As competent and well rounded management skills become increasingly important, many organisations are looking at how they can improve their capability in this area. Craig Donaldson takes stock of the executive education market and looks at how organisations can make the most of such investments for their executives
As competent and well rounded management skills become increasingly important, many organisations are looking at how they can improve their capability in this area. Craig Donaldson takes stock of the executive education market and looks at how organisations can make the most of such investments for their executives
Leadership and good management are, increasingly, hot topics for organisations across the board. With good economic growth over the past few years, many organisations have invested generously in executive education. However, increased scrutiny of such budgets has seen organisations taking a more targeted and increasingly sophisticated approach to developing their managers.
“There’s been a real move towards programs that are developed for corporates directly, rather than taking something off the shelf,” says Rob Thomason, director of executive education for Melbourne Business School. “Companies want to develop targeted and integrated programs that will meet all the business objectives of the organisation.”
Chris Clark, director of corporate and executive education for Macquarie Graduate School of Management (MGSM), agrees. He has seen a swing towards more customised programs, where four or five years ago companies were happy to send their executives off on more generic public programs. “More companies are getting better at identifying specific skill needs. Rather than having a policy for putting all managers through a general management program, they’ll say that mangers in marketing need more skills in financial analysis. They’ll then go and commission a two or three day financial management course and deliver it for a specific group of targeted individuals,” he says.
However, that’s not to say that short executive education programs are all the rage. Thomason is still seeing significant demand for programs that can run from anywhere between 5 and 21 days. “Our business is about half people coming along to do open programs and half organisations who want us to come and work directly with them in terms of developing a program.”
There is also a trend towards more organisations seeking to create an award pathway with an accredited outcome through the delivery of the executive program, Clark says. Woolworths, for example, has an entire suite of programs right up to Masters level. “More organisations are looking for accreditation from their programs, so that the distinction between award courses such as public MBAs and corporate executive education programs is blurred,” he says.
Making the most of executive education
One of the keys to a successful executive education program is understanding exactly what it is you need out of such a program. “Much of the success of a program comes before it’s actually delivered,” Clark says. “It’s difficult to design a brilliant program if the client comes in and says they want some management development. When you ask them exactly what they want and they say, ‘Well, that’s your job,’ it’s hard to understand what their requirements are.”
John Urbano, director of executive programs for the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM) agrees that clarifying the outcomes sought as a result of investing in executive education is important for a number of reasons. He also offers a number of pointers for organisations looking to tailor their executive education:
• Ensure the employees want to attend and agree with the outcomes required.
• Ensure the opportunity suits the career objectives of the individuals involved.
• Ensure appropriate action plans are created upon return to the office – encourage discussion of the topics covered and understand how skills learnt can benefit their team and the organisations.
• Make sure the programs attended suit the strategic objectives of the organisation and that these are understood by the participant.
• View executive education as a long-term plan, involving a number of employees across different teams and work functions to assist change processes within the organisation.
• As far as practically possible, determine that the employee is well placed to use the new concepts in the program.
• Track the training attended by the company as a whole and determine a method of measuring results.
• Position executive education as a developmental opportunity to improve both the individual’s performance as well as the organisation’s.
• Use executive education as a reward for high potential individuals and loyalty, not a punishment for poor performance.
Thomason says it’s also important to ensure that an executive education provider has the capability to deliver. “Don’t expect to get something off the shelf, but instead invest some time in actually working with the partner to define the program and have some clarity around the program outcomes,” he adds.
Executive buy-in and ROI
Securing executive buy-in is a perennially sticky issue for HR. Executive education programs are no exception. The benefits, however, that flow from securing buy-in are worth the effort involved. As executive education is typically driven out of HR or a subset of HR such as organisational development, Clark says that the earlier senior management and the board of directors are involved, the better. “There should be senior management input before we even start negotiating a program.”
Thomason agrees that senior management –and preferably CEO buy-in – is vital. “If the CEO is endorsing and driving the program it will be more successful.” Because of the spend involved in executive education, however, there are not too many organisations he works with where senior management doesn’t buy-in. “These are not small investments.”
Senior managers are often not committed to such programs because they can see them as an expense rather than an investment, Clark says. If ownership of an executive education program is vested in someone who doesn’t have the necessary clout because they’re lower down in an organisation’s hierarchy, then participants will pick up on this, he says. If this is the case, then transfer of learning back in the workplace can suffer. “There’s got to be commitment at all levels of an organisation so that the learning that comes out of a program is supported back in the workplace,”Thomason says.
Executive education providers agree that it’s costly and difficult (read nigh on impossible) to prove a hard and measurable ROI for their services. However, securing CEO support can be made easier if there is a direct and proven link between the education and the organisation’s strategic needs. Many modern executive education programs see participants undertake project-based learning which achieves a greater resonance within an organisation.
If a client wants to work on strategy and leadership, for example, Clark says participants might undergo a two module program covering theory first and practice second, via a series of real projects that have been identified by the company as being of value. “At the end of the second module they line up before senior management or the board of directors and present their analysis and findings,” Clark says. “You very quickly work out whether they’ve taken the learning on board and whether their quality of analysis and ability to provide solutions is any better than it was.”
Roche rolls out executive marketing education
Roche, a multinational pharmaceutical, provides tailored executive education programs for its marketing staff. In Europe, Latin America and North America, Roche works with the London Business School, while in the Asia Pacific region, Roche works with Macquarie Graduate School of Management.
Tom Morgan, global director of strategic marketing for Roche, says the program covers everything from basic levels of marketing, such as strategy, market research, public relations and various communication and marketing channels, through to more sophisticated education such as computer generated two-year business policy simulations. Anywhere between 30–45 marketing staff participate in the program at any one time, with 42 currently in attendance.
Roche does not measure hard ROI on the program. Morgan, however, says its success is gauged in a number of ways. Formal evaluation forms ask participants to rate every session along with their topic and speaker, while the overall value of the program is also assessed upon completion. Secondly, Roche measures transfer of learning. Participants write up action plans based on their learning, which are then signed off by upper management. The action plans then need to be implemented and fulfilled once the participants return to work in their country. Thirdly, Roche actively solicits managers’ feedback on the success of their participants’ learning back in the workplace.
