WHY BUSINESS SCHOOLS NEED TO KNOW
WHAT MBAS WANT TO LEARN
AND HOW TO FIND OUT - A CASE HISTORY
Leon Winer, Pace University
ABSTRACT
If business schools want to maximize their prestige and funding, they must help their students to succeed in
their business careers. Many MBA students have valuable insights of what they need for success in business. A
survey for obtaining MBA’s ideas is described. Results were surprising, but on closer examination, made sense.
INTRODUCTION
Business schools adapt their curricula to requirements defined by the AACSB and to needs expressed by
employers. The literature does not report any research aimed at discovering MBA students’ perceptions of their
learning needs. If the lack of such research reflects practice accurately, a grave injustice is being done to the
students. Furthermore, graduate business schools are not doing a good job of pursuing their own objectives.
WHY BUSINESS SCHOOLS NEED TO KNOW WHAT MBAS WANT TO LEARN
The research I am presenting was based on three assumptions:
1. MBA students want to succeed in their business careers, either as corporate managers or as entrepreneurs.
2. The business school wants its students to be successful in their business careers. The rationale for this
assumption is that the school stands to gain a lot if alumni succeed because they:
a) Increase the prestige of the school.
b) Are able to give large gifts, especially if they succeed as entrepreneurs.
c) Are likely to offer desirable positions to future alumni of the school.
3. MBA students have valuable insights. This is likely to be true if they have business experience and have
had opportunities to observe how people succeed in business.
These assumptions appeared to be eminently reasonable. I have presented them to faculty colleagues and no
one has disputed them. My intention was to use information obtained from students about their learning needs to
modify my teaching methods and to make the information and methodology available to those who are interested.
FINDING OUT WHAT MBA STUDENTS WANT TO LEARN - A CASE HISTORY
Background
I conducted the study in September and October of 1999 at Pace University. The business school, located in
down-town Manhattan and suburban Westchester County enrolls 2000 MBA students. Eighty percent of the
students attend school part-time and work in the daytime in entry level and supervisory jobs mostly in finance and
computing. The school is AACSB accredited.
Previously, I had done eight MBA exit surveys during the 1988-1993 time period. These studies had revealed
consistently that less than half of the graduating MBA students were willing to recommend the school’s MBA
program to good friends. The likely reason for the low level of satisfaction with the program was that students
reported that most of the core courses were not valuable. While courses in their major fields received higher ratings,
there was room for improvement there also. On the basis of these findings, the school made changes in the MBA
curriculum and I made many changes in my teaching methods. These changes aimed at helping students to develop
interpersonal skills and in my courses to improve students’ ability to market themselves.
During the Spring of 1999, the director of the MBA program asked me to conduct another exit survey to obtain
information that might lead to further improvements in the MBA curriculum. The exit survey was to be conducted
during November-December 1999.
In preparing the questionnaire for this exit survey, I reviewed previous student surveys, findings of an internal
career planning task force, interviews with corporate recruiters, my personal experience in business at Mobil Oil and
IBM, my consulting work, reports of 1,000 students over the previous 8 years for which they had interviewed
10,000 alumni, managers, executives, recruiters and headhunters and my reading of the school catalog, strategic
plan, internal memos, and other university publications, as well as reading many books, journals, proceedings,
magazines, newspapers and attendance at 17 professional and academic meetings.
As I was completing design of the survey form for the exit survey, it occurred to me that the first page of the
survey questionnaire could be administered productively to brand new MBA students to discover their perceived
learning needs. See Exhibit 1, which asks new MBA students to evaluate 16 abilities from the point of view of their
value in helping them to maximize their success in business and with respect to the respondents’ perceived need for
improvement.
----------------------------------------------EXHIBIT 1 ABOUT HERE
----------------------------------------------The Survey
Questionnaires were distributed to instructors of the 16 sections of the first course that MBA’s take. The
covering letter, written by the director of the MBA program asked the instructors to administer the questionnaires as
soon as possible. A total of 310 usable questionnaires were returned within two weeks. This represented an 82.2%
response rate. The questionnaires were tallied, some simple math was performed and the results are presented in
Exhibits 2 and 3.
----------------------------------------------EXHIBITS 2 AND 3 ABOUT HERE
----------------------------------------------Results
Exhibit 2 shows the averages of the data submitted by the respondents. Exhibit 3 presents the same
information ranked by Composite Index (sum of the “Valuable” and the “Need Improvement” averages). The
interpretation is that if the school wants to help its MBA students to succeed in business (the school’s mission
statement says that it does) the school should help the MBA students to improve the abilities that they identify as
most valuable and in which they require the most improvement. The school should help students to improve the
abilities shown in the top part of Exhibit 3:
1. To be able to recognize business opportunities.
2. To be able to solve business problems.
3. To market themselves skillfully.
4. To do a good job of giving oral presentations.
Lower rated abilities were, in order:
5. Competence in an important business discipline.
6. Ability to apply theory to practice.
7. Ability to integrate global issues into business decisions.
8. Skill in resolving conflicts.
9. Skill in writing business reports.
10. Skill in directing the work of others.
11. Understanding of business areas outside your major.
12. Skill in starting your own business.
13. Ability to prioritize activities.
14. Ability to work well with people of diverse backgrounds.
15. Ability to develop spreadsheet models.
16. Ability to use the Internet.
The lower ratings were caused either by low perceived value or by low perceived need for improvement, or
both. Many of the school’s MBA students have jobs that require heavy usage of computers so that they do not
perceive a great need for improving their spreadsheet and Internet skills. Some of them are professional web-site
and systems designers.
RECOMMENDATIONS TO THE SCHOOL
I made the following recommendations to the business school faculty (verbatim):
First we should evaluate the results of this study:
1. Do our students’ evaluations make sense? Should the Indexes of these particular four
abilities be at the top?
2. If our students’ evaluations make sense, why is the AACSB emphasizing other abilities and
giving light attention to our students’ top 4?
3. Furthermore, if our students’ estimates are based on good understanding of the business
world and their needs for improvement, are we looking at a superb opportunity to do great
deeds: vastly increasing the value of the school’s MBA degree, increasing our prestige,
getting many more applications so we can be more selective and raise GMATs of incoming
students, and in the future receive bigger gifts from more successful and grateful alumni?
In my opinion, the answers to these questions are:
1. On reflection, yes and yes. If a student does not improve in these 4, how useful will the others
be?
2. The AACSB, in all their studies, do not ask the right questions, of the right people.
3. Yes, we are looking at a superb opportunity, a far greater opportunity than the ones
discovered in the 1988-1993 exit surveys.
The final conclusion is that we should start helping our MBA students to improve the four abilities
identified here.
WHAT ABOUT UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS?
I have administered the same questionnaire to several undergraduate classes. The outcome was the same.
The top four categories were:
1. To be able to recognize business opportunities.
2. To be able to solve business problems.
3. To market themselves skillfully.
4. To do a good job of giving oral presentations.
RECOMMENDATIONS TO READERS OF THIS PAPER
If readers of this paper want to increase the usefulness of their programs in helping their students to achieve
success in their business careers, they should follow the procedure described here to discover their students’ learning
needs and then they should make appropriate changes in curricula, teaching methods and teaching evaluation
systems.
Exhibit 1. Survey of Entering Students
The purpose of this survey is to obtain your ideas for increasing the value of your learning
experience. Please answer candidly and do not sign your name. Thank you for participating.
Please circle the numbers that reflect your opinion. Please use a pen in marking your answers.
Not at all
For maximizing your success in business,
valuable
how valuable are the following abilities?
|
Competence in an important business discipline
0 1
Understanding of business areas outside your major
0 1
Ability to recognize business opportunities
0 1
Ability to solve business problems
0 1
Ability to integrate global issues into business decisions
0 1
Ability to apply theory to practice
0 1
Ability to develop spreadsheet models
0 1
Ability to use the Internet
0 1
Skill in writing business reports
0 1
Skill in giving oral presentations
0 1
Ability to work well with people of diverse backgrounds
0 1
Skill in directing the work of others
0 1
Skill in resolving conflicts
0 1
Ability to prioritize activities
0 1
Skill in marketing yourself
0 1
Skill in starting your own business
0 1
I don't need any
At the present time, how much
Improvement
improvement do you need in your . . . ?
|
Competence in an important business discipline
0 1
Understanding of business areas outside your major
0 1
Ability to recognize business opportunities
0 1
Ability to solve business problems
0 1
Ability to integrate global issues into business decisions
0 1
Ability to apply theory to practice
0 1
Ability to develop spreadsheet models
0 1
Ability to use the Internet
0 1
Skill in writing business reports
0 1
Skill in giving oral presentations
0 1
Ability to work well with people of diverse backgrounds
0 1
Skill in directing the work of others
0 1
Skill in resolving conflicts
0 1
Ability to prioritize activities
0 1
Skill in marketing yourself
0 1
Skill in starting your own business
0 1
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
Extremely
valuable
|
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
5 6
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
4
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
I need a lot of
Improvement
|
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
4 5 6
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
Exhibit 2. "How Valuable" and "How Much Improvement"
(14 classes, n=310)
Range of Answers = 0 to 6
Capabilities
Competence in an important business discipline
Understanding of business areas outside your major
Ability to recognize business opportunities
Ability to solve business problems
Ability to integrate global issues into business decisions
Ability to apply theory to practice
Ability to develop spreadsheet models
Ability to use the Internet
Skill in writing business reports
Skill in giving oral presentations
Ability to work well with people of diverse backgrounds
Skill in directing the work of others
Skill in resolving conflicts
Ability to prioritize activities
Skill in marketing yourself
Skill in starting your own business
Averages
Quest.
No.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Valuable
5.16
4.45
5.40
5.48
4.73
5.07
4.31
4.70
4.98
5.08
5.29
5.15
5.17
5.26
5.31
4.28
4.99
Need
Imprvmt
3.79
4.02
4.02
3.89
3.94
3.87
3.25
2.25
3.60
4.08
2.52
3.39
3.46
3.00
4.01
4.11
3.57
Exhibit 3. "How Valuable" and "How Much Improvement":
Ranked by Composite Index
Composite Index = Sum of (Valuable + Need Improvement)
Quest. ValuNeed Comp.
Capabilities
No.
able Imprvmt Index
Ability to recognize business opportunities
3
5.40
4.02
9.43
Ability to solve business problems
4
5.48
3.89
9.37
Skill in marketing yourself
15
5.31
4.01
9.32
Skill in giving oral presentations
10
5.08
4.08
9.16
Competence in an important business discipline
1
5.16
3.79
8.94
Ability to apply theory to practice
6
5.07
3.87
8.93
Ability to integrate global issues into business decisions
5
4.73
3.94
8.67
Skill in resolving conflicts
13
5.17
3.46
8.63
Skill in writing business reports
9
4.98
3.60
8.58
Skill in directing the work of others
12
5.15
3.39
8.53
Understanding of business areas outside your major
2
4.45
4.02
8.47
Skill in starting your own business
16
4.28
4.11
8.39
Ability to prioritize activities
14
5.26
3.00
8.26
Ability to work well with people of diverse backgrounds
11
5.29
2.52
7.81
Ability to develop spreadsheet models
7
4.31
3.25
7.56
Ability to use the Internet
8
4.70
2.25
6.95
Averages
4.99
3.57
8.56
* A difference in Composite Index of .20, or greater is statistically significant.
Diff. in
Index*
0.06
0.05
0.16
0.22
0.01
0.27
0.04
0.05
0.05
0.06
0.08
0.12
0.45
0.25
0.62