ARTICLE 3 PART 1 EVALUATING NEW AND INNOVATIVE MODELS OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATION - sudhanshu

ARTICLE 3 PART 1

EVALUATING NEW AND INNOVATIVE MODELS OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATION

This article is devoted to a critical examination and evaluation of a number of new models and interesting new approaches to management education that have been advocated both by deans (e.g. Richard Lyons at Haas, Berkeley, in the US, and before him Laura Tyson, and Roger Martin at Rotman, Toronto, in Canada) and critics (e.g. Henry Mintzberg at McGill, Montreal, Canada). We believe that the organising framework of careful insights, should provide a basis for our model review and analysis of the philosophy underlying each model. Despite the somewhat unfulfilled promise of management education, there has been considerable investment in new business models for its future development.

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Indeed, Professors Datar, Garvin and Cullen provide an exhaustive review of current curricula trends. Prompted by the growing scrutiny of MBA programmes, they started an ambitious and wide- ranging three-year research project on MBA programmes to coincide with the one-hundredth anniversary of Harvard Business School. They examined a range of secondary data sources, interviewed leading business school deans and corporate executives, and outlined clearly the curricula developments at around a dozen leading schools, focusing particularly on programmes at the Center for Creative Leadership, Chicago, Harvard, INSEAD, Stanford and Yale.

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A potential criticism of this aspects of what might characterise smaller business schools’ programmes are not reported or discussed. For instance, one of the authors was extensively interviewed in his capacity as head of IMD – a small, elite MBA programme. This data was, however, left out of the research volume. Could there be at least an implicit revealed preference for larger or case-method-type programmes?

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From their research analysis, however, the authors identify a number of important gaps and needs in MBA programmes that should be addressed in their future designs by business schools. They focus on the areas of individual student and management development and skills of leadership and strategic implementation. They suggest that promising innovations should include the following: gaining a global perspective; developing leadership skills; honing integration skills; understanding the roles, responsibilities and purposes of business; recognising organisational realities and the challenges of implementation; thinking creatively and innovatively; thinking critically and communicating clearly; and understanding the limits of models and markets (particularly in the context of non-government organisations and emerging markets).

However, they counsel that these unmet needs should be viewed as useful guidelines since one of the enduring strengths of business schools is the diversity of their approaches, cultures and models. I would offer an alternative set of curricula prescriptions and warns that ‘unless America’s business schools make radical changes, society will become convinced that MBAs work to service only their own selfish interests’.

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We now examine, in detail, a series of interesting educational models. By way of introduction, we map these different experiments and reforms in Figure 1 below...

In subsequent parts of this article we therefore review the following models:

?? Mintzberg’s IMPM (International Master’s Program in Practising Management);

?? the Haas/Berkeley dynamic capabilities model;

?? the Rotman design thinking model;

?? ideas from highly ranked schools (e.g. Yale, Stanford and Chicago);

?? the Open University ‘blended learning’ model;

?? the focused innovation model: UC San Diego;

?????? .? the Starkey knowledge model;

?? the network model of Lorange.

Figure 1

TO BE CONTINUED IN next post .......

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