‘MBA Students In Canada Tackle Sustainability To Get A Competitive Edge’
More schools are reflecting the need of sustainability that is being initiated in the corporate world. Sustainability is becoming hard to ignore in the business world because corporations are such big contributors to environmental impacts. Not only do the corporate side require this new responsible thinking but the employee side (the current generation) is also in search for more meaningful careers.
This article also lists a ranking of MBA schools on the Corporate Knights list. Schulich has placed first place since 2004. However, I disagreed and was very disappointed at one of the statements made by the school’s associate dean, Dirk Matten. He stated that although sustainability education is increasingly important and mainstream, he emphasized that MBA is still, at its core, a business degree. In my previous posts, I heavily emphasized the “great first, green second” concept. I still fully support it but Matten makes it seem like sustainability is something separate from the business aspect.
In contrast, McGill, number two on the Corporate Knights list, suggested a much better system of sustainability. Steve Maguire, a strategy professor, said that they differ from York’s approach in the sense that sustainability issues permeate much of the school’s MBA teaching and that the material is built into the required courses.
I agree with McGill’s perspective of sustainability over Schulich’s. The materials cannot be taught separately – it must be fully integrated into the core materials / operations to really capture all aspects of the business. Going more in depth, I looked into the ranking methodology and it made me reflect back to the discussion in class where we talked about what certifications really meant and the validity of their systems. In short, the ranking was based on how much support the school put towards sustainability and how much materials the school had on sustainability. I saw some flaws in this methodology; rather than the sheer volume, it should be ranked on how accurately and how genuinely the schools support sustainability.
As a UBC student, I am very proud of all the initiatives that we have launched in pursuing sustainability. In present times, when the society is looking at businesses to be the solution, I wish that Sauder can take the handle and really tackle sustainability challenges with full force. With such a strong support across the whole school, Sauder should use this opportunity and become a global leader.
Article: http://business.financialpost.com/executive/business-education/mba-students-in-canada-tackle-sustainability-to-get-a-competitive-edge?__lsa=7081-cfce
Daniel Lau
April 14, 2016 — 3:10 pm
So as basic as it may seem, I looked up the definition of business and commerce and it is defined as “the activity of buying and selling”. Although it is a broad definition it did help me to reflect on what I have learned throughout my years here at Sauder and the different facets of business that we got to learn about. I totally agree with your value on sustainability and I think that the biggest reason why it should be incorporated into the business curriculum is because it has been emerging as a key factor in “the activity of buying and selling”. If anything, it will continue to grow to become potentially one of the biggest components in business. At the end of the day, if the earth does not survive, business does not survive and I think that sustainability is just starting to reveal itself at the core of commerce.