Graduate Management Education (GME) News Digest - Making Graduate Program Management Simpler

Have you ever thought about the path learners navigate when they go from realizing their need to learn to be a loyal program supporter? When both learners and program leaders really understand the path learners follow, it’s like having a roadmap to success for both. A roadmap with interesting goals like identifying knowledge gaps, choosing a program, enrolling, and becoming a committed supporter. In the following episode, I describe six stages that most learners follow on their journey. Improving program effectiveness and reputation comes from understanding the learner journey and these stages. This episode is based on a blog article I wrote titled, From First Encounters to Lifelong Advocacy: Navigating the Learner’s Journey in a Graduate Program – The Learner View.

The effectiveness of a graduate program depends on the understanding of individual learner journeys by program leaders and faculty, as well as the understanding of the program’s learner journey by individual learners. I explored these understandings from two distinct perspectives of the learner journey in my two previous episodes. One perspective was that of the learner, and the other was that of the program’s management. This episode's purpose is to show how aligning the two perspectives develops a framework for effectively managing graduate programs to the benefit of a diverse set of stakeholders, such as individual learners, faculty members, employers, and the community.

Click here to complete this 9 question assessment to see what your program's learner journey is telling you.

Welcome back to the GME News Digest Podcast Series. Hi, I’m Rodney Alsup, your host for this episode, “Embracing Skills-Based Hiring in Graduate Programs.”

Ashley Mowreader’s insightful Inside Higher Ed article inspired this episode. Her title, “What Skills-Based Hiring Means for Higher Ed” caught my attention, so I thought I would explore its significance for the graduate education community. Her article was among the twelve pieces of content I included in last week’s curated selection for GME News Digest subscribers.

Our conversation focused on: • How the coming baby drought will affect the future of business education? • How generational behavior will affect the future of business education? • How changes in the behavior of the middle classes will affect the future of business education? • How gender shifts will affect the future of business education? • How urbanization will affect the future of business education? • How technological advances will affect the future of business education? • How a culture of sharing will affect the future of business education? • How changes in the medium of exchange will affect the future of business education?

Wharton Professor Mauro Guillén, recently named dean of Cambridge University’s Judge Business School, and author of 2030: How Today's Biggest Trends Will Collide and Reshape the Future of Everything joined me to discuss how B-School deans and graduate program leaders can prepare their programs for 2030 and beyond.