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A Truly International Student Body (North Americans Included!)

The more liberal approach that European business schools are taking with their curricula is not going unnoticed by the global applicant pool of aspiring managers and entrepreneurs. Many top-ranked European MBA programs have student bodies in which the nation hosting the institution contributes only a small minority of the student population.

For example, HEC in Paris is 82% international, with only 30% originating from all of Western Europe. David Bach, dean of the MBA program at IE reports that the profile of the MBA class matriculating in 2008 was 90% international. Significantly, IE, along with HEC, RSM at Erasmus University, and others are also seeing an increase in the number of North American applicants. This fact is significant since North America is home to some of the world’s most elite and prestigious business schools, which tend to give preference to qualified domestic applicants.

Of course, some level of diversity can be found in most competitive MBA programs, in North America and elsewhere; the difference is more philosophical in nature. For example, at HEC an American MBA candidate may find himself instructed to work in a team with citizens from China, Germany and Saudi Arabia to develop his abilities to work practically with a variety of peoples. As Valerie Gauthier, Associate Dean of HEC, said in an interview in earlier 2008, “The emphasis is not only on the leadership program, but human development.”

Global Collaboration Initiative

European business schools continue to diversify not only in terms of those they attract to their campuses, or the substantial and growing number of students who take part in exchange programs, but also in the ways they integrate with other educational concerns globally.

For instance, in a conference bringing the deans of 11 top business schools in London in July 2007, educational leaders discussed points of common interest, including joint loans and scholarships for students. They also discussed the merits and organization of their respective exchange programs.

The collaborative emphasis also exists between successful European schools and the developing world. IESE in Barcelona, which recently opened up a new office in New York City, has also opened three schools in Africa in Egypt, Nigeria, and Kenya with the hope of bringing about the same sort of transformational change to countries in Africa that it helped entrepreneurs bring to Mexico, Brazil and China 20 years ago. Jordi Canals, dean of the program, has said that he wants the school to use its resources to work within the regional educational systems in Africa to train faculty and administration to become self-sufficient and take a commanding role in their own business education.

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In a continuing effort to assist our students in navigating their careers in a challenging economy, we at Manhattan Review are proud to announce that our Student Service team can help you real-time online via our new Live Chat service!

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There is a great shift occurring in European business schools towards a highly modernized business education that incorporates multicultural diversity, interdisciplinary study, new technology, and the adoption of elements of the standard Anglo-Saxon university model.

The Bologna Accord and Europe’s New Educational Paradigm

The shift can be traced to the 1999 Bologna Accord, which outlined the steps necessary to standardize a model of higher education throughout Europe. Its primary goal is to enact reforms that would increase the level of competition between European universities. The reforms of the Bologna Accord include:

• standardization of degrees granted;
• establishment of clear divisions between undergraduate and graduate studies; and
• promotion of student mobility across disciplines, institutions, and nations.

Currently a plethora of different degrees are offered by institutes of higher education in Europe, which often leads to confusion and bureaucratic nightmares. Also, the long first-section model of 5 years is gradually being adapted towards the Anglo-Saxon model of 3-4 years for a bachelor’s degree and an additional 1-2 years for a master’s.

The Accord has been adopted by 40 European nations, and some nations like Switzerland and the Netherlands have already enacted their provisions. 2010 is the target year for the Accord’s implementation in all participating countries.

The Contextualization of MBAs within a Larger Curriculum

In the spirit of the Accord, European Universities are seeking not only to coordinate their MBA programs with the exigencies of the labor and financial markets, but with a spectrum of other disciplines as well Colin Mayer, Dean of the Said School at Oxford said recently in an interview with Business Week that the school’s offerings work in conjunction with those found in the University’s law, finance and science programs. He says that it is this sort of interdisciplinary work that is essential to successful entrepreneurship.

Dean Santiago Iniguez of the IE school in Madrid says that earning an MBA should be an “experience” and not merely a transmission of knowledge. According to Iniguez, the ideal is to create managers who are cosmopolitan, capable of negotiating different cultures while speaking a unified business language.

The degree of interaction between MBA programs and other fields is not clearly defined by the Accord and varies across universities. Some universities have taken steps to simplify the process of taking courses across disciplines, while others like IE have taken the more dramatic step of providing highly customized course offerings within the MBA program itself: courses with subjects like Chinese philosophy and literature, or global musical trends.

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Earlier 2008, Thomas Robertson, dean of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and Frank Brown, dean of INSEAD, announced a four-year renewal of the two business schools’ alliance initiated seven years ago in 2001, which they mutually consider has been a great success.

Synergy

The impetus for the alliance is to promote the internationalization of both schools’ programs in terms of MBA student exchange, faculty exchange, executive education, research collaboration, developing joint PhD curricula, and joint alumni initiatives. With INSEAD’s campuses in France and Singapore and Wharton’s campuses in Philadelphia and San Francisco, students and faculty are able to derive experience from three continents, all of which are vital players in international business.

Joint MBA Program – Size & More

Since its inception, the alliance has educated 800 MBAs, 50-75 from each school per year, through two-month exchanges giving students access to a broader and deeper selection of coursework led by regional faculty and assistance by local career coordinators.

Nearly the same number of executives have taken advantage of the exchange, enrolling in executive education programs like “Strategic R&D Management” and “Leading an Effective Sales Force”, which are taught by faculty of both schools at all the campus locations. The executive training offered by the partnership also makes company-specific curricula available for its multinational clients.

The networking potential for alumni is also immense with 82,000 Wharton alumni spread over 148 countries and 37,000 INSEAD alumni in even more locations.

Research Program

The research opportunities created by the partnership have been substantial as well. Through the creation of the jointly governed and funded INSEAD-Wharton Center for Global Research and Education over 60 faculty members have taken long-term teaching or research positions ranging from six months to two years at one of the partner schools.

Vision

What will the next four years bring to the partnership? Robertson says he would like to continue developing a pool of multinational clients looking for global solutions, which he believes the alliance is uniquely situated to provide. Both deans remark that further development of PhDs is desirable given the constant need for excellent faculty. “The more quality academics we can produce, the better off both institutions are going to be and the better off the academic community in general will be,” says Brown.

Near-Term Initiatives

• A plan to distribute proprietary case studies developed at INSEAD to Wharton;
• Workshops for staff across campuses that will focus on ideal practice in diverse elements of business ranging from training to diversity management;
• Continued joint alumni events;
• Opportunities for peer reviews of alumni work by both alumni populations.

More information regarding the partnership can be found here: http://www.insead.edu/alliance/

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