What's Wrong With Business Education

Professor Henry Mintzberg is a long-time critic of business schools, even though (or perhaps because) he graduated from one and is employed by another.

In this dialogue with businessman Ricardo Semler, Professor Mintzberg drops one gem after another, such as:

"Canada is one country that works remarkably well in practice, but doesn't work at all in theory."

"You can't create a manager in a classroom. If you try, you create hubris."

"Management is where art and craft and science meet. You can't do anything with craft when people have no experience, 'cause craft by definition is rooted in experience. And art tends to get treated in the classroom in a kind of voyeuristic way, we have cases about entrepreneurs and things...so the emphasis is really on the science or the analytical side and I think that distorts things. I wouldn't close down the MBA programs...I would simply recognize them for what they are: training in analytical skills for analytical jobs...just don't pretend we're creating them as managers...Don't close them down but recognize them for what they are."

"You shouldn't be a manager because you got an MBA. You should earn your managerial stripes."

"Regular MBA programs train the wrong people in the wrong ways with the wrong consequences."

Semler gets a good line in, too, when he says that most business schools bring in business people like zoo animals, and have a sign outside the classroom that says "Don't feed the businessman."