Business schools drill students on communication skills

Great business schools produce leaders, and those leaders must know how to effectively deal with people.

Seems pretty obvious. Unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case for many of the nation’s most-esteemed business schools. That’s finally changing according to a recent Wall Street Journal story. For example, students at Columbia School of Business are learning how to meditate. Stanford Graduate School of Business offers a “Touchy Feely” course. Professors at the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business are aiming to teach students how to tamp down their type-A personalities, at least to the extent they won’t aggravate their colleagues.

But here’s the one that’s most pertinent to me, a guy who teaches communication skills. The Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California, in response to feedback from corporate recruiters, is doubling the length of its mandatory Management Communication for Leaders class. That will extend its students communications training from eight to 16 weeks.

In particular, the message received by the Marshall School of Business is that employers want prospective hires to be comfortable presenting – whether to a large group or one-on-one with peers or subordinates.

James Ellis, dean of the Marshall School, says the new program appears to be working. Recruiters are telling Ellis his students are coming across well in interviews, which he thinks is helping them land jobs and internships earlier than in previous years.

The efforts being made by the Marshall School of Business and its peers is sorely needed, according to a recent study by DePaul University researchers. The study, cited in the Journal article, found that managing workers and decision making – two subjects that require softer skill sets such as being sensitive when delivering feedback – were most important to acting managers. However, those subjects were covered by fewer than 15 percent of required classes in a study of 373 business schools.

“Business schools are falling short where it matters most,” DePaul professor Erich Dierdorff, one of the study’s researchers, told the Journal.

But apparently business schools are catching on, and they’re finding that good things happen when people learn to present and communicate effectively.

To read the full Wall Street Journal article, click here.

Leave A Comment:

If you are already a member, please log-in to leave comments.
Not a member? Please register.
Have you forgotten your password?