BUSINESS EDUCATION Executive education, in the form of management development courses for employees, is generally offered in one of two basic formats: open enrolment and customised.
Customised programmes are developed and delivered in collaboration between a business school and a client company.
Open enrolment programmes, on the other hand, might be considered the off-the-shelf option. As the name suggests, theoretically they are open to all suitable comers and they deal with subjects ranging from marketing to leadership to finance for non-financial managers.
In 2006, 45 business schools made the grade to be included in the Financial Times open programme ranking, but this year the number has risen to 50. In spite of mutterings in the industry, it would appear that open enrolment courses are not headed for extinction; more schools are applying to participate in the Financial Times ranking every year.
However, the data collected for this expanded ranking also shows contraction in one important area: annual growth in average revenues has fallen back compared to last year.
In 2006, schools reported a robust 15 per cent increase in revenues on average. This year revenues grew by 9.5 per cent which means that after two very strong years, revenue growth is now slightly less than in 2005.
Nonetheless, while the market seems to have slowed a little it has not gone to sleep: 9.5 per cent is not a paltry figure and a more nuanced picture emerges if enrolment is also taken into account.
According to figures for the 2006 ranking, schools increased revenues by 15 per cent against the backdrop of a 7 per cent increase in participant numbers. In 2007, on the other hand, schools managed to attain 9 per cent in revenue growth with only a 2 per cent increase in the number of people coming in for courses.
Open enrolment courses are clearly not just a mug’s game either, then: on this years evidence schools appear to be managing quite nicely to make more money out of fewer people. However, revenue growth counts for only a small percentage of the final mark.
The ranking is primarily determined by what participants thought of their experience. And some schools really stand out as star performers in the not-so-dying-after-all art of open executive education.
After several years absence, Harvard Business School is included in the ranking again this year. Just as it did in all but one of the other years that it participated, it has taken the top slot.
Those who attended Harvard’s advanced or general management programme (data supplied by participants in these two programmes was used for the ranking) gave the school top marks in the category “aims achieved”. In other words, they felt that the programme had met both personal and professional expectations and they would recommend it to colleagues.
They also felt warm and fuzzy about their classmates; Harvard came first for “quality of participants”. For this part of the ranking, respondents were asked questions about how they rated the international mix of their class and whether they thought the academic and managerial level of their classmates was appropriate.
One Harvard participant summed up as follows: “What’s taught in the classroom is only half the learning. The biggest surprise for me was the depth of experience I was able to draw from the people, the students. They all have different perspectives on some of the same issues I’m facing because they come from different cultures, industries, and disciplines. Over the course of the programme, you build a great bond with your classmates. [The programme] is designed to force you to trust people, and that’s because you need to do that as a general manager.’
Stanford Graduate School of Business continued its steady rise up the open enrolment rankings. This year it was second overall but came top for preparation (that is, providing participants with programme information in advance). It also beat all the competition in the food and accommodation category – just as it did in 2006.
Five other schools appeared in the top 10 for the second year running. University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and IMD made particularly strong gains – both moved up five places to fourth and fifth respectively.
As the rankings expand so they become more international. The 50 schools ranked have campuses offering open enrolment executive education in 24 countries. Twenty of the business schools are primarily based in North America. South America is represented by two schools, one each in Argentina and Brazil.
As for Europe, ten countries are represented in the ranking. In the southern hemisphere, three schools in Australia and two schools in South Africa made the grade. Lagos Business School in Nigeria also made its debut in the rankings this year.
