The world of work is changing faster now than at any point in history. And executive education needs to develop at exactly the same dizzy pace to keep up. So how is the business school experience being reshaped? We ask the experts…
Across the established economies of the western world, and in the UK in particular, business schools face the challenge of dealing with changing demographics. At one end of the scale they need to find ways of engaging with professionals and managers in the latter stages of their careers, who carry around in their heads the secrets of how the organisation works but may be alienated by traditional approaches to training and development. For this group, training is less about abstract theory and more about the actual workplace, with applicable content that can immediately be put into practice.
At executive level, the focus has also shifted from expertise in one field to a strategic role that includes the leadership of others. So management training for these individuals increasingly involves a reflective process to challenge and debate issues that organisations face on a day-to-day basis and their impact on strategy, as well as coaching and mentoring to look at their effectiveness and how they influence and get the best out of others.
For Ryan Ahern, the IoD's learning and development director, the demands on leaders are constantly evolving, with the need to be one step ahead of the competition. "The changing business environment is complicated, and the executives on our courses simply cannot afford to stand still. They have to be up to date with best practice and current business thinking, recognise and create opportunities, and remain composed throughout challenges. The IoD designs courses, qualifications, and board development services for individuals and their organisations to achieve success now and in the future."
Next wave of leaders
At the other end of the scale, organisations need to satisfy generation Y, the next wave of business leaders and innovators born from the 1980s onwards. And that is prompting major players in the sector to question the way that MBA and executive education programmes are delivered.
"The learning journey that has shaped generation Y and the technological changes they have grown up with may have led to them missing out on a large segment of learning – that of exploring more deeply, enquiring and reflecting," says Kai Peters, chief executive of Ashridge Business School in Hertfordshire. "The value of business education for this group may not lie in learning about the mechanics of commerce, but the way to approach it."
Other trainers have looked at the environment that generation Y and its successors operate in, not just in the working day but also across all aspects of their lives in order to make the teaching process more relevant and effective. HEC Paris, for example, was the first European business school to deliver course material through iTunes U, the online learning arm of Apple's iTunes store. In a project with Apple, the school enabled students to preview courses through their iPod, and put together a personalised programme to review at their leisure, in keeping with a generation grown used to accessing information when and where they want it.
The technology helps to minimise time-wasting questions. HEC professors identify and pre-record responses to questions that are frequently raised in the classroom. Making these answers available in podcast format outside the lecture or workshop proves to be an enormously productive enhancement that focuses classroom discussion on case material.
The international leadership institute, Mannaz, has created a programme called Are You an Orc?, which examines the leadership and team-building techniques employed in the world's most popular online game, World of Warcraft. "Leaders in the game have to earn the support and commitment of their followers," says Jacob Theilgaard, the Mannaz business psychologist behind the project. "And the leadership role can pass from person to person depending on the problem the team is facing. These are the sorts of issues that managers in flatter, less hierarchical businesses face from day to day."
Meanwhile, the Science of Learning Center at the Tepper school in the US has suggested that physical business schools could in time be replaced by virtual knowledge hubs where traditional case studies would be replaced by real-time, real-life business problems that students would work on alongside the managers of client organisations.
Long-term rewards
In this new era of learning one of the key themes that appears to motivate the latest generation of directors and managers is the belief that success in business cannot come at any price. Commerce, and the rewards it generates, can no longer be immediate or short-term. They must be sustainable.
Perhaps the first and most public sign of this was the ethical pledge which surfaced at Harvard Business School as the financial crisis swept across the world in 2009. Despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that many perpetrators of the economic collapse had been through top US business schools themselves, Harvard students signed up peers from around the globe to promise they would act responsibly as and when they took corporate positions.
The initiative has been copied by the introduction of ethics and sustainability modules to MBA programmes across
the world. The Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in Belgium, for example, has added an extra month to the MBA programme for participants to devote their time exclusively to not-for-profit ventures. "When this sort of thing started up much of it was about learning what
is going on in terms of ethics and sustainability," says Peters.
However, now there is a real appetite for understanding what the next move should be. How the green agenda can play a part in staff attraction and retention. How the reduction of a carbon footprint is not a PR stunt but makes good commercial sense."
Potential business school students may be more interested in sustainability, co-operative working and mentoring leadership styles, but the financial crisis of the past few years is also affecting their attitude towards executive learning. The fall-out has forced upon them a pragmatic attitude to life.
"The employment market for executives never got quite as bad as it could have been," says Graeme Read, group managing director of global recruitment specialist Antal International "and there are now signs of improvement around the world. But we're still in a situation where employers are more interested in skills and experience than pure qualifications. An MBA may be good icing on the cake, but it's not the cake itself. Most people coming through business schools realise that."
As well as its effect on the employment market for business school graduates, the financial crisis clearly highlighted the need for schools to help instil a more responsible attitude towards risk in corporate leaders at all levels. Arvinder Dhesi, the new director of talent at the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, explains: "Peter McGrath, who heads up our in-house business school facility, saw that there was a definite case for more intervention in the development of leadership capability, for more robust scenario planning and stress testing of divisional business plans. It was important that risk management should be seen as, not just the province of specialists within the organisation, but core to every single manager's role."
Acting with integrity
The bank consequently partnered with Wharton business school at the University of Pennsylvania to create a dedicated programme for its top 1,000 leaders and is now working on a second phase, follow-up project. "We went to Wharton because they are the best in this field and they've proved it by constructing something that has
gone on to win major awards and get tremendous feedback from those who have gone through it," says McGrath.
Another consequence of the financial crisis has been a greater focus on corporate governance. If the ethics and values of Wall Street have come under scrutiny in recent years, the need to act with integrity and manage risk in an increasingly regulated environment are now seen to directly impact on a company's bottom line.
Ahern at the IoD says: "Corporate governance is now linked to performance, not just compliance. Whether working for a FTSE-listed company, the police service, or a healthcare provider, directors are faced with a simple choice: improve and raise standards, or face the consequences."
A demonstration of this commitment to stronger corporate governance is the IoD's Chartered Director qualification, which includes a code of conduct. Anyone that becomes a Chartered Director has to sign and commit to both behavioural and legal standards, in the best interests of the company and its shareholders, and towards employees, customers and the wider community.
Talking of which, the explosion in the use of social media over the past five years has done more to change the nature of
the way we interact both socially and commercially than any other aspect of the online revolution – and this has altered the ways business schools structure their programmes. It's of little surprise that
they have rushed out new programmes
and courses to help students and
executive education participants turn
these communication channels into money-making machines.
HEC Paris has launched a Digital Innovation for Business programme involving France's top five online entrepreneurs, which provides more than 100 hours of teaching on how to innovate and engage through social media. Bernard Ramanantsoa, dean of HEC Paris, says: "The creation of an e-business chair directed towards innovation demonstrates our ambition to train future managers and entrepreneurs in the digital economy."
With a site such as LinkedIn attracting a new user every second, what students now want to learn, and what schools such as the Harvard Business School, Insead and the London Business School are all too keen to teach them, is how to monetise the spread of social media, and respond to a corporate demand for employees who are savvy about the new media landscape.
Business education: the top trends
1) Growth markets
There are more study groups in China, Brazil and other fast-growing economies. It is not just about learning a new language, but looking at opportunities for growth, experiencing new environments and understanding opportunities and pitfalls.
2) Flexibility
Business education needs to adapt to keep pace with the rate of change in the workspace and the marketplace. Which is why five of the top schools in the US have announced major changes to their curricula over the past 12 months.
3) Embracing social media
A decade ago the must-have business school course was e-commerce. Now it's social media. Major players such as Harvard Business School, HEC Paris and Columbia Business School have all added social media elements to their MBA programmes.
4) New destinations
The traditional homes of business education in the UK and US are under threat from what might have been seen as peripheral destinations a few years ago. Look at Russia's Skolkovo, the Indian School of Business, Slovenia's Bled and HEC Paris's new location in Qatar for examples of this growing trend.
5) Distance and blended learning
Improvements in technology make this a credible option. Virtual classrooms such as Warwick's wbsLive, which allows students to interact with each other and their teachers on a real-time basis, have revolutionised the distance learning experience.
6) Operate in a global context
Programmes such as the executive OneMBA which uses the resources of schools in the US, Netherlands, Hong Kong, Brazil and Mexico, aim to develop managers who can run teams operating across multiple geographies, and seek to expose participants to the business worlds of Asia, Europe and the Americas.
7) Greater classroom diversity
Not just in terms of gender, nationality and culture but by attracting students from the arts, not-for-profit, government and academia. A balanced board should be an aspiration, and it is good for business.
Europe's top players:
A quick guide to the key business schools
The establishment
• Insead (France)
• London Business School
• IMD (Switzerland)
Major players
All the following schools are consistently highly ranked.
• HEC Paris (France)
• IESE, Esade and IE (Spain)
• Cambridge-Judge, Cranfield and
Oxford-Saïd (UK)
Rising stars
Schools notable for expertise in specific sectors and disciplines.
• Cass (UK) Finance
• SDA Bocconi (Italy) Luxury goods
• EM Lyon (France) Entrepreneurship
• ESMT (Germany) Technology
• Vlerick (Belgium) Industry
