MBA is Dead, Long Live MBA

By Hemant C Trivedi

Every notable b-school is trying their best to reinvent their offerings to match up with the changed industry requirements. The reinvention is so drastic that the very soul of the MBA program is undergoing a change.

The traditional proclamation on the accession of a new Monarch on the death of a king – 'The King is Dead, Long live the King' is applicable to the erstwhile MBA programs the world over. As management education grapples with changing job profiles and skills requirements by the industry, keeping your curriculum contemporary and relevant is the most challenging task for any academician. The MBA program of the 1980s and 1990s evolved with the change of the century. But as we entered Industry 4.0 suddenly industry requirements have undergone a metamorphosis. New technologies are emerging with the suddenness of a magic trick and technologies are dying faster than ever.

With emerging technologies in internet and communication domains businesses and industries are undergoing changes; changes in the way processes are designed, the way works are executed, and the way tasks are reoriented. This not only requires a total rethink of the design and execution of tasks and activities, it necessitates a revolutionary approach to how systems are restructured from the grassroots levels. And in turn this requires a change in thought processes of managers and administrators of managerial functions. This change in the way managers think cannot happen with the same learning and knowledge levels they have acquired at the typical ‘B-School’ – the most successful of MBA programs.

Thus every notable business school is trying their best to reinvent their offerings to match up with the changed industry requirements. The reinvention is so drastic that the very soul of the MBA program is undergoing a change. Borrowing and integrating disciplines and universes of knowledge the new MBA program will have to be fundamentally different from what it has been so far. The new MBA will have to take birth.

The New MBA

With the advent of modern retail businesses in late 20^th century it was observed that many functions of distribution management have undergone changes. Some of the functions for which independent businesses used to exist and operate earlier have now become very much a part of the modern retail businesses.

Business enterprises known as Stockiest have lost relevance and are required no more. This is an example of how new business managers have had to reorient their thought processes in terms of the way in which business processes are required to be redesigned. This is but an old example. Now we are living in the era of real-time integrated supply chains and multimodal distribution networks where in several business functions and managerial activities are largely integrated into one seamless process. Several examples of similar developments in the industry and business world can be easily recounted. I am sure people in the direct and allied functions to the example cited above realize the extreme nature of thought processes reorientation required to function in the changed environment. The overarching role of technology can be underestimated only at your own peril. A management graduate hence requires to be well versed not only in information and communications technologies but has to understand the various modes of transport, relative costs, packing and packaging requirements, regulatory norms for each mode etc.

Now imagine a situation where a brand manager needs to decide on a fresh initiative for a brands distribution. He shall have a team of logistics expert, costing expert, production person, and programmer etc. to help him decide on the best alternatives across his market geographies. It is a tenet of effective management that 'you cannot supervise a task which you don’t know how to do’. Though he doesn’t need to be an expert of all the disciplines he has to understand each of them sufficiently well to be able to get the best out of his team. More than that he needs to understand interactions of each of the varied set of activities and enabling technologies so that he is able to visualize an integrated plan that the experts will put together to optimize the distribution function in the new era of multimodal distribution logistics.

Take any functional area of management and it is but evident that a new age manager will have to understand many more aspects of different functions to a reasonably good extent. And then as Picasso has said "Learn the rules like a Pro, so you can break them like an artist" This brings me to the early era discussion on whether Management is a science or an art! And today with integration of disciplines and domains there is enough science in management for one to learn like a pro; and then to excel the manager will have to perform in a very creative manner. Picasso could get away with himself being an excellent person at what all he did! But today’s manager has to make Picassos out of all his team mates in their individual domains and disciplines. This is what I mean when I speak about the NEW MBA!

Long Live MBA!!!

About the Author:

Hemant C Trivedi is senior professor and officiating dean at School of Management, The NorthCap University, Gurgaon.