Ethics in the b-schools

It was not long ago that I was considering my options for MBA studies. At least it does not seem that long ago, and yet I graduated last week from Imperial College (Tanaka Business School) - London, so clearly it has been over a year!

Prior to embarking on my full-time MBA studies I had to gather information and make several choices. Some simple ones were to undertake these studies within Europe, and to do it as a full-time student. Top candidates includes INSEAD, IESE, ESADE, IMD, SDA Bocconi... curiously London Business School, together with other schools in UK, were initially put to one side - as I had spent sufficient time in UK already (and in London in particular) whilst also holding a desire to emerse myself into a new culture and environment.

From all the knowledge gathered, IESE was top institution in my mind. This might relate also to it holding an early advantage - as I had kept a FT newspaper cutting from years ago, which described the ethical behaviour that was well recognised within this institution (a student rejected a business deal as it would have reversed a personal pledge made earlier in the negotiations). I cannot help it, it is my nature to bring technology and business needs together - it is also in my nature to do so in an ethical manner (or at least seek to be ethically upstanding). Therefore it was appealing to consider a leading business school, and for it to match on additional attributes which I hold dear. I certainly did not find the competitive characteristics that I heard from feedback on LSB. Sadly the 2 years at IESE was too costly for my personal circumstances - and could not be justified (I was not able to secure a scholarship within the timeframe of my application).

It is therefore with some humour that I read during my MBA year that certain students in business schools had been found to have cheated or acted in dishonest manner (see ft.com article). It was also with some sadness that I heard last week that there was at least one case of plagiarism within my cohort. There will be justifications for which I am not privy to, just like the reasons for positively recognising certain students for academic achievement -when during the year they hardly indicated particular merit. The difference is that what might appear to be misplaced meritocracy can generate mild humour, it can also create spite and resentment. There are other battles to fight that these wobbles must be put to one side. This is not to forget, but rather to operate within the sphere of influence so as to create the feeling of satisfaction and positive contribution.

Back to business schools. If I were placed in same situation I suspect I would make same choices in many situations. In selecting the business school, Imperial College appeared as a good choice. Within budget, application timing/course length, anticipated quality of cohort, match with future career pathways, and good institutional reputation. It would have been highly relevant to have investigated HEC Paris, particularly given my subsequent relocation to France (post MBA studies) together with a closer look at ESADE. Time was of the essense at time of gathering data and making choices - with work commitments sucking 17hrs per day out of me, this was hard to come by... Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I have accepted to mentor a number of future MBA students - to help make the decisions and to help ask the candidate ask the key questions to themselves.

During my MBA studies I had the joy of attending a short course run by Prof Anand Narasimhan "Leadership" (Anand is now at IMD). This was perhaps the closest that Tanaka got to offering a personal insight/ethics course (the Public Policy course didn't get anywhere close). Evidently there is a place for such content within a MBA programme - but few have shown the initiative to communicated this to the market. An exception in London might be observed in the visiting professor of organisational ethics at Cass : Roger Steare (see brief ft.com article)