Schools wager on global programmes
Quique Rodríguez.
Globalisation is a reality which is why the most prestigious Spanish business schools offer international MBAs. ESADE is the latest to do so.
The programme is a Master in Business Administration with a global focus offered jointly with the prestigious American university, Georgetown, especially renowned for international relations, and carried out in seven countries: the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Russia, China, India and Spain. It is the ESADE Business School’s latest gambit. It is aimed at executives who want to participate in a programme that is compatible with their work but which also provides them with a truly international vision with which to embark on a successful international career in a multinational.
These types of programmes are increasingly seen as the apple of the country’s most prestigious business schools’ eyes, the latter having joined the elite ranking of leading international executive education schools years ago. The programmes are well-cared for, and the best in-house professors from each school take part, developing different modules in the various countries and continents for students with at least ten years’ professional experience. The price tag also tends to be the highest of all the academic programmes provided by these management centres: the registration fee alone for the new ESADE programme next year is €90,500. It is scheduled to begin in 2009 and last 15 months with six 11-day modules.
The ESADE Global Executive MBA launched last month is the most recent player in this nascent market, but there are other examples.
ESCP-EAP is the fruit of a merger between various European schools. With campuses in London, Paris, Berlin, Turin and Madrid, this school is renowned in France though less well known in our country. It provides a European Executive MBA which offers participants the chance to study in the five countries where it has campuses in addition to seminars held in Brussels, the United States, China, India and Brazil. The programme is aimed at working professionals. As such, it also has a modular structure spanning 18 months. It costs €39,000.
IESE
Eight years ago, IESE also announced the launch of its Global Executive MBA, starting in 2001 in Madrid, Barcelona, Silicon Valley and Shanghai. The success of this costly programme (€89,500 for the upcoming academic year) has led the business school to develop two versions: one bi-monthly, with 17 modules over 22 months taught at the cities mentioned above, and a new monthly programme consisting of 14 modules over a 16-month period held in Barcelona, Madrid, Mumbai (India) and New York. lESE has decided to open its own campus in New York to teach other programmes in addition to this one.
For its part, the Instituto de Empresa has a four-year-old programme aimed at executives with ten years' professional experience. It is organised jointly with the University of Chicago Business School. Their Global Senior Management Program is taught at the American university’s campus in London and in Madrid. It consists of two, in-class modules opening and closing the programme and an online campus the rest of the time. Next year the programme will cost €18,500.
A fruitful international career
Luis Villar (Madrid, 1958) is the Director of Business Projects and Development for the consulting firm, Strategy & Focus. Before reaching this position, he worked for 20 years in various industries and companies in Spain, Mexico, Italy, the United States, and the United Kingdom, among many others. He holds an undergraduate degree in Economics from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and a Master’s in Foreign Trade from the Centro de Estudios Comerciales (CECO). However, he felt that his academic training was insufficient for the professional career he wanted. “After acquiring certain experience and some responsibility, I realised that the business education provided by universities is not very in-depth. My work at that time had a very important international component because I was the Director of Exports for a group of countries. In addition, the multicultural factor had always been very attractive and important for me.” As such, in 1991 he enrolled in the European Executive MBA offered by ESCP-EAP with classes in Madrid, Oxford and Paris. “Sharing experiences with people from other industries, companies and countries was very enriching; it opened my mind to a more strategic and global idea of business and a broader view of the world.” Since then, his professional career has moved upwards and has had a markedly international tint. “To be able to participate in global markets you need an open mind, one that's receptive to other ways of doing business, leading and managing. Since 1991, the world and the economy are much more global because they are more transparent and, as a result, it’s easy and necessary to compete in other markets. It provides tremendous opportunities for growth and it is much simpler to offshore operations.”
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