FUTURE ROLE OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATION

FUTURE ROLE OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATION

…..Virender Kumar*

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The leadership of management schools will be put to test in the days to come because of the challenges posed by the changes taking place in the environment today. During the past three decades these institutions have been said to have achieved greater success both intellectually and educationally by maintaining a balance between rigorous scholarship and thoughtful relevance to management practice. During this period the social and management sciences have come to dominate the curricula and research agenda of these business schools. All these years the burden of carrying out these complex challenges of management education rested on the shoulders of social scientists who have accepted the challenge and put in their best to achieve the desired results.

It is now believed that sharing the burden that has produced past accomplishments will require new priorities from the leaders of graduate management schools. Otherwise, there is clear danger of missed opportunities-and in the face of tremendous challenges that the next decade promises both for business and society – the ramifications of such opportunities will extend far beyond MBA classrooms. This is being believed primarily because of the fact that the world is changing with more speed and complexity today than it was at any time in history due to technological advancements.

Never before the management institutions have faced challenges as complex as those of rapidly changing fields as bio-technology, information science, energy, production, material science, medicine and perhaps many more, including complex ethical problems,

* Joint Controller of Examinations, Panjab University, Chandigarh.



changing political processes, the role of non-marketing and non-profit institutions and the relationship between business and government. Yet there are three major forces of technological change, globalization and diversity that will most shape the new knowledge, skills, attitudes and values that successful managers of tomorrow will require.

What is expected from future business managers? The challenges posed by the rapid changes brought by science and technology will require Graduate Management Schools to chart out new priorities in terms of education. The future managers will be required to be much more technologically advanced and mature, mindful of the fact that in the recent decades the technological advances have created a new global economic system. The recent stock market crash in view of the 25 percent increase in petroleum prices on account of the Gulf crises is a telling example of economic turmoil in the business world.

Different social changes are bringing to the work-force a new diversity in age, caste background (concessions for other backward classes). Despite various disparities in workers’ education and backgrounds, corporations, government have to offer equal treatment and opportunity to every one as enshrined in our Constitution. At the same time we must understand the unique problems and priorities for each type of group. These qualities of purpose give rise to separate challenges not just for corporate human resources policies but also for issues of business strategy and corporate social responsibilities.

The growth of population separately poses its own immense challenges for managers in the 21st century. The unacceptably high unemployment among educated youth , seeming inability of school/colleges to provide students with even minimal educational skills, especially in the rural section, are the other most evident manifestations of this malaise with which tomorrow’s managers have to live and find remedies.

While still relevant and important to managerial work, discipline-based knowledge and technical skills alone are insufficient for successfully facing the challenges of the changing environment. As management theorists have observed, the new demands may call for not only sound correlation between knowledge and action but also between traditional academic discipline of business school and those of Commerce, Arts, Sciences and Technology, Effectively combining these streams of learning attuned to the needs of the industry in the central task that the management education has to perform in the 21st century.

As students from diverse backgrounds are opting for management education, it is all the more essential to frame the curriculum in such a fashion so as to upgrade their knowledge and skill in their respective fields, in addition to dissemination of knowledge through the development of indigenous literature attuned with Indian conditions. Of course, lessons from the West, and particularly Japanese style of management, are not to be forgotten keeping in view the mixed economy model as prevalent in India.

The foremost challenge of management schools in India is the selection process whether it is of students who are to be admitted or of faculty members who teach them. A variety of different methods are being used for admission of students in various management schools. Some are admitting students by holding aptitude test jointly (Like IIMs) while others are doing it alone. But none of the management schools in India is going in for dual admission tests – one for aptitude and the other for knowledge of subject. Thus, creating a National Admission Test Agency will provide greater relief to management schools, which in turn may pressurize them to devote their time and energies towards research (This could be one way out).

Going further, the same national agency could select faculty members for different management schools in India by holding different types of tests – both written and verbal – wherein due weightage be given to the managerial work experience. Management school faculty should be asked to collaborate with their counterparts within their institutions and outside, as also with the practicing managers of their respective regions. Even collaboration with different institutes of technology will be a great relief to the already over-burdened faculty members.

Further, a mobile faculty will strengthen management education in India. In view of this, faculty members should be allowed to stay in a particular management school for not more than four years.

Privatizing of industry is another challenge for management schools in the years to come. There are two schools of thought for and against privatization that argue with equal stress to drive in their contentions. The ventures that stated with state participation were mainly for producing capital goods, machinery, steel, heavy engineering, mining etc. requiring huge investments which no individual or business house could afford. Now a review of the performance of public sector undertakings shows that their efficiency has always been at the lower ebb (even those of nationalized banks) with the bogging losses they have incurred year after year.

Privatizing of British Airways and railways are examples of magical effects which have generated more employment boosted the morale of people and ensured adequate returns which ultimately resulted in upward growth of economy. Even in USSR major path-breaking developments towards privatization are taking place. All these will be entrusted to the existing private managements with proven track record or to management professionals which will result in enhancing efficiency and productivity.