The Exec-Ed Zone

I am delighted to have Milenko Gudic, from CEEMAN, making his first contribution to the Exec-ed Zone. Here he gives his view on management education from eastern Europe :

Being involved in the design and implementation of the First CEEMAN Executive Education Workshop on "Executive Education in Transition and Dynamically Changing Economies: Key Issues and Possible Synergies", held on 27-29 June 2007, Tallinn, and participating as one of the speakers in the Roundtable on Executive Education: Investments and Effectiveness, organized by the Russian Association of Managers on 4 July 2007 in Moscow, I got inspired to look back, and reflect on the recent trends in executive education in Central and Eastern Europe.

The reference point was the research project on “Assessing Management Training Needs at the Achieved Level of Transition”, which CEEMAN carried out on behalf of the ETF in 1999-2001 in Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovenia, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine. The project established a specific context chain, which included:

• challenges faced by the corporate world;
• strategies being developed to cope with those challenges;
• managerial capabilities;
• needs and gaps;
• development approaches and practices;
• evaluation of their effectiveness;
• lessons learned and recommendations for the future.

The “challenge myopia” phenomenon and self-complacent attitude of companies that have successfully accomplished complex restructuring processes, observed in 1999/2001 is disappearing. Companies are increasingly aware that as they advance and get exposed to global competition they face even more serious challenges.

In developing comprehensive approaches to deal with new challenges companies shift from hard strategies to ones in which human resource and management development are getting higher importance and are integrated into the overall strategic thinking and actions.

Companies are increasingly aware that management development needs are contextual and dynamic and therefore require persistent efforts to be assessed on a continuous basis. Vertical inconsistencies (which resulted from the lack of understanding of the context chain) and horizontal inconsistencies in assessing needs and developing management education approaches and practices (resulting from the lack of communication between top management, HR management and individual managers in need for management development inputs) are more successfully dealt with. This is facilitated also by a higher position and new mandate of the HR function, particularly in the best companies.

The effectiveness of management development and its ROI, however, still require more attention. In this respect the diminishing effects from the individual up to departmental and company levels, once again raises the issue of knowledge management and diffusion. As shown in Tallinn and Moscow, even world best practices indicate that most of the effects are lost unless management development inputs are further supported by internal coaching and mentoring.

Executive education is shifting from training towards development. Its original focus on functional knowledge, followed by an emphasis on integrative managerial skills, is shifting towards leadership skills, values and attitudes. Companies distinguish between leaders’ development and leadership development, and by promoting the latter they try to improve their internal strategic mentality and change implementation capabilities.

Along the same line is a more selective approach to the providers of services. Traditional provision of training services is being replaced by management development efforts based upon strategic alliances and partnerships among the corporate world and the providers of educational services.

Being aware of increasingly higher competition from consulting firms and more recently from the corporate universities, business schools in CEE are developing new responses. There are innovations in all major aspects of management development; educational programs are becoming integrative and holistic; educational processes shift towards participant centered approaches; faculty is recognized as a critical factor and faculty development efforts are combined by recruiting non-faculty sources of relevant knowledge, skills and attitudes; new strategic alliances and partnerships are being developed among management development institutions and between business schools and their corporate learning partners. The importance of these innovations goes beyond the CEE region and they are attracting a broader attention.

As an association of 175 members from 43 countries from around the world, CEEMAN is actively supporting all this. Its IMTA faculty development program has already educated 268 management educators from 96 institutions from 31 countries: its annual conferences focus on key business and leadership issues and challenges and their implications for management development, attracting participants from all over the world, while its first Exec-Ed workshop additionally confirmed the interest and need for joint efforts for the further advancement of the executive development activity.

With all this, the answer to the question from title is: Nothing Quiet on the Eastern Front! On the contrary, the momentum is high and the direction is right!

Milenko Gudic is Director of the International Management Teachers Academy (IMTA) at CEEMAN.