Having an EMBA Does Make a Difference

What value can an Executive MBA bring to your career?

The Executive MBA is credited with equipping candidates with a range of skills. Graduates of the business school classroom leave with the most up-to-date management practices, the latest in strategic thinking, and a feeling of incredible achievement. What’s more, these are on top of the tried and true values of the EMBA. So what exactly are the core values of an Executive MBA? QS TopExecutive asks the experts.

Flexibility

“The tried, trusted and true values of an EMBA are the programme’s flexibility, and the fact that it enables students to implement their knowledge and skills directly into the workplace,” says Dr. Susan Balint, director of MBA programs at Westminster Business School in the UK.

“Students enjoy the same unique experience as full-time students, networking with classmates from all sectors, background and cultures and learning from their experiences,” she says. “And as well as studying the fundamentals of key functional business areas, there is a period of integration and application where modules take a multi-disciplinary approach to real-world business issues.”

This insight into real-world business issues is particularly valuable in today’s business environment, which is one of rapid change and diverse challenges. “An Executive MBA develops leaders and innovators who can meet those challenges, driving organisations – both public and private – forward,” Dr Balint says.

Reflection

While the flexibility of the program allows candidates to implement what they’ve learnt in the business school classroom immediately into the workplace, having the time to reflect on this newly acquired knowledge is yet another true value of the Executive MBA, according to Marianne Vandenbosch, graduate program director for the McGill-HEC Executive MBA at The Desautels Faculty of Management at McGill University in Canada.

“Reflection is part of the daily discipline of the program, but is something that gets lost in the hectic world of deadlines and crises, mistakenly, we believe,” Vandenbosch says. “By developing the habit of conscious, regular reflection is an excellent approach to learning and an excellent precursor to action.”

Partnership

An Executive MBA may be an individual qualification to pursue, but candidates are not alone in their experience and it is this fostering of an EMBA community which Dr Marian Iszatt-White, director of the Executive MBA at Lancaster University Management School (LUMS) in the UK, believes is a core value of this prestigious degree.

“The most tried and true value underpinning our EMBA is one of partnership,” says Dr Marian Iszatt-White. “Students are not empty vessels to be filled with knowledge, nor are faculty the only ‘experts’ in the room. Instead, we firmly believe the most valuable learning comes from the partnership between faculty and participants, with all of us bringing different types of knowledge and expertise into the learning forum.”

Employers are also part of that partnership, according to Dr Iszatt-White. “In many cases, students are sponsored by their employers who, not unreasonably, want to derive practical benefits from student learning. This they do by supplying challenging projects and topics for students to work on for their assignments and dissertations – and seeing immediate value in the work produced as a result, often solving long-standing problems or generating new insights around key decisions.”

Challenge

Candidates may encounter a few obstacles along the way as they embark on an Executive MBA. There is, after all, a hefty cost involved in pursuing the degree, not to mention time away from the office and family. But overcoming these obstacles and stepping up to the challenge is also a value of the degree.

Professor Nick van der Walt, executive director of the Executive MBA program at Hult International Business School, Dubai campus says the EMBA is a tough program but that is what makes it a valuable degree.  “The fact that you have been selected and had the tenacity and ability to undertake it makes a clear statement to employers.”

However, being accepted onto the program is only the first of many challenges to come!