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The traditional MBA under the spotlight

What are employers really looking for in business school graduates? Do graduates today have what it takes to make waves in the workplace right from day one? Hult Labs, a research unit of Hult International Business School, decided to put business school curricula to the test by asking over 90 top executives what they were looking for in employees and how effective they found traditional business school education.

The traditional MBA under the spotlight

The 2012 study – the most comprehensive ever conducted – quizzed leading CEOs, senior executives, and hiring managers at 90 top companies around world.  Their feedback was unanimous: MBA graduates are rarely job-ready when they leave the classroom. 

What they don’t teach you at business school
Business education received poor grades in two key areas: interpersonal soft skills learning and practical, real-world experience.

Hard analytical skills are appreciated and problem-solving proficiency is vital for any successful MBA graduate. Yet, their impact in the workplace is limited without key interpersonal skills such as the ability to communicate clearly, motivate a team and resolve conflict.

Employers also want to hire graduates who can thrive in today’s fast-moving and inherently complex business world. The lack of emphasis on practical learning methods means graduates are not yet comfortable acting in uncertain environments and making sound decisions under pressure.

It’s little wonder that a study by the Corporate Executive Board (CEB) showed that on average, it takes new leaders nine months to get up to speed in a new job and 50 percent of first-time managers underperform in parallel with employee expectations.

The MBA that means business
Acting upon these findings, Hult International Business School has re-designed its curriculum to ensure it is equipping students with both the hard and interpersonal soft skills required of future business leaders.

Hult’s unique approach integrates soft-skill development and hands-on experience throughout all aspects of its MBA curriculum. With a belief that interpersonal soft skills are competencies that can be learned and improved through practice and constructive feedback, a professional skills development model has been developed. Through a series of regular and progressively more challenging competitive simulations and feedback processes, students focus on developing five competencies identified as key by employers; adaptive thinking, communication, relationships, teamwork and execution.

The new curriculum also reflects the value Hult sees in real-world practice as an essential component of any MBA curriculum. The Hult Impact Challenge is a team exercise, which has been integrated into the curriculum in order to hone practical as well as entrepreneurial skills, and allow students to customise their MBA experience by focusing on an area of personal or professional interest.

A truly international MBA experience
In today’s globalised business climate, an MBA graduate’s future career can take them anywhere in the world. With campuses in Boston, San Francisco, London, Dubai and Shanghai and a rotation center in New York, Hult enables students to capture a truly international experience on their professional journey.  Through their unique Global Rotation Program, students have the opportunity to select their home campus and then spend up to three months studying at two further campuses.

Hult also offers MBA students the chance to network with their classroom peers at an unprecedented graduation event in Davos, Switzerland. With up to 1,000 participants from all of the Hult campuses, the most international gathering of MBA students in the world offers the perfect opportunity to build a network of future international leaders. 

Hult International Business School
Over the past 50 years, Hult has grown to become the world’s largest graduate business school with 2,000 students of over 140 different nationalities studying for MBA, Executive MBA, Master and Bachelor degrees at locations across the world.

Learn more about the Hult MBA experience

For more information contact Pär Ekström:
Email: p[email protected] 
Phone: +41 786353134
LinkedIn XING

This article was produced by The Local and sponsored by Hult International Business School

BUSINESS

France’s EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

French energy giant EDF has unveiled net profit of €10billion and cut its massive debt by increasing nuclear production after problems forced some plants offline.

France's EDF hails €10billion profit, despite huge UK nuclear charge

EDF hailed an “exceptional” year after its loss of €17.9billion in 2022.

Sales slipped 2.6 percent to €139.7billion , but the group managed to slice debt by €10billion euros to €54.4billion.

EDF said however that it had booked a €12.9 billion depreciation linked to difficulties at its Hinkley Point nuclear plant in Britain.

The charge includes €11.2 billion for Hinkley Point assets and €1.7billion at its British subsidiary, EDF Energy, the group explained.

EDF announced last month a fresh delay and additional costs for the giant project hit by repeated cost overruns.

“The year was marked by many events, in particular by the recovery of production and the company’s mobilisation around production recovery,” CEO Luc Remont told reporters.

EDF put its strong showing down to a strong operational performance, notably a significant increase in nuclear generation in France at a time of historically high prices.

That followed a drop in nuclear output in France in 2022. The group had to deal with stress corrosion problems at some reactors while also facing government orders to limit price rises.

The French reactors last year produced around 320.4 TWh, in the upper range of expectations.

Nuclear production had slid back in 2022 to 279 TWh, its lowest level in three decades, because of the corrosion problems and maintenance changes after
the Covid-19 pandemic.

Hinkley Point C is one of a small number of European Pressurised Reactors (EPRs) worldwide, an EDF-led design that has been plagued by cost overruns
running into billions of euros and years of construction delays.

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