New students are arriving on business school campuses for the first fall term since the flood of management malpractice disclosures hit the headlines. For this reason, it is perhaps a good time to solicit creative ideas about how leading business schools that mint a high proportion of senior executives in large organizations can identify and weed out candidates whose personal values suggest potential long-term risk to themselves and to business in general.
I'm not suggesting we delude ourselves into thinking that business schools can solve the problem. As we have been reminded many times, the problem begins in the family, or what serves for one. But can schools at least attempt to "license" leaders and managers in whom they can have some degree of confidence? Judging from the large proportion of those accused of wrongdoing as part of the "Enron syndrome" who possess MBAs from leading business schools, this is a valid question. It's a question made more urgent by what we now know as the immense cost to individuals, and the economy in general, of a loss of trust in our business institutions and those who lead them.
We know a few things on which to base a judgment. First, any organization can best avoid loss of productivity and the achievement of quality through the quality of its hiring. |
James Heskett |
We know a few things on which to base a judgment. First, any organization can best avoid loss of productivity and the achievement of quality through the quality of its hiring. Several outstanding organizations I have studied regard hiring as their leaders and managers most important task, an "almost religious experience," in the words of one. The admissions process at business schools thus becomes the first line of defense in raising the quality of eventual graduates. In business, we "hire for attitude and train for skills" because it is very difficult to shape attitudes in adults. An MBA program can provide an opportunity to discuss and make us aware of the nuances of business "gray areas" when it comes to ethical business decisions, but no method has yet been devised to teach values to adults with any expectation of success.
In addition to academic performance and test scores, the devices that are used to sort applicants to MBA programs today include letters of recommendation, essays written by applicants about how they have handled or would handle various value-laden leadership challenges, and careful checks for inaccuracies in resumes that might suggest fraudulent claims. Applications are read and reread for suggestions regarding an applicant's sensitivity to the needs of those whom he or she might one day be leading. Only in some of the smaller programs are personal interviews by admissions personnel of every candidate possible.
What more can be done at the MBA program entry level? Or is it unrealistic to expect that there is any set of processes that can adequately address the problem of sorting out "bad apples" at this point? Specifically, what kind of evidence, in addition to that described above, would you try to obtain in order to insure that our graduate schools of business grant the MBA to those in whom society and the business community can have some degree of trust? How would you go about getting it? Is it worth the effort? What do you think?