged about Marshall Goldsmith (PhD '77) and Professor Richard Rumelt, Anderson's Harry and Elsa Kunin Chair in Business and Society, both being named to Thinkers50's list of the world's best business thinkers. Goldsmith was ranked seventh, Rumelt twentieth.

Now, we happily update this news with the word that Goldsmith was also named the winner of the 2011 Thinkers50 Leadership Award (sponsored by Harvard Business Review) as the World's Most-Influential Leadership Thinker.

From the press release:

Over the past decade, the prestigious, bi-annual Thinkers50 ranking (now sponsored by the Harvard Business Review) has served the global business community by showcasing the top business thinkers on the planet. This week in London, internationally acclaimed executive educator, coach and author, Dr. Marshall Goldsmith, was named winner of the 2011 Thinkers50 Leadership Award – as the World’s Most Influential Leadership Thinker.  Along with being recognized as the #1 Leadership Thinker, Marshall was ranked #7 on the list of the world’s Top 50 Business Thinkers.

"Marshall Goldsmith is singularly persuasive, networked, and energetic. In the crowded leadership sphere, he is fixed on changing the practice of leaders for the better rather than the neatness of his theories," says Thinkers50 co-founder Stuart Crainer.

Goldsmith, a world authority on helping successful leaders get even better, is the million-selling author of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers MOJO and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There – winner of the Harold Longman Award for Business Book of the Year. He received his Ph.D. from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management (where he was recognized in 2010 as one of the school’s 100 distinguished graduates) and teaches executive education at Dartmouth’s Tuck School.

Earlier this year, Goldsmith was also named to the list of UCLA Anderson's 100 Inspirational Alumni.

Marshall Goldsmith, Thinkers50

In Case You Missed It: See The Whole Larry Fink, Bill Gross Candid Conversation Here

 

For those who missed last night's broadcast of "Heavy Hitters," the candid conversation between Larry Fink ('76) and Bill Gross ('71) we're happy to present the show in its entirety here. 

Here is Bloomberg's description of the program:

Bill Gross, co-chief investment officer at Pacific Investment Management Co., and Laurence Fink, chief executive officer of BlackRock Inc., discuss the European sovereign-debt crisis, the U.S. economy and investment strategy. Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker moderated the Nov. 17 event hosted by the UCLA Anderson School of Management and Bloomberg Television. (Source: Bloomberg)

If you prefer to watch on your 60-inch plasma, check your local listings as Bloomberg TV plans several rebroadcasts of the show this week.

(Note: The video opens with an advertisement from a Bloomberg TV sponsor.)

UCLA Beats USC... Again; Full-time MBA Round 1 Applications Are Up

Here's a quick round-up from a few of the other blogs at UCLA Anderson.

The UCLA Real Estate Wire (from the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate) reports that "A team of students from UCLA Anderson and UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture won the 2011 NAIOP Real Estate Challenge held at Town and Gown at the University of Southern California." Writes Tim Kawahara, the Ziman's Center's executive director:

The UCLA team, which defended the Silver Shovel, consisted of second-year UCLA Anderson students Michael Johnson, John Shishido, Blake Thomas, and Robert Wilshusen, and UCLA Architecture student Adam Rude.  The annual event, presented by the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties (NAIOP), presents a specific real estate case challenge to a team of students at UCLA and USC.  In addition to providing a rich learning experience that requires participating students to produce high-quality professional work within a limited timeframe, the competition is designed to showcase the talents and creativity of the next generation of real estate leaders.

Read the whole post here or the media advisory here.

The MBA Insider's Blog reports that "round 1 applications are up by more than 20% as prospectives worldwide recognize the growing value offered by the UCLA Anderson MBA program." The post notes that:

Innovations in our curriculum spark the interest of those looking for strong career preparation, while our exciting location and collaborative culture have enduring appeal.  Streamlining our application also helped as we make it easier for candidates to present their case to join the UCLA Anderson family.

Read the whole post here.

 

L.A. Times' Money and Company Blog Previews Fink Gross Discussion

From the L.A. Times' Money and Company blog:

Gross and Fink, who both grew up in California and attended UCLA, have often found themselves at opposite viewpoints on the economy. Both are fretting that economic growth in developed countries could be weighed down for years by debt problems in Europe and high unemployment in the U.S. Gross is more bearish about the future, while Fink says in the interview that he's more optimistic because of the underlying "vitality" in many of America's cutting-edge companies.

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The financial news channel also has online video here and here.

Here is a clip from tonight's show. It airs on Bloomberg TV at 7pm / 10pm:

The U.S. is Entrepreneurial But Can We Create Jobs?

 

L.A. Times: Gross/Fink run different operations, but they share California roots

Last Thursday, Bill Gross ('71) and Larry Fink ('76) joined together in conversation with Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker. The program airs tonight on Bloomberg TV at 7pm PT / 10pm ET. 

Here is a preview of tonight's program, the two talking about Japan.

 

On Sunday, the Los Angeles Times ran a lengthy feature on the two, detailing their rise to the top of the financial world and their shared, California roots. Headlined "The rise of the bond barons" and authored by Nathaniel Popper and Walter Hamilton. Here's a sample:

The gregarious Fink, 59, and the more reserved Gross, 67, have very different personalities and run very different companies. Fink's asset management company, based in New York, has a much broader business model than Gross' more focused operation in Newport Beach, but their ascension to the top of the bond world has some striking parallels.

Both men created upstart behemoths in a financial industry that tends to favor experience. Gross was one of Fink's first big clients when he began trading bonds, and Fink used Gross as an advisor when BlackRock launched in 1989.

More strikingly, before starting their companies, they were both free-spirited California boys — Gross from the Bay Area, Fink in the San Fernando Valley. And the business training they received came not from some ivy-cloaked East Coast academic institution but at the less aristocratic business school atUCLA. They graduated within five years of each other.

"Maybe the laid-back philosophy allows you to think longer term," Fink said, only half in jest, during a recent interview at his New York office.

 

 

Larry Fink and Bill Gross In A Candid Conversation, 'Nuff Said

 

After months of anticipation, Larry Fink ('76) and Bill Gross ('71) sat down with Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker (that's him in the screen shot above) last night at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel for a candid conversation about the world's financial market outlook and the pair delivered in spectacular fashion. 

The conversation -- which will air Monday night on Bloomberg Television -- ranged from the implication of the nation's debt burden to the country's need for a policy of investment and much more. In the clip above, Fink and Gross discuss how economic problems in Euroland are among the greatest threats to the U.S. economy.

In the clip found here on the Bloomberg TV website, Schatzker asks the duo how they feel about the Occupy Wall Street movement. In a surpise, both of the financial titans expressed their sympathy with the OWS movement.