Can you teach economics with an mba




















Most college professors are either faculty members with Ph. However, schools sometimes employ adjunct faculty who are experts in their field. If you have an MBA, you'll likely need some business or academic experience to be able to teach college-level courses. Professors who teach business courses frequently have MBAs.

You might teach core business classes, such as business administration, to undergraduate students. You could also end up teaching courses to students pursuing an MBA. We put all this material in a coursebook handed out in lecture 1. It may not seem like a big deal, and indeed it isn't, really, but it does make an extraordinarily big difference. One MBA student put this very succinctly on the feedback form:. Second, don't "teach to the textbook" - unless, of course, it is a text you have written yourself.

My experience is that MBAs do not like it at all when faculty teach straight from a text. The reason is clear enough. The MBAs expect, as an absolute minimum, that faculty will bring their own experience and expertise to the classroom. This way they know they are getting something that is unique, and which they would not get anywhere else. To mimic a textbook is to add no value at all.

Of course, those who produce all their own material but use a textbook as a backup may sometimes say things that contradict what is in the textbook. MBA students, like any others, prefer not to encounter such contradictions. But this is a much lesser sin than mimicking the text. The third detail is topicality.

I remember once being gently mocked by a friend from the City of London when he found me reading a Financial Times from the previous week.

For him, of course, there could be no market relevant information in yesterday's FT - let alone one that was a week old. The life cycle for materials used with MBA students is not quite so short.

But a useful rule of thumb is that last year's case may now be out of date. Even if an old case illustrates your point perfectly, it is generally interpreted as a bad signal to leave old material in a coursebook. Having said that, MBA students can be surprisingly ambivalent about references to recent materials on the web. They like the "up to the minute" flavour which web references seem to imply, but MBA students still seem to work, primarily, in a paper culture.

The fourth detail concerns intellectual modesty. Some may be surprised to read this, believing that neither teacher nor student is likely to be intellectually modest in the MBA classroom. But my point is a little different. MBA students, as we have seen, come from a diverse range of backgrounds. Those with a background in the hard sciences don't tend to be too impressed with any of the social sciences, not even economics. And those with a business background often argue that, to paraphrase, "the real world is not like your simple economic models".

As a result, the MBA teacher should be very cautious about claiming too much for economic theory in this audience. In particular, it is very hazardous to make any statements like, "economic theory shows this must happen", or, "economic theory shows that can't happen". For example, if the MBA student points to a particular economic phenomenon and is met with a response from the tutor, "economic theory shows that cannot happen", then an audience of this sort can react very badly.

I am reminded of Dr Johnson's angry response on hearing Bishop Berkeley's theory of the non-existence of matter. Kicking out at a stone, he shouted, "I refute it thus! The fifth and final point on my list of "small matters" concerns how you deal with student enquiries.

Although, once again, it may seem a small point, it is hard to overestimate how much this matters to MBA students. Let us focus on enquiries in class. MBA teaching must be more interactive than most other types of teaching. MBA students expect to have the opportunity to interact with lecturers, and with each other, in class. It has a pedagogic role, of course, but is even more important as a signal that you are responsive to their views and questions.

Some MBA students say in their feedback that lecturers should be much tougher on those who ask stupid questions or give stupid answers. This will always be a matter of personal style and preference, but my view is that such toughness can be dangerous. It is well known that Keynes' practice was to be rather gentle with students when they made foolish remarks, even if he was quite intolerant of stupidity from his colleagues.

I believe that is a very sound strategy for dealing with MBA students, at any rate. MBA students tend to be hugely impressed if you remember questions raised in one session and then come back a few lectures later and say, "as that student said in lecture 2.

Yes, I think it does. It is all a part of the strategy of keeping within the "good will threshold". If you can do that, then you have a far better chance of persuading them to engage with your subject matter.

There is a perception in many business schools that MBA students do not want to learn about economics, and especially not micro! Sometimes this perception originates with colleagues in other fields and disciplines, rather than with the students themselves.

It is true that MBA students are usually cautious at the start, and wonder why they are expected to study economics on top of everything else. A key part of the economist's strategy must be to show them very early on how economic concepts provide powerful tools to understand everyday business issues. While some MBA students will never be persuaded, I think that it should almost always be possible to overcome the initial skepticism in the class. Moreover, several MBA students have told me that they appreciate the substance - and even the rigour - which is missing on some other courses on the MBA.

The key here is to make the rigour work for you and not against you, and there is a very fundamental asymmetry in how the MBA student perceives rigour.

When rigour is combined with relevance, that enhances the attraction of economics over some other fields and disciplines. But when rigour seems to be combined with irrelevance, then that just makes things worse.

This relates to my earlier point about intellectual modesty. In short, rigour enhances relevance but exacerbates irrelevance. A good strategy in teaching economics to MBA students is to show them that economics underpins many of the other fields on the curriculum - such as strategy, marketing, finance, etc.

But to do this requires that one knows some marketing and strategy and other fields , and is familiar with some of their key references. It is difficult to overstate the importance of this. MBA students sometimes wonder why they are expected to cover so many different fields when many of their teachers are only familiar with one field.

There are high dividends to be gained from showing the class some of the linkages between fields and disciplines. Last year, one student said to me after studying economics and several related fields, "now I see economics in everything. It is generally easier to convince our colleagues in other fields and disciplines of the relevance of macroeconomics than of microeconomics. I think a majority of students also find it easier to relate to macro.

They refer to the fact that macroeconomics is to be found on the front page of the newspaper. But that gives us an indispensable clue. Choose micro case studies from the front pages, and students are quickly persuaded of its importance. This illustrates a more general point. Economics works best with MBA students if they can very quickly see ways in which to apply economic tools to practical business questions.

For example, most MBA students have a good knowledge of air travel and the mobile phone market, and those two alone allow us to illustrate quite a few economic phenomena.

In some business schools, there is - or perhaps was - a widespread view that we can find a negative correlation between research ability and the ability to teach MBA students. This could be interpreted in at least three ways. First, maybe the MBA student does not value research. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Furthermore, with a degree in economics, you will apply economic theory to managerial decision-making.

Emphasis on both quantitative and qualitative application of microeconomic principles to business analysis. If this sounds like you, then economics could be an excellent career path for you. You can prepare for this journey by earning your Bachelors of Arts in Business Economics.

Our online economics classes teach the fundamentals students need to decipher the graphs for supply and demand, gross domestic product and others, as well as the tools to develop a successful business strategy. Students who choose to study economics classes online not only gain the skills needed to understand complex markets, but come away with strong analytical and problem-solving skills, as well as business acumen necessary to succeed in the professional world.

An MBA has long been the gold standard in business education. Lena Rodriguez , and has developed a multitude of MBA graduates who are now exercising innovative and critical thinking in their jobs, shaping the communities they live in, and leading lives of significance.



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