Monday MBA Newsdump

B-Schools’ Big Challenge: Developing Leaders, Not Just Managers by Matt Symonds at Forbes.com

On the difference between management and leadership.

…At its best, leadership thereby achieves much more than simple management can. In a survey of 50 global companies, the research firm ISR found a direct link between effective leadership and the bottom line. In organizations whose employees gave their superiors an “average” leadership rating, sales improved just over 6% within a year. In organizations where they rated them more highly, sales rose more than 10%…

A New MBA’s View: The Sorry World We’re Entering by Umaimah Mendhro at Forbes.com

One of the MBA Oath’s organisors takes a good hard look at corporate America, and how to address its flaws. I just can’t get over that an MBA interviewed Noam Chomsky!

“A corporation is about the closest thing to a totalitarian institution that humans have ever contrived,” Noam Chomsky said to me in his cool, matter-of-fact way when I interviewed him for this article. “It is designed to be so.”

I shifted in my seat. “In fact, one of the main business techniques of control is to ‘engineer consent’ so the ‘intelligent minority’ can rule,” he said.

That sounded rather extreme. Corporate America, like America itself, is built on the solid pillars of democracy and freedom. We enjoy free markets where consumers have the power to make rational, informed decisions in their best self-interests. And where corporations compete to earn our business.

Right?

Jobless MBAs Opt for Entrepreneurship by Alison Damast at BusinessWeek

It’s been said a lot, but BusinessWeek looks at MBAs going into entrepreneurship in more detail.

Giovachino is not alone in her entrepreneurial ambitions. The new business bug has bitten both graduate and undergraduate business school students hard this year. Typically, only a handful start businesses after graduating, with most choosing to go the more conventional route by securing a full-time job offer. This year, the number of business students launching companies after graduation, or even while still in school, has skyrocketed. Business schools from Harvard Business School(Harvard Full-Time MBA Profile) to NYU’s Stern School of Business(NYU Stern Full-Time MBA Profile) are reporting a surge of interest from students who have decided to strike out on their own.

Top Indian CEO: Most American Grads Are ‘Unemployable’ by Rob Preston at InformationWeek.com

Some interesting comments from Vineet Nayar, CEO of HCL Technologies. Evidently controversial.

Many American grads looking to enter the tech field are preoccupied with getting rich, Vineet said. They’re far less inclined than students from developing countries like India, China, Brazil, South Africa, and Ireland to spend their time learning the “boring” details of tech process, methodology, and tools–ITIL, Six Sigma, and the like.

Become a Chief Executive Officer by Carol Lewis for TimesOnline.com

Some tips for those with their eye on the top seat, including some words of warning and interesting stats.

You need to be sure you really want the job. About half of the 150 chief executive officers that were interviewed for the book The Secrets of CEOs said that they found the role “intensely lonely,” that the hours were long and that the responsibilities were huge, with international travel playing havoc with any social life that they might have had.

The business of going solo by Della Bradshaw for FT.com

Another look at MBA Entrepreneurs, via FT.

When Abhishek Mitra and Chandrani Chakrabarthi left their jobs in the Californian information technology industry to return to India, they were looking for an opportunity to set up their own business. So just a couple of months after the husband and wife team enrolled on the Indian School of Business MBA in April last year, they decided there was a real opportunity to be had in developing healthy drinks for the Indian market.

M.B.As Swearing in Vain by Alan M. Webber at Forbes.com

Mr Webber points out some flaws he sees in the MBA Oath.

It’s a nice gesture, and the kids are definitely all right. Charmingly naive, but all right. But their pledges to uphold business ethics are likely to prove as successful in changing America’s business culture as high school virginity pledges are at changing America’s sexual culture.

Back to Old School Values by Jean-Pierre Helfer for TimesOnline.com

Jean-Pierre Helfer, Dean of Audencia Nantes School of Management defends  business schools against calls for sweeping overhauls inlight of the crisis. A very good read.

In the most extreme cases, calls are coming for a scorched-earth policy that will allow MBAs and other business education programmes to be rebuilt from scratch. The argument is that the old order has crumbled and that something fresh is needed to break with the past.

The idea is tempting but the problem with such a drastic approach is the question of what this brave new model should be. In such uncertain times, no one can predict when the current crisis will end let alone what the new business landscape will look like. Redesigning MBAs for post-crisis times is simply too tricky today.

And that’s it for today. We wish you all a great start to the week!