How Business Schools Must Transform for Future of Business Leadership - Mercedes Martin & Co.

How Business Schools Must Transform for the Future of Leadership

July 21, 2022 Mercedes Martin

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In April I had the opportunity to join the North America Meeting of PRME, the United Nations-supported Principles for Responsible Management Education, in Washington DC. At one point during one of many future-focused discussions about business and leadership, one of the conference presenters, a Senior Fellow and Dean, commented “Wow…this is not the conversation that I was expecting from a group of business school professors.”

His surprise encapsulated the shift that must happen in business schools: moving from a focus on a single bottom-line measurement of investor value to a focus on a Sustainability Mindset as framed by Isabel Rimanoczy. Rimanoczy literally wrote the book on the Sustainability Mindset, which she defines “as a way of thinking and being that results from a broad understanding of the ecosystem, from social sensitivity, and an introspective focus on our personal values and higher self. It finds its expression in actions for the greater good.” (Kassel, Rimanoczy, Mitchell, 2018)

As one of a handful of consultants in the session of mostly academics or university administrators, and with my background in C-suite executive development, I see firsthand the gap between what’s still being taught in business schools now and what students need today to lead businesses tomorrow. The good news is that there’s a growing movement in academia and supported by the UN to shift the MBA and business leadership development paradigm that embraces the ESG sustainable business practices.

PRME is helping to drive that movement around the globe.

What is PRME?

PRME is The Principles for Responsible Management Education (PRME). Founded in 2007, PRME is a United Nations-supported initiative to raise the profile of sustainability in schools around the world. Over 800 institutions have signed on to date. Visioning and implementation are guided by various committees. I have been a part of the US Steering Committee.

UN PRME’s vision is to “create a global movement and drive thought leadership on responsible management education. The mission is to transform management education and develop the responsible decision-makers of tomorrow to advance sustainable development.”

As of today, 118 universities in the US have signed on, including the likes of John Hopkins University, Howard University, UCLA, Boston College, Cornell, and many other public and private universities.

REWIRING the Mindset

The conversation that we were having at the aforementioned conference was about the paradigm shift needed for business leaders to align their mindset with what will be demanded of post-Covid 21st-century leadership. Business as a source for good–as increasingly expected from employees, investors, consumers and the world for sustainability–doesn’t happen by accident. That’s why in my work today I strive to serve as a bridge between the aspirational, future-focused goals of the vision of a business, and the strategy and tactics a business leader needs to make the shift to get there.

That shift is guided by three principles:

Rewiring the leadership mindset;
Humanizing the workplace;
Redefining the future.

There are five practices that I teach and counsel as the roadmap to a mindshift. Leaders must shift from:

Lens to “mirror work”
Masking to rewarding vulnerability
Tribal and transactional to collective and transformational relationships
A short-term problem focus to a long-term future focus
Individual to whole system convening

My work is grounded on leading transformation with a sustainability mindset and is based on Dr. Isabel Rimanoczy’s award-winning, and deeply researched framework of the sustainability principles that provide, in her words, the “scaffolding for educators to guide them to how they can embed these aspects of a different mindset into their teaching.”

Looking at transformational organizational change, Rimanoczy uses the metaphor of the iceberg—we can make superficial transformations on the surface, like the part of the iceberg above the water—but it is a foundational change that will make the difference—the much bigger part that’s not so readily visible. That is harder because that’s the part that’s driven by values, beliefs, and assumptions…many of which are set in business school, especially about “the way things work.” Think of the long-time teaching that the bottom line for investors is the measure of business success, shifting to the topline triple goal of sustainability.

What does change look like in your organization?

Change is coming. Indeed it is already here. The good news is that there are practices that leaders can adopt to prepare to lead and transform their organizations into a sustainable future. Contact us to set up an exploratory meeting to get started on transforming the business leadership mindset at your organization.