The future of MBAs

Charmian Love

January 19, 2010

I was impressed by a recent report by McKinsey Quarterly which looks at how MBA programs are responding to the changing landscape of business education.
This report takes the format of a short (10 minute) interview with the Dean of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business – Blair Sheppard. In the first few sentences of his remarks, he indicates that there has been a twentyfold increase in student interest in public-policy and social entrepreneurship by his students over the last 5 years. Twentyfold! The time has come to recognize this in business schools and really give students what they are asking for…
Dean Sheppard also talks about the future of MBA programs – and presents a case for truly interscholastic learning models. This might include mergers between policy schools and business schools in order to give students what they want. What nailed this point for me was his positioning of what is needed to prepare the future leaders of banks. Is it a business degree? Is it a policy degree? The answer is YES! Both practices are necessary to arm this future leader with the necessary toolkit and experiences.
For more on this discussion, check out at the McKinsey Quarterly article Reshaping Business Education In A New Era.