Character and
self-awareness in business education? Great — let’s get started
By Dr. Mark J. Eppli, Interim Keyes Dean of
Business Administration, Marquette University
Met with a measured pause followed by a few nervous laughs,
I knew I had their attention.
“We’re going to teach that here at Marquette Business,” I
said. “We’re going to graduate business leaders with self-awareness and
character.”
If they were skeptical, it didn’t show — each was as excited
as the next. “Great — let’s get started.”
Truth is, we already had. It was these same alumni who,
working side-by-side with our faculty, helped shape our new “Day 1” vision.
Knowing — just as hundreds of other AACSB schools do — that business education
must change to meet the demands of industry, we sought industry wisdom.
While their input varied by sector, age and life experience,
there were two resounding themes: 1) Business students aren’t fully prepared to
add immediate value to organizations upon graduation, and 2) they lack the
character and self-awareness to lead.
Over time, the answer became clear to us: A Marquette
Business education will start on Day 1. From that moment we will ensure every graduate
is prepared to lead with a depth of business expertise, character and
self-awareness.
But what does that
mean? More importantly, how do we successfully execute on such a promise?
Diligent business educators, we started with the research. A
May 2014 Gallup report on workplace and employee engagement sets the tone for
how we will implement the Day 1 vision. Gallup surveyed 30,000 college
graduates and found that people who feel happy and engaged in their jobs are
the most productive — yet only 39 percent are considered engaged employees.
Gallup then looked at what college activities correlate with
workplace engagement, which ultimately leads to personal well-being and
employee satisfaction. The primary contributing factors, in order of
importance:
1.
Feelings of being “emotionally supported” at
school by a professor or mentor
2.
Learning from a professor who excited you about
learning and encouraged you to pursue your dreams
3.
Student internships
4.
Projects that took a semester or more to
complete
5.
Involvement in extracurricular activities and
organizations
To be clear, we haven’t developed a magic formula. There is
no one-size-fits-all when it comes to education. But for us, a Jesuit business
school in Milwaukee with our own unique challenges and opportunities, we want
to ensure that every Marquette Business graduate is prepared to lead with a
depth of business expertise, character and self-awareness, and we will do so
through three strategic initiatives.
First, our students will be internship-ready as sophomores.
To that end, we are moving major courses earlier in the curriculum and adding a
required first-year course on how businesses make money and create value. To be
competitive, students need to quickly understand how business operates as a
whole, rather than in isolation by major disciplines.
Second, we will capitalize on the success of our applied
centers and programs in applied investment management, supply chain management
and real estate. We will scale these up and use them as models to develop new
centers and programs. In fact, we recently announced the expansion of our
Applied Investment Management program, which will now feature a private equity
track — a direct result of industry demand.
Lastly, that pesky character and self-awareness bit. How do
we even begin to make good on that promise?
In part, our Catholic, Jesuit foundation gives us an
advantage — but we will do more. The cornerstone of Day 1 will be the Center
for Leadership and Career Development. Led by an assistant dean and guided by
non-tenured faculty from industry and executives-in-residence, the center will
combine traditional career services with a required leadership program built
around character and self-awareness that permeates every Marquette Business
student’s experience.
We will not do this softly. A hallmark of a Jesuit business
education is rigor, so we must — and we will — measure student progress. The
executives-in-residence and professional mentors will be accountable, too. We
invite them in not to simply tell war stories, but to guide and mentor, helping
our students to reflect on their experiences and solve real problems.
The Gallup report authors write: “…Answers lie in thinking
about things that are more lasting than…traditional measures of college.
Instead, the answers may lie in what students are doing in college and how they
are experiencing it. Those elements — more than any others — have a profound
relationship to a person’s life and career. Yet they are being achieved by too
few. It should be a national imperative — owned by higher education
institutions, students, parents, businesses, non-profits, and government alike,
to change this.”
At Marquette Business, we heard this and said, “Great — let’s
get started.”
Dr. Mark Eppli is the
interim Keyes Dean of Business Administration at Marquette University in
Milwaukee. A professor of finance, Dr. Eppli also holds the Robert B. Bell,
Sr., Chair in Real Estate.
