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The Euro*MBA in Handelszeitung

Programme Director Stuart Dixon and alumnus Gabor Markus interviewed by Handelszeitung, 24 February 2010

 

Euro verbindet die Talente NACHGEFRAGT | Stuart Dixon, Programmdirektor Euro*MBA, Maastricht NL Wollen guten Mix von Studierenden

 

Austausch Die Maastricht University bietet mit fuenf weiteren internationalen Universitaeten den Euro*MBA an: Die Menschen aus allen Kontinenten lernen live und online mit- sowie voneinander.

Da ist beispielsweise Ra-min Shahzamani, ein iranischer und kanadischer Staatsbuerger. Weil er fuer eine humanitaere Organisation zuerst im Kongo, dann in Afghanistan und spaeter in Kolumbien taetig war, entschied er sich fuer den Euro*MBA. 80% des Pensums finden naemlich in zehn E-Learning-Modulen statt, die Shahzamani von irgendeinem Einsatzort, an dem er sich gerade befindet, studieren kann.

 

Dazu kommen sechs sogenannte Residential Weeks, das heisst, alle Teilnehmer lernen sich persoenlich kennen und studieren miteinander an den Partneruniversitaeten des Euro*MBA: Audencia (Nantes), EADA (Barcelona), HHL (Leipzig), Paul Cezanne (Aix en Provence), Kominski (Warschau) sowie an der federfuehrenden Maastricht University. Ein wahrhaft europäischer Wurf.

 

Auch Schweizer engagieren sich

 

Bei allen Teilnehmern finden sich aehnlich spannende Biografien wie die von Ramin Shahzamani. Einer unter ihnen ist der Schweizer Gabor Markus, der sein Ingenieursstudium an der EPFL in Lausanne absolviert hatte. Entschieden hat er sich nach einer gruendlichen Umschau in der Heimat.

Der Grund: In der Schweiz hat es sehr gute Schulen, die zwar auch internationale Studenten haben, aber die meisten arbeiten und wohnen doch hier, sagt Markus. Fuer ihn war ausserdem das internationale Profil des Euro*MBA, der zudem AACSB-, AMBA- und EQUIS-akkreditiert ist, absolut kompatibel mit seiner damaligen Taetigkeit in der Luftfahrtbranche, fuer die er viel auf Reisen war. Die Kombination, online arbeiten zu koennen, verbunden mit dem je einwoechigen Live-Aufenthalt an sechs verschiedenen Universitaeten in Europa mit Menschen unglaublich vieler Nationalitaeten und Patchwork-Karrieren, reizte ihn ebenfalls, wie Markus ausfuehrt.

 

Lernen, wie andere Leute ticken

 

Dazu kam spaeter die interessante Erfahrung, wie franzoesische Schulen mit der Theorie umgehen, deutsche Professoren mit einer gewissen Political Correctness lehren oder wie die besonders ehrgeizigen polnischen Mitstudierenden sich ins Zeug legen – das hat Markus unglaublich gefallen. All dies habe ihm zu vielen Einblicken und Erlebnissen verholfen.

 

Gabor Markus lebt heute, wenn er nicht gerade reist, in Genf. Seinen Euro*MBA hat er im Januar 2006 begonnen und genau zwei Jahre spaeter abgeschlossen. Sein derzeitiger Arbeitgeber habe den Abschluss und den damit verbundenen Ehrgeiz sehr geschaetzt, betont Markus. Den Euro*MBA hat er selbst bezahlt, weil er es so wollte, damit er unabhaengig von einem Arbeitgeber war. Er ist auch heute noch seiner Ausbildungsstaette und der Alumni-Organisation als Treasurer fest verbunden.

 

Aufstrecken: Nur wer sich austauscht, kommt auf dem globalen Parkettder Wirtschaft weiter.

Wie entstand die Idee zu diesem Euro*MBA?

 

Stuart Dixon: Das globale Umfeld hat sich unglaublich rasch veraendert. Damit fand auch ein grosser Wandel in der Kommunikation und Technologie statt. Der Informationsbedarf ist international ebenfalls stark gewachsen und mit ihm die Organisationen und das Interesse der Menschen. Das war die Inspiration zu diesem Programm.

 

Was sind das fuer Menschen, die den Euro*MBA machen?

 

Dixon: Die meisten sind Europaer, davon viele Expatriates, aber auch Menschen aus Uebersee, vor allem Asien. Das Erlebnis, auf diese Weise viel von Europa zu sehen und andere Menschen kennenzulernen, scheint den besonderen Reiz auszumachen. Ein gutes Beispiel ist die Franzoesin Michelle, Hotelmanagerin in Indonesien und viel unterwegs auf dem Globus. Die meisten arbeiten in einem internationalen Umfeld, hauptsaechlich für europaeische Firmen.

 

Sie haben bewusst kleine Klassen mit 30 bis 40 Studenten. Welche Philosophie steht dahinter?

 

Dixon: Mit noch mehr Studenten ginge eine gewisse Intimitaet verloren. Dann wuerden sich einige beschweren, dass sie zu wenig Kontakt hätten oder dass sich eine Gruppe in verschiedene Untergruppen, eventuell auch Nationalitaeten aufspaltet. Genau das wollen wir bei unserem Euro*MBA nicht. Wir wollen eine gute Groesse, gute Netzwerke, gute Diskussionen – sprich einen guten Mix von Studierenden.

 

The Euro*MBA in The Independent

The Independent

Direct link to the article in The Independent

January 19, 2010

 

Part-time, but with a difference

Education | OVERSEAS: EURO MBA The Euro MBA combines home study with residential trips to build contacts. James Morrison reports

An oft-cited criticism of distance-learning MBAs is that they isolate students from their peers, depriving them of the day-to-day dynamism of the business school environment. Part-time programmes, meanwhile, are often characterised by the high numbers of applicants drawn from their immediate surroundings - a contrast to the celebrated international mix of many full-time MBA cohorts.

But if either of these were ever meant to be rules of thumb, no one told the architects of the Euro MBA. In the 13 years since its inception, this two-year executive programme - delivered by a consortium of six leading European schools - has overcome many of the perceived weaknesses of other flexible MBA course structures. It reconvenes its students every three months for exams and seven-day residentials, preceded by lavish team-building exercises ranging from sailing races to rugby matches. They remain connected in the meantime by online tools ranging from Twitter to Lotus Notes.

"In the past, when people studied MBAs from home they often never finished them, and most part-time programmes were geared towards people in their local areas looking to fit evening classes around their jobs," explains programme director Dr Stuart Dixon. "At the time we launched this course, no one talked about e-learning. Then the guy who designed it started using Lotus Notes to upload materials linked directly to the quarterly residentials.

"By giving students the flexibility to study and communicate with each other online wherever they are, and inviting them all in for quarterly residentials, we've made our programme much more international than most part-time MBAs. This helps us attract students who want the classic MBA experience of being able to network with people from all over the world."

Five minutes spent chatting to the class of 2009 would convince even the most hardened Euro MBA sceptic of the programme's cosmopolitan credentials. In a coffee-break between introductory sessions during a residential at the Audencia Nantes School of Management, I meet Florence Karera, 36, a senior United Nations human resources officer. In the space of two minutes, Karera runs through a CV that makes her sound like a one-woman advert for internationalism. Rwandan-born, she has worked for the UN in locations ranging from Kosovo to New York before being posted to the Democratic Republic of Congo. Florence's gruelling schedule means she rarely sees her two-year-old daughter, Simbi, who lives with her partner in Kenya, but she explains her "Euro MBA baby" is already well travelled, having accompanied her mother to a previous residential in Poland.

"The international nature of this MBA is what appeals to me," says Florence. "I like the idea that it is authored by different universities, and that we move from Barcelona to Maastricht. I hadn't ever seen that before. Whenever you go to a different country for a residential, you get a real feel for its culture."

 

At 59, Glaswegian Mike Mann is the oldest in this particular cohort. He is an accountant by profession and is now working as a consultant on various development projects led by the EU while living in the West Indies. He skipped O-levels in his youth, and the extent of his academic qualifications was a business diploma from Glasgow Technical College before he enrolled on the Euro MBA. But he says the experience has motivated him to consider reading for a PhD.

"I've come late to this - I started working overseas 20 years ago, and I've been a tax exile ever since," he says candidly. "I love this to bits, though. I'm meeting people from all over, and learning about different perspectives."

Besides adopting a week-long residential format - as opposed to the frantic one or two-day "boot camps" shoehorned in between working weeks by many distance-learning courses - the structure of the Euro MBA is unique in other ways. The fact that residentials rotate between different countries (courtesy of the locations of the various partner institutions) effectively renders the programme's "campus" as multinational as its intake. Group projects undertaken during residential weeks are organised in such a way that students shuffle teams from one to another, ensuring no one works with the same colleague twice. As the programme has two annual entry-points, September and January, some students' first module is their classmates' fifth.

Dixon sums up: "Normally with MBA courses, you get stuck with the same people for the whole year or two years. After a while, you think, 'I know everyone now - I need to meet other people'. If you don't like the group you're in, you're stuffed. With this programme, people come and go the whole time."

Students are mingling with those at later stages in their studies from the word go. The first half of each residential coincides with a marathon four-day introduction seminar for raw recruits (focusing on everything from writing skills to multicultural communication). Evening social events cut across dividing lines, giving freshers an opportunity to pick the brains of older hands.

This September's intake is distinguished by an unusually high proportion of expats. Among these is Cesare Pagahi, 35, an Italian emigre who describes the Netherlands as home, but spends much of his time working as a marine contractor for the oil and gas industries off the Angolan coast. Given his dizzyingly peripatetic lifestyle, it's no surprise to learn Cesare was attracted to the Euro MBA by the intensive nature of its residential weeks.

As he heads off for the sinuous ten-minute tram ride into central Nantes at the end of his induction, Cesare reflects: "I travel to a lot of remote places. I needed an executive MBA that allotted specific portions of time for residentials. The problem with some distance courses is that every few weeks you've got to go somewhere else. That's simply impossible for me. The intensity of these residential weeks, and the fact they're set well in advance, helps me plan around them."

If the students sound like they're a multicultural bunch, their lecturers are no less diverse. Dr Ludovico Alcorta (known as "Ludo") is a charismatic former banker who's just driven the 500 miles from Maastricht to Nantes to deliver his introductory session on technology and innovation management.

 

"I was born in Peru - only born. Don't ask me where I belong, because I don't know!" he announces at the start of his talk. One by one, heads nod sympathetically around the lecture-theatre. He appears to be in good company.

Key facts

 * The Euro MBA was launched in 1996 by the Open University of the Netherlands.

* It's administered by the University of Maastricht Business School and taught by a consortium of six centres: Audencia Nantes School of Management; Kozminski University, Warsaw; IAE Graduate School of Management, Aix-en-Provence; Leipzig Graduate School of Management; and EADA, Barcelona.

* The programme boasts a 93 per cent completion rate - with only 13 out of 185 students ever having left before graduating.

* Nine out of 10 Euro MBA graduates get pay rises and 35 per cent change jobs within a year of completing.

* The 2009 cohort contains a 70-30 male-female split, with 22 nationalities represented - ranging from Moroccan to Slovakian.

* The programme is fully accredited by the Association of MBAs, and has Equis and AACSB accreditation via the individual participating schools.

 

In the Top 4 by The Economist

The Euro*MBA was rated as one of the top 4 programmes worldwide by The Economist WhichMBA?Guide February 2010