Build it and they may come

An interesting article from The Economist this week titled ‘Build it and they may come’.  

Several prestigious business schools are investing vast sums building new facilities. These include The Kellogg School of Management in Illinois $200m, Stanford Business School $345 million, Columbia Business School (in New York) $600m, Judge Business School in Cambridge $85m. Several prestigious business schools are investing vast sums building new facilities.

Downsides identified in the article: the demand for MBAs is ‘soft’ and distance learning technology may reduce the need/desire for participants to meet as often in one physical location.  

At MTP we began 26 years ago running courses for groups of managers, mainly in Europe.  Over that time the proportion of our courses taking place outside Europe has grown substantially (to 30%) and the proportion of our revenue from distance learning (with virtual courses being the main contributor) to 20%.  We are travelling to participants (by plane or virtual classroom) rather than them travelling to us. 

Who knows what will happen.  We will see. 

One wonders if one of the quotations we use in our branding may prove to be prescient. ‘If you see a bandwagon, it’s too late.’  James Goldsmith

Chris Goodwin