Marseille Conference Report (4): Measuring Personal Development and ROI
Bernard Belletante underlin3ed that it is not only companies that must justify their investment in personal development; business schools are equally under pressure to show concrete results if their investment is to be sustained. But what exactly you should measure when it comes to personal development initiatives?
Timothy Philips, Peer Reviewer for EQUIS, summarized a recent update of the requirements in personal development at the EFMD in the following chart:
Phillips pointed out two recent areas of emphasis for business school learning to effectively develop the personal skills of leadership: action learning through projects and experience of research and consultancy methods in different business contexts.
However he also underlined that processes to grow personal awareness are now an essential component of business education and judged Metizo as “best in the business” in this area. As founder of Metizo, this was one of the most impressive recognitions of my efforts over the years and, I must admit, gave me a strong boost in confidence for our future.
Peter Reed, Director of Monash University MBA program provided a historical perspective of the debate over how much importance should be given to personal development in business education. The very first business schools, Wharton and Harvard, disagreed on what constitutes legitimate knowledge: should it be cognitive and scientific (Wharton’s point of view) or practical and aimed at the preparation of business leadership (Harvard’s point of view). By the 1980s the debate was still heated concerning different educational studies in the USA such as marketing.
Peter Reed’s own subject, marketing, was highly affected by this debate and only became an accepted subject in MBA programs when enough research was accumulated to make it into an acceptable field. But in Europe the more recent growth of MBA programs favored leadership and practical dimensions, partly because of the traditional closeness of business schools to industry and partly because the cultural diversity of students required a personal dimension, as the European Foundation of Management Development orientation illustrates. Peter Reed suggested that personal development may nevertheless show the same requirements for academic research as marketing if it is to become part of the academic curriculum.
It is useful to mention that as Director of an MBA program, Peter Reed did decide to invest resources and teaching hours in personal development with the consequence that Monash was ranked sixth in the Economist MBA rankings. A week after his speech in Marseille, the Economist published its 2006 rankings and Monash placed third. Note that the first USA business school in the ranking comes only in 5th, place despite America’s dominance in most MBA rankings: this illustrates Peter Reed’s point about the focus of business schools in different countries.
Personal development includes the ability to deal with people and in global business this means people of different cultures as well as with individual personalities. Soon Ang of Nanyang Technology University, Singapore, began with a reminder that, according to the 2006 Economist report to CEOs, intercultural and global management issues are uppermost in the minds of today’s corporate leaders.
She presented a method for assessing CQ (Cultural Intelligence) and for improving competency in intercultural situations. She defined CQ as “an individual’s capability to deal effectively in situations characterized by cultural diversity” and presented four dimensions of intelligence that go far beyond the old IQ tests invented by Frenchman Alfred Binet in the early 20th century, a framework that still makes up the core of many selection tests including the GMat. In the current definition of intelligences, there are four major dimensions:
- CQ Strategy: Awareness, planning, monitoring, and controlling intercultural encounters
- CQ Knowledge: Knowledge of cultural norms, practices, values and conventions
- CQ Motivation: Direct energy & attention toward learning and functioning
- CQ Behaviour: Enact verbal and non-verbal flexibility
To assess cultural intelligence, these four dimensions are put on a competency scale which allows individuals to assess their level and develop ways of improving their ability to deal with culturally diverse situations.
Linn Van Dyne, Professor of Management at Michigan State University described how each dimension of CQ can be improved by different learning methods and illustrated how deficiency in one area can produce counterproductive behavior.
The question of Return on Investment in corporate training was addressed by Klaus Bodel, Head of Management Development Programs at BMW. In 2002, BMW integrated all the training initiatives into a concept that links the strategic, technical and leadership dimensions of personal development into the concept of a house:
The foundation of the house is made up of personal qualities and includes basic personal development training. The three dimensions constitute the pillars of the house and the roof is provided by achievement of goals.
The company started with classic measurement system of training effectiveness developed by Donald Kirkpatrick: evaluation of participant reactions, assessment of learning, transfer of learning to the workplace and impact on business results. Rather than simply presenting what BMW is doing and the typical ROI arguments, Bodel asked outside consultant Karin Remolu, who carries out these programs internationally, to criticize real problems that BMW is facing in sustaining the investment in personal development, particularly in showing the link to business results. The dialogue was lively between the two and spilled over into the panel discussion.