Posted on

Using AI to empower the next generation

MIP Politecnico di Milano has developed an AI-infused career-coaching tool to help students gain new skills faster and boost their employability, explains Federico Frattini

As the education sector booms, universities are being forced to think further outside the box to attract the best students. Courses that are not flexible, personal and relevant to the increasing digitisation of many jobs and workplaces are simply being left behind. New demands from students about how courses are taught, as well as their content, are making the industry increasingly competitive and put more pressure on the educational systems in place. The goal for students is not just to graduate, but to be truly employable, by gaining a set of skills that will be relevant now and in the workplace of the future.

Practically all universities will have witnessed the market widening over the past few years, with a new demographic of potential students looking to continue their lifelong learning and keep abreast of ongoing technological advances. The World Economic Forum reports that 65% of  primary school students will be doing jobs that don’t yet exist when they graduate. 

From this perspective, acquiring new skills is important, not only for young people, but also for those wishing to remain competitive in their industry and grow in their professional life or even in their current position. In fact, according to Vanessa Byrnes, Sector Managing Director at global talent management consultancy, Alexander Mann Solutions, upskilling has never been more vital. She explains: ‘In our experience, retraining and redeploying internal resources is one of the most efficient ways of bridging future skills gaps. When faced with the option to “buy, build or borrow” expertise, growing your own talent comes with numerous benefits, not least the retention of culture and reduced recruitment costs.’

A career coach for students and alumni

Fresh technologies must be made available to empower everybody with new capabilities. Research suggests that AI, as well as a plethora of other new technologies, will directly impact a huge number of jobs worldwide, so real-life experience is critical in both understanding and adapting to these advances. For MIP Politecnico di Milano, using these new tools is important both for our School and our students. 

That’s why we have launched FLEXA, an AI continuous learning platform which acts as a career coach for potential students, current cohorts and alumni networks. 

The basic idea is to give our students the knowledge they need to achieve their career goals faster and make them more employable. Developed in partnership with Microsoft, FLEXA analyses each individual and suggests personalised material that can close skills gaps while promoting their profiles to recruiters. 

So, how does it work? To begin, users undergo a short assessment of their hard, digital and soft skills. This, combined with details of their personal career aspirations, helps to identify courses, tutorials, digital material, MOOCs, and even the best mentors and coaches to help enhance their capabilities. 

FLEXA can be accessed by current students, alumni and potential students alike, mapping out their next logical steps to close skills gaps at all levels of their career. Each individual’s data is then set against job skills required by the market and FLEXA allows a number of top recruiters to access the profiles of both students and alumni. 

FLEXA uses Microsoft’s cloud service and AI platform, Cortana Intelligence, which Silvia Candiani, Microsoft Italy’s General Manager describes as an ‘innovative continuous learning tool’. She says it is ‘fully aligned with Microsoft’s culture of continuous skills updating and its mission of empowering every person and organisation on the planet to achieve more. The goal is upskilling, the improvement of people’s employability, and (for it to act) as an enabler of innovation and digital transformation’.

Personalisation of the student experience 

Innovations such as these are the first step in accelerating a transformation in education. Matching curricula with aspirations is one side of the coin, but it becomes a larger, more targeted operation when employers get involved. This creates the perfect platform to match supply and demand, and provides critical information to fine-tune curriculum development. This is likely to transform the curriculum from a top-down, education system-led model to a bottom-up, or market-led one, while still working on students’ terms. 

One of the key benefits of this digital learning ecosystem is that it allows users to personalise their learning journey, which is of increasing importance for those selecting which MBA or master’s degree to undertake. The changing role of Business Schools means they must now curate knowledge and broker content, to deliver to students and alumni at exactly the right time for them and their careers. It appears that management education is becoming less about imparting ‘know-how’ to the next generation of business minds than focusing on ‘know-where’ – the critical ability to source knowledge from different media. FLEXA is designed to do just that.

The implications of using technology such as FLEXA are far-reaching. One advantage is the wealth of data that can be collected from recruiters using the technology, many of which systematically develop talent for future roles. As Byrnes explains: ‘In order to know what skills need to be developed to ensure an organisation is future-fit, leaders need to map capabilities against project demand.’ 

In this way, data collected from the system will provide insights into what employers are really searching for, as well as the knowledge that allows students to reach career targets. This is invaluable for the education system, which can start to anticipate and follow shifting demands in the real business world for the first time. This could be the key to understanding how to close rapidly growing, global skills gaps. This service could even be offered without an accompanying degree to strengthen the digital capabilities and soft skills of individuals, whether they are a Business School student or not. This is an indication of potential societal impact.

In addition, the system also encourages intelligence-based networking between individuals, allowing collaborative learning and skills building, as well as connecting people with mentors. This is a huge advantage to students who are exposed to situations where they must develop soft skills such as problem solving, verbal communication and adaptability. 

According to Deloitte’s 2016 Global Human Capital Trends report, executives now consider these skills key to employee retention, improving leadership and building a meaningful culture. In fact, 92% of Deloitte’s respondents rated soft skills as a critical priority. As technologies such as AI and robotics are increasingly capable of completing automated and analytical tasks, business minds of the future must develop their ability to work effectively alongside and in synergy with these systems, as well as nurturing the qualities that tech does not possess. 

Growth of online education and the need for flexibility 

The number of online courses being offered by Business Schools is increasing, as is the number of applicants to them. A 2018 report published by the Babson Survey Research Group suggests that the number of US students who enrolled in at least one online course
rose by 5.6% between 2015 and 2016, a faster rate than the three previous years. Jeff Seaman, Co-Director of the Babson Survey Research Group and a co-author of the study, expects this trend to continue and that data for 2017 will mark 15 consecutive years of enrolment growth. At MIP, flexible learning with the student at the core of the programme is part of the School’s ethos. In the past few years, we have been experiencing a radical change in the needs of professionals interested in post-graduate training who, besides an increasing need for flexibility and the compatibility of educational programmes with their agenda, are demanding a highly personalised and concrete learning experience. MIP has responded to this need with a dedicated educational offering revolving around the concept of smart learning, which combines digital learning tools with personal coaching, mentoring and advisory services. 

In 2012, the School started to adopt emerging technologies in higher education and  its first digital executive MBA was launched in 2014. It was so successful that we had to launch a new edition of the programme every six months. Today, there are domestic and international executive MBA digital offerings, the Flex and International Flex Executive MBAs, which allow participants to decide where and how to access their lesson material, from anywhere in the world and with any device. This means that their learning fits around other commitments, and is part of the School’s wider digital strategy to use tech to enhance learning capabilities. In 2016, the Flex EMBA was shortlisted for the MBA Innovation Award in the annual AMBA Excellence Awards. FLEXA further enhances the School’s educational offerings and operates entirely online, making it accessible to all users at any time.

Advances in technology mean the traditional education framework will soon become as anachronistic as the notion of knowledge acquisition occurring merely through a textbook, or in a discussion. The best people in each field are becoming aware that they must keep up with these advances and know how to use them to get ahead, as well as developing soft skills. If Business Schools don’t innovate and cater to this growing demographic, they are likely to see potential students applying elsewhere. In order to remain valuable, Business Schools must rise to the challenge of engaging alumni in a meaningful way, and encourage them to see the value in lifelong learning. By failing to take advantage of new technologies, universities are not arming current – or future – generations of business minds with the knowledge and skills needed to succeed.

Federico Frattini is Associate Dean of Digital Transformation at MIP Politecnico di Milano.

Posted on

Five fundamentals of experiential learning

Experiential learning teaches MBAs how to continue acquiring new skills and knowledge throughout their careers, writes Stuart Robinson

To succeed in a world of rapid and turbulent change, MBA graduates need to have learned how to learn.  In Business School classrooms, we present knowledge in packaged, and hopefully accessible, forms as part of a structured learning product; the MBA. On graduation, when students proceed to corporate, public sector or startup life, that structure of institutionally based education is largely lost.

The MBA graduate who wants to remain relevant in the workplace must find a way of continually learning and cannot rely on thoughtfully built slide packs, well-organised seminar discussions and integrated assessments. Experiential learning on an MBA programme has a big part to play.

In the 1980s, David Kolb described experiential learning as a process that brings education and personal development together with workplace experience. He expressed this as a cycle of experience, observation and reflection. Effective learners and managers may fulfil this process naturally as a part of their daily practice. However, others may need help to recognise the value of the interplay between different activities in the cycle, or to ensure they cover it all.    

A key question for MBA programme designers is how they can structure experiential learning not only for the benefit of students’ immediate learning but also as a way of teaching them how to learn continually, building a skill that will serve them throughout their future careers. I believe there are five fundamental aspects that are key to successfully planning and delivering experiential learning in MBA-level education. 

1. Authenticity

Any experiential learning must be real and relevant to MBA students and the challenges they face both during the programme and afterwards. This is part of the student’s process of learning to recognise significant learning opportunities in the future.  We often seem to look back on our past experiences and recognise them as important learning milestones. Part of learning how to learn is getting to this recognition earlier, ideally as the experience is happening. In the slightly artificial environment of an MBA it is easy, but often overlooked, for a tutor to point out to students that they are in the midst of an important learning experience.

2. Integration throughout an MBA programme

Experiential learning events should be used to build a student’s ability to learn by complementing other sessions and modules, to encourage them to reflect repeatedly on the results of action and the development of appropriate responses. Careful integration can provide multiple and developing cycles of experience, reflection and experimentation. 

Experiential learning focused on leadership, for example, can be set up as part of the overall pedagogical approach to core leadership topics in the curriculum. In planning the MBA programme at the University of Exeter Business School, we put in milestone events throughout the academic year where students come together around a specific challenge. 

Examples include learning to work in teams on a full-day outdoor exercise, co-operating with others on innovative designs and a corporate challenge where students work together under time pressure to address a problem posed by a large organisation. Each event is integrated with the year-long leadership module. 

Students’ individual achievements in these challenges are used as a basis for their personal learning about leadership. Surveys, questionnaires, videos, and photographs from the events provide the raw material for reflection and modification of approaches at an individual level.

3. Ensuring all students can take part

Experiential learning needs to be accessible and flexible enough to accommodate the learning needs of different MBA students. In some cases, experiential learning can be physically challenging or demanding as it takes students out of their comfort zones. This risks isolating those who will not or cannot take part. The design of learning must therefore take the varying needs and abilities of the whole cohort of students into account.

When we took a group of students on our first leadership expedition last year, the need for accessibility was very clear. We asked them to spend a week trekking across a high plateau in Norway with heavy packs, dried food and in weather conditions that were, at times, very challenging. Students came along with different levels of fitness and aptitude for the personal discomforts that come with a week in the wilderness. Although all ended well in our case, it was clear that personal physical capability should not be a barrier to gaining the educational value that an experience like this offers. Our plan for the future is to offer different ways of tackling the expedition; for example, using huts as an alternative to tents or adapting the targets for distance to be covered. These steps will broaden accessibility without affecting the opportunities for personal development that the experience brings.

4. Effective measurement

Experiential learning should be designed so the overall impact on the student and the performance of individual students can be analysed. Without effective measurement and reflection, experiential learning can sometimes be viewed as a gimmick or a bit of fun, and not a true part of the overall educational process. 

Incorporating elements of reflective work into different modules and other learning activities across the MBA helps both students and staff to measure progress. This must be seen to be valuable by the student, however. Asking for deep and thoughtful reflection on different aspects of improvement (‘what would you do differently?’) and not simply a description of what happened is very important. For example, we ask students to describe themselves and their goals at the outset of the programme and then to reflect on the experience at the end, setting out specific next steps that they intend to follow.

Extending this from the individual to the wider group is also helpful. Much MBA work is group based, with the key aim of teaching students not only how to deal with the task at hand but also to practise the skills and behaviours needed to work and interact with others. This has much experiential value but can be overlooked when measuring results. Peer assessment can play a role, but is sometimes a blunt-edged tool if there is conflict in groups. If there is time, a more structured approach, using surveys to capture students’ thoughts and feelings at planned points in a group exercise, can provide a useful basis for productive group-based reflection and action planning.

5. Memorability 

Finally, effective experiential learning needs to be highly memorable. The learning experiences we create for students during an MBA should be remembered long after graduation. Memory of specific MBA experiences can form the basis of templates for action in the future. Students will recall some experiences more than others, reflecting their individual interests and the achievements they value. Building a rope bridge across a river, leading a team through a snowy wilderness, overcoming their own nerves to make a successful client presentation are all examples of the type of experience we try to create during our MBA. These form the basis of the good stories we want our alumni to tell, cementing their learning from the MBA and, in the end, enthusing others to embark upon it.

Effective experiential learning not only helps students to learn, it can bring renewed vigour and energy to an MBA programme, helping to build its reputation and that of the wider Business School.

Experiential learning at the University of Exeter Business School

Experiential learning runs across the Exeter MBA’s 12-month curriculum, developing from abstract through to real experiences and from a group focus to an individual one.

For example, in the first week, students are asked to work in teams to deliver a group result. This is not a classroom exercise – we ask them to build a bridge across a local river. Sometimes they get wet.

Afterwards, we ask them to reflect on the experience and integrate this with our more academic leadership module. The experience of working in a new and diverse team, the subsequent reflection, and the opportunities this gives us for the building of teams in term one of the MBA, helps establish an approach to effective teamwork with the students. This culminates in a term-two exercise in which students are asked to work in their now-established teams to prepare and deliver a proposal to a client. We work with large organisations (Unilever and Ikea are recent examples) which bring a problem to the class. 

Students have a week to integrate their knowledge from the core MBA programme into a reasoned response and proposal. On the final day, they present their ideas to the organisation’s managers who are facing the problem in the real world. This simulates an authentic consultancy exercise calling for analytical rigour, creativity and persuasion skills.

The experience of this challenge is then taken forward into an individual consultancy exercise that the student carries out with a client. Building on skills they have developed or that have been pointed out to them through peer feedback, they must figure out and agree a project brief that will deliver client value when carried out. This is then implemented in the client’s organisation, forcing the student to overcome barriers, be creative, talk to and work with a range of professionals. The project is a memorable and authentic experience which rounds off the student’s MBA journey.

Stuart Robinson is MBA Director, University of Exeter Business School.

Posted on

Should MBA degrees come with an expiry date?

Business Schools must adopt alternative business models and embrace technology, or risk becoming a casualty of the paradigmatic changes in business, argues Professor Bodo Schlegelmilch in a call for action

When AMBA accredits an MBA programme, it does so for a maximum of five years, because in five years, a lot can change. A Business School has to apply for re-accreditation and demonstrate that the content of its programme(s), its teaching methods and quality standards remain current and up to date.

When Business Schools award degrees, they do this for life – but is there a genuinely good reason for doing so?

What MBAs learned five, 10 or 15 years ago is certainly not current, often irrelevant and sometimes even wrong. Business Schools need to change their business model. For example, in sync with the sharing economy, future Business Schools could move from ownership to renting. Under this,  Schools would not award their MBA degrees forever (the ownership model), but would grant the degree for a limited number of years (subscription model). 

Unless MBA graduates demonstrated a commitment to continuous professional development, their degrees would expire. 

However, degrees for rent are not the only potential change in store for Business Schools. There are a number of developments that suggest the end of ‘business as usual’. 

I want to focus on four change catalysts: 

  • New paradigms of success 
  • The growing influence of Asia 
  • An unprecedented speed of technological development  
  • An increasing demand for sustainability.

New paradigms of success

Traditional Business Schools rely on their full-time professors for teaching. These professors  spend most of their time on research and are often also tasked with administrative duties. According to Kai Peters, Richard Smith and Howard Thomas’ 2018 book Rethinking the Business Models of Business Schools, depending on the particular type of university, the seniority of the professor and the country, the time such professors spend in class is no more than 120-300 hours per year. 

This model makes teaching expensive. In 2011, Howard Thomas and I wrote a paper for the Journal of Management Development entitled ‘The MBA in 2020: Will there still be one?’ and reported that, for all but the top 13,000 institutions that offer business degrees worldwide, this teaching model is probably unsustainable. With some MBA and executive MBA (EMBA) fees now well in excess of €100,000, this also raises serious questions of social equity and fairness. 

Most Business Schools are therefore looking for ways  to reduce teaching costs, and various options exist. Most Schools employ clinical or practice-based faculty (essentially lecturers free of research obligations) to bring down costs. Blended learning or flipped classrooms can further boost the bottom line, if less-costly tutors can replace expensive full time faculty. In such models, students work through a variety of tasks and teaching materials outside the class and only return to the Business School campus for a substantially reduced number of face-to-face teaching hours. 

While these cost reductions seek efficiencies within the existing Business School model, they fail to question the rationale of the model itself. This is akin to Blockbuster Video looking for cost savings when Netflix changed the rules of the game. We  all know what happened to Blockbuster: it  went bust. 

The real competition for many Business Schools comes from drastically different business models. First, there are the so-called massive open online courses (MOOCs) aimed at open access via the internet. These courses bring a new competitive dynamic to Business Schools. Some large, financially well-off universities produce their own MOOCS, while the majority scramble to partner with a heterogeneous group of providers. 

Other eLearning platforms work independent of traditional Business Schools. MOOCs have shifted the competition from being  between Business Schools to between networks. These networks include a range of companies that team up to design and distribute educational content. 

To add another level of complexity to the competitive landscape, international consulting companies are expanding their digital learning offerings. While these companies do not (yet) have the right to grant degrees and typically offer a certificate on completion of their courses, it is ultimately arguable whether a certificate from a prestigious consulting company such as McKinsey or PwC or a degree from a relatively unknown university has more currency. In addition, some MBAs offered by traditional Business Schools are already giving credits for a variety of MOOC certificates.   

Finally, corporate universities and system integrators are encroaching on the traditional Business School market. Some corporations, such as Sberbank Corporate University in Russia, have built large and highly impressive campuses, where they not only train their own employees but also those of selected partner companies. 

Sberbank Corporate University has teamed up with INSEAD and London Business School (strong brands obviously still count) and makes use of learning material from Khan Academy. Sberbank and other non-conventional Business Schools use a fly-in faculty model, which saves them having expensive full-time professors on their books. Students at such institutions may well be taught by excellent professors with up-to-date research records; but other Business Schools pay for the research time of these professors.

Thus, traditional Business Schools face a myriad of competitive challenges. There are new, mostly technology-driven market entries; increasing competition from outside the industry by consultants, publishers and IT companies; increasingly competitive corporate universities, and there are Business Schools that are system integrators with minimal overheads and no research expenditures. 

All of this suggests that the time for ‘business as usual’ is over. A few cosmetic changes to the existing business model will not be enough to secure survival. In particular, Business Schools that are not among the top aspirational brands will need to adopt alternative business models or risk becoming a casualty of the paradigmatic changes in the business environment.

Growing influence of Asia

A brief look at the history of Business Schools, and the development of MBAs in particular, helps us to appreciate the startling emergence of Asian MBA programmes in recent years. 

Business Schools were initially founded in Europe, but quickly became a hallmark of the US.  According to a 2004 article in Accounting History by academics Lúcia Lima Rodrigues, Delfina Gomes, and Russell Craig, Aula do Comércio (School of Commerce) in Lisbon, Portugal, is believed to be the world’s first government-sponsored School to specialise in the teaching of commerce, including accounting. It was established in 1759 and closed in 1844. 

Meanwhile, ESCP Paris, founded in 1819 in France, regards itself as the world’s oldest fully fledged Business School. More than 60 years later, in 1881, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania was established in the US (according to its website as ‘the world’s first collegiate school of business’).

Next, in 1900, the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College was established as the first graduate school of management in the US. Tuck is noteworthy because it conferred the first advanced degree in business – a master of commercial science. This is widely regarded as the predecessor of the MBA.

In 1908, the first MBA programme was established by the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration, and in 1943, the first EMBA was established at the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business. At this time, only US universities offered MBAs and it took until 1948 for MBAs to become popular at Business Schools elsewhere. 

The first MBA programme outside the US was offered by the Ivey School of Business, University of Western Ontario, Canada. One year later, this was followed by the University of Pretoria in South Africa. In 1957, INSEAD in France became the first European Business School to offer an MBA. During the following decade, a burst of new Business Schools and MBA programmes took place, including the founding of renowned institutions in the UK such as London Business School (in 1964)  and Manchester Business School and (in 1965). Unfortunately, the market was also entered by some less-sound competitors. To provide quality guidance to potential Business School students, AMBA was founded in 1967.

The first MBA degree in Asia can be traced back to 1955. The Institute of Business Administration at the University of Karachi, Pakistan, offered the MBA with technical support from Wharton and, later the University of Southern California. In 1963, Korea University established the Graduate School of Business Administration and recruited the first MBA students. In China, the MBA has a short history: the first nine MBA programmes were launched in 1991; today, there are more than 230 MBA programmes in the country.

Despite the late adoption of MBAs in Asia, the 2018 Financial Times full-time global MBA ranking included 15 Asian MBAs in the top 100; seven of them from China. In its 2018 EMBA Ranking, 28 Asian EMBAs are among the top 100, all of the top eight involving Business Schools from China.

A decade ago, the Financial Times ranked only four Asian MBAs among the top 100 in its full-time global MBA ranking, and only nine in its EMBA ranking. Sceptical readers who point to the widely criticised reliance on financial criteria in the Financial Times rankings may, instead, look to accreditation: AMBA now accredits more than 50 Business Schools with MBA programmes in Asia, 35 in China alone. This provides further evidence of the importance of Asia’s Business Schools gained in just over two decades.

The phenomenal rise of MBA programmes in Asia reflects the region’s transformation into a hive of global business. As Pavida Pananond, Associate Professor of Thammasat University in Bangkok, aptly commented in February 2018, in an article in the Bankok Post: ‘If you are sitting in London or Boston, you might not really feel the action as much as if you were sitting in Shanghai, to see how business is growing in China. So one of the first advantages of these Asian Schools is that you are located where the action is.’  

In 2017, China surpassed the UK and Germany for the first time in terms of the number of citations of international science papers (according to China Daily in 2017). In summary, the evidence suggests the dominance of US and European Business Schools is reducing and the emergence of top Asian Business Schools as formidable competitors has become yet another indicator of the end of business as usual.

Speed of technological change

The impact of MOOCs on traditional Business Schools only scratches the surface of a vast range of developments that will revolutionise the way students learn and Business Schools teach in the future. 

Already, students want to learn where, when and how best fits their individual needs; for example, watching a video while on board a plane at 5am in the morning. They also want learning to be a stimulating and enjoyable experience. Commuting to a Business School located in a city, finding a parking space, and listening to a traditional lecture hardly fits this picture. 

Just imagine the potential of using Microsoft’s HoloLens for teaching. Students could learn about consumer behaviour in emerging markets by immersing themselves in a souk in Marrakesh or a bazaar in Kolkata. On an operations management course, students could embark on a virtual tour through the shop floor of a robotics manufacturer. The technology could be used to make them feel that they were really there, without ever leaving their living room. 

The technology (such as Microsoft HoloLens) already exists and the applications are only limited by our imagination. 

Meanwhile, augmented reality holographic technology is also set to change our teaching approach. Instead of flying expensive faculty around the world, they could be beamed into a classroom via holographic telepresence and give lectures or deliver entire courses in different continents. 

During AMBA’s 2018 Global Conference in Stockholm, Sweden, a live two-way discussion took place between the audience and the digital human hologram of the CEO of ARHT Media, Larry O’Reilly, who was thousands of miles away in Toronto, Canada. Delegates had the impression that O’Reilly was actually in Stockholm. The entire discussion could be stored for playback on-demand. In fact, according to ARHT Media, the hologram can also be ‘captured, transmitted and displayed directly to multiple stages simultaneously with complete live two-way interactivity’. This challenges the age-old wisdom that one cannot be in two places at the same time.

While these technological advances are impressive, they are not the only ones. Other innovations, such as adaptive learning and artificial intelligence (AI), are already emerging. Collectively, these rapid technological changes indicate the end of ‘business as usual’. Traditional Business Schools will not be able to survive without embracing fundamental changes in technology. 

Demand for sustainability

The increasing demand for sustainability will have a profound influence on Business Schools. But what does demand for sustainability mean and where does it come from? 

At a rudimentary level, according to the UN, sustainability refers to our concern that human activities should meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. At a more detailed level, sustainability calls for the balancing of three fundamental dimensions: environmental protection, societal progress and economic growth. While Business School teaching has traditionally focused on economic growth – the profit part of the three sustainability dimensions – the other two dimensions, often labelled as ‘people and planet’, are increasingly gaining centre stage. 

However, most case discussions and lectures do not even question the primacy of profit as an outcome variable of corporate value creation. Typically, Business School teaching centres around how various elements of the value chain can be optimised to increase profits. Students debate how employees can become more profit-orientated. They research how the supply chain can be optimised to increase profits. Professors teach how customer touch points should be designed to increase profits. And classes debate the most profitable pricing strategy. 

Even when corporate social responsibility (CSR) or sustainability issues are addressed, they are usually also cast into a model that focuses on profit outcomes. For example, we may investigate how our CSR measures impact on profits. Likewise, we debate whether support of local causes is more profitable than support of international causes; and we examine whether supporting a children’s charity has a higher profit impact than supporting a local art gallery.

Non-financial outcomes

While these and similar questions are undoubtedly important for both teaching and research in Business Schools, it is the virtually exclusive focus on profit as outcome that is the problem. What about non-financial outcomes, such as customer safety, reduction of waste or health of employees? What about organisations that have other purposes, such as social enterprises or ‘B-corporations’ which balance purpose and profit?  

In a paper I wrote with Magdalena Öberseder and Patrick Murphy in 2013 for the Journal of Business Research entitled ‘CSR Practices and Consumer Perceptions’, we concluded that MBA students – in their roles as consumers, employees, employers and entrepreneurs – are increasingly concerned about a multitude of sustainability issues, such as food quality, their own biological footprint and working conditions. Legislators also focus increasingly on issues such as environmental degradation or recycling. And corporations themselves are not only reacting to shifting consumer demands and legal requirements, but explore sustainability issues such as recycling and energy conservation. 

Business Schools cannot ignore these value changes. Instead, the increasing demand for sustainability needs to translate into a widening curriculum for Business Schools, in which much more debate on the purpose of the enterprise will have to take place. 

Current faculty is ill-equipped to tackle such fundamental debates. Typically, faculty has a strong grounding in particular subject areas, such as finance, operations or statistics. This is necessary but not sufficient. Faculty needs to adopt more holistic viewpoints. Perhaps Business Schools of the future, in whatever shape or form they may still exist, will employ philosophers to lead discussions on the purpose of business.

The futures of Business Schools 

Are the developments discussed above hailing the end of Business Schools and, hence, the end of MBAs? It depends which future trajectory a Business School will choose.

If a Business School opts to continue with business as usual, it will soon encounter a substantial drop in its MBA enrolment. A knee-jerk boost in advertising spend, increase in scholarships, and reduction in teaching costs by bringing less-qualified instructors into MBA classrooms, will be insufficient.

Such measures are unlikely to stop the downward spiral of fewer qualified students, lower income and a restricted ability to make necessary investments. 

Instead, Business Schools need to go beyond cosmetic adjustments and consider fundamental changes to their business models. This starts with a realistic assessment of their resources and capabilities. Few Schools have massive endowments, strong brands or the unquestioning support of taxpayers, enabling them to run a costly, campus-centric system. 

These Schools will be able to continue attracting MBA students into classrooms where they can interact with expensive faculty. While we are living in a hyper-connected world, this is often accompanied by social isolation. To this end, personal networking with influential peers and alumni will continue to play a key role at these Schools. And having an MBA from XYZ (please insert a top-brand Business School of your choice) is as much a rite of passage en route to a desirable corporate career as it is an opportunity to acquire knowledge and skills. 

Less fortunate Business Schools – the majority – will have to think carefully about their resources, capabilities and, in particular, purpose. Before they settle on a business model, Schools need to gain clarity on a host of soul-searching questions: what constitutes success, both for the Business Schools and for the MBA programme? (See box, left). 

Of course, any Business School dean will easily be able to add another few dozen pertinent questions. Coming up with truthful answers that guide future strategies is more challenging.

Many deans appear to be in a state of denial, hoping that the Business School world, and with it the MBA programmes, will somehow be unaffected by the paradigmatic changes occurring in our environment. And if fundamental changes are required, the hope is that they can be tackled by the next dean.

The uncomfortable truth is that this may already be too late for many MBA programmes and, indeed, many Business Schools.

This article, therefore, is a call to action. Its objective is to encourage Business Schools to embrace the environmental turbulences we are experiencing. Not every change is a threat. Changes can also open up opportunities, but taking advantage of changes requires the courage to chart new routes. And these routes may be very different for Business Schools with varying resources, capabilities and purposes. 

Not all Business Schools will be able to serve their students in comfortable campuses with full-time faculty who spend the majority of their time on research. Some will use blended systems, both in terms of mixing teaching by practitioners and traditional academics, and in terms of programme delivery, using online and offline modes of instructions. Some will try to work with a modicum of their own faculty and become systems integrators. Some may not offer traditional degrees any longer but certify short, focused interventions, which keep managers abreast of new developments. 

There may be Business Schools that work on a subscription basis, offering MBA graduates the opportunity for continuous professional development as they advance and make changes throughout their career paths. And even after the active career of a manager comes to an end, a Business School may reach out to older learners and offer them attractive reasons to keep engaged with the School. 

A one-time intervention which finishes with the award of an MBA degree would give way to a lifelong relationship which starts with an MBA degree. Of course, this brings us back to the beginning of the article: degrees for rent. 

Arguably, MBA degrees with expiry dates that require proof of continuous professional development to keep the degree valid do have some merit.  

Professor Bodo Schlegelmilch is Chair of AMBA & BGA’s Board. He was the Founding Dean of WU Executive Academy at Vienna University of Economics and Business from 2004 until 2015 and remains Professor of International Management and Marketing at the School. 

Posted on

Business Schools for business and society

Business Schools must understand how they can contribute to the wellbeing of society, adopting an active stance, writes Loïck Roche, Director and Dean at Grenoble École de Management

On 11 December 2017, the then French Minister of Environmental Transitions and Solidarity, Nicolas Hulot, announced in a speech, at the Medef Employer Federation in Paris: ‘We [the French Government] are going to help companies evolve in terms of their social objectives, which can no longer be limited to earning profits without regard for working women and men, and without consideration for environmental consequences.’ 

His proposed French Pacte Law (action plan for business growth and transformation) was put forward, with the goal of helping to ‘reintegrate morality in capitalism’. 

To ensure financial objectives better support the greater good, the law will re-write two 200-year-old articles in the French Civil Code (articles 1832 and 1833, see box overleaf). 

The articles redefine a company’s role as simply  creating profit for shareholders. The proposed modifications will integrate social and environmental considerations. At the time of AMBITION going to press, the law was to be voted on in autumn 2018 and its primary actions could come into effect as early as 2019.

But, taking this news out of the context of the French arena, and into the wider global economy, could this development suggest that the era of the Chicago School and one of its most noted economists Milton Friedman – who coined the phrase ‘money matters’ – is over? 

A reason for existence

The step change outlined above looks set to take business thought back to 19th and 20th century business magnate Henry Ford’s fundamental advice: ‘Business must be run at a profit, else it will die. But when anyone tries to run a business solely for profit, then also the business must die, for it no longer has a reason for existence.’

This gives us, as Business School leaders, the opportunity to position social responsibility as the foundation for business. 

The perspective that a company can no longer exist within a silo, but instead must be part of the whole, builds on the stakeholder theory developed by R Edward Freeman, an American philosopher and Professor at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business.

His theory suggests companies should not only consider their own interests but also the interests of all concerned parties (employees, customers, stakeholders, leaders, and so on). This helps to improve the wellbeing of society. Corporate social responsibility is an example that was born from the concrete application of this approach.

To implement these changes, and to ensure companies accept that they must go beyond their mission (to manufacture products or deliver services) and participate in a larger responsibility, Business Schools have a primary role to play as they train future managers and leaders and offer continuing education for working professionals who are ready to question their practices.

Beyond the ‘usual goals’ of the Business School

The first step in taking on this new role, is to go beyond a Business School’s usual goals (for example ‘training the leaders of tomorrow’ or ‘ranking in the top 10, 20 or 30’) in order to ask: ‘why train the leaders of tomorrow?’, ‘what do the leaders of tomorrow need to be able to do?’, and ‘why attempt to be in the top 10, 20 or 30 Business Schools?’

The second step is a result of this exploration: in addition to working through these questions with students, professionals and employers, Business Schools have to consider the bigger picture. 

Much like what is expected of companies, Business Schools have to understand how they can contribute to the wellbeing of society. As a result, Schools are preparing and implementing a process of change to become ‘schools for business for society’. 

It is a positive sign to see that what was once the perspective of a few has become a generally shared vision. While not all Business Schools are currently working in this way, they are all headed in the same direction and that’s a great result.

It might not seem like much, but there is an important difference between saying ‘we want to train the leaders of tomorrow,’ and ‘we want to train the leaders of tomorrow to do something special’. 

It’s vital to understand that this concept of doing ‘first, for society’ is, in fact, quite complicated to implement because it’s a reversal of traditional values. For Business Schools,  it means that if we only carry out our mission to offer training and support research we will miss our fundamental objective. And, if we miss this fundamental objective, we will still be doing something positive – but the current stakes are so much higher.

In addition to working with students and companies, Business Schools have to offer a vision and solutions for major global challenges (issues surrounding end of life, climate change, energy transition, immigration crises, terrorism, epidemics, corruption, child exploitation, human rights, women’s rights, cybersecurity and artificial intelligence).

The challenge for Business Schools

The mission is for Business Schools, and higher education in general, to continue working in their particular fields of expertise, while contributing to solving the world’s larger challenges. They have to go beyond their comfort zone; in other words, move beyond their limited focus on business, in order to understand and explore the complexities of the world. 

It’s a change that will enable them to provide support in overcoming the major hurdles faced by society.

When Business Schools take the step to work on major societal problems, they open the door to risks and are forced to take sides. By this, I mean that Business Schools do not currently think (and this is a simple fact, not provocation). Their researchers and professors think, but the Schools themselves do not. They ‘describe’ and often they do so after the fact. This was illustrated by the 2008 financial crisis – no Business School anywhere in the world predicted or anticipated this crisis. In other words: Schools do not think, they do not take sides, they do not act.

For example, what does Harvard Business School think about problems impacting on society? Does Harvard voice an opinion, not on immigration, but on what we should do in concrete terms about immigration and immigrants? Going further, if a School’s opinion supports immigrants, does the School work actively to welcome them?

Another example that might offer better perspective is the case of US President Donald Trump. The researchers and professors at Harvard voiced many negative opinions before and after the election of Trump. But in concrete terms, what has Harvard done about it? Nothing. 

If the School had an editorial policy, if it truly wanted to change the world, then Harvard wouldn’t simply denounce policy or take sides. The School would act in concrete terms. How? For example, by setting up locations in the US where people voted overwhelmingly for Trump. 

That would be going beyond its comfort zone in Cambridge, Massachussets, and entering the playground where things are taking place. To understand societal changes, events and facts, it’s important for Business Schools to be ‘external’ and to maintain a certain impartiality. But if you want to change things – and to have an impact – you have to be where the action is. While Business Schools have been limited to describing and explaining, they now also have to (and I do mean ‘also’, not  ‘instead’), state their aims, choose sides, communicate and convince. 

They have to act, which is at the heart of being engaged and inciting change within the world. In this way, Schools can help federate the business world and public institutions in order to work together on important human values and the goal of companies: to perform and create profit for all concerned parties, thereby improving our shared social fabric and contributing to the common good.

Loïck Roche is Director and Dean at Grenoble École de Management (Grenoble Business School). Coming from a corporate background, he worked for 10 years in France and internationally as a consultant in the field of human resources.

Posted on

Diversity and recruiting the optimal MBA cohort

Diverse cohorts broaden students’ minds and skill sets, equipping them for the global marketplace and future leadership roles, writes HEC Paris’ Andrea Masini

In the past few decades, there has been a dramatic focus on the makeup of MBA cohorts in terms of nationality, academic and professional background, gender, religion, sexual orientation and other factors. This comes as little surprise, given that today’s employers are interested in hiring candidates who have experience navigating diverse, cross-cultural environments.

While diversity spans numerous characteristics, it is geographical diversity that is most often referred to in business education. We know that students are best prepared for top international jobs when they have a proven track record of working with people from different backgrounds. Just imagine the wisdom our students acquire when they work in small groups to solve complex business problems with, for instance, a tech whizz from Berlin, a policymaker from Egypt and a former Olympic athlete from South America. 

More responsible leaders

Success in an international career is no mean feat. Global managers have to be able to relate to people from different backgrounds, and to consider how they will think and react in various situations, particularly under pressure. The MBA provides these opportunities on an almost daily basis, creating better, more responsible leaders. These leaders of tomorrow will already have been challenged and confronted by opposing political ideas and conflicting beliefs by the time they reach managerial positions. They will not only be familiar with a whole spectrum of contrasting ideas, but they’ll know how to work best with the people who hold them. 

More than this, working with a diverse group of individuals helps students develop their soft skills effectively. For example, at HEC Paris, we send all of our MBA students to a bootcamp at Saint-Cyr, the prominent French military academy. This annual seminar is specifically designed to improve team-leadership skills through a series of increasingly difficult tasks supervised by leadership experts. Students must work in teams to achieve a common goal – and it reveals some important lessons.

Recently, I witnessed a shy student from Asia discover the solution to one of the Saint-Cyr challenges. Her nine teammates – who were more dominant, Western MBA candidates – loudly offered their own thoughts to the point that she gave up trying to tell them her idea. They failed the task. Since no one had heard the one team member who had the solution, the whole group learned an important lesson about their own cultural norms and the need to listen to every voice.

Having a diverse cohort allows these lessons to filter through the whole programme. MBA programmes usually consist of group work, and every person’s skill set is invaluable to the rest of team. Students develop the tools to understand diversity – from nationality to religious beliefs and sexual orientation – and see how they can work with, and benefit from, these differences. 

Opposing ideas that broaden the mindset

While most MBA candidates share some important characteristics, such as a desire pursue excellence and a willingness to work hard, they will discover new or opposing ideas that broaden their mindsets. Diversity offers practical benefits, too. 

Many people join MBA programmes with the desire to learn new languages, for example, and spend time with students whose first language they are keen to learn. At HEC Paris, our MBA candidates must be proficient in three languages when they graduate. Students learn from each other both in classroom settings and in informal social settings. Russian students connect with French students, for example, and they pick up new languages through their friendships. 

Cultural events

A diverse cohort is also a lot of fun. Students plan cultural events and invite their classmates, the faculty and the local community along to enjoy them. From cultural weeks that focus on traditional food and activities to various celebrations, such as Holi – the Hindu festival of colours – diversity enriches campus life. For example, for last year’s Nigerian Independence Day, our Nigerian students cooked a traditional dinner for the entire MBA student body. When we celebrated Holi at HEC Paris, Indian students organised a wonderfully flamboyant celebration with the local town mayor. It really was like New Delhi came to Jouy-en-Josas.

Despite cultural diversity stealing most of the focus, we can’t ignore our students’ work experience. Students should be able to learn from a wide range of professionals, from economists and doctors to engineers and bankers. Past employers among recent HEC MBA cohorts have ranged from Microsoft to the Peace Corps. Former job titles, meanwhile, have included everything from Air Traffic Controller for the Israeli Air Force to consultants from JP Morgan and McKinsey. We have even had the Acting Creative Excellence Manager for Coca-Cola in Pakistan and Afghanistan among recent cohorts of students. 

Achieving career transformation

Exposure to such a variety of peers is particularly important if students want to achieve career transformation. The close friendships they make during the MBA programme will invariably include people from other countries and industries. Finance professionals can look to the tech specialists, for instance, while managers from commerce can learn from those who come from global consultancies. 

This is a key reason why diversity really pays off at Business School – a more diverse MBA class transforms into a more diverse professional network. Students create global links with points of contact around the world that last for their whole careers. 

Students who choose to study abroad already have a head start. They immediately open themselves up to another culture, ready to absorb ideas that can help them far into the future. By spending time in France, students pick up aspects of the country’s heritage easily. That might mean being able to order the right wine at a business dinner, or holding conversations about art and history. 

Still, not all MBA programmes place such a high value on having a diverse MBA class. Many students tell us that they chose HEC Paris because diversity is at the heart of our programme. Every HEC student profile is unique and atypical. For this reason, students come to HEC Paris ready and willing to accept other people’s ideas. 

We are extremely proud of our diversity, and we work to ensure it at every step of the selection process. In perusing the quality international applicants that form a talented and diverse MBA cohort, some Schools are largely able to rely on their reputation. While HEC Paris is globally visible and receives exceptional applications from across the globe, our MBA marketing managers still travel the world to meet applicants personally and introduce them to HEC Paris. Today, our cohort is 93% international – those people are all from outside France – and comprises more than 50 nationalities. We are one of the most diverse MBA programmes in the world. 

Celebrating diversity

Once students join the programme, this diversity is both celebrated and utilised. The idea is never to enforce a level of standardisation, but to leverage each person’s uniqueness, their values, understanding and experiences. 

After all, the world is changing. Companies operate across borders and technology continues to break down barriers. The business leaders of the future should be able to experience how international companies work as soon as they join an MBA programme. We take this mandate very seriously at the HEC Paris MBA. 

Andrea Masini is an Associate Professor and Associate Dean, HEC Paris MBA. He holds a PhD in management from INSEAD. Prior to joining HEC Paris in 2010, Andrea was Assistant Professor of Operations and Technology Management at London Business School. He has a background in mechanical engineering and environmental management.

Posted on

A spotlight on Business Schools in Asia Pacific

Three Deans and two employer speakers at AMBA’s Asia Pacific Conference in November 2018 explore key trends, challenges and strategies for Business Schools, MBAs and businesses in the region. Interviews by Jack Villanueva and David Woods-Hale

Rick Smith, Professor of Strategic Management and Deputy Dean of Programmes at Singapore Management University 

Why do you think there has been such an increase in management education over the past 20 years? 

If I go back even further than 20 years, there has been an insatiable appetite for professional skills in management. This was seen in the 1980s and 1990s, when the MBA hit its heyday. 

There was a need for a network for advancement and careers, and the return on investment was clear in terms of employment. That trend, until recently, has been strong.

Now we’re starting to see a shift and this is worrying for Schools. They’re questioning whether employers still want to pay a premium for this type of graduate. 

As we think about the future of Business Schools, we see many potential areas of disruption, so we need to pay attention to this and rethink what we’re doing. 

We need to think about where we set value as a Business School. What are the things that, as leaders of Business Schools, we should be thinking about in order to address and reshape the market in which we operate.

Is the question of an MBA’s value for money set to become more prominent? 

There is still strong demand around the world for the MBA – emerging markets are getting more students. 

But in some countries there are questions around the cost of the MBA – especially the cost of being in School for two years and not working. So the question of the value of the MBA is there. 

Will this trend plateau? 

A number of Schools are seeing decreases in their MBA applicants (particularly in the US and UK). Even the elite Schools are seeing this. There will always be demand for those, but the rest of us need to figure out a response.

In terms of undergraduates, are students and their families willing to pay? In the past couple of months, a lot of employers (such as Google, Accenture and Deloitte) have said that a college degree is no longer a prerequisite [to gaining employment with them]. So this leads to questions about the real value of degrees. 

What does the future hold for the traditional Business School model? 

The traditional model is not in jeopardy, but it is in question. We need to be prudent and ask some tough questions. For some Schools, the game needs to change and we need to really challenge ourselves. 

For example, we need to differentiate ourselves from our competitors and think about what we offer. Should we be niche players in specific areas? This is going to be different for every School and coming up with a strategy for a Business School is not something we’ve done very much of as an industry.

How should Business Schools begin to re-evaluate their current strategies in order to ‘future-proof’ themselves? 

We are all proud of our institutions and all think we have great brand equity, but we need to be honest with ourselves in terms of how far this will carry us outside our local context. We must think about some competitive things we can do. 

We need to look at the portfolio of what we offer, to students and employers. We need to think about where we play and where we don’t play. 

The other dynamic is location. Some Schools may be located in fabulous college towns, but if they are not close to a metropolitan area, it will limit them in terms of what they do. Could this hold us back in terms of programmes and executive education? These factors are up for question and I think more and more Business Schools are thinking through these things, in terms of competitive advantage, and how they align themselves. This is our challenge going forward. 

Richard Hall, Deputy Dean of Leadership and Executive Education, Monash Business School, Australia

Why do you think the topic of ethics is often overlooked in MBA curricula? 

MBA programmes are trying to look at ethics in a modern manner, which helps our leaders and emerging leaders deal with some of the complexity, stresses and problems in pragmatic and practical ways. 

The ethics piece has been controversial in MBA programming for a lot of Schools. Sometimes, it’s a business unit or session or a discrete part of the programme. It could also be infused throughout the programme rather than being a standalone course. 

It’s often underdone or overlooked because it brings issues that are difficult to grapple with. A lot of the time, we don’t know where it fits into the programme. The traditional MBA programme has been overly focused on technical knowledge in particular, with ethics seen as an optional add-on. 

I think this is changing now but since the global recession, we have continued to see stories of ethical breaches (for example, by Volkswagen and Facebook) so MBA programmes are responding to the challenge. 

Ideally, how should ethics be discussed with MBAs – in standalone ‘ethics’ modules or as a thread throughout the programme? 

There is a real debate here; there is a debate as to whether ethics can even be taught. We discuss whether or not there should be standalone courses in business ethics. But more and more, we’re seeing ethics infused throughout the course. 

Students are being asked to look at the ethical principles that apply to any decisions being made in any course. Are we recognising the breadth of stakeholders to whom we have an obligation? In the wake of scandals, this infusion is becoming more popular. 

Ethics is not the concern of one single part of an organisation. It has to be in the culture of any business so, similarly, it needs to be infused throughout an MBA curriculum. 

In complex environments, do you believe MBA graduates are struggling to thrive under pressure? 

Complex environments characterise business now, and MBA graduates moving into these dynamics are facing extra challenges. No longer is it the case that you can thrive on technical expertise in one area. 

You need to have depth of technical knowledge, but you also need to be able to work across various areas. While you might not have depth of expertise in these areas, you need to be able to communicate effectively across them. 

One of the challenges for our contemporary graduates is the pace of change – the innovation and agility imperative. They need to accept that projects they’re working on can be ended. They need resilience. They need to be horizontally effective as well as resilient. 

Do you feel optimistic about the growth in ethical teaching and an increase in ethical practices across the board? 

I’m optimistic about how ethics on MBA programmes is taught. I’m less of an optimist when it comes to the systems in businesses that allow ethical decision making.

Those concerned about ethics recognise sustainability, breadth of stakeholders, duty to shareholders, employees, and communities. This is demanded by students and they want to work in and for organisations that understand their place in the world. It therefore makes good business sense for Schools to be taking these matters seriously.

Patrick Butler, Professor of Marketing and Director of MBA Programmes at Monash Business School, Australia

How would you define ‘next-generation MBA programmes’?

I’m interested in how we, as Business Schools, can move towards practice-based MBAs. One of our important learning platforms is to commit to the idea of next-generation programmes. We need to let go of industrial-era problems. 

We are no longer concerned in the main with issues of standardisation and control and command, but we’re keen to engage students with contemporary issues, such as how technology is shaping business, as well as resilience, agility and ethics. 

Is there still a disconnect between theory and practice in MBA programmes? 

This tension between theory and practice in all management programmes is longstanding and well recognised. There should be a tension and we should be conscious of connecting great ideas with great application. We can develop skills to extend our theoretical grasp, as well as our ability to manage in complex environments by teaching people really well. 

One way to do this is to commit to practice-based MBA programmes, especially through applied projects.  

Can you share some insight into your new MBA programme at Monash? 

Three years ago, we committed to creating next-generation MBA programmes that would have a very strong practical component. 

Rather than placing a practical project at the end of the programme, we placed projects in every module across the whole MBA programme. First strategy, then commercialisation, technology startups and then international business with fieldwork on the ground. 

Our students will have demonstrable evidence of practice. They can show the precise value they can add to the employer. This is similar to an art student having a portfolio of project work. 

What challenges did you face in growing a practice-based MBA?

Creating a practice-based MBA programme is not easy; it’s risky. You are putting students in difficult and complex situations. 

The key to success is not to shirk from risk, but to mitigate against it at all points. It’s important to have clear specifications and back the students with staff that can guide them well, supervise their process and recalibrate as they go through. 

What would your advice be to MBA directors that want to follow in your footsteps? 

We’ve learned that the design of a practice-based programme is critical. You have to be clear about the process and you have to be clear about the outcomes. You’ll need to recalibrate and pivot. If you start off without clear outcomes, it’s very hard for students to make progress, it’s hard for your sponsoring companies to understand what’s going on, and it’s almost impossible to supervise. 

Amber Anderson, Client Partner at Korn Ferry, Australia

What are employers looking for in MBA graduates?

A variety of things: they’re looking for people who can work with others; a diverse range of people. They’re looking for people who can work with stakeholders. They need people who are externally focused, have a global outlook, and who have digital acumen and can understand artificial intelligence (AI). 

Recruits will need to be adaptable in the future. They need to be articulate in order to sell themselves throughout their career. 

In terms of ethics and sustainable outlook, this will become more important. 

Do you think employers are looking for generalist or specialist MBAs? 

An MBA is increasingly seen as the ticket to fly. It’s a baseline and the specialist knowledge depends on the role. The MBA will supplement undergraduate technical skills, so we want ‘T-shaped candidates’ with [breadth and depth of] generalist and softer skills; more than data-processing and accounting skills. 

These technical skills are a prerequisite for an MBA but not the be-all and end-all that we look for. 

What would differentiate an MBA applicant from the rest of the talent pool? 

Recruiters tend to favour the Schools they know or the ones they went to. In terms of brand, there is an affinity with better-known Schools and that can jump off the page. 

More MBAs are popping up that are online or shorter programmes. Employers need to understand what the programmes comprise before they can make a call on the quality of their graduates. 

We need to know what an MBA has gone through to get the qualification. The diversity of the cohort and the quality of the teaching all goes towards making a decision. 

Do you think MBAs are bringing both theoretical and practical skills to the workplace? 

Absolutely. Theoretical and practical skills in an MBA are very useful. Theory around case studies is necessary as it puts students in real-life situations. And practical skills around management and people are vital. 

How important are soft skills to you? 

From an executive search perspective, soft skills are what differentiate candidates. We know of people in the market, but their soft skills make them stand out. 

A CEO will have a track record that often speaks for itself; technical skills will have got them so far. But what would make them an effective CEO would be their ability to manage people, adapt to change and set strategy. We test this at interview and with psychometric and assessment processes. 

Do you think the qualities on your wishlist are being met by applicants? 

The qualities put forward by current MBA graduates are often hitting the mark, but we have to tease these out of individuals as the skills we’re looking for aren’t always readily coming through. We’re looking for what differentiates them from other MBA candidates, so we can understand what they’ve accomplished and the standard they’ve reached. 

How important is a global mindset for MBA graduates? 

The global mindset is increasingly important for Australian businesses. We can be quite insular in our viewpoint. We’re quite far away from North America and Europe. Increasingly with visa requirements, we cannot bring in talent from overseas easily. 

We need Australians who can understand different countries and cultures. Markets are increasing overseas and the need for a global mindset can only increase. 

Are Business Schools rising to the challenge of developing leaders that are future-proof? 

Business Schools are rising to the challenge, but it’s also down to the individual. This all comes down to cohort selection. 

By their nature, some people are adept at changing – this makes them future-proof and able to adopt different viewpoints. 

Business Schools need diverse cohorts and perspectives to allow people to have a more rounded view. 

Where are the skills gaps in terms of what employers expect from MBAs? 

The only skills gap I can see is around the presentation of candidates going forward in their careers – the ability to sell oneself. 

We see people who have been in organisations for years before completing an MBA. 

They want to move but they are unclear about their own value proposition. This is difficult for us to help them with. 

Greater inward reflection – to allow candidates to interview better and know where they can add value in their careers – would be very useful. 

How could Business Schools build closer links with employers to strengthen their talent pipeline? 

Networks are vital. Programme directors should be reaching out to local businesses to have these discussions, because it won’t be proactive the other way. 

Business Schools need to market themselves to people like us. Let us know what your programmes are and what’s going on in your School. Tell us about the standard of graduate that is coming out. 

Rob Papworth, Group Manager, Talent at MMG (Minerals and Metals Group) Limited

What are employers looking for in MBA graduates?

There are various perspectives, but the skills depend on the organisation. We’re looking for an awareness of culture and self-reflection on your career.

There are various factors at play. It also depends on what a particular manager is looking for. In HR, we want to support managers to make their selection. We have views around culture, criteria and leadership frameworks, but managers will have their own mindset around what they need from MBAs. 

Fundamentally, technical skills, knowledge and experience from completing an MBA programme are important. Certain Schools have strengths and weaknesses in these areas. Some focus on management and others entrepreneurship. Employers need to know these skills have been both taught and applied well. 

Second, we look at personal characteristics – what have the students learned but, just as importantly, what have they unlearned? Often, the MBA can be transformational for people in awakening their minds. Personally, I like people who are reflective, aware and adaptive because business leadership and executive management will bring challenges that MBAs need to address. 

What would differentiate an MBA applicant from the rest of the talent pool? 

When employers are hiring, they will have a natural preference for their own School, but I haven’t seen a bias towards particular Schools. We look at rankings, but we’re more concerned that recruits have gone to a reputable School and had a good experience.

The decision to do an MBA and the awareness that there’s more to learn makes a candidate stand out. It’s the acceptance that there is 100 years of thought in modern management theory that they would want to access. 

We take into account the amount of work it takes to do an MBA and to balance life and work around this, as well as the sacrifice that comes with it. It’s a reflective piece for a person to take this difficult path. 

I think the belief that you’re out to better yourself and the realisation that learning is a lifetime thing, puts MBAs in high regard. 

Is it always a success story when you recruit an MBA?  

People have different strengths and weaknesses, so it’s important to find the right opportunity for them. If I can use an analogy, I feel that when you’re recruiting people you’re buying plants for a garden; plants don’t always work where you think they will. 

Hiring people with MBAs is similar: you might think someone would be good in strategy, but they’re actually better in stakeholder relations. I’ve never had a failure as such, but you need to think about where the person is placed. 

I’m focused on talent management in our company. We have 6,000 people and want to produce leaders from within, so part of this is moving these ‘plants’ around and making sure they’re broad. They need to be ‘T-shaped’ so they have a breadth as well as a depth
of knowledge. 

I like people with a variety of experiences, because some of the business and political challenges are broad, so the more experience you have, the better. 

Do you think MBAs are bringing both theoretical and practical
skills to the workplace? 

I do. Most MBAs have come from the workforce already, so they have had five or 10 years of experience behind them. 

The Schools with which I have worked have remarkable theoretical foundations. I’ve noticed, in the Australian context, that many people take MBAs to broaden their mindset. In South America, the MBA seems to be done earlier in careers. Universally, the average age of the MBA student seems to be reducing, but I think it’s important that MBAs have had time in the workplace.

How important are soft skills to you? 

For me, soft skills are critical. Being exposed to internal workings of organisations, I can see that things have become unstuck due to a lack of soft skills. There might have been mistakes made culturally or from a management perspective. 

Soft skills drive leadership. They articulate the meaning and purpose of your actual work. Soft skills make great leaders – shaping people and moving them. 

However, if you don’t have basic commercial and strategic grounding, there’s no point in having soft skills. Soft skills are the core and you build the hard skills on top of these.

How important is a global mindset for MBA graduates in terms of employment opportunities? 

In the context of heading up talent, it’s critical. It’s also complex. We have leaders who need to go to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Peru, Australia or Nigeria, so they need respect and curiosity. 

We have 6,000 people globally and 3,000 of these are in South America with 1,000 in Africa, so leaders need to respect this and understand all these cultures. 

More broadly, the global mindset is growing ever more important. Considering immigration into Australia, for example, how can you not have a global mindset? 

Are Business Schools rising to the challenge of developing leaders that are future-proof? 

I’m not sure and at the moment I’m quite reflective. We’re still seeing stagnation after the financial crisis and the changes in neoliberalism. 

Schools have a structure and certified programmes. Can they respond quickly to change? Probably not. There are core things around ethics they can teach to help business leaders. 

There are also fundamental things around humanities that Business Schools should teach. 

Where do the skills gaps exist in terms of what employers expect from MBAs? 

When I look at skills gaps, I don’t look at them in relation to the course, but in relation to the job. 

Often, roles need specific skills and it’s our responsibility as the employer to plug these gaps. We need to teach new hires about our company – not just how to manage it, but how to manage from a cultural perspective. 

How could Business Schools forge closer links with employers to strengthen their talent pipeline? 

All Business Schools want to build links. There is a lot of pressure within organisations in terms of business performance, restructuring and external factors.

I’ve found a lot of interest with Business Schools. The challenge is working out which Business Schools to form these relationships with, and indeed what these relationships look like. 

Our relationship with Monash Business School is important to me and this grew out of our shared vision. We have a good history there and there is trust. Monash feels like a partner. 

I think it’s more up to the employers to accept the interest from the Schools when they reach out. 

How often does diversity enter the process in recruitment? 

We look at many facets of diversity: gender, identity, nationality or education. We recruit based on merit, but diversity does come into play in terms of building pipelines of people coming into the selection process. 


Posted on

Solving complex problems with design thinking

Design thinking requires essential ‘front-end’ questioning skills to understand the end user’s experience fully writes David Steinberg

Allow me to introduce you to three hypothetical individuals, with differing priorities, who will set the context for the following article:

Zaha is a full-time MBA student at a prestigious Business School, taking a design-thinking course and learning how to apply the process to her capstone project. Her School will apply design thinking to help her take the next step in her career.

Anna is a partner at a prestigious consulting firm and responsible for recruitment planning. She recently completed a design-thinking course for executives offered by Zaha’s Business School. She’ll apply design thinking to help Business Schools around the world visualise the ideal student profile in three, five and even 10 years. 

Etienne is Director of Post-Graduate Careers at Zaha’s Business School. He recently met and spoke at length with the professors who teach Zaha’s and Anna’s design-thinking courses. Etienne will apply design thinking to help his Business School align its curriculum to the strategic goals of the world’s most successful companies, including Anna’s firm. He’ll also help Zaha take that next big step in her career.

What Zaha, Anna and Etienne don’t realise is that their questioning skills are critical to the success of their design thinking. 

Why? Because design thinking begins with empathy. With empathy, we can immerse ourselves in the world of the end user, and by doing so, we can properly frame the problem experienced by the end user, and go on to solve the problem together in extraordinary ways. 

Design thinking fosters the co-creation of value, ideal for those who work in the highly competitive, ever-changing and relationship-dependent professions of graduate business career services and employer recruitment.

What is design thinking? 

Tim Brown, CEO and President of IDEO, describes design thinking as ‘the integration of feeling, intuition and inspiration with rational and analytical thought.’ 

To Roger Martin, former Dean of the Rotman School of Management in Toronto, design thinking is a ‘balance between analytical mastery and intuitive originality’. 

Meanwhile, David Kelley, founder of IDEO and the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford University, calls it a ‘framework that people can hang their creative confidence on,’ providing those who don’t consider themselves to be creative with a way to solve some of the world’s most complex problems. 

University of Potsdam and Stanford University are two of the leading centres for the study and application of design thinking. Companies flock to the campuses to apply it to their challenges and change management. Ian Wylie at the Financial Times writes that industry adoption of design thinking ‘has encouraged Business Schools to add design-thinking methods to their executive MBAs and help students find innovative solutions in sectors from healthcare and pharmaceuticals to banking and insurance’. 

It turns out that there isn’t one design-thinking process: several have emerged in the past decade, each with its own terminology and devotees. 

For example, IDEO’s process focuses on inspiration, ideation and implementation. Roger Martin’s version requires ‘moving through a knowledge funnel’ from mystery to heuristic to algorithm. The Design Council, Google and IBM have their own versions. However, the Stanford five-step process is considered the gold standard: empathise, define, ideate, prototype and test.  

Let’s bring in Anna and Etienne to help explain each phase of the Stanford process using a simple scenario.

Empathise: during a recent meeting, Etienne initiated a series of questions and learned some sobering news about new hires from his School. They’re not building trust with clients of Anna’s firm. Etienne then conducted extensive interviews with other clients and heard a similar story. 

Define: Etienne returned to his School and met with faculty and staff to define the problem. They determined that the underlying issue was that students, while certainly high-calibre, lacked training in advanced interpersonal skills.

Ideate: Etienne’s team held a brainstorming session and came up with several solutions, including coaching and feedback, workplace simulations and field immersion.

Prototype: a sub-committee of Etienne’s team developed a prototype programme to solve the problem.

Test: Etienne’s School tested and tuned the programme with a selected group of graduate business students before formally launching it the following year.

The enduring value of the Stanford process is that when it is applied properly, it can produce innovative solutions that emerge not from the ‘ideate’ phase per se, but from the ‘empathise’ phase – the information-gathering phase. Proper application means not moving too quickly downstream into the latter phases – what most of us would consider to be the exciting bits involving late nights and whiteboards and lots of pacing around the room – without first understanding the underlying issues associated with the end user’s experience. 

Here’s a common and costly mistake that many companies and organisations make: they conduct a few cursory interviews with end users; they think they understand the problem; they think they have a solution; they roll out the solution and go home feeling good. They return the next day… and the problem is still there. 

IDEO’s Tim Brown describes empathy as the most important skill for the design thinker. He adds that empathic designers ‘notice things that others do not and use their insights to inspire innovation’. 

Design thinkers are taught how to empathise by combining observation and engagement in ways resembling techniques used by ethnographers in the field. Observation includes looking for work arounds and for disconnects between what is said and what is done. Engagement means asking mostly ‘why’ questions to ‘uncover deeper meaning’. 

If empathy is the most important skill for the design thinker, then asking questions comes a close second. However, there are as many generic approaches to understanding the end user’s experience as there are processes for design thinking. One size doesn’t always fit all. What follows is an approach to questioning tailor-made for the ‘empathise’ phase of the Stanford process and for people in career services and employer recruitment. Indeed, business students can also use it to complete their external projects. This approach will put you on the right path towards successfully defining and solving the end user’s problem. 

Change points

Your first step as a designer is to determine the topics to explore with the end user. John Sawatsky, Michener-Award-winning investigative journalist and interview expert, argues that the secret to crafting compelling questions is to build them around ‘change points’, which are key changes in someone’s personal or professional life. In the context of design thinking, the designer seeks to discover change points in the end user’s experience and to understand the associated underlying issues. Focus on the timeframe before a change point and build your question sequence around it. 

There are parallels between this process and an intriguing principle in Eastern philosophy called ‘ma’. According to theatre director Colleen Lanki: ‘Ma is a Japanese aesthetic principle meaning “emptiness” or “absence”. It is the space between objects, the silence between sounds, or the stillness between movements… The emptiness is, in fact, a palpable entity.’

Listen for ma in Japanese conversation in the form of question fragments, or in the silence between drum beats or flute notes or lyrics in Kabuki theatre. Look for ma in Japanese visual arts such as paintings that have empty space in them. Author and TV presenter James Fox notes that ma can give structure to the whole, the way open spaces in traditional Japanese homes are given meaning by those who live in them. It’s the spaces between the change points in people’s lives that offer rich insights for the design thinker.

Ask ‘what-how-why?’

Your next step is to develop a list of questions. In the early 1980s, Sawatsky began teaching journalism at various Canadian universities. He noticed that students who asked ‘what-how-why’ questions (topic-process-motivation) for class projects elicited more vivid responses from sources compared with students who used other words and sequences. This sequence corresponds with the neural basis of human listening. 

Social Neuroscientist, Robert Spunt, at Caltech writes: ‘Listening requires not simply a comprehension of what others are saying and how they are saying it, but also why they are saying it: what caused them to say that and to say it in that way?’ 

Think of the what-how-why sequence as a navigational system in an aircraft cockpit. Use the sequence to prepare for your end-user engagement by developing questions that function as waypoints between the first and last topic you’d like to explore. 

In between the what-how-why waypoints, probe and clarify responses using questions that you deem appropriate; open-ended questions work best, particularly when you want to explore matters of degree such as confidence, dedication, and success. When you’d like the person to confirm or deny a topic, ask a yes/no question, but it’s best to do so after you’ve explored a matter of degree. Moreover, use what-how-why when the person offers you a revelation. If you only have one opportunity to ask the person questions, you must quickly improvise a new sequence. You might eventually return to your original flight plan, or you might decide to stay on the new course. You’re the pilot.

Remember: we prepare to improvise.

PHASE 1: DEFINE THE CHALLENGE

The Stanford ‘empathise’ phase begins with defining the challenge. This can be interpreted as discovering one or more change points associated with the end user’s experience. Three question models follow to jumpstart your information-gathering process: 

Etienne’s questions for Zaha

• What was a positive moment during your time at the Business School that you vividly remember and often reflect on?

• How did this moment make you feel?

• Why do you think this moment made you feel this way?

This question sequence helps Etienne ‘dig into the emotion’, as the Stanford design school phrases it, to help Zaha take the next step in her career. Etienne learns that Zaha often thinks about her idea for a startup project in her elective: to build high-definition cameras and install them inside incubators in neonatal units to help parents see their newborns when they’re away from the hospital. Her work group’s enthusiastic response to her idea gave her a level of confidence she’d never had before.

Etienne’s questions for Anna 

• What is your firm’s top strategic goal in the next five years?

• How will this strategic goal change your firm?

• Why is this strategic goal important to your firm?

This sequence is designed to create alignment between Etienne’s Business School and Anna’s firm, while at the same time assuring that he understands the underlying issues associated with her firm’s strategic goals. Etienne learns that Anna’s firm has access to vast quantities of data with no means of harnessing it for clients. He also learns that the firm’s managing director is growing uneasy about the fierce competition from rival consulting firms, and has asked for ways to design innovative solutions for clients and to roll them out more quickly. Indeed, Etienne learns that the firm would like to launch a new data/predictive analytics division.

Anna’s questions for Etienne 

• What, in your view, is the next step for our employer/ Business School partnership?

• How can we collaborate on this next step?

• Why do you feel this step is right at this time?

This sequence is also designed to align Etienne’s Business School with Anna’s firm but from Etienne’s perspective. Anna learns that Etienne’s Business School proposes to co-create the new analytics division to help the firm’s clients address their own customers’ challenges and make informed predictions about the future. Students would enrol in a new business immersion course and spend six weeks at Anna’s firm. 

After the induction period, students would then work on challenging projects based on their specialisation. This partnership would provide students with the immersive learning experience they expect, and provide Anna’s firm with a continuous supply of ideas and skills provided by students at one of the world’s premier Business Schools. 

PHASE 2: GATHER INSPIRATION

Once you have defined the challenge by discovering a change point, the next step in the Stanford ‘empathise’ phase is to gather inspiration, which can be interpreted as exploring the change point. Help the end user go deeper into their experience. 

As market research interviewers will attest, the end user’s first response may not fully capture their feelings. 

For example, the end user might initially describe their long-haul flight to Shanghai as being ‘fine’, but after a few probing questions, ‘fine’ turns out to mean ‘the in-flight meal was average and the entertainment was limited’. 

Here are three ways to explore a change point:

Ask an immersive question

Craft a question in a comparative structure and turn up the contrast. 

For example, Etienne might ask Zaha this question to learn more about how her work group’s positive reaction to her start-up idea has changed her self-perception: ‘Thinking back to your work group’s positive reaction to your startup idea, how would you compare your perception of yourself as an entrepreneur then and now?’

Embed a verbatim comment

Embed a verbatim comment made by the end user in a comparative structure and once again, turn up the contrast. For example, Anna might ask Etienne this devil of a question to learn more about his Business School’s vision of the ideal student profile in five years: ‘You recently said that “artificial intelligence will reshape labour markets in unimaginable ways”. How would a student’s profile that takes into account the rise of high-level machine intelligence compare with the profile of a current student?

Wrap the change point

Again, it’s the spaces between a change point that are as important as the moment of change. Ask one question that takes the person back into the moment before the change point. Ask a second question that explores the actual change point. Then ask a third question that explores the moment after the change point. 

For example, Zaha might ask the following three questions to her client at Lego as part of her capstone project:

• Thinking back to 2012, before you introduced your co-creation process, how did Lego developers bring their ideas to market?

• When Lego introduced co-creation with customers, what were the steps to bring these products to market?

• What’s the primary difference between products created only by Lego developers and those co-created with your customers?

Design thinking offers people in career services and employer recruitment a way to co-create rather than dictate solutions. It also offers a way for students to hone their problem-solving skills and to co-create solutions with their clients for class projects. 

However, design thinking requires essential ‘front-end’ questioning skills to fully understand the end user’s experience. Mastering these skills will assure that everyone involved is headed in the right direction. 

Dr David Steinberg is Principal at Reykjavik Sky Consulting. He conducts MBA masterclasses on advanced questioning skills at several Business Schools including Cass Business School and Nottingham Business School and is Associate Professor in Leadership, Strategy and Organisation at Heriot-Watt University.