1. READ THIS…Indicative Evidence
 “Business Schools have to start extending their boundaries and work
with other disciplines in Universities (history, politics, sociology for
example). Easy to say but very hard to do. And it is easier in
research. Teaching collaboration is a nightmare and most sane
Business School teachers stay safe in their own haven”....(Dean for
Teaching and Exec Programmes)
 “Business Schools are in danger of becoming obsolete....why couldn’t
Departments of Economics, Social Sciences and Mathematics teach
the syllabus? They would probably do a better job” (Deputy Dean)
 “Professional accrediting bodies constrain the curricula most. But, in
fostering (a culture of) standardisation, we lose judgement, variety,
reactivity and innovation” (Dean)
 “In the process of accreditation, we try to celebrate diversity but, in
practice, it is very difficult” (EQUIS expert)

2. The 21st Century Academic
15th Irish Academy of Management Conference
University of Ireland
Maynooth
September 2012
David Wilson Peter McKiernan

3. Key Message
The trajectory of B-Schools has been one of isomorphic
standardisation with trust in an ‘old school’ tradition not in
innovation. New school models of customised, digitised
learning mark a broader trust in innovation that will
change the shape of business education in the future.

4. Accreditation Rankings
& Regulation School
School A
B
School
Mimetic C Mimetic
Tendency Tendency
Homogeneity

5. Homogeneity differs: less in staffing; some in mission; more in curriculla

6. Issues
 Critique and plateau of B-Schools
B-Schools as ‘legitimate parts of society’ or ‘guilty of moral failure’; ‘abdication of
moral responsibility’; as self referencing, self serving, self centred, self preserving
: Cornuel, 2005; Ghoshal, 2005; Currie, Knights & Starkey, 2010; Podolny, 2009;
Schoemaker, (2008); hence debate amongst leaders...no voice in the current
debate (Muff)…what to become? (Chia)...Schools of theology?
(Greensted)…or…’sugar and spice’? (50:20)
 Theoretical situating of B-Schools
Institutional Theory: DiMaggio & Powell, (1983); Zucker, (1987); Granovetter,
(1985)… ”to construe actions and behaviours as independent is a grievous
misunderstanding”; Polyani (1957) on non-economic agencies, but warned by
Mizruchi & Fein, (1999) on isomorphic mimicry as socially constructed
 Institutionalisation of a Sector (Tolbert & Zucker, 1996):
 Habitualisation-Objectification-Sedimentation
 Isomorphism

7. Pressures to conform
 Isomorphism as “the constraining process that forces one unit
in a population to resemble other units that face the same set
of environmental conditions”…contingency theory (Woodward,
1958; Burns & Stalker, 1961; Lawrence and Lorsch, 1967) to
population ecology (Hannan & Freeman, 1977)
Three key pressures (coercive, normative, mimetic)
: ‘dependence and power’; competitive
: professionalisation…the badges and triple accreditation;
staff training & policies, external examiners, international transfer
market
 Accreditation and Regulation
AACSB, EQUIS, AMBA, CEEMAN and professional agencies e.g.,
CIPD, ACCA etc; ‘elites’ Lowrie & Wilmott, (2009)… “a group of foxes,
guarding the MBA hen-houses”; Durand & McGuire, (2005)

8. Pressures to conform
 Rankings:
schools…game playing & templates (Wedlin, 2007); morale
(Kogut, 2008); first mover advantages (Devinney et al, 2008);
quantitative sociology (Espeland, 2007); audit society &
commensuration (Power, 1994, 1998); ‘engines not cameras’
(MacKenzie, 2006)…the ‘Life Form’…back to Bourdieu (1984)
research…RAE/REF; Lists (ABS); stickiness; pay for papers;
4x4; type 1 & 2 errors; no big projects; structure follows strategy;
‘conservative young’; journal lists as incongruous and unreliable
(Hodgskinson et al, 2012)
cash cows; MBA model; journal dictats; use of English; free
market philosophy (Khurana, 2007; Starkey & Tempest, 2008; Parker,
2008) whither co-ops, unions, third sector, mafia, Amish, Al Qaeda
(‘coca cola of terrorism’…Monnet & Very, 2010)?

9. Old School Model Sedimentation; the end game?
 Supply led accreditations and Trip Advisor
 Increasing consumerism
 Generation Y and Z?
 Open Innovation, quadruple helix, innovation networks (Curley)
 Dynamic and dysfunctional context
 Price and cost
 Established, conservative players
 Too much love ruins innovation
(Molina-Morales & Martinez-Fernandez, 2009; Bidault & Castello, 2010)

10. Social Trust in Innovation
 Institutionalisation of a Sector (Tolbert & Zucker, 1996):
 Habitualisation-Objectification-Sedimentation but this is dynamic
and habitualisation can be triggered by innovation…a new model
dawns (cp legitimacy in social process as innovation, local validation, diffusion
and general validation; Johnson et alia, 2006)
 The B School sector had reached sedimentation placing trust
in the old school model of supply-led delivery but on line
digitised, customised learning through both content and
interaction are changing the game from supply led to demand
based and a new habitualisation has begun
 Emergence from old model through DLMBA in two stages i)
content & ii) interaction
 Who is in the new game and why?

11. New Game, Old Players?
 Floating University (Jack Parker Corp & Big Think); Khan Academy
(Google and Gates Foundation); Udacity (ex Stanford Profs); i Tunes
U (Apple); TED-ED; MITx; Minerva Project; Coursera (ex Stanford
Profs backed by Intel billionaire); edX (Harvard & MIT)
 As of Jan 2012, i Tunes U had 700 million downloads “The stuff of
learning…lectures, course materials, instructional videos,
explanatory songs, syllabi is largely in place…the next challenge
is to make (social) engagement around it” Sankar, CEO Piazza
(platform for I Tunes U social engagement and interactive class
discussion)
 Fall 2011, 160,000 global subscribers to Stanford’s first on line
courses
 “I would have to teach for 250 years to reach the same number of
students that I did on one semester with this on line course” Prof
Ng, ex Stanford now Coursera
 Students attending the actual lecture fell from 200 to 20 as Stanford
went on line: “These are students who pay $30000pa to see our
brightest and best professors, and they prefer to see us on
video? This was a shock to us” Porf Thrun ex Stanford now Udacity

12. Changed Learning Pattern and Scale
 Short, basic format 5 to 10 minute lectures with embedded
assessment; same content as paid courses; interaction on
FB/Blackboard/WiKi now but new tools from artificial
intelligence, robotics, crowdsourcing allowing grading and
teaching without staff; everyone gets the answer eventually
 It’s Free now, but qualifications will mean charges later
 “ I believe that we can work with a billion people around
the world and change education in a fundamental way
as it really hasn’t changed in 1000 years” Prof Agarwal,
ex head of MIT’s Comp Sci and Artificial Intelligence Lab,
now CEO edX

14. Questions inspired from the Demand Side
 Left to their own devices, what courses are people
most interested in?
 What times of year do people chose to learn?
 Why do people go to College? (not just for content &
delivery but for branding and network) so long as these
are kept separate, free delivery is fine
 Will Colleges exist as fixed asset campuses in future?

15. Meaning for the future academic?
 Classroom is ‘flipped’ from passive to active learning
 Teacher to facilitators to problem solvers
 Research is flipped from theory to practice and problem solving as
core; a scholarship of engagement
 An increase in problem-centred papers (what organisations do
about poverty/climate change, economic crisis)
 An increase in the theoretical underpinnings of such arguments
leading to credible problem solvers
 An increase in grants & funding to this area and use of new
technologies
 Re-intellectualisation of business/management research