What's Driving New Value for Business Schools?

• As businesses become key players in solving global societal issues, today's learners must be able to lead positive change when they enter or advance in the workforce.
• Business schools are well-placed to integrate new technology tools into their learning content and experiences, and by leading their own digital transformations, they also open access to previously restricted markets.
• When business schools expand their thought leadership beyond the boundaries of academia, they can produce timely and relevant research that has a far-reaching impact on business and society.

Transcript

Sherif Kamel: [0:14] Business schools around the world have incredible wealth of best practices that needs to be shared, learned from our own experiences, but also learned from our own failures, and how to learn from that and move forward.

[0:28] Societal impact is becoming center stage of the entrepreneurs, the policymakers, the leaders. Not just of tomorrow, but also of today, to be able to navigate some of the elements that are affecting our societies. That is a global development—let it be climate, let it be digitalization, the future of work, sustainability. The list goes on and on and on.

[0:54] We need to bring business and industry into the classroom more. You need to work more with different stakeholders and society to be able to identify what are the global issues but also keep an eye on the local issues. The local context is extremely important. That differs from one society to the other.

[1:12] Identify what are the expectations of the business schools to be able to meet those changes and try to grow the knowledge through the academic offerings of business schools that can help realize a positive societal impact.

We need to bring business and industry into the classroom more. You need to work more with different stakeholders and society to be able to identify what are the global issues but also keep an eye on the local issues.

Ann Harrison: [1:31] One of the things that I'm most proud of, and this is my fifth year as dean, is really embracing that mission of equitable access across the entire community of Berkeley Haas. That includes for our staff, for our faculty—how do we ensure an equitable group of faculty—and of course, for our students.

[1:54] When I first came to Berkeley Haas, I looked around and I realized our community does not look like the rest of California. California's high schools are 50 percent Latinx, and you just don't see that at UC Berkeley.

[2:09] We proceeded to really make enormous changes at every level. At the staff level, we changed our staff hiring practices. At the faculty level, we ensured that every faculty has to write a DEIBJ statement. They actually have to present as part of their job talk what they will do to advance DEIBJ.

We [at Berkeley Haas] bring students to campus. We mentor them through their young years so that they see the university and a business education as something that they should get.

[2:38] At the student level, ensuring equitable access is a different kind of a story. A lot of it is about scholarships, so we doubled scholarships, for example. But it means more than that; it also means a much better pipeline. Pipeline is one of the biggest challenges we face. We continue to face it today.

[2:59] How do you ensure a pipeline of diverse candidates to come to business schools? Actually, to be honest, we start in junior high and high school. We have a program that we're very proud of called Boost, where we reach out to local community, junior highs, and high schools.

[3:17] And we bring students to campus. We mentor them through their young years so that they see the university and a business education as something that they should get. It's been incredibly successful.

We have all various types of activities that we can use to help individuals take these business skill sets that we provide to impact the communities and the organizations that they lead.

Ian Williamson: [3:32] As educators in business schools, adapting to the needs of our learners is critical. For me, it's summed up with the statement, "Meet them where they are." As great as our education experience might be, as great as the insight might be, if we're not meeting the learners where they are, it will not have an impact on their lives.

[3:51] Part of that is have the goal of creating access to a world-class education at the heart of what you're trying to do. If that's the purpose, then meeting them when there are, you don't feel like that's a burden. If you set the goal that, my job is to create access for you, then of course I'm going to go to where you are.

[4:09] Then ask yourself, "Well, what are you facing? Where are you? What tools can I bring?" We are very fortunate. We have a set of tools now that we did not ever conceive of before. We have digital technology tools, we have the metaverse.

[4:23] We have all various types of activities that we can use to help individuals take these business skill sets that we provide to impact the communities and the organizations that they lead. But it does start with that notion of, "If my goal is access, then it shouldn't be about me making access for you to find me. It's about me finding ways to find you."

Business schools need to reach non-traditional audiences. We need to enhance and democratize access to our education and to our knowledge.

Simon Mercado: [4:43] I think business schools are long past the day where degree education or degree-level education was the sole focus. I myself run a fairly sizable executive education operation in Europe at ESCP, which is a mix of degree-level and sub-degree-level offering.

[5:05] Within that context, certainly, microcredentials and shorter course offerings, largely online or hybrid, have become a centerpiece. I think this is fundamentally important for a number of reasons. One, we need to reach nontraditional audiences. We need to enhance and democratize access to our education and to our knowledge.

[5:32] Microcredentials have the capacity to do that, particularly with the digital platform as a hallmark. It can help to broaden reach and. therefore, impact.

[5:46] I think the market is changing. There is demand for more flexible, often shorter, more intensive pills and capsules, nuggets of knowledge. Microcredentials have, of course, a very significant role to play in that context. We're talking also, I think, about new patterns of design. We're looking at possibilities around the unbundling of degree courses into shorter courses.

[6:22] We're looking also at the potential for stacking and aggregating shorter courses so that we're not just talking about the possibility of people securing microcredentials but potentially aggregating those qualifications into higher-level qualifications, potentially all the way through to degree-level or degree standard.

If we want the future leaders, or lifelong learners, and students to be innovative, business schools should be more innovative to offer them the opportunities to realize positive and scalable impact.

Kamel: [6:47] Business schools, amongst the things they do and they should do more of, is to try to innovate business solutions through the academic and non-degree offerings they offer to the community, to be able to address the issues, the complexes we face daily in our lives.

[7:08] That could be manifested in so many different ways. That could be within the context of business schools, degree programs, projects, community development activities, student competitions. Students are smart. The more diverse the student portfolio is, you get very good ideas. Those ideas could go all the way to the next level and help create solutions for the community.

[7:36] If we want the future leaders, our learners—lifelong learners and students—to be innovative, business schools should be more innovative to offer them the opportunities to realize positive and scalable impact.

By focusing on research that makes a difference, it pushes academics and business schools into this ecosystem which is more impactful.

Geoff Perry: [7:50] There's this broad capability within business school, an incredible ability to create knowledge that can make a difference. There are faculty with expertise across a wide range of discipline areas, but as importantly, with a focus into a range of social, economic, physical, and business areas.

[8:12] There is a potential to bring together knowledge that will make a difference to society. In a more traditional model, you tend to look, "What are the gaps in the literature? How can I get published in this journal?" And you would publish that.

[8:28] Now, as soon as you start to think, "I want to make a difference," just starting to think, "Where? To whom?" and you start talking to those people. You end up in more of a co-creation model. It's a paradigm shift as we move forward from, "How can I just get published in a top-tier journal? What are the gaps? What are they looking for?" to, "How can I make a difference?"

[8:50] The whole way that you frame, start, and who you connect with to do the research changes. By focusing on research that makes a difference, it pushes academics and business schools into this ecosystem which is more impactful.