Business Education Alliance

Archive for the ‘Alliance Business School’ Category

Introduction

Despite the fact that change is difficult to do well, it is a very vital aspect to organizational growth and survival. Dismissal record of success is one thing that is shared by the different forms of change. In educational organizational setting, change is required in order to bring about high performance and high quality of education. It should be clearly understood that out of the very many companies that implement change for success, only a few of them are able to succeed. This is the reason as to why it is indicated that change is difficult to implement. Educational organization across the whole world are beginning to see the benefits of change and hence are increasingly beginning to use a new and innovative approach that brings about small and large scale systems of change in different schools especially universities (Fullan, 2001, pp.43).

This study addresses the concept of change and its impacts or effects to educational organization settings, management and leading change, counteracts to change, politics, and economics, comprehension of the dynamics of change and their effects on the strategic planning of learning institutions, and other information that is related to leading change in educational organizations. Educational organizations are among the aspects that are experiencing a lot of change in the whole world and hence information concerning how this change should be led and managed is of great importance. There are different ways that are used in bringing about change in educational systems. Many researchers and scholars have stated that bring about change is one thing and leading and managing that change is another aspect. Traditional educational settings need to be changed in order to incorporate the aspect of advanced technology in education (Harris, 2007, pp.316).

Examination of Change, Behavior, Leadership Theories, and Principles

In order to gain a clear understanding of educational change process and its associated impacts on the practices of education, it is very imperative to examine change, leadership theories, behavior, and principles. In this case, change is brought about by leaders and good leaders usually consult the employees before implementing a change as indicated by the participatory leadership theories (Silverman, 2005, pp.23). According to the behavioral theory of leadership, great leaders are usually made but not born. In this case, a leader learns how to be a leader through practicing. Principles of a good leader include; listening, trusting oneself, empowering the subordinates, learning to be resilient, communicating effectively, and learning to take responsibilities.

The Concept of Change

In order to clearly understand the concept of change, it is of great importance to define this change. Change can be defined differently according to different situations. As indicated by Werkman (2009, pp.670), change is so all-encompassing in people’s lives to the extent that it almost defeats analysis and description. Generally, change is the aspect of making something looks new or transforming something from the old form to a new one (Harris, 2007, pp.317).

Change occurs over time and hence it is inevitable. This implies that there is not a time when individuals will avoid change; this is an aspect that comes as time goes by. For instance, the increased advancement of technology has brought about a lot of changes in all aspects of life over a very short period of time. Change is not always positive as in some ways it is negative or both. This means that change may come to alter what is already there either negatively or positively or even both. Researches, as indicated by Silverman (2005, pp.23), change is unavoidable and hence it is the role of the affected parties to make sure that this change is well led and managed (Leithwood et al, 1999). Change can be brought about by an individual to the society and it can emanate from the society to an individual. This indicates that a person can change the entire society while on the other hand a society can change the behaviors and thoughts of an individual. It should be noted that for a change to take place or to occur, there must be a cause and effects. In educational settings, technology has caused a lot of changes which have brought about improvement in performance of both students and teachers (Paton & McCalman, 2000).

Until recently, educational management structures and governance have been majorly bureaucratic particularly in their mode of operation which was based on centralized and top-down control. This indicates that the management and leadership of education were from districts to schools to departments to teachers to students (Dubrin, 2004, pp.87). Organizational theories and practices that have been developed and used indicate that effective educational organizations afford tampering and reforming the vertical chains of commands and greater degrees of self management as well as lateral collaborations that are characterized by bureaucratic school management (Jacobson et al, 2005, pp.617). This is a good example that change occurs over time and it is inevitable.

Do you find your work meaningful?  The Harvard Business School Alumni Bulletin for December 2007 on pages 34-35, had an article on “How Business Schools Lost their Way.”  HBS associate professor Rakesh Khurana has written a book that points out problems including, “…business schools on average are not providing some way for them (students) to link the values they have to the work they are going to be doing.  And as a consequence, many students have adopted a view of the world in which they believe they cannot live their values through their work.”  … “By denying students the opportunity to see the possibility of living their life as a profession, seeing meaning in their work, seeing their work as a calling.…”

There are many different factors that go into deciding what MBA programs a candidate should apply to.  While location, cost, reputation, and acceptance difficulty are certainly the major factors that one should consider, many students would also like to know where many of today’s most successful business leaders got their MBA’s from.  Apart from individually searching one by one, it is hard to find a resource to find out this information.  For this reason, I’ve compiled a collection of some of my favorite MBA business leaders and where they went to school.

With the current economic shake up on Wall Street an appropriate place to start is with Jamie Dimon, President of JP Morgan Chase.  Mr. Dimon was selected as one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People and received his MBA from Harvard University.  Staying with the same theme, Dick Kovacevich, Chairman and CEO of Wells Fargo obtained his MBA from Stanford University.  Laurence Fink, Chairman of BlackRock attended UCLA’s Anderson School for his MBA and keeping with the financial theme, Warren Buffet, ‘The Oracle of Omaha’ while not an MBA holder did receive his MS in Economics at Columbia University back in a day when MBA’s weren’t as common.  Finally, Robert Edward Diamond Jr., the President of Barclay’s received his Masters from The University of Connecticut School of Business Administration.