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What is your market? & What are the characteristics of good M BA programs?

  • 1.  What is your market? & What are the characteristics of good M BA programs?

    Posted 10-10-2001 07:18
    From: B.Batiz@open.ac.uk [mailto:B.Batiz@open.ac.uk]

    Don,
    Although this is self serving, I did like the way the people at Equis went
    about making their selection:

    http://www.efmd.be/equis/5.htm

    Their emphasis is on teaching quality, but they were able to accommodate
    European style (1 yr) and American style (2 yr) programs regardless of
    whether they were based here or across the Atlantic.

    They also went at lengths to understand the intricacies of distance
    learning. This was quite important for us as it seldom recognised that we
    serve a community of over 35,000 people each year. Even though we are the
    market leader, being a 100% often puts us out of the "beauty contests" (i.e.
    league tables).

    As others have mentioned, we are also going through an exercise to revamp
    the structure rather than the content of our programme. Our main market is
    the 30-39 group in the UK and Europe (although we have operations in Africa
    and Asia), which is expected to shrink no less than 16% in the forth coming
    years with the added treat that currently less than 28% have graduate
    studies but this is expected to rise to 50% within the next 10 years.

    My point is that the current idea of re-gearing programs to market is
    conspicuously avoiding a great opportunity to re-think what MBAs are for,
    what are they supposed to deliver and which groups (such as minorities or
    entrepreneurs) have been traditionally ignored.

    Sorry if I am imposing a "hobby horse" on the list but would be interesting
    to see what colleagues have to say.

    Best wishes,

    Bernardo

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  • 2.  Open University & MBA Curriculum

    Posted 10-10-2001 23:44
    At 7:18 AM -0400 10/10/01, Charles Wankel wrote:
    >Although this is self serving, I did like the way the people at Equis went
    >about making their selection:

    I'm confused. Is Equis the same as The Open University?

    >My point is that the current idea of re-gearing programs to market is
    >conspicuously avoiding a great opportunity to re-think what MBAs are for,
    >what are they supposed to deliver and which groups (such as minorities or
    >entrepreneurs) have been traditionally ignored.

    Could you please say more about rethinking what an MBA is for, what
    they are supposed to delive and how to serve underserved groups?

    >
    >Sorry if I am imposing a "hobby horse" on the list but would be interesting
    >to see what colleagues have to say.

    Don't apologize. Some of the best posts have been from people
    discussing why they think their programmes are the best.

    Sincerely

    Don


    --
    Don McCormick, Ph.D
    Associate Professor
    School of Business
    University of Redlands
    1200 E. Colton Avenue
    Redlands, CA 92373-0999
    (909) 748-6249 don_mccormick@redlands.edu
    http://newton.uor.edu/FacultyFolder/DMcCormick