AUB Business School Set to Join Rank of Top 6 Percent in the Wolrd

A strong business school is "a major catalyst of economic invigoration for a country," said the president and CEO of the business school accreditation agency, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB), during a three-day visit to Lebanon that ended September 26.

John Fernandez, who was on his third visit to AUB since he first met Olayan School of Business Dean George Najjar in 2003, said he believed that in addition to creating a secure and stable political environment, the Lebanese should work on developing their business schools to help stimulate economic growth.

Since 2005, the Suliman S. Olayan School of Business has been working on earning the coveted AACSB accreditation, which would thus allow it to join the ranks of the top 6 percent of business schools in the world, the likes of Harvard, Yale, and others. "Countries with strong business schools are often those with a strong economy," said Fernandez. "Look at China nowadays." (China has six AACSB-accredited business schools.)

Described by Forbes magazine as the "gold standard of business school accreditations," AACSB accreditation involves a long process in which a business school needs to prove it meets 21 standards that fall under three categories. The school must have a mission and strategic plan and it should show that it is fulfilling them. It also needs to prove it can recruit and maintain excellent faculty and students, and that it can meet its learning goals. AUB expects to earn its accreditation by 2009.

In general, most business schools face difficulties in recruiting PhD-qualified faculty, as the number of MBA graduates interested in pursuing a PhD in their field is limited, particularly because those geared toward business can find more lucrative positions in the corporate world. But Fernandez believes that AUB will manage to attract even more faculty with the completion of the state-of-the art building it will move into by the end of 2008. "I expect AUB will become a leading business school in the region," he said.

In terms of future trends in business education, globalization has imposed added importance on communications skills, especially in cross-cultural settings, said Fernandez. "That's why all business schools need to focus more on developing the written and oral communication skills of students, in addition to training them in teamwork and group projects, since business is rarely ever done by one person sitting in the corner in front of his/her computer."

Other trends include developing curricula that include courses on entrepreneurship and corporate social responsibility. As a result, students will learn to think of the ethical and social impacts of their decisions. AUB has already incorporated courses on entrepreneurship and the school also offers workshops on leadership and high-performance team-building, among others.

"This accreditation will certainly help us become more competitive in attracting quality faculty and students from all over the world," said Dean Najjar.