Leadership Change at Emory’s Goizueta Business School
December 18th, 2006 • Business, Education
It is with a heavy heart that I inform you that I have come to the decision to resign my position as Associate Dean for the full time MBA programs.
I’m a little surprised by the above which is the first sentence in a letter from Kembrel Jones, formerly associate dean of the MBA program at Emory’s Goizueta Business School. I don’t know the circumstances behind why Kembrel is leaving the school. The recent drop in BusinessWeek’s MBA rankings may have contributed to Kembrel’s decision. Under Kembrel’s direction, the school jumped from a second tier ranked school to positions 28 in 2000, 22 in 2002, and 20 in 2004. Everyone expected the assent to continue but in the most recent rankings (2006), GBS dropped to 23.
A lot of alumni (and current students) complained that the rankings weren’t fair because BusinessWeek changed their ranking criteria this year. Obviously, BusinessWeek has the right to change their judging criteria whenever and however they wish. This is the reason why I’ve never believed in managing to an arbitrary external ranking system. An organization’s focus should be on providing the best possible product and/or service to customers. By focusing on the actual resulting product/service, you can assure that those who care about your quality and standards will seek you out regardless of where someone’s rankings place you at.
With this shakeup there are tough times ahead for GBS. Hopefully the recent ranking drop doesn’t continue. But if it does, I hope the school focuses on what is most important - putting out great graduates who will represent the school better than any set of rankings ever has.
UPDATE: Here is a video of what happened at GBS when the rankings came out in 2002 (the school jumped from #28 to #22).
