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IU MBA students develop and design new program that gives them "international perspective"
March 13, 2000
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- This week, while many students retreat to spring break meccas such as sunny Florida beaches or the powdery slopes of the Rocky Mountains, two groups of graduate business students at Indiana University will be touring places such as manufacturing operations in Brazil and corporate headquarters in Japan.
They've traded their beach towels or skis for passports and laptops.
The 10-day global treks are the result of a new student-designed and student-driven program in IU's Kelley School of Business called Kelley International Perspectives (KIP). About 50 students in the school's master of business administration program are enrolled in the class. Half have traveled to Brazil and the other half to Japan.
One night a week since January, the students have opted for a supplemental three-hour class -- in addition to their already intense course loads -- to become familiar with the business, political and cultural climate in the countries where they're traveling.
Visiting scholars and faculty from the Kelley School, other departments at IU and even from other countries came in to present lectures and other material. Students received jump-start language lessons in Portuguese, which is spoken in Brazil, and Japanese.
This week, it all culminates in visits to manufacturers, tech firms, banks and other businesses in the two countries, as well as to public officials involved in government regulation of U.S. exports. For example, the students are visiting Toyota City in Japan and Banco Pactual and Infomartel in Brazil.
The IU students said the KIP program reflects their growing desire for a better understanding of international business that goes beyond textbooks and news reports.
"We live in a global economy, and it is a requirement of being effective as a manager or in having a successful career that you be open to people of other cultures and other ways of thinking," said Christina Frank, a second-year MBA from Omaha, Neb., who is student leader for KIP's Brazil trip. "This class is an opportunity to do that, but we've also leveraged a lot of our peers and their knowledge and experience, which is one of the advantages of being in a program that consists of nearly one-third international students."
"It's equally important for us to get a sense of the culture and just to learn about a new place," added Catherine Sorce, a second-year MBA from Geneva, Ill., who also is headed to Brazil.
Terrill Cosgray, director of the Kelley MBA Program, said some people might be surprised by what motivates his students to take an interest in world affairs.
"One thing that sets our MBA students apart from the typical person is these are highly driven people, but not just in business," Cosgray said. "They're interested in culture. They're interested in art and music. They're interested in every aspect of living, and they bring all of these heightened interests they have together to create very unique selves, which is why they are ultimately going to be so successful in business.
"They're not just single-focused people," Cosgray added. "I think that's true at all the top MBA programs in the United States. There's a misunderstanding of the typical business student as someone who just wants to get the best job and make the most money. These are people who actually want to be involved in the key activities of our world."
The KIP program is not the only international offering available to IU's MBA students. The MBA program offers students the opportunity to take one of the dozens of foreign languages offered at IU Bloomington, without additional tuition or fee costs. The school also offers three cross-disciplinary MBA degrees in cultural study areas. What does make KIP so different is that it was developed by the students, with support from faculty.
The idea for KIP, Frank said, came from a casual conversation she had with other students, in which they all agreed that the only thing they felt was missing from IU's MBA program was an experience abroad. On the other hand, since most students were anxious to begin their new careers after completing the two-year program, few wanted to lengthen their time in the program by spending eight to 16 weeks overseas.
"It takes time away from recruiting," Frank said. "If you're gone away for the first eight weeks of the semester, that's often a top interviewing time. It takes time away from time you could be applying to your major or minor requirements; time you could be taking an elective you might really be interested in; time away from extracurricular activities, if you're really involved as most of us are."
The students approached Cosgray and the school, which looked for ways to help them create a program that met their expectations and goals. "We consider our MBA students our partners in the process of designing and recreating existing programs," he said. "This really fell into 'business as usual.'"
"Part of the reason we believed it would work is because this is an environment where students can have a direct impact on the program and be able to influence things here. It is so pervasive," Frank added. "There was little doubt that it would take off. In terms of how it makes me feel, well, it is one of the reasons I came here."
In addition to learning more about how business gets done in other countries, the students said they are looking forward to learning how well their preconceived notions about the places and the people match with reality. It won't be all work, since students heading to Brazil will be there at the same time as Carnival, the nation's great annual festival.
"I'm looking forward to seeing how well actual Brazilian food stacks up to what we cooked up here from cookbooks," quipped Sorce, "and I'd love to learn how to samba. I don't know if I'll get very far, but I want to give it a good, honest try."
(George Vlahakis, 812-855-0846, gvlahaki@indiana.edu)