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Volume 08 | Issue 02 | 2014
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Volume 08 | Issue 02 | 2014
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Business schools Can they really save the world?
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In focus
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
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Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
In focus
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magisterial article by EFMD’s Richard Straub begins this edition of Global Focus (page 10). In it Straub analyses the many economic and social challenges facing the world as the 21st century unfolds and how the application of sound management principles might help solve them. He writes:“…a key question that faces us today is whether we have the regenerating capacity in the Western world to achieve a transformation for regaining growth and prosperity as opposed to moving inexorably toward social and economic decline – and, quite possibly, facing the wrenching trauma of a citizens’ revolt along the way”. The world of business schools also receives the customary in-depth analysis in this issue. Andrew Crisp and Joanne Hession provide a checklist for both schools and potential students to ascertain just how “international” they really are (page 38) while Julie Perrin Halot and Rachael Weiss argue that accreditation, though hard to achieve and tough to maintain, provides its own long-term rewards. And on page 42, Jan Ginneberge analyses the results of an EFMD survey into the current and likely future state of executive education. Two articles (page 23 and page 34) look at the vital area of innovation and the role of management education and business schools in providing it.
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The first article, by John North and Anders Aspling details the work of the first GRLI Management Education Innovation Cohort, an offshoot of GRLI, which has brought together academics and corporate leaders form 16 institutions. The second, “Innovation for growth” by Stefan Schepers, explains how the High Level Group on Innovation Policy Management, a unique public-private partnership, comprising top-level representatives from European Union Member States, the European Commission, the European Council, business and academia launched in 2011, is designing a new approach for European innovation.
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Finally, in a rather original article, Jan Hagen explains the aviation industry’s open approach to identifying and resolving errors and suggests that it could be applied with beneficial results to many other industry sectors.
We are always pleased to hear your thoughts on Global Focus, and ideas on what you would like to see in future issues. Please address comments and ideas to Matthew Wood at EFMD: matthew.wood@efmd.org
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Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
Contents Global Focus The EFMD Business Magazine
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Executive Editor Matthew Wood matthew.wood@efmd.org
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Advisory Board Eric Cornuel Howard Thomas John Peters Consultant Editor George Bickerstaffe georgebickerstaffe@gmail.com Contributing Editors Anders Aspling Nadine Burquel Andrew Crisp Jan Ginneberge Jan Hagen Julie Perrin Halot Joanne Hession Eva Male Rickie Moore John North Stefan Schepers Danielle Steele Richard Straub Rachael Weiss Liane Weitert Philippe de Woot Design & Art Direction Jebens Design www.jebensdesign.co.uk Photographs & Illustrations © Jebens Design Ltd / EFMD unless otherwise stated Editorial & Advertising Matthew Wood matthew.wood@efmd.org Telephone: +32 2 629 0810 EFMD aisbl Rue Gachard 88 – Box 3 1050 Brussels, Belgium www.efmd.org/globalfocus ©
EFMD
In focus
The great transformation Richard Straub on why, with gigantic changes in society, managers will be of pivotal importance for shaping the future
18 WU’s new campus – building the future A spectacular new campus reflects the venerable Viennese university’s commitment to the future says Eva Male
22 Innovation in action: shaping management education for the world John North and Anders Aspling detail the work of the first GRLI Management Education Innovation Cohort
28 Uncertainty and the ‘entrepreneurial mindset’ How do you teach students to become entrepreneurs? Rickie Moore, who does just that, shares some ideas
34 Rethinking enterprise Philippe de Woot, in an article based on his latest book, argues that economic actions based on ethical and political dimensions are increasingly essential
38 Developing an international brand Most business schools will say they are international. Are they really? Andrew Crisp and Joanne Hession provide a checklist for both schools and potential students
42 Quality Street: the sweet side of accreditation Gaining accreditation (and maintaining it) is a tough business. But Julie Perrin Halot and Rachael Weiss argue that it provides its own long-term rewards
Contents
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Where and how for exec ed? Jan Ginneberge analyses the results of an EFMD survey into the current and likely future state of executive education
52 Error management: not just a wing and a prayer Jan Hagen suggests that the aviation industry’s open approach to identifying and resolving errors could be applied to many other sectors
56 Warm memories of the Winter School The EFMD (ESMU)/HUMANE Winter School is designed to develop the leadership potential of senior administrators in business schools and universities. Nadine Burquel looks back at its first 12 years
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60 How many business schools does it take to change the world? Danielle Steele and Liane Weitert describe how six business schools from around the world have joined forces to make the idea of applied interaction a reality
64 Innovation for growth Stefan Schepers explains how the High Level Group on Innovation Policy Management is designing a new approach for European innovation
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64 P60 Six business schools from around the world have joined forces to make the idea of applied interaction a reality – Danielle Steele and Liane Weitert describe how
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Winners EFMD Case Writing Competition
Corporate Social Responsibility “Accenture Development Partnership” Written by Michelle Rogan and Christiane Bode, both at INSEAD, France Sponsored by Kedge Business School Entrepreneurship
EFMD is delighted to announce the winners of the 2013 EFMD Case Writing Competition. It was a record year for entries with 258 cases submitted from 30 countries. The quality was exceptionally high so we thank all of you who took part.
“WooRank: Creating & Capturing Value in a European Web Start-Up” Written by Robin Demaria, Olivier Witmeur and Paul Verdin, all colleagues from Solvay Brussels School of Economics & Management, Belgium Sponsored by EM Lyon Family Business “Trusted Family: By Families, For Families, Forever…" (video case) Written by Benoît Leleux, IMD, Switzerland
BEST OF THE BEST Responsible Leadership “SMS for Life Case Series” Written by Donald A. Marchand, Anna Moncef and Patricia Santos, all IMD, Switzerland
Finance and Banking “Tumi and the Doughty Hanson Value Enhancement Group (VEG)" Written by Benoit Leleux, Michel Galeazzi and Esmeralda Megally all from IMD, Switzerland
Sponsored by University of San Diego-School of Business Administration
Sponsored by Toulouse Business School-Groupe ESC Toulouse Supply Chain Management
To review the winning cases and find out more about taking part in the 2014 EFMD Case Writing Competition please visit: www.efmd.org/case
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This year's competition was a record with 258 case entries from 30 countries
“CISCO Systems Inc.: Supply Chain Risk Management” Written by Maria Jesus Saenz, MIT-Zaragoza International Logistics Program (ZLC), ES and Elena Revilla, IE Business School, Spain Sponsored by Kedge Business School
EFMD Case Writing Competition
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
Emerging Global Chinese Competitors
Responsible Leadership
“LENOVO Challenger to Leader”, Written by Hadiya Faheem, Freelance Case Writer, India and Muralidhara G.V., IBS Hyderabad, India
“SMS for Life Case Series” Written by Donald A. Marchand, Anna Moncef and Patricia Santos, all IMD, Switzerland
Sponsored by Renmin University of China School of Business
Sponsored by University of San Diego-School of Business Administration.
Euro-Mediterranean Managerial Practices and Issues
Inclusive Business Models
“HPS, a successful South/North Technology Transfer Model” Written by Belhcen Lhacen and Abbitan Yoni, both at ESCA School of Management, Morocco
“Child in Need Institute: Non-Profit or Hybrid?” Written by Anjan Ghosh, Sougata Ray and Indranil Biswas, all three at Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, India
Sponsored by Groupe Sup de Co Montpellier Business School
Sponsored by IMD
Public Sector Innovations
Latin American Business Cases
“Finding Community Solutions from Common Ground: A New Business Model to End America’s Homelessness” Written by Howard Yu, IMD, Switzerland
“Mabe: Learning to be a Multinational” Written by José Luis Rivas, ITAM-Santa Teresa Campus, Mexico and Luis Arciniega, ITAM – Rio Hondo Campus, Mexico
African Business Cases
Sponsored by Universidad Externado de Colombia
“Research in Motion: Managing Channel Conflicts” Written by Uchenna Uzo, Lagos Business School, Nigeria Sponsored by China Europe International Business School (CEIBS) Indian Management Issues and Opportunities “Embrace” Written by Mridula Anand and Anand Nandkumar, both Indian School of Business, India and Charles Dhanaraj, Indiana University, USA Sponsored by Emerald Group Publishing Ltd
MENA Business Cases “Roca in Egypt” Written by Josep Franch and Marianna Sablina Kondratieva, both at ESADE Business School, Spain. Sponsored by HEC Paris in Qatar Bringing Technology to the Market “787 Dreamliner: Cleared for Takeoff?” Written by Vitaliano Fiorillo, Raffaele Secchi and Silvia Zamboni, all at SDA Bocconi School of Management, Italy Sponsored by ESMT
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EFMD & Business:
Making Real Progress in Sustainable Development EFMD is proud to announce the publication of The Sustainable Business: Resource-Life Extension, the newest addition to its portfolio of sustainability based education and training materials
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vailable as a free download for businesses and business schools, this latest volume of application exercises is the second workbook in the series and is designed to walk participants through the beginning stages of resource-life extension, the foundation on which circular economics, cradle-back-tothe-cradle, closed-loop production and similar resource-recapture concepts are based. Measurable results are a certainty – and any organisation that earnestly undertakes the exercises can expect to reap significant financial benefits. EFMD offers this workbook in conjunction with The Sustainable Business and The Sustainable Business Workbook: Waste Elimination. These books are now being used as workplace training guides in a number of businesses and they can be easily put to use as a post-graduate business school elective that blends theory with application. Moreover, all three books have been translated into Simplified Chinese by National Chengchi University in Taiwan. Arabic translations will be available this summer, courtesy of the University of Dubai.
The importance of resource-life extension To accommodate a growing population that is becoming increasingly affluent and living longer (all of which escalates material consumption), smart businesses are beginning to transform from a production-based business model into a more intelligent performance-based model that uses less to do more. The core of this is resource-life extension, a process that helps marshal the planet’s finite resources by extending the life of materials to maximise profits, reduce waste and pollutants, and create jobs. Remanufacturing provides a good example. As far back as 2004, a look at remanufacturing used automotive engines compared with manufacturing brand-new engines revealed lower economic costs (30%-53%), lower raw material consumption (26%-90%), lower waste generation (65%-88%), lower energy consumption (68%-83%) and lower emissions (50%-88%) including: • 73%-78% less CO2, • 48%-88% less CO, • 72%-85% less NOx, • 71%-85% less SOx, and, • 50%-61% less non-methane hydrocarbons.
EFMD & Business: Making Real Progress in Sustainable Development
‘The Sustainable Business’ is the operational guide for the sustainable development of our company, not least because it summarises the abstract concept of ‘sustainable development’ into two forms of application – waste elimination and resource-life extension – and lays out a clear path to their achievement MAHINDRA TRACTOR CO LTD YANCHENG ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT ZONE YANCHENG, CHINA
“The United Nations (UN) has set a goal of becoming climate neutral and environmentally sustainable. We call this initiative ‘Greening the Blue’. We heard about the Sustainable Business programme, downloaded the materials from the EFMD website, and asked Jonathan Scott and Walter Stahel to conduct a training session for UNFPA staff at UN City in Copenhagen, where 42 UNFPA staff members had the opportunity to learn about the principles of sustainability and how waste reduction and circular economics (resource-life extension) helps our suppliers while at the same time achieving the goals of the UN. As an introductory text, The Sustainable Business offers us real examples from well-known companies and emphasises the financial benefits of being sustainable. And the attractiveness of the workbook programme lies in its self-implementation methodology and a results-orientated focus on efficiency and profitability for our suppliers.” MORTEN SORENSEN, DEPUTY CHIEF, PROCUREMENT SERVICE BRANCH, UNITED NATIONS POPULATION FUND
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Additionally, remanufacturing engines creates jobs because skilled workers are needed to take apart and inspect the old engines. Furthermore, remanufactured engines are more durable than new engines because heat and vibrations from everyday use causes new engines to solidify and settle– all of which makes a used engine stronger. “Just keep in mind that extending the life of resources isn’t only about remanufacturing,” says Jonathan Scott, author of The Sustainable Business, and co-author of its workbooks. “Additional examples include training an employee to perform different tasks; finding multiple uses for a chemical, tool, material, machine, building, work area or process; sharing employees, tools, equipment, shipments/deliveries and research projects; making joint purchases with other companies; exceeding the average lifespan of a tool, machine, building or material; decreasing employee turnover and absenteeism; adopting cascading uses of components, materials and resources (such as water); facilitating repeat customers, and so on.” Scott speaks from experience. For years, as part of his sustainability courses taught at business schools across Europe, he has required his students to conduct waste assessments in local businesses – the results of which have showed hundreds of businesses in over a dozen countries how they can achieve millions of dollars in (combined) cost savings. Recently, he and Walter Stahel (the pioneer behind resource-life extension) worked with a factory in Yancheng, China, and in less than three hours showed that it was possible to achieve 1.3-million RMB in annual cost savings if the waste in several key areas was reduced by a mere 5%.
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How the books work The exercises in the workbooks are designed to be administered over several months by a manager or teacher with experience in project management, change management, team building and/or coaching (an MBA programme is an ideal setting). Participants first read The Sustainable Business and then meet to go over the programme and its objectives (to cut costs and increase revenue by examining sustainable practices). The assignments are completed by the participants at the businesses where they work. The participants then meet again to give short presentations describing the estimated results of the exercises they were assigned. This is a lively process that stimulates an exchange of best practices and problem-solving ideas. It is important, however, that the workbooks are done in the proper order because waste elimination should precede resourcelife extension (this is fully explained in The Sustainable Business). Just as important, after completing the programme, businesses can administer it to their suppliers and distributors so that even more waste and revenue can be squeezed out of logistic chains. This is why the Yueda Group, one of China’s largest state-owned conglomerates, is adopting the programme among its numerous subsidiaries and partnerships. Networking and more information Does your sustainability program deliver financial results for its participants? Or are you still overemphasising ‘going green’ (which only covers a fraction of the sustainability spectrum) and recycling (the most wasteful and expensive of the closedloop options) as a means of proving your sustainability credentials? Sustainable development is reliant on co-operative networking, ongoing education and measurement. If your business or business school would like to administer the sustainability workbook programme and join its growing network, please contact Jonathan T Scott through the Facebook page of The Sustainable Business or through his LinkedIn profile.
TOP: Walter Stahel (left), and Jonathan Scott answer questions at a business forum in the Yancheng Economic and Technical Zone, Yancheng China. The forum was hosted by Chen Yunhua, Chairman of the Yueda Group, deputy to the 12th National Party Congress and chairman and secretary of PC. ABOVE: Walter Stahel (left) and Jonathan Scott conduct a training session at the United Nations
The Sustainable Business Workbook is available for download from the EFMD website: www.efmd.org/sustainablebusiness
‘The Sustainable Business’ and its workbooks are a great source of significant value, both practical and profound and worthy of a thorough reading by every business and industrial zone that wants to increase its chances of profitability and survival in a world that is facing many challenges JUDI YONG SHAO VICE CHAIRMAN AND PRESIDENT, YUEDA GROUP DEPUTY, 11TH NATIONAL PARTY CONGRESS, PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
2014 EFMD CONFERENCE ON UNDERGRADUATE PROGRAMMES
Undergraduate Management Education: Preparing our students for the journey Hands-on information and solutions for challenges encountered by undergraduate directors, admissions offices and career services. Topics discussed will include: Challenges linked to a diverse student population
Teaching millenials
Evaluation & feedback
Employers
Internships
As the student population gets more and more diverse, how do you handle and manage this?
Learning styles for millennials – how does technology influence the way students learn? What is the difference in learning styles compared to other generations? Understanding how millennials think, act and react.
What are the best methods for providing feedback (both face-toface and remotely)?
How do companies work with millenials and what do they expect from them? In exchange what do younger graduates expect and want from their employer?
How well do internships prepare students for their future role?
13-15 October 2014 Hosted by Robins School of Business, University of Richmond, USA
More information and how to register from: Ms. Diana Grote, Manager, Business School Services Unit e diana.grote@efmd.org www.efmd.org/conferences
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We are at the beginning of a set of gigantic changes in society – for better or for worse. The future is open; nobody knows what it will hold. One thing we know says Richard Straub: on this stage, managers will surely be of pivotal importance for shaping it
The Great Transformation by Richard Straub
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n his landmark book Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Peter Drucker quotes Thomas Jefferson: “Every generation needs a new revolution.” But Drucker quickly makes clear that, as much as he admires Jefferson, this particular comment is off the mark. In truth, Drucker notes, most of the revolutions that we have witnessed in recent history failed to deliver on what they had promised. As Alexis de Tocqueville, the French philosopher and political theorist, pointed out, revolutions do not demolish the prisons of the old regime; they tend to enlarge them. The conditions that lead to revolution in the first place are typically oppressive leadership, the bankruptcy of ideas and institutions and, above all, a failure by society to renew itself. Achieving large-scale social change without going through the upheaval of a violent revolution is obviously the better option. The term “transformation” well describes this preferable path. Hence, a key question that faces us today is whether we have the regenerating capacity in the Western world to achieve a transformation for regaining growth and prosperity as opposed to moving inexorably toward social and economic decline – and, quite possibly, facing the wrenching trauma of a citizens’ revolt along the way. Dangerous trends Evidence of the need for change is strong. A number of factors have converged to make the picture especially daunting. Taken together, they indicate that we are heading towards decline rather than prosperity: • Economic stagnation and financial instability Even though some indicators have improved since the global financial meltdown of 2007/2008, the structural problems that are bogging down our economies are by no means resolved. American economist Larry Summers talked in a recent interview about the probability of secular stagnation as a “base case” for decision makers. In addition the debt crisis in developed economies severely limits the ability of governments to provide further stimulus.
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The conditions that lead to revolution in the first place are typically oppressive leadership, the bankruptcy of ideas and institutions and, above all, a failure by society to renew itself
• Growing income inequality The French economist and academic Thomas Piketty argues in his much-discussed book, Capital in the 21st Century, that capital has essentially won in a fight over labour. With returns on capital growing faster than the economy overall, the share of capital is increasing at the expense of labour, resulting in widening income disparities. Piketty’s profound fact-based analysis points to a long-term trend. Henry Mintzberg, a leading management thinker, comes to a similar conclusion when he analyses the imbalance in our society in his recent online pamphlet Rebalancing Society. • Unemployment and underemployment Unemployment and underemployment are at stubbornly high levels. Youth unemployment remains a huge concern. Some Western trade unions make things worse by opposing flexibility within labour markets (though Drucker, for one, believed that unions represent an important “countervailing power” to that of large corporations and thus “modern society... needs an organ such as the labour union”). • An ageing population in Western countries combined with low birth rates One billion people around the globe, demographers tell us, will be above the age of 65 by 2035. At the same time, falling birth rates in developed economies have meant a decline in the number of people who can support this older population. The implications for funding retirement and social protection systems are striking. The financial burden for those in the workforce is on a course to becoming unbearable. • Untamed Leviathan The state almost everywhere is big, inefficient and broke, Economist editor John Micklethwaite remarked in 2011. Since then, things have only got worse. With a suffocating bureaucracy, the state too often deprives advanced economies of the oxygen they need for innovation and growth.
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• Increasing corporate autism Since the 1980s, corporations have increasingly set aside concerns for a broader set of stakeholders – customers, employees and communities – in favour of the supposed interests of shareholders. This trend has accelerated after the financial crisis and led to a significant reduction in value-creating investments with a long-term horizon. Will these steadily worsening trends be tomorrow’s reality or do we still have an opportunity to shape a better future? How to escape the vicious cycle we seem to be caught in? Obviously, levers need to be pulled at both the macro and the micro levels. At the macro level, monetary and fiscal policy, labour markets, social security, tax regimes and rules governing competition all need to be addressed. Policymakers should be focused on removing obstacles and creating incentives in the right direction. This approach can be summarised, at least in part, as “Management by Getting Out of the Way,” which means refocusing regulations in fields where they are essential and otherwise enabling productive forces to act without artificial and counterproductive burdens. The micro level is, of course, the heart of management – where actual value is created and destroyed. It is where specific decisions are taken that lead into world-changing innovations or a waste of productive resources. Before growth figures for a country are calculated, the actual growth happens in individual organisations that are successfully “managed”. While politicians and other experts are obsessed with aggregations and ratios, they tend to forget that the action happens in real life and not in the abstractions of economics. Management is a real-world practice dealing with people and organisations. Managers can make all the difference in the world with their knowledge, their creativity, their emotions and their values. Management, in this broad (and very Druckerian) sense includes commercial players, non-profit organisations and public-sector bodies. Each has the mandate to create value and to achieve its mission. Management, the American author and journalist Walter Kiechel wrote in Harvard Business Review, has come to “shape the world in which we work” amid “an era of global triumph, measured by agreement on certain key ideas, steadily improving productivity, the worldwide march of the MBA degree and a general elevation of expectations about how workers should be treated”.
Drucker was a key figure in the rise of management as a discipline. He “laid out a vision of the corporation as a social institution – indeed, a social network – in which the capacity and potential of everyone involved were to be respected,” Kiechel asserted. Management – a track record with big question marks Once we accept the importance of good management for the economic and social wellbeing of today’s world, it is legitimate to ask a critical question: are managers equipped – in terms of skills, competencies and courage – to lead us towards the Great Transformation? We have indeed learned a lot about management. It has become a focus of education, research and practice. Great thinking has gone into the development of the discipline of management, into tools and methodologies and, increasingly, into specialised fields such as marketing, operations, finance and human resources. Thousands of books proclaim the latest breakthroughs and show the progress of management thinking and research. For example, Julian Birkinshaw, a professor at London Business School in the UK, suggests in his book Reinventing Management four main dimensions along which management has been steadily, if slowly, evolving: (1) co-ordinating work with a shift from bureaucracy to emergent practices (2) m aking decisions by drawing on collective wisdom (3) setting objectives that rely on the principle of obliquity rather than direct alignment (4) motivating employees by intrinsic rather than extrinsic methods
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One billion people around the globe, demographers tell us, will be above the age of 65 by 2035
The Great Transformation by Richard Straub
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
Pictured clockwise from left: Clay Christensen, Gary Hamel, Roger Martin, and John Hagel III
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Yet a reality check shows that, despite considerable progress in making management more effective, many fundamental challenges remain. Bureaucratic hierarchies, in the form of control-oriented, top-down structures, are still highly prevalent. In his book What Matters Now, American management thinker Gary Hamel argues that innovation, particularly disruptive innovation, is unlikely to flourish when a few executives have a chokehold on resource allocation. The overwhelming internal complexity of large organisations causes a tendency to focus internally rather than taking the outside-in perspective. This brings a loss of customer focus and, as a consequence, more energy is spent on resolving internal issues rather than finding new ways of delighting customers. The overemphasis on short-term gains at the expense of long-term prosperity has become the new normal despite its negative consequences. A recent McKinsey survey of 1,000 corporate board members and C-suite executives found that 63% of respondents claim that the pressure to generate strong short-term results has increased over the past five years. This was despite the fact that 86% declared that using a longer time horizon to make business decisions would positively affect corporate performance in a number of ways, including strengthening financial returns and increasing innovation. Regrettably the shareholder value creed still has a tight grip on corporate executives and their governance.
Management is a real-world practice dealing with people and organisations. Managers can make all the difference in the world with their knowledge, their creativity, their emotions and their values
And when one looks behind the gadgetry of corporate finance, the results are not nearly so impressive. The rates of return on assets and on invested capital of US firms in 2011 was only one-quarter of what they were in 1965. And the effectiveness of management to win the hearts and minds of the workforce is even worse. According to the latest global Gallup State of the Global Workplace survey only 13% of employees are engaged in their jobs. That is, they are emotionally invested in and focused on creating value for the organisation every day. They are outnumbered by those who are negative and potentially hostile to the organisation at a rate of nearly 2:1. Clayton Christensen, an HBS professor and recognised as number one Management Thinker in the Thinkers50 ranking, has maintained that management’s misallocation of capital is putting capitalism itself at risk.
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With a constant drive to achieve short-term cost reductions, most corporate innovations have centred on improving efficiency. Yet the capital freed up by increasing efficiencies is not being used to generate what Christensen calls “empowering innovations”, which would create new business or even whole new industries, spurring growth and jobs. Instead, corporations are hoarding cash on their balance sheets like never before and some of the capital generated by efficiency innovation is reinvested in even more efficiency innovation. The picture is not rosy, either, in the management of mega-scale initiatives initiated by political decisions. Government leaders may be good at communication and managing the pure political process. However, when it comes to execution and the ultimate value creation for the citizens, things easily get out of control. High-profile projects such as the German energy transition (Energiewende) show deep management flaws ranging from strategy to execution. Everyday projects, which do not typically capture the headlines, are also mismanaged. A recent report in the US, for example, found that the federal government has 77,000 empty or underutilised buildings across the country, costing taxpayers more than $1.5 billion a year. Such troubles may be related to the fact that those in the political class have not yet embraced management skills as a success factor for their political careers. Yet the damage that flawed management of such initiatives can produce is huge. To sum up, the overall track record of management effectiveness and leadership is rather mixed. But there are enough bright spots to give us confidence that managers can still form the basis upon which we forge the Great Transformation. The Great Transformation for the better is within our reach It is an exceptional moment in history. We are at the beginning of a set of gigantic changes in society – for better or for worse. The future is open; nobody knows what it will hold. However, it is not destiny. Myriad actors will shape the future and some of them will have more impact than others. One thing we know: on this stage, managers will surely be of pivotal importance. “Management and managers are the central resource, the generic, distinctive, the constitutive organ of society... and the very survival of society is dependent on the performance, the competence, the earnestness and the values of their managers,” Drucker wrote in his 1993 book The Ecological Vision. “What managers are doing is therefore a public concern”.
63%
A recent McKinsey survey of 1,000 corporate board members and C-suite executives found that 63% of respondents claim that the pressure to generate strong short-term results has increased over the past five years
High-profile projects such as the German energy transition (Energiewende) show deep management flaws ranging from strategy to execution. Everyday projects, which do not typically capture the headlines, are also mismanaged
The Great Transformation by Richard Straub
This seems to be the moment to take Drucker’s statement seriously, to live up to our responsibility as managers and leaders. To do so will require courageous and decisive action. The Great Transformation starts with revisiting the fundamental commitment of managers towards society – namely, innovation and value creation. Of course, done well, this is also good for the company and its bottom line over the long term. Failing to invest in innovation means putting the future of the whole organisation at risk. No company that goes out of business can be a good neighbour, good employer and a good citizen. Even worse – by failing to keep its business viable it creates significant damage due to the human suffering it causes and the need to kick-in social programs at the expense of society. At the same time, it cannot be acceptable that CEOs continue to earn 300 times or more the income of their average employee. Trust must be rebuilt. From scalable efficiency to scalable learning Despite great new management ideas and concepts, the issue of scalability and broad-based application of innovative management practices is far from resolved. Instead of liberating the creative and innovative energy of employees as well as those of supply-chain partners and others who are part of a corporation’s overall ecosystem, blind processes and rigid hierarchies still hold them down. In effect, the emergence of a Taylorism of a sort in non manufacturing business operations has been enabled by digital technology. However, we can do much better than that… John Hagel III and John Seely Brown (Co-Chairmen of the Deloitte Centre for the Edge and authors) have described the shift toward a massive transformation from institutions designed for scalable efficiency to institutions designed for scalable learning.
2:1
Only 13% of employees are engaged in their jobs – every day emotionally invested in and focused on creating value for the organisation. They are outnumbered by those who are negative and potentially hostile to the organisation at a rate of nearly 2:1
This relates not so much to formal, classroom-based learning but learning from the ongoing experiences, projects and initiatives that are occurring in various parts of an organisation. The key is to foster learning by connecting minds for value creation and knowledge sharing for innovation across the organisation. Enterprise social media along with traditional means of communication provide a new infrastructure for scalable learning. Towards a human-centric paradigm Digital technology is an unprecedented game changer due to its continuous exponential development. As such, it can lead either further down the efficiency-enhancing and cost-cutting route or up the innovation path. It can replace brawn via robotics or augment brains with artificial intelligence.
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And many organisations will undoubtedly be tempted to use technology to replace human beings wherever and whenever possible. But this would be a terrible mistake, leading to a certain downward spiral for both society and economy. Instead, the emphasis should be on educating and empowering workers so they can leverage new technologies, while it is understood that technology is always meant to serve people and enhance their capabilities. The leader of a prominent gaming company put it to me this way: the primary task of management in his organisation is to eliminate obstacles and provide tools for his workers so that they can improve their access to knowledge and collaborate across functions and even beyond the company’s walls. Great talent engaged in organisations will make the difference between stagnation and growth. Attracting and developing talent will be the basis for competitiveness of companies, regions and states. Focusing on people and leveraging their strengths for the organisation remains a fundamental management responsibility, despite all the great technology that becomes increasingly available to our fingertips. Management as a Liberal Art For this kind of vision to be realised, the humanists must be given prominence alongside the technologists. The grossly reductionist idea that almost any expert can be replaced by an “expert system” does not take into account profound human capabilities like intuition, creativity and empathy. It is also naïve to assume that knowledge is objective and in a way disconnected from the human condition; in fact, it is largely determined by the values of those producing and applying it. Drucker had this in mind when he called management a liberal art: it is “liberal”, he explained, because it deals with the fundamentals of knowledge, self-knowledge, wisdom and leadership; “art” because it is practice and application. Managers draw upon all of the knowledges and insights of the humanities and social sciences on psychology and philosophy, on economics and history, on the physical sciences and ethics. But they have to focus this knowledge on effectiveness and results. This is something that management education institutions should seriously consider if they do not want to become ever-more specialised engineeringtype schools for management techniques.
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A Second Renaissance? In a time where technologists and technocrats dominate much of the conversation, the rediscovery of the essence of being human is more important than ever. Indeed, in order to benefit from what MIT’s Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee have dubbed “the Second Machine Age,” we also need a Second Renaissance powered by humanities and knowledge across disciplines as posited by Drucker. Otherwise we run the risk of ending up in a technocracy, where technology becomes the new faith and the top technocrats are the new masters who determine the fate of those subject to their technology-driven world. What financial technocrats might do in such a world does not need further comment. Equally, the Transhumanists and Kurzweills Singularity adepts seem to have lost the connection to the roots of human existence and uniqueness. When Roger L Martin, former dean of Rotman School of Management in Toronto, Canada, talks in his book The Design of Business about the knowledge funnel and shows the progress from mystery to heuristics and then to algorithms he does not imply that the world is going algorithmic. As scientific progress has demonstrated – each new discovery and each new algorithm opens up new mysteries. The deeper we drill the more mysteries we seem to unlock. A Tsunami of Innovation Done right, a new marriage between the human spirit and the most powerful technology that humanity has ever developed (and that is still in the early stages of deployment) could produce truly incredible results. Just think about the unbelievable waste that is created in today’s organisation in terms of people’s ideas, creativity, motivation and engagement. Releasing just 10% of this latent value would mean a jump in innovation, value creation – and, in turn, the world’s prosperity. Gallup estimates that the actively disengaged workers in the US alone cost the economy haf a trillion dollars each year. With a human-centric approach, serviced by the best that technology has to offer and supported by smarter government policies and regulations, our organisations can create new infrastructures enabling knowledge, communication and collaboration. And we can trigger a tsunami of innovation and value creation. Luckily we can see already today cases that show the tremendous potential for achieving massive and deep transformation in short time-spans.
With a human-centric approach, serviced by the best that technology has to offer and supported by smarter government policies and regulations, our organisations can create new infrastructures enabling knowledge, communication and collaboration
10%
In terms of people’s ideas, creativity, motivation and engagement, releasing just 10% of this latent value would mean a jump in innovation, value creation – and, in turn, the world’s prosperity
1.2bn
A project aimed at providing a fake-proof ID to each of the 1.2 billion people who reside in India, saw within five years after its inception 650 million people enrolled for the unique online-authenticated Aadhaar biometric ID
India’s Aadhaar project led by former Infosys CEO Nandan Nilekani is such an example: a project aimed at providing a fake-proof ID to each of the 1.2 billion people who reside in India. Five years after its inception 650 million people have enrolled for the unique online-authenticated Aadhaar biometric ID, potentially giving access to social benefits, bank services and the labour market. The implications are enormous – for India and potentially the whole developing world. It is the classic example of advanced technology serving fundamental human needs (500 million Indians live below the poverty line). It also shows how the application of sound management practice can bring the two streams together – leading-edge technology and the deep commitment to improving the human condition. In transition towards the Great Transformation The Great Transformation will not happen overnight. However, we are already in a state of transition where sound, existing management knowledge can be applied. We find a lot of this in the legacy of great management thinkers whose ideas are based on a human-centric worldview: Peter Drucker, Henry Mintzberg, Charles Handy and CK Parahald among them. Based on these foundations, many new concepts and methods are being introduced that fit our time even more precisely. We don’t know what the future will be. But we can determine the direction in which we want to go. We can, that is, take purposeful steps toward the Great Transformation, creating a world that embraces technology but that keeps the human being at its core, conscious of our culture, our history, our spirituality and our unending quest for self-realisation.
FURTHER INFORMATION
The Great Transformation will be the theme of the 6th Global Peter Drucker Forum to be held in Vienna from November 13 to 14, 2014. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard Straub is Director of Corporate Services and EU Affairs at EFMD and President of the Peter Drucker Society Europe.
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of Sciences VIENNA Hall Aula der Wissenschaften
13I14 NOV.
MANAGING OUR WAY TO PROSPERITY
Clayton Christensen, Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School Steve Denning, Member of the Board of Directors Scrum Alliance, Forbes contributor Yves Doz, Professor of Technological Innovation at INSEAD Pankaj Ghemawat, Professor of Strategic Management at IESE Business School John Hagel III, Director Deloitte Consulting LLP, Co-Chairman Deloitte Center for the Edge Gary Hamel, Management expert, Consultant, MIX Co-founder and Professor at London Business School Jeff Hoffman, Serial entrepreneur, Co-founder of priceline.com Herminia Ibarra, Professor of Leadership and Learning and Professor of Organisational Behaviour at INSEAD Adi Ignatius, Editor-in-chief, Harvard Business Review Roger L. Martin, Academic Director, Martin Prosperity Institute, Rotman School of Management Nilofer Merchant, Writer Marc Merrill, President & Co-founder of Riot Games Vineet Nayar, Vice Chairman of HCL Technologies Martin Wolf, Chief Economics Commentator, the Financial Times
www.druckerforum.org
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A spectacular new campus reflects the venerable Viennese university’s commitment to the future says Eva Male
WU’s new campus building the future
THE LIBRARY & LEARNING CENTER THE HEART OF THE NEW UNIVERSITY CAMPUS IS THE LIBRARY & LEARNING CENTER (LC), DESIGNED BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
WU’s new campus – building the future by Eva Male
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W
hat should the university of the future look like? What tasks is a modern business and economics university expected to fulfil? And what functions does an urban campus need to perform today?
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The project to build a new WU campus was launched in 2007, the groundbreaking ceremony took place in 2009 and the new campus was inaugurated in early October 2013 – in the same week that WU celebrated its 115th anniversary
These were the questions WU (Vienna University of Economics and Business) had to tackle when it became clear that it would move to a new campus built from scratch rather than renovate its buildings at the old location. The project to build a new WU campus was launched in 2007, the groundbreaking ceremony took place in 2009 and the new campus was inaugurated in early October 2013 – in the same week that WU celebrated its 115th anniversary. The new campus was completed on schedule and within budget. Now the first academic year at the new location is nearly complete and the new Campus WU has stood up to the test well. The visions and ideas that guided the planning and design phases have come to full fruition. The new campus not only offers vastly improved teaching and learning spaces and facilities for students and faculty, it has also become a popular meeting place for non-academic visitors, attracting large numbers of tourists and local residents. There are children playing, people having fun on the campus basketball court or simply enjoying the sun – everyone is very welcome on Campus WU. After all, WU’s new campus was always meant to be more than just a place for academic research and teaching and learning practical skills; it was also designed to create a new space for social, cultural and political life. It is the concrete realisation of WU’s vision of a modern university. The fundamental principles of the architecture reflect the values and ideas such as diversity, innovation and internationalism we cherish at WU. And as a public institution WU has lived up to its responsibility to build its new campus in an economical, ecological and socially sustainable manner. We have not only constructed new buildings but in the process have built on our ideas of what the university of the future should look like. What does this mean in real terms? The heart of the new university campus is the Library & Learning Center (LC), designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. This imposing building is a testament to the central importance of research and teaching at WU. All other buildings and facilities on campus have been conceptualised, designed and built around this core element.
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communication. The buildings and the surrounding grounds offer plenty of opportunities for communication and meeting people. Approximately 55,000 m2 of publicly accessible open space surround the six building complexes, perfect for strolling and exploring. The campus is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 365 days a year. Fences or barriers would contradict our vision of an open campus.
The Library & Learning Center is surrounded by five complexes, including the Teaching Center (TC), which houses most of WU’s auditoriums. The Teaching Center is intended mainly for bachelor degree students. Masters degree programmes are taught primarily in individual department buildings. The Executive Academy building is the home of continuing education and life-long learning programmes. In this way, the various buildings and their functions reflect the three tiers of teaching and learning represented by the Bologna Process that was implemented at WU in 2007. WU’s department-based organisational structure was also a contributing factor. In the past, the various institutes that make up the departments were scattered across different locations. Now they have been brought together in four department buildings, which make life much easier for both students and faculty. These are not the only improvements the new campus has to offer. All rooms have natural light and the auditoriums feature state-of-the-art teaching equipment, including digital whiteboards. There are 3,000 student workplaces, three times as many as in the old buildings. These workplaces are located not only in dedicated self-study areas but also in project rooms that can be booked by both teaching staff and students. They cater to different needs by providing quiet spots for focused academic work as well as opportunities for work on group projects in communication-friendly study areas. It was a conscious design decision that the areas and rooms intended for use by students should be the most attractive spaces on the new campus. The top priority in planning the new campus was to create an environment for WU students and staff that is conducive to productive work and
WU is open to impulses and influences from the non-academic “outside world” and at the same time it also wants to have a positive impact on the city of Vienna, the Austrian economy and society at large.
3k
There are 3,000 student workplaces, three times as many as in the old buildings
Six architects of international renown, representing the international, open-minded spirit that is such an important hallmark of a modern university, designed the buildings on Campus WU. The multi-faceted character of the campus architecture symbolises the diversity of disciplines, perspectives and research methods at WU. Uniformity and a one-size-fits-all approach are detrimental to any university. In order to thrive, a university must be a place that encourages and cultivates a broad diversity of approaches and perspectives. Despite their different appearances the buildings are all based on the same overall technical concept, standardised in terms of construction, energy supply, ventilation and sanitary facilities.
WU’s new campus – building the future by Eva Male
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Approximately 55,000 m2 of publicly accessible open space surround the six building complexes, the campus is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 365 days a year
The entire campus has been designed in accordance with “green building” principles. Seventy per cent of the required energy is obtained using geothermal groundwater. Durable, long-lasting materials were used in construction in order to minimise life-cycle costs. Further “green” features include energy efficient exteriors and technical equipment and a high percentage of renewable energy sources in energy generation and material use. Preference is given to local energy sources and materials. All buildings are equipped with heat recovery systems with an efficiency rate of 75% and occupancy-sensitive and daylight-sensitive lighting systems. WU has also implemented new green IT strategies, including data centre heat recovery systems across the campus. With these features, the new Campus WU places great emphasis on one of the key principles informing current social and political debates: sustainability. WU is firmly committed to sustainability in teaching, research and university management – both out of necessity and from conviction. One of the most important steps taken as part of this commitment was the establishment of a Competence Center for Sustainability at WU a few months ago. Another key feature of Campus WU is barrier-free accessibility. All auditoriums are specially equipped for people with disabilities, all areas are designed to be wheelchair accessible and the campus features a tactile guidance system for the visually impaired. We have not only made sure to comply with all the relevant legal guidelines in designing the new campus but we have also drawn on experience gained from best-practice examples. WU aims to play a pioneering role – in all respects.
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As well as bringing about an impressive improvement in the quality of WU’s buildings, facilities and equipment, the move to Campus WU has also prompted the university to rethink its own position and activities– a process of reorientation that is of vital importance for any modern business and economics university. In a world struggling with growing economic and social problems, we simply cannot go on using the same old economic decision-making processes that serve short-term, parochial or national interests while – seen from a global perspective – keeping a majority of the people on earth in a state of poverty and deprivation. A university such as WU that takes pride in educating leaders for business and society must accept its part of the responsibility for global economic and social developments. In this context, WU currently offers its students the highly popular courses Future-Oriented Business I & II. As well as an interdisciplinary, English-language masters degree programme in Socio-Ecological Economics and Policy. This provides students with the skills and knowledge to harness different theories and disciplinary perspectives for analysing and addressing important questions for the future. In addition to conventional business and management skills, WU also looks at issues of great importance for current global developments such as research on ageing, demographics and social responsibility. To conclude, WU is refocusing its activities in accordance with the following fundamental principles: • to make a sustainable contribution to a new and improved economy • to encourage a diversity of perspectives on business, economics, and society • to foster an international and open-minded attitude towards academic, intellectual exchange and real-life business practice • to stimulate innovative thinking to create new ways of dealing with business and economic phenomena of the 21st century.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Eva Male is press relations officer at WU. She was previously a journalist with Die Presse, an Austrian daily newspaper, working in Vienna and for several years as correspondent in Washington and Berlin.
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I
n May 2013 a group of deans and directors of business schools and corporate learning and development specialists met at EFMD’s Brussels headquarters drawn by the question: how do we drive change towards management education that serves a world in transition? They envisioned a shared journey and programme for business schools, other educators and corporate university leaders to build on insights developed through the 50+20 vision “Management Education for the World” and issued an invitation to a global network of committed peers to pilot and test responsible change in education and business. Less than a year since the meeting in Brussels the first “Management Education Innovation Cohort”, a group of 18 individuals representing 16 institutions (see box page 26) is actively driving three hands-on projects (described below) aimed at transforming management education in the service of society.
Shaping Management Education for the World John North and Anders Aspling detail the work of the first GRLI Management Education Innovation Cohort
Innovation in Action: Shaping Management Education for the World by John North and Anders Aspling
The changes imply that responsible and ethical behaviour should be an integral part of business schools’ values as well as strategy and should be reflected in their regular activities
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These recent developments reflect the need of business schools to contribute to the resolution of societal challenges and to act at all times as “good citizens”. This implies heavy demands on a school’s strategic and institutional development. However, questions arise over how to interpret the new standards, what constitutes quality in ERS, and how can we define and measure successful developments? The Innovation Cohort has set up the Values in Action (ViA) Project Group to evaluate and assess, using EFMD’s EQUIS accreditation scheme as reference point, the role and potential of accreditation in developing ethical and globally responsible citizens and its contribution to sustainability.
Project 1 Leveraging accreditation for change Integrating ethics, responsibility and sustainability (ERS) into all major areas of business schools and measuring its impact is an ongoing challenge in today’s management education world. The accreditation systems of both EFMD and AACSB International revised their accreditation standards and criteria in 2013 and established far-reaching demands that would integrate ERS into all major areas of business and management education. The changes imply that responsible and ethical behaviour should be an integral part of business schools’ values as well as strategy and should be reflected in their regular activities.
The Management Education Innovation Cohort is actively driving three handson projects aimed at transforming management education in the service of society
The project group is working to produce guidance for applying the standards in practice and establishing benchmarks to measure performance. The Cohort members will pilot these recommendations as part of their own strategic development process to meet and exceed the new standards. The group also aims to contribute to the understanding of the rationales and motives for integrating ERS into business schools, concentrating on the strategic “what” and “why” and not primarily on the operational “how”. ViA also seeks to define best practice among business schools and stimulate discussion on applying and assessing the new ERS Standards by business schools and peer review teams. The following key questions guide the work of the ViA Project Group: • What is a business school’s value proposition for strategically and systematically integrating ERS? • What are appropriate methods and tools to analyse ERS exposure and to assess the ERS performance and impact of business schools? • What are good practices for business schools in the different areas of activity addressed by the new standards?
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Project 2
Project 3
Motivating faculty to lead change The goal for this project is to create a framework for motivating faculty to integrate responsibility and sustainability into their offerings and approaches – a framework that change agents in business schools and business programmes can use in their own context.
Shifting to peer learning from “sage on the stage” A third group within the Cohort recognised that there are learning and development needs that are not being answered or met within current learning institutions and approaches. This project aims to engage with students, educators and business practitioners in an online learning experiment to explore the following challenge:
In developing the proposed framework, Innovation Cohort members are investigating and reporting on their own institutional understanding concerning the following questions: • What sustainability and responsibility related content is taught? • How is such content taught? • What are the most important challenges when teaching sustainability and responsibility related content? • What would help and motivate faculty to teach sustainability and responsibility related content? • How can we develop pedagogical methods, assignments and student performance evaluation criteria to support faculty in integrating sustainability and responsibility into their teaching content and methods?
The peer learning project has been actively experimenting with Google Hang Out to connect with people from diverse backgrounds – business leaders, consultants, academics and students – encouraging participants to explore and address their challenges through learning differently
“Thinking of the big long-term questions that you are facing about how management education can meet the societal and environmental needs of the world in the 21st century, what do you need to learn or understand that you cannot learn within your current learning environment?” The project aims to spark the development of innovative learning environments capable of inspiring and equipping a new generation of leaders to find their way into the future. In doing so this project has set these specific objectives: • I dentify the gaps in current learning regarding decisions in management that are truly good for the world ilot new forms of collaborative learning using •P advanced technology apture the shared learning that emerges as •C we make connections through dialogue across education and business boundaries By creating a space for people to explore ideas and connections, the project aims to enable participants to co-create their own learning agendas and discover their own benefits, which may include: •C onsciousness of different perspectives around a shared agenda earning how others are dealing with these •L questions in their own environments aking mutually beneficial connections outside •M their own organisations The peer learning project has been actively experimenting with Google Hang Out to connect with people from diverse backgrounds – business leaders, consultants, academics and students – encouraging participants to explore and address their challenges through learning differently. Topics to date have been wide-ranging: from how young people conduct collaborative business using social media to leveraging cross-cultural awareness and expertise when establishing enterprises in developing markets. These conversations have generally been characterised by a willingness to listen and to understand further diverse experiences and perspectives. Participants bring what really matters to them in terms of their unique experience shaped by their values and participate with great energy and an enthusiasm to learn more.
Innovation in Action: Shaping Management Education for the World by John North and Anders Aspling
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Facilitation of the Innovation Cohort The core GRLI team of Nick Ellerby, Claire Maxwell, Anders Aspling and John North facilitates this participant-directed programme, which is built on a framework incorporating Whole Person Learning and a Theory-U process. It builds on insights developed through the 50+20 vision and GRLI’s 10 years of experience developing unique learning facilitation and methodology. The Cohort operates along the same guiding principles that inform Communities of Responsible Action and the GRLI itself. From the outset it was agreed that the Cohort’s work would answer to the key dimensions of: • Result orientation – will it deliver visible results on the ground? •L ong-term effects – will it live on and continuously affect the development of globally responsible leaders and practice? • Uniqueness – will it get things done that could not be achieved elsewhere? Along with these criteria the Cohort also agreed to undertake its work being mindful of the following: • To encourage development through innovation with others • To mobilise both our collective and individual potential • To work with learning approaches that seek to offer both safety and freedom • To prepare the self as an instrument of change Underlying this approach is an acknowledgement and desire to develop globally responsible leadership and practice at individual, organisational and systemic levels – or, put differently, through “me”, “we” and “all of us”.
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The Innovation Cohort builds on insights developed through the 50+20 vision and GRLI’s 10 years of experience developing unique learning facilitation and methodology
In parallel, the facilitation team is exploring the principles and terms of engagement that will enable future Management Education Innovation Cohorts to continue the work. It is commonly felt that what is done is not done elsewhere and that it represents a new, different and emerging format of genuine and effective peer learning.
It is commonly felt that what is done is not done elsewhere and that it represents a new, different and emerging format of genuine and effective peer learning
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THE FIRST MANAGEMENT EDUCATION INNOVATION COHORT PARTICIPANTS ARE:
Anders Sandoff, University of Gothenburg – School of Business, Economics and Law Charles Cho, ESSEC Business School Daniel Serra, Universitat Pompeu Fabra – Barcelona School of Management
The journey of the first Innovation Cohort In the beginning each of the 18 participants representing 16 institutions prepared an overview on what they would like to contribute to the Cohort and also gain from participation in it. It was clear from the outset that this was a group of dedicated and committed change agents who were willing to engage fully in a process of co-learning and co-creation. Within a day and half of the first cohort meeting held at University of St Gallen in Switzerland in October 2013, the group organised itself into the three working clusters or projects. At the second meeting in New York in January 2014, Innovation Cohort members accompanied faculty and students of The New School (a progressive university in New York city, founded in 1919) on visits to five project sites of community-engaged innovation. The projects address a range of local challenges – connecting fresh food access to under-served communities, running a food truck business employing formerly incarcerated young people, rebuilding housing in Brooklyn after Hurricane Sandy and reimagining the juvenile justice system. The third meeting at Oulu Business School in Finland in March reinforced the Cohort’s sense of purpose and the understanding that changing the face of content, pedagogy and impact of management education requires a hands-on collaborative “do-tank”. The learning and journey to date is perhaps best summarised by cohort participant Daniel Serra, Dean at Barcelona School of Management and host of the upcoming fourth and final meeting in June, who says: “I am learning that innovation is not about me, it’s about the people we serve.”
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
This article was produced with input from all the participants of the first Management Education Innovation Cohort. Anders Aspling is the Secretary-General, Globally Responsible Leadership Initiative (GRLI) and Professor, Tongji School of Economics and Management, Shanghai. John North is the Head of Projects, Globally Responsible Leadership Initiative.
Edith Littich, Vienna University of Economics and Business Francesco Rullani, LUISS University Guido Carli – LUISS School of Business and Management Graham Boyd, Learning Transfer Systems Leticia Greyling, Rhodes University – Rhodes Business School
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In the beginning each of the 18 participants representing 16 institutions prepared an overview on what they would like to contribute to the Cohort and also gain from participation in it
Mark Reno, Western University – Ivey Business School Mary Godfrey, Bettys & Taylors Group Mary Watson, The New School Mathias Falkenstein, LUISS University Guido Carli – LUISS School of Business and Management Olivier Brenninkmeijer, Business School Lausanne Philip O’Regan, University of Limerick – Kemmy Business School Rudolf Müller, Maastricht University – School of Business and Economics Satu Nätti, University of Oulu – Oulu Business School Sheila Killian, University of Limerick – Kemmy Business School Sybille Schiffmann, University of Plymouth – Plymouth Business School Thomas Dyllick, University of St Gallen For profiles on all the participants and more on the work of the Innovation Cohort please visit: www.50plus20.org/ic2014
APPLY NOW TO JOIN THE SECOND MANAGEMENT EDUCATION INNOVATION COHORT The experience and learnings from the first round of the Management Education Innovation Cohort will be used in starting and conducting the second. The first cohort passes on the torch both regarding learning related to the process and to results and outcomes of their work. EFMD member schools that are interested in joining the second intake of the Innovation Cohort are welcome to contact John North at john.north@grli.org. The programme is planned to start during the third quarter of 2014.
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Connect
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Share knowledge
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Amplify impact
Global Business School Network & EFMD Present a Joint Conference in Africa Hosted by GIMPA
Quality in Context Management Education for the Developing World
How do you define “quality” for management education in the context of the developing world? Explore the on-the-ground realities facing students, companies, governments and countries, and how to deliver the management education that they need.
4–5 November 2014 Accra, Ghana 3 November 2014: GBSN Annual Members Meeting and EFMD Accredtation Seminar at CIEBS Africa campus More information: www.efmd.org/africa www.gbsnonline.org/africa2014
Sponsored by:
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HOW DO YOU TEACH STUDENTS TO BECOME ENTREPRENEURS? RICKIE MOORE, WHO DOES JUST THAT, SHARES SOME IDEAS
UNCERTAINTY & THE ‘ENTREPRENEURIAL MINDSET’
Uncertainty and the ‘entrepreneurial mindset’ by Rickie Moore
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n entrepreneurial revolution is sweeping the globe. It is reported that 90% of all jobs today are created by entrepreneurs. If anything, it is entrepreneurs more than the central banks and governments that have kept the global economy alive over recent years. As under-developed economies transform into global economic powerhouses, individuals such as Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey are riding a wave that has taken their college-born ideas to a global audience of billions. Today, there are several initiatives underway to awaken the spirit of enterprise in citizens and firms across the world. From the freedom to act and the necessity to invent and innovate, today’s economy is increasingly an entrepreneurial one. As a major stakeholder and contributor to the economic ecosystem, business schools have a key role to play in the training of entrepreneurs and developing the entrepreneurial capacity of future business leaders. While it is true that one does not need a college degree to start a business (see Richard Branson, Michael Dell, Bill Gates, David Geffen or Steve Jobs), going to business school to learn how to start a business can make a huge difference. It offers the opportunity to learn from those that understand the challenges of being an entrepreneur and benefit from the rich diversity of talent, resources, connections and fertility of the business school environment. Economist Frank Knight’s theory of the entrepreneurial function in modern enterprise helped frame the phenomenon of “uncertainty”. This constitutes one of the pillars of all entrepreneurial undertakings: outcomes in the future are known in advance and will materialise; outcomes in the future are not known in advance and will materialise; and, finally, known and anticipated outcomes in the future may not materialise.
90% It is reported that 90% of all jobs today are created by entrepreneurs – it is entrepreneurs that have kept the global economy alive over recent years
The notion of uncertainty therefore provides a useful backdrop for the comprehension of the entrepreneurial opportunity. Two schools of thought, competing yet complementary, condition how the phenomenon is perceived: • opportunities emerge because the entrepreneur is able to detect and/or discover a gap in an existing market that he or she is able to fill • opportunities are created because the entrepreneur is able to initiate a new gap in an existing market based on his or her ability to offer a new higher value-added or enhanced product or service. With uncertainty comes insecurity (there are lots of questions and doubts) and instability (the idea and several of its dimensions evolve as the value composition and proposition are defined and redefined) as predictability becomes a probability. The essence of entrepreneurial venturing can therefore be summarised as the identification (emergence or creation), evaluation (analysis and assessment) and the pursuit of the opportunity (organisation and implementation of the solution). Consequently, the number-one challenge for any business school with an eye on developing entrepreneurs is how to stimulate and create appropriate entrepreneurial mindsets among its students in order to enable them to pursue entrepreneurial opportunities. • How do you provide the best entrepreneurial education? • How do you develop appropriate entrepreneurial postures and overcome the barriers of nurturing an entrepreneurial spirit and ambition? • How do you coax the “correct” entrepreneurial behaviours out of students together with the accompanying skill, talent and tool sets?
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While the educational environment and resources are critical factors, the answer to developing the entrepreneurial mindset lies in the pedagogy. What is needed is an approach that allows the student to become totally comfortable in highly uncertain environments, to identify an attractive opportunity and to pursue it. At EMLYON, an international business school in France, I use three over-arching principles – Exposure (including examples), Exploration and Encouragement – to guide my teaching. And I challenge my students to use Experience and Experimentation to guide their learning. The business school environment allows for an abundant exposure to the world of entrepreneurs. Students interact with local role models and entrepreneurs at various stages of their journeys and through our courses and projects we encourage our students to overcome their inhibitions and embrace entrepreneurship. A key component of the entrepreneurship education portfolio is our business incubator, the longestestablished in Europe. Over 90% of the businesses that have been set up through it survive beyond their first five years. Since its inception, over 1,100 projects have been launched and over 800 companies registered, generating over 20,000 jobs in the process. Success stories include Verycook, whose French founder Alexandre Carre already had the seed of an idea for a business that designs and sells plancha grills – an alternative to barbecues. Arnold Ferlin and Renaud Marin, founders of bio-tech company Anastom Surgical, met on the MBA programme a couple of years ago and developed the technology behind UroLink, a unique circular suturing device specifically to assist surgeons during prostate cancer surgery. Julien Gillet-Daubin has teamed up with Gilles Devillers and Nicolas Foray to create Neolys Diagnostics which has developed two highly innovative diagnostic tests that enable radiation oncologists to customise radiation treatments for solid-tumour cancer patients thereby increasing the effectiveness of the protocol and reducing the negative risks and consequences of suboptimal or over radiation.
The pedagogical intention is that students must learn to venture and take decisions in situations of uncertainty and without any guarantee of success
Uncertainty and the ‘entrepreneurial mindset’ by Rickie Moore
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Throughout it all, they benefit from the resources of the school (faculty, infrastructure, alumni, etc.) and its extensive network (corporate partners, specialist agencies, etc.). We enable them to develop their self-confidence, and we guide and aid them in their endeavors.
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Since EMLYON’S business incubator’s inception, over 1,100 projects have been launched and over 800 companies registered, generating over 20,000 jobs in the process
Equipped with this new “second nature” approach, graduates are then able to identify high-potential opportunities in an uncertain and unpredictable environment – and are much more comfortable in pursuing these opportunities and finding ways around problems. However, developing this approach is no walk in the park. Embracing entrepreneurship and uncertainty is not for everyone and there is a lot of risk involved. From the outset, students have to generate and evaluate compelling business ideas while forging their project teams. Some ideas will be rejected and initiators may find themselves as followers.
DOZ.com is a promising on-line marketing platform created by Anji Ismail and Faouzi El Yagoubi. Coming from two different schools, Anji from EMLYON Business School, and Faouzi from our partner school Ecole Centrale, the neighboring engineering school, Anji and Faouzi met in class and they combined their talents, initiatives and aspirations. Using the innovative curated content approach, DOZ revolutionises how companies brand their firms with the use of local and experts in over 30 countries.
90%
A key component of the entrepreneurship education portfolio is our business incubator, the longest-established in Europe. Over 90% of the businesses that have been set up through it survive beyond their first five years
Students are encouraged to use their own past experiences (and those of others) to aid them in identifying potential problems that they would have liked to solve. Next, they are forced to experiment with new techniques to solve a problem – often inspired by their own frustrations, learning challenges or the knowledge of their classmates. Finally, they are inspired to explore new opportunities and create new markets – things they perhaps would not try without the safety net of the business school around them and the support of their peers and teachers.
Rather than lapse into disappointment, students are encouraged to learn from the situation, sharpen their skills and hone their arguments. As they undertake the iterative journey of transforming their ideas into feasible opportunities, they are constantly challenged and taken out of their comfort zones. Some students struggle with the pedagogy. While for some the experience can be stimulating and exhilarating for others it can prove to be very destabilising and intimidating. Further, there is no guarantee of a successful outcome. The pedagogical intention is that students must learn to venture and take decisions in situations of uncertainty and without any guarantee of success. The bar of performance is quite high. EMLYON is a strong advocate and adept of the “flipped classroom”, an approach where each student must chart and assume responsibility for and take charge of his /her own development, even though they work in teams. Case studies are used to allow students to journey in the shoes of the entrepreneur and there is a strong “do it yourself” emphasis as to what the student would or would not do. This in situ / in vitroisation allows students to identify the advantages and limits of their own reasoning and experiential learning approach.
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We can tell when the cognitive shift occurs as the reasoning and behavior change dramatically, we can see the light bulbs going on! Unlike other subjects and contexts where students are in the consumer seat and are being served, in entrepreneurship they find themselves in the driver’s seat, charged with steering their own learning and the application of knowledge to their projects. Students who might excel in the more finite disciplines where there is always or mostly a “right” answer will have to learn how to “scope out” an entrepreneurial opportunity for their team and their project. It is very quickly possible to identify those students that are risk accepting, risk averse or risk resisting. We challenge students to “connect the dots” and “redesign businesses and processes”. They need to be creative and innovative. With the accompanying instability and insecurity inherent in the entrepreneurial journey it is truly a horse of a different colour! EMLYON MBA students have to get their hands dirty – they are forced to venture and to embrace risk, uncertainty and ambiguity, all the while developing their own approach – much as “real” entrepreneurs do. Sitting behind a computer screen in a classroom and trying to become an entrepreneur without going into the field or assuming that because they are educated or intelligent they will succeed as entrepreneurs is synonymous with the famous Descartesian saying – I think therefore I am.
However, such an approach leads to building and designing products and services not necessarily for customers, but for the “ideators”. It is one thing to learn by reading but you can learn much more by doing. Students enjoy the sense of achievement when they have been able to successfully transform their ideas into reality. The transformation journey is one of the richest most comprehensive mediums for entrepreneurial learning. In addition, when the students become business leaders and mangers themselves, they will have been prepared to lead and run entrepreneurial organisations, having had the exposure as a student. In essence, entrepreneurship is about the mastery of self, the mastery of opportunity and the mastery of the enterprise.
In essence, entrepreneurship is about the mastery of self, the mastery of opportunity and the mastery of the enterprise
The common perception of “what lies around us or before us is nothing compared to what lies within us” is correct and – as business schools – our responsibility is to unlock this often hidden potential. We can as institutions give our students fish to eat but they will become hungry soon after. However, if we teach them how to fish we will be empowering them forever. I see my students not as vessels to be filled but rather as engines to be started. My job is to provide the ignition. Teaching entrepreneurship is in essence developing the capacity within my students to go out and live their dreams. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
American Professor of Entrepreneurship, Rickie Moore, has been the driving force behind the entrepreneurial curricula and activities of the International MBA programme of EMLYON Business School, located in Lyon, France. EMLYON has just been ranked 10th for entrepreneurship in the global FT MBA ranking.
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Philippe de Woot, in an article based on his latest book, argues that economic actions based on ethical and political dimensions are increasingly essential
Rethinking enterprise by Philippe de Woot
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f there is a key trend in our time it is that of the progress of science and technology. This trend has become a steamroller whatever the vagaries of history and economic conditions. Science has undergone an unprecedented acceleration in the last century and several factors have contributed to this. The accumulation of knowledge and its rapid dissemination have provided researchers with broader and more ambitious research fields, with inter-disciplinary approaches and universal access to information that has fostered new and bolder research. Technological competition, now global, has expanded and multiplied the means of funding research and development. We have got to the heart of many secrets that seemed indecipherable just a few decades ago. We have discovered the mechanisms of life. We have come up with precise figures on the origin of the universe. We have discovered its first moments and are beginning to know “the music of the stars”.
Enterprise being the ultimate agent of economic and technical creativity, it was long believed that it automatically served the common good through the virtues of the market and its famous “invisible hand”
This question has intrigued humans since the beginning of civilization.
It is enterprise that transforms scientific knowledge and technologies, often as soon as they emerge, into products and services. By mastering the methods and tools of techno-science, enterprise has the power of knowledge behind its economic strategies.
Greek myths extensively discussed it and placed it in its proper perspective, which is that of creative impulse but also the concerns of men: pride and fear. For them, the creators of material progress played a major role in society. They were heroes – but damned heroes.
Techno-science constantly provides new opportunities and more powerful competitive weapons. It thus becomes a key element of economic development and competitive power. Enterprise is therefore the main mediator between science and society. Yet is it an agent of progress?
This approach leads to the question of whether men, these “ephemeral beings”, can appropriate mastery of technology without giving it a societal purpose or subjecting it to a broader vision of the common good. This a question that, in various ways, transcends history.
Questioning the purpose of enterprise and the development model that drives it means questioning material progress, its orientation and its ambiguities.
Enterprise being the ultimate agent of economic and technical creativity, it was long believed that it automatically served the common good through the virtues of the market and its famous “invisible hand”. The market economy has undoubtedly been a source of considerable progress for that part of humanity that it lifted out of poverty. Many leaders justify this system by saying that overall the benefits outweigh the disadvantages.
It is enterprise that transforms scientific knowledge and technologies, often as soon as they emerge, into products and services
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Today, the link between economic growth and the common good has become less clear. A globalised, neo-liberal approach has gradually “de-linked� economics from ethics and politics. Globalisation, the acceleration of techno-science and the lack of global regulation give the economic system autonomy and unprecedented power. It operates according to its own criteria: profitability, competitiveness, the race to win market share. In the absence of global regulation this approach tends to become dominant and impose a development model on us that has no purpose other than its effectiveness and dynamism. Led solely by its own instrumental logic, this model becomes increasingly ambiguous and paradoxical. While providing economic growth unprecedented in human history, our model runs out of control, pollutes, excludes and generates domination, injustice and social disintegration. Never has our ability to create wealth been greater and never has the absolute number of people in poverty been so high. Never has our scientific and technical knowledge been so great and never has the planet been so threatened. Never has the need for economic governance been so compelling and never have governments of nation-states been so toothless.
Never has our ability to create wealth been greater and never has the absolute number of people in poverty been so high
This raises the question of whether the current model is still politically and morally acceptable without profound change. One might even ask if we are not completely blinded to the excesses of it, if we are not complicit in its overall malfunctions and if it does not lead us into a kind of madness. Our model generates systemic risks that are not explicitly desired and are difficult to measure, albeit not unexpected, and whose consequences can endanger social harmony, existing regulations and institutions, and the planet itself. We are in a high-risk society that forces us to question ourselves, to take more responsibility and to invent new modes of co-operation and governance. The challenges of the 21st century are immense: implementing a more sustainable development model, maintaining markets and societies as open as possible, deploying entrepreneurial dynamism in the service of the common good, boosting employment, re-industrialising Western countries while promoting the development of emerging countries. How can we better focus our extraordinary creative capacity to meet the challenges ahead?
Rethinking enterprise by Philippe de Woot
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Many of them co-operate with capitalist enterprises that are inspired to transform their culture and meet their social responsibilities. This abundance of creativity brings with it new forms of enterprise, which, far from competing with more conventional forms, are an indispensable complement and a source of cultural inspiration.
By changing the culture of enterprise, it can be a powerful tool to better meet the global challenges of our century. Given the power it holds over resources, enterprise has a major responsibility
Enterprise is the central agent of our economic system. We focus on it not to impute to it full responsibility for the excesses and failures of our economic model but rather to outline the role enterprise could play in its transformation.
Many companies, among the most enlightened, have already begun this process. But alone they are not enough to restore the ethical and political dimensions to economic activity. Enterprise is obviously one stakeholder among others. The public authorities, social forces and civil society are expected to contribute to this transformation. Real cultural change drives leaders to rethink three major business functions: creativity and innovation (entrepreneurship), organising and leading a community (leadership) and serving the common good (statesmanship). The aim of the book is not to discuss in detail each of these functions but to outline some practical pathways for change toward restoring the ethical and political dimensions to economics.
By changing its culture, it can be a powerful tool to better meet the global challenges of our century. Given the power it holds over resources, enterprise has a major responsibility. Entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation are necessary responses to societal challenges. Although the current economic model is the source of major deviations, enterprise in the broadest sense can help correct many of them. From problem it can become solution. This approach is particularly realistic today given that creativity, innovation and entrepreneurial activity go far beyond the scope of capitalist enterprise and the market. Thousands of initiatives appear throughout the world to propose solutions: social entrepreneurship, the social economy, fair trade and so on. These are a sign of devolved and more accountable entrepreneurial activities.
ABOUT THE BOOK
To order your copy of ‘Rethinking Enterprise: Competitiveness, Technology and Society Restoring the ethical and political dimension to economic action’ go to www.greenleaf-publishing.com ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Philippe de Woot is Emeritus Professor at Louvain Catholic University in Belgium, where he taught Business Policy, Strategic Management and Business Ethics. He has led multidisciplinary research in these fields and is still actively committed to research and promotion of Corporate Social Responsibility.
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Most business schools will say they are international. Are they really? Andrew Crisp and Joanne Hession provide a checklist for both schools and potential students
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he recent CarringtonCrisp major study See the Future reported that 68% of respondent students are interested in studying abroad while 89% of all managers and directors agree that “good business education must develop understanding of business in different parts of the world”.
68%
The recent study See the Future reported that 68% of respondent students are interested in studying abroad...
Clearly internationalisation should be part of any business school offer but the question raised is this: If every school wants to be international, how can a school develop a stronger international brand than its competitors? Statements on business school websites telling potential students and stakeholders about how international, global, multicultural or multinational they are actually say very little. The task is to define what “international” actually means to, and at, your school.
YOUR BRAND
Traditionally, “internationalisation” primarily meant either attracting international students or building strong international academic networks. Associate Deans were appointed to develop internationalisation strategies around these twin issues. However, this narrow view of internationalisation has become outmoded and no longer serves the best interests of a school, its faculty or, most importantly, its students.
Developing an international brand
Developing an international brand by Andrew Crisp and Joanne Hession
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Could international accreditation help to differentiate a school?
89%
...while 89% of all managers agree that “good business education must develop understanding of business in different parts of the world”
Accreditation can certainly have a significant impact on the development of a school’s international branding and reputation. The major international business school accrediting bodies, led by the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD), AACSB International and the Association of MBAs (AMBA) have recognised an increasingly critical point: internationalisation is not about what a school can get, it is about what a school can be. What this means is that institutions need to start seeing internationalisation as a culture that can become part of and drive every aspect of a school’s activities. Internationalisation and accreditation In developing its EQUIS and EPAS accreditations, EFMD sought to ensure that schools appreciated the importance of developing an international culture within all layers of activity. EFMD made this clear by including internationalisation as a thread running through each standard. Thus, when describing their institutional context, schools should discuss their international strategy and international competitive position. Schools also need to address research in terms of international collaborations and international research impact. And when discussing programme portfolios a school should outline how the curriculum is preparing students for careers that will inevitably have an international aspect. AACSB and AMBA are also increasingly concerned with ensuring that the student experience is preparing them for an international business marketplace. Accreditation applications for both AACSB and AMBA now require that a school addresses this crucial issue.
What this means is that institutions need to start seeing internationalisation as a culture that can become part of and drive every aspect of a school’s activities
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The nine elements of internationalisation Clearly, it is imperative for business schools to look more broadly at the issue of internationalisation. What can help them is to examine their current activities in relation to what we call “The nine elements of internationalisation”. Students A truly international culture requires an international student body. How is your school developing this, in terms of full international degree students, incoming exchange students and outgoing exchanges? Equally importantly, how well do you support those students at your school? Faculty Students need to be presented with a perspective on business that reflects more than just a narrow national or regional bias. How international is your faculty? What proportion of your faculty is international by nationality? How many have spent significant periods studying or working abroad? How many received PhDs outside their home country? How many have been involved in overseas faculty exchanges or as visiting lecturers? What explicit policies are in place at the school level to build the “international” profile of the faculty? Research How much of your school’s research is aimed at an international audience? What proportion of output is published in international journals or delivered at international conferences? How many faculty are involved in international research collaborations? How many are on international editorial boards? International partners Many schools have a large portfolio of international partners developed over a long period. Schools need to bear in mind the old truism that “we are often judged by the company we keep”. In addition to academic partners, look at your corporate partners. A school that describes itself as international should be developing a portfolio of international corporate partners not merely regional ones. How strong is the range of partners that you have developed; how deep are the partnerships; what are the kinds of activities that you co-operate on?
Schools need to bear in mind the old truism that “we are often judged by the company we keep”. In addition to academic partners, look at your corporate partners
Curriculum Some of the most important opportunities to demonstrate internationalisation are in the classroom. Increasingly students want case studies from Asia, Africa, Latin and South America, and from emerging economies around the world. Students expect the careers they pursue on graduation to have an international component and are looking for an understanding of business that will enable them to work in such environments. Is your school systematically ensuring that students are provided with an education that will allow them to survive and prosper in a globalised world? Do all curricula need to incorporate global and intercultural issues? Do programmes utilise international cases as standard? Are international textbooks used? Do you involve international guest speakers or international teams? . Languages Proficiency in English is considered particularly important in business but as international trade becomes more diverse, other languages are increasing in importance. What is the language of teaching? How many students are offered (and take up) additional language courses? What is the range of languages available? How high have you set the bar for language abilities within your admissions requirements?
Developing an international brand by Andrew Crisp and Joanne Hession
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Communicating the brand A starting point in communicating the international nature of a school’s offer is having reliable data: •h ow many nationalities are there among students or faculty? •w hich international employers recruit graduates? •w here do students get jobs?; and such like. However, data can be manipulated, so it is important to go further. Case studies from students, faculty and employers that show what internationalism really means are a powerful tool.
Governance Developing an international culture requires a clear commitment to internationalisation at a senior management level. This must be clearly part of the overall governance structure. How can you show that governance at your school involves an international element? Do you have an international advisory board? Is your senior management represented on international boards? Strategy One issue looked at closely for any school that puts itself forward as “international” is its explicit internationalisation strategy. Is there a written strategy around internationalisation? Are you clear on who your international competitors are or do you see yourself only competing nationally? Do you monitor and explicitly try to develop your international reputation?
Are you clear on who your international competitors are or do you see yourself only competing nationally? Do you monitor and explicitly try to develop your international reputation?
Graduates Possibly the single most effective way to demonstrate that your school is truly international is to point to a body of alumni employed internationally, either working outside the country of your school or employed locally but in clearly international companies. Does your school monitor where your graduates are employed and the international nature of their employment?
One of the most common phrases in marketing today is the question: “How authentic is your marketing?” Students in particular are more likely to respond to authentic messages from students and alumni than to corporate “marketingspeak” One particular area where international students can help with communication is contact with prospective students. Having native speakers from applicant countries available to answer questions or providing at the very least a welcome message on a school’s website will make internationalisation real for a prospective student and enhance a school’s reputation as one that has a true culture of internationalisation. A commitment to internationalisation is a key potential differentiator for many schools. International accreditation may be one means for a school to position itself as international but it is not enough on its own to deliver a strong international brand. The nine elements of internationalisation can help a school to position itself as having a defined international culture. Understanding which international aspects of the school offer or which combination of elements are appropriate is the key to making internationalisation an active and positive part of a school’s brand. ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Andrew Crisp is co-founder of CarringtonCrisp and one of the authors of the See the Future report. For more information on the report, visit www.carringtoncrisp.com or email andrew@carringtoncrisp.com Joanne Hession is founder of QED Accreditation Advisors, an advisory company that has been successfully helping international business schools with their accreditation processes for almost 15 years. www.QEDAccreditationAdvisors.com
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THE SWEET SIDE OF ACCREDITATION
Gaining accreditation (and maintaining it) is a tough business. But Julie Perrin Halot and Rachael Weiss argue that it provides its own long-term rewards
Quality Street: the sweet side of accreditation by Julie Perrin Halot and Rachael Weiss
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he business school race for accreditations shows no sign of losing momentum. On the contrary, the number of schools entering their first accreditation process remains steady and those embarking on the long-term work of maintaining their accreditations continues to grow. Accreditation presents a challenge for many schools. They must decide how best to integrate the work done for accreditation into their organisational structures and processes and how to use the data gathered. Accreditation may often begin as an ad hoc project management response, resulting in a sometimes rather chaotic and stress-laden collection of data and production of reports. Many schools are now looking to move beyond this to a more sustainable means of embedding accreditation management into the life of their institutions. Accreditation labels on institutional websites and brochures carry significant clout in the eyes of many future students and other stakeholders. However, it is what we are doing with our accreditations internally that provides the greatest value.
Ideally, the quality process that we engage in by working to obtain or maintain accreditation should be synonymous with continuous improvement in our schools and should act as a key element in informing strategic planning and decision making. It is here that we are able to guarantee the quality sought by our stakeholders. We believe that two primary factors enable this and help us to address many of the challenges schools face. The first factor is organisational – the positioning of quality in the institution and the existence of a dedicated service. The second is operational – having the most efficient systems and processes possible for collecting data, reporting it and then converting it into a useable tool.
The quality process that we engage in by working to obtain or maintain accreditation should be synonymous with continuous improvement in our school
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Institutionalising accreditation – a Quality Office Every institution should have its own Quality Office staffed with a dedicated team – its size and remit depending upon the scope and resources of the school. We are sceptical about the long-term sustainability of treating accreditation as a project assigned to a faculty member or an administrator in addition to their “real job”. Accreditation needs to be embodied by a leader and a team of people with clear responsibilities in the process. A Quality Office needs to be a permanent part of the organisation with a mission to be responsible for accreditation during the first and subsequent review periods and to use it as a tool and guide for continuous improvement. This structure should engage with both pedagogical and administrative departments. Ideally, the Quality Office manager should report directly to the Dean and be a member of the executive team. He or she should also be a permanent member of the principal academic and administrative committees. This ensures that information is constantly being collected. It also ensures that development and decisions remain consistently informed by – and in compliance with – standards for good practice. A dedicated IT specialist who provides the link between available in-house data and the reporting requirements of both the school and accrediting bodies is also essential to the Quality Office. Equally important, this individual must play a key role in developing the tools necessary to capture data at its source and producing statistics and scorecards necessary to monitor activities in real time. Because of his/her knowledge of the accreditation requirements, the IT specialist will be able to assist school managers to structure and apply the information they are required to provide. Last (but in no way least), the Quality Office team plays a fundamental role in bringing staff and stakeholders together around a common objective to drive improvement and pursue excellence across the full range of the school’s activities .
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Operationalising accreditation – a system for data management The most challenging aspect of making use of an accreditation process in this way is gathering and presenting the evidence to support the narrative of the self-assessment documents. It is relatively easy to document journal articles and conference papers; it is harder to catalogue the full story around, for example, a school’s internationalisation or its corporate relations activities. Even so, the documentation of journal articles can prove a more complicated task than it might at first appear. Often, research output is collected in a university-wide system that does not classify output in precisely the ways required by accreditation. For this reason, schools must install systems to collect information already available and devise methods of further categorisation. This further categorisation, since it documents activity and output of staff, will always involve input from academic staff. Generally, the best method at this point of first collection is a survey to identify and provide data to be added to data already held. This can be stored in a database that must have the following characteristics: • Easy accessibility • Easy interface for academics and administrators to update • Output matches accreditation requirements • Robust data integrity maintenance Ideally, the system should be able to feed that information into other output requirements such as individual academic web pages, standardised CVs and annual reflection documentation. The information for accreditation will often have been collected previously – often several times – in different formats for different purposes. A tangible result of accreditation must be that data is held centrally and used efficiently, by both the school and its academic staff. The evidence collected for accreditation purposes needs to be accessible to individual academics for their own purposes, such as data for an annual self-reflection and showing individual contributions and developments against a school’s strategic imperatives.
Beyond the needs of the individual, the evidence must also be readily available as a key input into development choices and other decision-making processes. Internationalisation provides a good example of data that can be difficult to capture and maintain. Typically, internationalisation will have many facets in a business school, beginning with simple demographics of staff and students through student exchange activities, visiting scholars, module content, student extra-curricular activities, conference attendance and continuing up to research collaboration and dual degrees. Data will range from a school’s internationalisation strategy, its criteria for partnership at different levels, student experiences at exchange schools, academic research projects, case studies, university international fairs and so on. Not all of this can be captured in one neat database although the database should acquire everything that can be tabulated. Further mechanisms and repositories need to be implemented to capture these activities. Once a first accreditation has been gained, the focus of the school changes to accreditation maintenance and hence robust data collections. This will mean that different areas in a school need to absorb accreditation-related activities and data capture.
Quality Street: the sweet side of accreditation by Julie Perrin Halot and Rachael Weiss
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Staying with the example of internationalisation, it is likely that at a first accreditation, a school will have a well thought-out internationalisation strategy and a plan in place for increasing the reach and level of internationalisation activities. Typically, hiring policies, conference funding and marketing would be the first areas affected by a wide-ranging internationalisation strategy. But in order to implement continuous improvement, an accreditation presence needs to be maintained in each area affected by strategic change. Functional managers need to be aware of the strategic impact, of course, but also of the fit with accreditation so that data gathering and storing can take place continuously and meaningfully. The systems used can be relatively simple. Key to effective ongoing collection and analysis of accreditation-related data is an interconnected strategy in which accreditation is explicit and acknowledged and the strategic imperatives are communicated regularly throughout the school. This requires a combination of tools, such as • an integrated database • r eports with key data sets included and mandatory •a reporting system that is meaningful and integrated and processes, such as • regular database updates • regular meetings in which key reports are absorbed and actioned • feedback loops The implementation of post first-accreditation processes and tools is the immediate main focus of the Quality Office. These tools aim to streamline data collection and, more importantly, optimise data use and output for both the school and the individual academic.
Typically, internationalisation will have many facets in a business school, beginning with simple demographics of staff and students through student exchange activities, visiting scholars, module content, student extra-curricular activities, conference attendance and continuing up to research collaboration and dual degrees
This is one of the most valuable outcomes of accreditation for a school and provides a secure base for its future.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Julie Perrin-Halot is the Associate Dean/Director of Quality at Grenoble Ecole de Management in France. She joined the school in 1998 and as Head of the Centre for Quality and Institutional Development has guided the school through national and international accreditations and ISO 9001 certification. Rachael Weiss is Director of Accreditations at Kemmy Business School at the University of Limerick, Ireland. Prior to this she was Head of Student Experience and Accreditations at Sheffield University Management School, gaining EQUIS and AACSB initial accreditation for the school.
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Jan Ginneberge analyses the results of an EFMD survey into the current and likely future state of executive education
Where and how for exec ed? by Jan Ginneberge
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his article focuses on the trends and positioning of the three main stakeholder groups in executive education: learning and development organisations; consultancies and other alternative providers; and business schools as revealed by an EFMD survey. Figure 1 (overleaf) shows a summary of these trends. More details on the outcomes of the multi-perspective SWOTs are included in the text. Revenues and costs of executive education: confirming the difficult budgetary context Not surprisingly, the survey confirms the reduction of learning and development (L&D) budgets and the pressure on perceived high prices of all provided solutions. In this debate, corporate L&D organisations are considered to be strong in working on solutions that reduce the time off the job while alternative providers are keen to stress the opportunity to provide efficient, low-cost solutions – low-cost solutions that are perceived to be a threat to business schools.
Opportunities are perceived in extending development to a wider range of managers or to non-traditional audiences. In this respect, alternative providers are seen as the key beneficiaries of filling the gaps left by business schools
Evolution of executive education markets and clients: extended geographical reach and changing participant profile All providers tend to see a trend for the executive education market to expand geographically (into emerging markets) while companies see their biggest future challenge being the global delivery of solutions. And in this respect, providers are not perceived as being as global as they would need to be to deliver effectively a one-stop service. Providers also see much growth potential in the replacement of the baby-boom generation now giving up the helm of many companies. But corporate L&D organisations as well as business schools see the traditionally elitist approach of executive development as a risk. So opportunities are perceived in extending development to a wider range of managers or to non-traditional audiences. In this respect, alternative providers are seen as the key beneficiaries of filling the gaps left by business schools.
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The executive education value proposition: zooming in on human capital and business challenges A significant trend in the executive development value proposition is the integration of leadership development and talent management practices. Alternative providers are seen to be strong in this area with their interest in co-evolving with their clients as effectively joint providers. The opportunity for corporate L&D organisations is to tap into the wider human capital dimension. The biggest demand from corporate clients is a focus on business challenges. Corporate L&D organisations see this positioning of learning as a lever for transformation as a specific strength for them. This is boosted by a capacity to respond to explicit needs and a tendency to tread cautiously with regard to education fashions. Business schools, on the other hand, see their strength as an ability to generate insight. However, some survey respondents consider that business schools run the risk of failing to respond to the demand to connect to business challenges and missing the opportunity to create “Management Education 2.0” by remaining conservatively attached to their own business model. FIGURE 1: BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS OF THE TRENDS IN EXECUTIVE EDUCATION, CONSTRUCTED FROM SURVEY INPUT OF CORPORATE L&D DEPARTMENTS, BUSINESS SCHOOLS AND ALTERNATIVE PROVIDERS* •
canvas as developed by Osterwalder & Pigneur in Business Model Generation, Wiley, 2010
KEY ACTIVITIES
CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS
INTEGRATIVE APPROACH
IMPACT AND RELEVANCE
ACTION LEARNING
BUSINESS FOCUS
KEY PARTNERS
SOCIAL AND INFORMAL LEARNING
BS – AP – CORPORATE L&D ORGANISATIONS
QUALIFICATION PROGRAMME
CONCENTRATION SPECIALISATION (NICHE/ INDIVIDUALS)
KEY RESOURCES
PARTNERSHIPS
STAFF AND FACULTY
OUTSOURCING
KNOWLEDGE BRANDS BUDGET PARTICIPANTS
COST STRUCTURE
FLEXIBILITY CLIENT-CENTRIC VALUE PROPOSITIONS
CUSTOMER SEGMENTS
LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT TALENT MANAGEMENT FOCUS ON BUSINESS CHALLENGES
EMERGING MARKETS CHANNELS
BABY BOOMERS
IN-HOUSE DELIVERY
LOCAL/GLOBAL
ON-LINE AND BLENDED MOOCS (GOOGLE, APPLE, MICROSOFT, FACEBOOK …)
REVENUE STREAMS
Corporate L&D organisations, business schools and alternative providers all see an opportunity to better respond to the growing importance of proven impact and relevance of L&D projects
Where and how for exec ed? by Jan Ginneberge
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
Connecting to the executive development needs: the privileged domain of corporate L&D Flexibility and close alignment with the business combined with the unique opportunity to partner are considered core strengths of corporate L&D organisations. Alternative providers are also seen as client centric, given their agility, flexibility and adaptability. Business schools are aware of their opportunity for improvement in areas such as customisation and responsiveness to market conditions.
Growing variety of development activities and formats: traditional entry point of alternative providers Embedding learning in the business through action learning is a confirmed trend, complemented by the inclusion of social and informal learning practices. The latter are seen as a major challenge for their own positioning by corporate L&D organisations and business schools while alternative providers see a potential opportunity (particularly combining this approach with new technologies).
With respect to the understanding of client needs, the survey outcomes give mixed signals.
Embedding in the business is seen as an opportunity for business schools, especially when linking executive development to organisational development.
Corporate L&D organisations see a risk for themselves in not being strategic enough and are seen by other providers as potentially becoming too insular. Business schools see themselves in a symbiotic relationship with companies but are seen by others as neglecting individual needs. Alternative providers see opportunities to improve their understanding of client needs. All see an opportunity to better respond to the growing importance of proven impact and relevance of L&D projects. Evolving channels of executive education: new and challenging providers With respect to the channels for delivering executive development to clients, one trend is very clear: getting physically closer to participants, either by delivering on client premises or, more than ever, considering blended learning “journeys� that integrate extended on-line learning capabilities. It is interesting to note that some business schools still see their teaching facilities as a major strength. Across the three respondent groups, innovation and the use of technology are seen as major opportunities though on the provider side there is considerable ambivalence, with technology-based solutions seen as a major future threat. MOOCs were also mentioned as a potential entry route for new players in the executive development eco-system, while corporate L&D organisations are conscious of the risk of implementing technology for technology’s sake without a real strategy to back it up.
On qualification and certification programmes, there is no obvious path ahead as yet though key evolutions are expected in the future. For alternative providers this is perceived as a threat rather than an opportunity. While business schools pride themselves on their innovative strength, they are perceived as old fashioned in their approach by the other respondent groups and might benefit from exploring new learning approaches.
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Core executive education resources: faculty, academic content and brand as the traditional strongholds of business schools Staff and/or faculty will remain critical resources in executive development in the future. Respondents stress corporate L&D staff’s professionalism in education; business schools view faculty as their core strength; and alternative providers regard the reach of their resources as a crucial asset. But for corporate L&D organisations, positioning in the company and resource availability are challenges. For business schools faculty are also a constant source of concern, amongst others due the (reduced) perceived value of academic content. Alternative providers regard it as a strength to provide a different point of view though they are aware of the struggle to achieve and maintain the quality of their content-related resources. The other respondent groups sometimes used the label “non-academic” in this respect. Faculty and (academic) content are clearly part of the ‘battle of brands’ as defined by providers: L&D organisations risk singularity, stagnation and lack of independence hence credibility. Business schools have the challenge of thought leadership along with the risk of getting caught up in their academic reputation. Alternative providers still need to strengthen brands and credibility but have the opportunity of their consulting model. A constant pressure on resources for corporate L&D organisations, limited scalability for business schools and the problems of sustainability for alternative providers reveal a considerable resource stretch in the executive development world. One alternate perspective came from corporate L&D organisations mentioning participants as key resources for the future – potentially alongside the growing trend towards social and informal learning.
A constant pressure on resources for corporate L&D organisations, limited scalability for business schools and the problems of sustainability for alternative providers reveal a considerable resource stretch in the executive development world
Evolving partnerships: main trend for the future? Specialisation and differentiation, leading to concentration or diversification, are seen as key trends for the future. By some as opportunity; by others as threat. Partnerships are seen as the way forward. Corporate L&D organisations see an opportunity for themselves as lead actors; alternative providers see partnering as an opportunity. Business schools are rather apprehensive while aware of their dominant provider focus. The current hesitation over partnerships is showing in the mutual threat perspective held by business schools and alternative providers. However, it is clear to most that new players are going to be added to the mix and that they will disturb today’s fragile equilibrium. Questions moving forward In summary, the challenges for each of the three survey respondent categories could be stated as follows: an business schools maximise their current •C academic strengths while zooming in on human capital questions and business challenges? •C an alternative providers become trusted and respected partners while claiming their place with innovations in development activities, formats, channels and partnership models? •C an corporate L&D organisations build credibility as challenging partners for executives while being heavily embedded in their businesses? This article is dedicated to Gérard Mangin, who unfortunately passed away early this year. Gérard co-designed the survey and co-edited the clustering of the answers. Unfortunately he was not able to finish the work we started by co-authoring this piece. We have lost a valuable “companion on the route” in the quest for excellence in executive development.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jan Ginneberge is a special advisor to EFMD
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JAN HAGEN SUGGESTS THAT THE AVIATION INDUSTRY’S OPEN APPROACH TO IDENTIFYING AND RESOLVING ERRORS COULD BE APPLIED TO MANY OTHER SECTORS
Error management: not just a wing and a prayer by Jan Hagen
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he financial markets crisis began in 2007 and unfolded with increasing severity. At the time, we were dumbfounded that big-name banks had taken such disproportionately high risks with their structured securities.
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Many of us saw the investment banking sector’s remuneration system and the associated asymmetric risk distribution as the main causes of the crisis. We asked how things could have spiralled so far out of control, especially as even before the crisis some parties within the banks had urged caution. The question is why these warnings went unheard. Were they overlooked? Underestimated? What mistakes were made? How did they come about? Who failed to pick them up? And how were they allowed to trigger a series of further errors that ultimately had such dramatic consequences? However, banking is by no means an exception. There have been mistakes, errors, poor decision making, infringements, affairs and scandals in any and every industry and organisation you care to mention.
The question is why these warnings went unheard. Were they overlooked? Underestimated? What mistakes were made? How did they come about? Who failed to pick them up? And how were they allowed to trigger a series of further errors that ultimately had such dramatic consequences?
None of them appears to have had any effective controls in place that allowed them to intervene in time to prevent things going awry. Instead, those involved could only watch as fate ran its course. Let us take a look at normal day-to-day operations in a company. What happens if someone makes a mistake or takes the wrong decision? The issue here is not intentional misconduct, fraudulent behaviour, gross negligence or large-scale mismanagement. I am referring to the little mistakes, errors and poor decisions that occur every single day. (This is described in greater detail by Reason, J (1990) Human Error New York; Cambridge University Press.) Often we are not even aware of these blunders, though in complex environments, research shows we make errors every four minutes. (See Ruffell Smith, H P (1979) “A Simulator Study of the Interaction of Pilot Workload with Errors, Vigilance, and Decisions,� NASA TM 748482. Moffett Field, CA: NASA-Ames Research Center, pp. 14-21.).
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Mostly, errors are the result of momentary blackouts, a temporary short circuit in the brain, false impressions, deceptive memories, dots wrongly joined, fragments of conversation that we interpret incorrectly, prejudices, momentary feelings of mental imbalance, disorientation, stress and other disturbances. All this we could perhaps accept but our problem is that we believe we can and should be “right”, when in reality we start out with “quasi-right” at best and ideally adjust our decisions and actions as we proceed. The alternative –believing that we are right and later realising that we were wrong – creates a state of confusion leading to uncomfortable questions as to the validity of our convictions. Recently, my ESMT colleagues and I looked at how managers discuss errors made by their employees. Do they step in if a member of staff makes a mistake? Yes, we found out, most of them do. But do employees also say something if their superior gets his or her figures wrong or looks set to make a questionable decision? Here, we learned, people are far more reluctant to speak up. This is in line with previous research such as Edmondson, A (1996). “Learning from Mistakes Is Easier Said Than Done: Group and Organizational Influences on the Detection and Correction of Human Error”, Journal of Applied Behavioral Sciences, 32: 5–32 and Milliken, F J, E W Morrison and P F Hewlin (2003) “An Exploratory Study of Employee Silence: Issues that Employees Don’t Communicate Upward and Why”, Journal of Management Studies, 40 (6): 1453–1476. Another question was how managers address errors made by employees, colleagues and superiors? Our survey revealed that if they discovered an error made by an employee or colleague, 88% of managers would raise the issue privately, 11% would discuss it openly and just 1% would ignore it. When it comes to pointing out a mistake made by someone higher up the ranks, 86% would do so in private. Only 4% would be prepared to broach the issue openly. And 10% would rather keep any knowledge of an error made by their superior to themselves. We asked managers how their own employees, colleagues and superiors speak to them about errors. Just 54% said they would mainly do so in private; 18% said mistakes were addressed in a more open forum. And a further 28% assumed they were never actually made aware of their mistakes. However, these figures do not tally with the previous results. Of those questioned, 88% claimed that they would generally address errors made by others in private. Yet only 54% believed they are being informed of errors in this way. In contrast with the 11% quoted earlier on talking about errors openly,
18% said their own errors are discussed in front of other people. That could be because this experience has stuck in their minds more than those occasions when they addressed others’ mistakes in a public. What does this mean for companies? No doubt, most still have a long way to go before error management becomes a regular part of day-to-day work life despite the fact that, according to our study, most managers accept errors as being a normal part of the work culture. Yet, there is one aspect that does not match this conviction; namely, the overwhelming preference for discussing errors in private and involving as few people as possible. Mistakes, in other words, are still associated with shame and embarrassment. Yet factual error management can work and be successful. Since the second world war, research into air accidents, for example, has had the aim of identifying the causes of accidents, avoiding any recurrences and increasing overall safety. In addition, at the start of the 1980s, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) developed a concept to address the problem of accidents and the mistakes leading to them. Today we call it Crew Resource Management (CRM). (See Wiener, E L, B G Kanki and R L Helmreich (Eds) Cockpit Resource Management, San Diego, CA: Academic Press.) It focuses on co-operation between the flight crew and, above all, on reducing barriers between the captain, cockpit crew and cabin crew due to their hierarchical positions. Thus, for example, captains are trained not to use commands and voice their own assessment when solving non-normal situations but to first collect the assessments of the other crew members. This form of communication avoids framing and leads to an active exchange of information. All pilots, but especially first officers, are trained to focus on facts when communicating the error they have observed, rather than blame the crew member committing the error. (You say, “watch speed – 10 knots above approach speed” instead of “you are not flying at the correct speed”). At this point, I should emphasise that neither captains nor crews were or are a unique phenomenon. However, unlike their counterparts in the everyday corporate environment, they have by now learned to use a range of strategies to counteract the negative effects of someone making his or her business decisions unchallenged. Of course, the question is how a system as highly successful as CRM can be implemented in everyday business life. After all, unlike most other industries, aviation is a high-risk industry. Most managers do
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54% of managers said their own employees, colleagues and superiors speak to them about errors mainly in private; 18% said mistakes were addressed in a more open forum, and 28% assumed they were never actually made aware of their mistakes
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not arrive at work each day knowing that they are responsible for the safe transport of hundreds of people. They are, however, in charge of business processes, the success of their particular division and for keeping their work force employed. So the number of errors they make should be limited as well. From this perspective, the answer to the question above is simple: error management is relevant to every organisation that wishes to reduce error volumes be it in a high-risk industry or not. In fact, most organisations will already have taken steps in this direction by trying to eliminate potential error sources and attempting to analyse and resolve errors that do occur. Still, there is a fundamental difference between the traditional approach to preventing errors and the error management strategies used in CRM.
88% 4% Our survey revealed that if they discovered an error made by an employee or colleague, 88% of managers would raise the issue privately, 11% would discuss it openly and just 1% would ignore it
When an error is made by someone higher up the ranks, 86% would only discuss it in private, just 4% would be prepared to broach the issue openly, and 10% would rather keep any knowledge to themselves
Captains are trained not to use commands and voice their own assessment when solving non-normal situations but to first collect the assessments of the other crew members. This form of communication avoids framing and leads to an active exchange of information, focusing on facts when communicating the error they have observed, rather than blame the crew member committing the error
Conventionally, errors are stigmatised as individual weaknesses, whereas modern error management accepts them as an unavoidable aspect of human behaviour. While both strategies seek to avoid errors, the former puts them in a negative light and associates them with embarrassment, shame, fear and punishment. In the latter, those who have made the errors might become annoyed at themselves but they need not fear any sanctions from others. Instead, they – ideally together with others –analyse what led to the mistake and eliminate this so that it will not be repeated and continue to cause problems. So how do we actually implement error management? Thankfully, the aviation industry has led the way with the CRM programme. The only condition that cannot easily be replicated is the internal mindset needed for this endeavour. Among other things, it requires the effort to replace old habits with new ones and vary or revise familiar thought patterns. Error management thus begins with a new mindset that has internalised that errors are normal and have to be accepted. As far as the larger organisational error management is concerned, its implementation has to start as a top-down management decision though the overall success will depend on individuals and teams. The scope of the change of mindset must however not be underestimated: in aviation it took pilots more than ten years to accept CRM – but the safety record of today speaks for its success.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jan Hagen is an associate professor at ESMT European School of Management and Technology, Berlin, Germany, and author of Confronting Mistakes: Lessons from the Aviation Industry when Dealing with Error (Palgrave MacMillan, UK, 2013)
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THE EFMD (ESMU)/HUMANE WINTER SCHOOL IS DESIGNED TO DEVELOP THE LEADERSHIP POTENTIAL OF SENIOR ADMINISTRATORS IN BUSINESS SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES. NADINE BURQUEL LOOKS BACK AT ITS FIRST 12 YEARS
Warm memories of the Winter School by Nadine Burquel
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hen the European Centre for Strategic Management of Universities (ESMU) and the Heads of University Management and Administration Network in Europe (HUMANE) launched their Winter School in 2003 they were eager to train the next generation of European university senior administrators. The aim was also to develop a cadre of professional senior university administrators and encourage them to network across Europe. The belief was that senior leaders and managers must be able to understand the global challenges facing their institutions; and acquire the necessary skills to lead their institutions through complex developments. The HUMANE network was launched in the mid-1990s to promote the professional development and networking of university heads of administration in Europe. Through the integration of the activities of ESMU into EFMD in 2013, the Winter School is now undergoing exciting new developments in the global context of EFMD’s activities. Business schools and universities have seen tremendous changes in the last few years. Global competition for talent has risen significantly while public funding has decreased and new information technology offers opportunities to address new markets. It has more than ever become vital to face complex changes and establish a strong brand and reputation. The Winter School is a major international leadership development programme in higher education management which is unique at the European level. It brings together senior administrators from business schools and universities from all over Europe. Participants are supported by their heads of administration or heads of school. They submit a detailed application to their school or institution outlining their interest and their reasons for wanting to attend the Winter School. This often follows an internal selection procedure.
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A Steering Committee of EFMD and HUMANE representatives selects the best candidates out of each year’s applications and accepted 40 applicants (a record number) for the 2014 session. The Winter School will expand as demand grows and is now considering offering multiple editions in different parts of the world. The programme is delivered over five days, currently at the Continuing Education Centre of the Universitat Politecnica de Valencia in Spain, a dynamic university that has had a significant impact on regional innovation. Its purpose is to develop the leadership potential of fast-track administrators and make them fully aware of the importance of integrating academic matters with financial, human resource and quality assurance issues. It also emphasises the importance of strategic management in European and global contexts. The programme offers short, mainly informal lectures delivered by higher-education experts and “reflective practitioners”. There are many opportunities for networking through case study and group learning as well as social events throughout the week. The first day of the Winter School aims to give participants a sense of the internationalisation and globalisation of higher education and the implications for institutional strategies. Over the years Frans van Vught, a leading higher education expert, (former Rector of Universiteit Twente in the Netherlands and former president of ESMU), has taken participants through EU policies in education, research and innovation and the practical implications for their institutions. The programme also discusses changes at systemic and institutional levels such as national stratification strategies, rankings, accreditation and benchmarking as well as the need for institutional profiling and branding. During the week participants are placed in small groups to work on a case study. This is an important experience as senior managers from different contexts, types of institution, senior positions and management styles are challenged to work together and propose a strategy to merge a large university with a large research centre, looking at the implications for staff management, finances, properties and communication. “We learned that what we took for granted had to be renegotiated,” says one former participant. “We had to find the best collaborative approach. It took us quite some time before our international team could be fully effective. This was the great learning point in the Winter School.”
Another defining moment is when participants go out to find good tapas bars in Valencia old town and work on the case study that runs throughout the programme. With good food and wine, groups debate the challenges of the strategic management of higher education institutions in a creative environment. Though there are some stressful moments experienced by the groups in delivering their written assignment to the School Steering Committee there are other similar moments of fun in sharing ideas and working on collaborative solutions. The Steering Committee reviews all proposals based on the case study and offers valuable feedback. A strong learning point is the final session on “What really happened with the merger”. The case is based on the collaboration between Karlsruhe Universität and a large research centre in Karlsruhe to form the new Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). The merger received major initial funding through the Excellence Initiative of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the German Research Foundation. This aims to promote high-quality innovative research and enhance the international presence of German universities. Several other sessions also touch on the issue of mergers in higher education since strategic partnerships, acquisitions and integration are now common around the world. From one Winter School alumnus we heard about the challenges related to the communication strategy of Aalto University in Finland, the result of a merger between Helsinki University of Technology, the Helsinki School of Economics, and the University of Art and Design Helsinki.
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A Steering Committee of EFMD and HUMANE representatives selects the best candidates out of each year’s applications and accepted 40 applicants (a record number) for the 2014 session
Warm memories of the Winter School by Nadine Burquel
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By the final day participants are friends for life and always part with heavy hearts after such an intensive week together. But this is only the start. Every year, the Winter School Alumni Network (WSAN) organises a seminar that reconnects participants. There are now more than 300 alumni, a tremendous pool of talent and expertise in higher-education management ranging from HRM, finances and quality management to communication and internationalisation. In 2013 WSAN held its annual seminar at Oxford University in the UK looking at the challenges of globalisation. In the autumn of 2014 alumni will meet at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. The Steering Committee is instrumental in shaping the developments of the Winter School and the week’s programme. The Winter School take great care in evaluating what it does, listening to feedback from participants and making regular adaptations to the programme. When the Winter School meets each spring School staff will have been working on the programme for the previous year with the local hosts and with speakers. A highlight of the March 2014 edition was the contribution of Hubert de Neve, Vice-President of IMEC, a major R&D company specialising in nanotechnologies. IMEC started more than 20 years ago as a spin-off from Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium. It now employs almost 2,000 staff around the world. His presentation explained how to organise the work of professionals in a way that combines their professional and individual passions with the need for alignment, procedures and regulations in large organisations. Leadership, governance and management always feature highly in every Winter School through case studies (the last one was on how to tackle the increasing problem of academic fraud), external and internal governance arrangements such as higher education systems at national and supranational levels and the impact on institutional autonomy, and personal leadership issues and styles. Participants often dread “the finance day”. That is before experiencing the fun of the financial session delivered by Ian Creagh, Head of Administration and College Secretary of King’s College London in the UK. The session discusses the principles and practices of strategic financial management, the critical success factors for institutional financial health, and the need to align financial and academic strategies, often in a very amusing way.
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There are now more than 300 Winter School alumni, with talent and expertise in higher-education management ranging from HRM, finances and quality management to communication and internationalisation
Inès Proenca, the Winter School Co-ordinator, develops a close relation with all the participants in the months prior to the programme, first at the application stage then during the pre-course tasks and readings assigned to participants. Eric Cornuel, Director General and CEO of EFMD, believes the Winter School is a powerful programme that allows leaders and managers in business schools and universities to enhance their institutional capacity to build strength in global contexts. We need to adopt strategic management approaches. We need to promote strong leadership and management to take our institutions further in new directions. And we need to measure the impact of what we do.
Leadership, governance and management always feature highly in every Winter School through case studies ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Nadine Burquel is Director of the Winter School for Senior Administrators. She has worked on higher education developments in Europe for the last 20 years and has directed the Winter School since its launch in 2003.
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Danielle Steele and Liane Weitert describe how six business schools from around the world have joined forces to make the idea of applied interaction a reality
How many business schools does it take to change the world?
Because we are training the leaders of tomorrow, we have a responsibility to ensure that our students recognise the important role they will play in developing socially responsible business practices
How many business schools does it take to change the world? by Danielle Steele and Liane Weitert
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n 2010, Dr Pierre Tapie, former Dean of ESSEC Business School in Paris, France, questioned what role business schools were playing in solving some of the world’s pressing societal issues. He recognised the enormous potential schools can have in finding or creating relevant, sustainable solutions to these global issues and determined to turn the theory of interaction between business and society into a reality. Dr Tapie set out to create a global think-tank, an international network of leading business schools, which could contribute to problem solving from different, country-specific perspectives. The idea was to have each of the partner schools involve their networks – from researchers and students to corporate, political and non-governmental collaborators – to form a global alliance. In the end, six business schools came on board, with a common belief in the power of academic excellence, global outlook, innovation, social responsibility, humanism and transformational leadership, to form the Council on Business & Society. “Because we are training the leaders of tomorrow, we have a responsibility to ensure that our students recognise the important role they will play in developing socially responsible business practices,” says Jean-Michel Blanquer, Dean of ESSEC Business School. And Xiongwen Lu, Dean of the School of Management Fudan University in China, a member school of the Council, adds that “society is a big platform for any enterprise involved in higher education. As a leading institution of higher learning in China, we have a responsibility to proactively contribute our thoughts, insights, research and findings to benefit not only the international academic community but also the global economy”. A series of conferences, known as International Forums, is one of the key elements of the Council’s work. Although the six partnering schools are located on different continents, they mutually set the agenda for researchers, students, politicians, and representatives of corporations and NGOs. Many months of preparation, co-ordinated via countless emails and video conferences, precede the forums, which bring together all involved for a rewarding and motivating experience. The personal exchange during the forums also gives an enormous boost to the joint research that flanks the conference preparations on a long-term basis. “Motivation and mutual trust are essential when it comes to the Council’s organisation,” explains Christian Koenig, Associate Dean of Strategic Partnerships and International Relations at ESSEC and the Executive Director of the Council. “Communicating with the faculty and staff of six business schools in different countries has its challenges.” It all starts with organising video conferences, which take into account the time differences for each of our partners. When, for those of us in Paris and Mannheim, the call starts at 12pm. (lunchtime), it is already 7pm (dinnertime) for the Council team at Keio Business School in Tokyo and a mere 6am (coffee time) for our colleagues at Tuck School of Business in Hanover in the US.
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Also, in addition to any technical difficulties that might hinder communication, video conferencing means we also have to keep in mind countryspecific characteristics and methods of communication as well as different accents. During our calls, the different communication styles, cultural preferences and different decision-making processes become a lesson in cultural diversity and UN-style diplomacy. During the run-up to the International Forum, Council members, headed by the Board of Deans, are in constant contact. Although the forums are hosted by each of the partner schools on a rotating basis, all decisions related to the event have to be agreed by each school. All stages of the process from the conception of the forum’s theme to the implementation and logistical organisation are based on group consensus and the various responsibilities are subsequently distributed among the schools. Communication between the faculty and staff of the member schools is vital and as a result of our continued efforts the partnership between our institutions has strengthened significantly. Council Executive Director Koenig adds: “The Council network has opened doors for joint projects in line with the mission of the Council. Our students collaborate on long-term projects such as the international student survey that examines a different topic each conference year. They also bring life to the Council’s social media channels by contributing to the Council Community blog and tweeting about the conference topics as well as topical issues related to business and society. Of course, as a reward for their engagement, these students are invited to attend the conferences and make presentations”. “We share the feeling that there should be an equilibrium of power and respect for both sides: social well-being and economic progress. Of course, it is a constant struggle. Our job is to give our students the tools to manage the balance,” adds Dean Juergen M. Schneider of University of Mannheim Business School in Germany, another member school. The first International Forum, organised by ESSEC, was held in Paris in November 2012 and focused on the theme of “Corporate Governance and Leadership”. This year’s conference, hosted by Keio Business School on March 6-7, 2014 in Tokyo, was the second the Council has organised.
This is what the Council on Business & Society, and particularly the International Forum, is about: global understanding, intercultural exchange, learning from each other, and sharing research results and business expertise that promote innovative approaches to problem solving
How many business schools does it take to change the world? by Danielle Steele and Liane Weitert
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“We need to tell people in different countries about the benefits of the Japanese way of thinking. Partially because of the language barrier and partially because of a commonly held mentality to not aggressively self-promote, important messages are not delivered. This is a big challenge for Japanese business leaders,” says Hirokazu Kono, Dean of Keio Business School in Japan, a member school. Where is the Council on Business & Society heading? Certainly, we will continue to disseminate the results and key takeaways from the forums and with this strive to make an impact on society in general. Extending the partner network and including more business schools from different regions are also on the long-term agenda. For the near future, the alliance has launched its Annual Dean’s Paris Seminar series, the first of which will take place in September this year. This seminar series will reflect on how business schools can affect business and society and on joint projects such as shared courses and research projects. Our alliance is also looking forward to the next forum, which will be hosted by Tuck School of Business in autumn 2015. The forum will focus on the theme of Energy and Environment. More than 230 participants came together to discuss “Health and Healthcare: At the Crossroads of Business and Society”. Discussions revolved around questions such as why corporate health management is important; what are the challenges for the health care industry in ageing societies; and what are the latest innovations and technologies in health care.
“The globalisation of business schools has followed the globalisation of business in the world. By now, it is pretty complete. No one thinks of a pure American point of view the way we used to. It’s no longer an American-centric world,” concludes Paul Danos, long-standing Dean of Tuck School of Business, who is retiring this year.
“With the aging societies that you have in the developed world, health care is a huge and important issue. But it’s also an important issue in emerging countries. It must be addressed not only from a public perspective but a private one,” says Dean Maria Tereza Fleury of member school Fundação Getulio Vargas EAESP in Brazil.
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More than 230 participants came together to discuss “Health and Healthcare: At the Crossroads of Business and Society”
For two days, healthcare experts and researchers shared their unique views – which differed due to their cultural as well as professional backgrounds – about diverse issues related to health and what role businesses can play in helping to solve some of the pressing healthcare issues. This is what the Council on Business & Society, and particularly the International Forum, is about: global understanding, intercultural exchange, learning from each other, and sharing research results and business expertise that promote innovative approaches to problem solving.
ABOUT THE COUNCIL
The Council on Business & Society is a collaboration between ESSEC Business School (France),Fundação Getulio Vargas EAESP (Brazil), Keio Business School (Japan), School of Management, Fudan University (China), Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth (US) and the University of Mannheim Business School (Germany), who together endeavour to implement a multicultural, multi-school process to study the critical issues facing business and society, organise a series of international forums and develop and disseminate educational materials designed to foster continued debate on these themes. www.councilonbusinessandsociety.com ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Liane Weitert is the Head of Communications and Corporate Relations at the University of Mannheim, Business School and Danielle Steele is the International Communications Officer at ESSEC Business School and the Communications Coordinator for the Council.
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H N T O W I T O R A V G O R N FO IN n
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n at io nov t a ov n in n In pea on uro up E ro for G el ach v Le ro h app g i H w e e th a n w g ho nin s in ig la des p ex is s nt r e pe em e h g Sc ana n a M ef y St olic P
Innovation for growth by Stefan Schepers
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
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he High Level Group on Innovation Policy Management (HLG), a unique public-private partnership, comprising top-level representatives from European Union Member States, the European Commission, the European Council, business and academia, was launched in December 2011. The aim was create out-of the-box thinking and concrete proposals on how to enhance existing initiatives, develop and manage a more comprehensive innovation policy in the EU, and to boost sustainable growth and competitiveness.
Many elements of an innovation policy are already present in the EU but there is a need to develop a real innovation “ecosystem”: a set of ideas, institutions, instruments, policies and regulations
The group was deliberately structured as independent from the EU Commission or Member States. It has a tripartite composition: senior officials from the Commission and eight EU governments; 10 corporations from different industry sectors; and several academics plus a representative of the European Council President. All operate without mandate, under Chatham House rules, to ensure a truly open and creative approach. It has not focused on innovation in a particular area, such as, for example, the pharmaceutical or automotive sectors, as some other groups but on the framework conditions themselves that would stimulate innovation in the EU. Innovation policy is a key component in re-launching economic growth, creating employment and improving the competitiveness of European companies in global markets. HLG came up with a set of concrete recommendations of what to do and how to bring it about, based on their own comparative analysis and study of private companies and public institutions in selective countries, predominantly those that head the innovation and competitiveness rankings.
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Many elements of an innovation policy are already present in the EU but there is a need to develop a real innovation “ecosystem”: a set of ideas, institutions, instruments, policies and regulations. The EU of 28 loses much effectiveness because of its lack of efficient mechanisms to align diverse views and objectives and because of multiple fault lines, both inside EU institutions and between them and Member States and between industry and academia, to name but a few stakeholders. The Lisbon Treaty was supposed to remedy this but it clearly has not delivered the desired outcome. As the Innovation Union Scoreboard 2013, published by the Commission, also indicates, only an holistic and ecosystemoriented approach to all the aspects of innovation can achieve the main goal of innovation-policy management, the “European Common Good” or the best living and working conditions for European citizens. To achieve an innovation ecosystem, the EU must, in the opinion of the HLG experts, focus on five “Cs”: • Complexity Management • Collaboration • Competition • Competence • Communication It is imperative to acknowledge that innovation results from a complex process, combining curiosity, creativity, rigorous scientific method and a suitable institutional framework of interaction.
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The emergence of novel concepts, processes, products or services can only result from out-of-the-box thinking, improvisation, trial and error, and new tacit or explicit knowledge. We are not yet in an ecosystem approach in the EU and the present traditional approach will not yield the desired results. The so-called “Community Method" is fine for opening up markets and setting standards but it does not work well when faced with new needs, such as innovation policy. The HLG produced a number of recommendations for the EU and Member States. These ranged from setting up an ecosystem approach and all that this requires – including innovation in government itself – to temporary assistance by an independent brain trust. They also advocated more policy and budgetary coherence in the Commission and between it and Member States’ innovation policies, systematic and rapid elimination of all obstacles to innovation, and new modes of funding and facilitating industrial co-operation across sectors and borders. Finally, they recommended broader protection of intellectual property, serious reduction of regulatory costs and complexity, more bottom-up approaches, demand and consumer driven innovation, and more transparency in order to get more social acceptance of innovative products, processes or services. (See www.highlevelgroup.eu.) These recommendations were well received and the Irish Presidency asked the HLG to continue its work and organised a first meeting of Phase II work in Dublin in December 2013. Most of the same corporations took part again (with some new ones) and two more Member States and one more DG from the Commission. The objective of Phase II is to deliver a blueprint of possible reforms and initiatives, which together can better and faster achieve all objectives, to be implemented by the next Commission.
The HLG approach allows some presumptions about future recommendations. In order to resolve the pressing needs of growth and employment, industry must be recognised as the basis for Europe to remain a global economic leader. Therefore the needs of different industry sectors must be accommodated in policy and regulatory frameworks that are sufficiently adapted to global economic realities and stable enough to justify long-term investments. This is as necessary for SMEs as for transnational companies. This also requires better businessgovernment interface and collaboration, focused on capturing the high-end parts of the value chain and on strengthening Europe’s position in global markets, in high technology as well as traditional sectors. Therefore the EU should concentrate primarily on stimulating the right frameworks for comprehensive innovation and for building key competitive advantage where they can really make a difference. An integrated innovation policy for industrial competitiveness can be built upon an innovation ecosystem, as outlined in the paper accompanying the first series of HLG recommendations. Europe needs coherent and co-ordinated policy responses and an approach that looks at the whole value chain, from infrastructure and supply to distribution. Without a quantum leap in innovation policies, Europe will not be able to master its economic and social problems and make its industries strong enough to compete. Special attention must be given to long-term business-academia co-operation, to training and education for the digital age, and to developing entrepreneurship to create employment opportunities given the competitive opportunities and challenges of industry. Management innovation is as important as public governance innovation.
The EU should concentrate primarily on stimulating the right frameworks for comprehensive innovation and for building key competitive advantage where they can really make a difference
Innovation for growth by Stefan Schepers
The European innovation ecosystem will be globally strong only if it is internally coherent and if all countries attain a minimum level of integration within it
EFMD Global Focus: Volume 08 Issue 02 | 2014
Policy thinking and implementing must be better aligned with fundamentally new contextual conditions. The various agendas of Member States and their different political and economic conditions makes this a difficult enough task but at the same time they need to be aligned with a variety of stakeholder agendas in order to ensure a strong, coherent and acceptable basis for innovation. The EU needs a fundamental re-think of how to achieve a new and widely shared European vision and how to communicate it. There must be policy coherence not just within the Commission but also between and among the EU and Member States. New approaches to impact assessment, policy elaboration and rule making, and application in diverse contextual conditions must be found. The gaps in competitiveness between Member States are widening, with some advancing well in developing and implementing innovation in their economies and governance, others still at the stage of planning and piecemeal implementation, and still other countries just thinking what to do, if anything. The European innovation ecosystem will be globally strong only if it is internally coherent and if all countries attain a minimum level of integration within it. It is clearly a collective European interest to ensure that all productive and innovative forces and opportunities are identified and used. This requires structural reforms and sometimes different attitudes in most, if not all, Member States and in the EU itself. Since the 1990s, as a consequence of a variety of developments, EU policy making and implementation has become heavily focused on following proper procedure, restricting initiative, creativity and responsibility of otherwise highly competent officials and leading to excessive bureaucratisation of problem solving.
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There is an urgent need to examine how a return to an earlier, more productive governance culture and which innovative governance methods are required to ensure legitimacy and accountability. Today, once the EU has opened a specific regulatory trajectory, new (public and economic) interests grow upon it that prevent timely regulatory innovation. Rigidity of purpose should not necessarily be accompanied by rigidity of methodology. Just continuing a particular regulatory trajectory without regular checks on its impact and costs, and without re-examination of the objectives themselves, is the main cause of excessive regulatory burden. Besides removing obstacles, there are also a number of policies, instruments and regulations that can facilitate the operation of the innovation value chain from research to market. Many of these are existing but need completion or modernisation in view of innovation processes and global challenges. The EU needs to stimulate research, technological and industrial co-operation in and between all sectors and across all Member States. This requires a diversified, strong approach to stimulating entrepreneurship and new industries and to helping European players of international standing as well as strengthening the ecosystem for innovation and investment. The final meeting of Phase II will be later this year and in September 2014 the Italian Presidency will present the conclusions of HLG’s work to the European Council and others. The interest and support received by the HLG shows that the time is ripe for a new approach.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Stefan Schepers is secretary general of the High Level Group on Innovation Policy Management.
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