Improving the Quality of MBA Education in Korea, Japan and China(1) - Integrating East & West
It is little doubt that MBA (Master of Business Administration) education is important to business people. It is because MBA education can help students develop career, expand network, go through global experience, start new business and broaden horizon.
However,
there is some criticism of MBAs from the corporate side, especially during
economic downturns. Critics point out that most MBA education is not worthy of
investing huge amount of money and time. They argue that MBA education fails to
bring whatever value companies eagerly want to get although snowballing number
of students fly to American or European MBA
schools to study year by year.
Negative point of view is also found out even
inside the academic field. For example, Ikujiro Nonaka, a professor at JAIMS
and one of the most influential scholars in the management academy, claims that
professors do not know the real business world. He went on saying that professors
tend to focus on abstract theories and models without enough hands-on
experiences.
However, we insist that an Eastern-Western value
integrated MBA education would be a competitive advantage to companies, particularly
in Asian context. And the integrated MBA education could raise their value
within companies consequently.
