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).
The point she's making is an essential one. The essential lessons of management and business education need not be limited in their application to the business or corporate worlds. What's taught in the classrooms of UCLA Andersona and other top management/business schools must also be put into use in solving the big issues of the day, in health care, sustainability, education and so on.
Towards the end of the essay, Dean Olian makes another key point. Beyond the lessons of marketing and finance, even leadership, are an imparting of values. She writes:
Virtuousness as a standard for business education? Absolutely. Business schools must focus on producing principled, skilled leaders for all forms of organizations. To achieve that calling, schools must exploit every tool available to bridge the global educational and digital divide, and to increase the accessibility of business education to all groups—economically privileged or not. For example, Africa has only 771 business schools compared to 3,850 in the Americas and 6,494 in Asia. Mobile communications have revolutionized the reach of our programs, so that we now can rise above the social, political, and infrastructure barriers that exist in underdeveloped regions, to deliver business education and advance ideas that will elevate the wellbeing of global communities.
The entire article is worth a read, as are the essays from nine other management/business school deans. Take the time to read through them here.
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