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n Future business schools will look more like design schools—alive with design studios, interdisciplinary teams, and rapid prototyping—where managers act as designers who recognize disruptive, unexpected innovation opportunities. n Management is a noble profession that could be the decisive player in the world's massive transition to a sustain- able economy. n Sustainable value creation is the business opportunity of the 21st century. More important, these schools are realizing that there is much to be done at the intersection of management education, sustainability, and design (See "What Can B-Schools Learn from Design?" below). The concept of sustainable value provides business schools with a unify- ing ideal and a much needed vision of progress. It is a new vision for management education, a field that former AACSB president Scott Cowen once said is still "in search of its soul." A Great Time for Business What a great time to be a student—or a professor—of man- agement! Factories are being designed that return more What Can Business Schools Learn from Design? such as William McDonough or a design firm such as IDEO? How far could design concepts enlarge our conception of good manag- ing, especially as it relates to corporate citizenship and the breakthrough potential of sustainable value? Dean Mohan Reddy W wanted to explore these questions fully at Case Western Reserve University's Weatherhead School of Management, where we recently redesigned the MBA program to integrate two primary themes: sustain- able value and managing as designing. In this curricu- lar redesign, Weatherhead has committed to building design thinking, skills, and experience into the heart of its MBA and research. In the process, Weath- erhead is discovering the power and promise of design. We, like business 34 hat can managers learn from an architect itself, are turning to archi- tects, artists, graphic spe- cialists, product designers, open source communities, and performing artists as inspired models for innova- tion, improvisation, and col- laborative designing. After all, as technologies become more complex and as markets experience faster rates of change, managers will require a broadening and strengthening of their design skills. Only then will they be prepared to cope with the ill-behaved prob- lems they will encounter. Sustainability + Design = Innovation To introduce our MBA students to the idea of managing-as-designing, we ask them: "When you hear the word 'designer,' what is the first image that comes to mind?" Many think of the tra- ditional images of a designer as an inventor developing a new product, an artist BizEd JULY/AUGUST 2008 weeklong MBA stu- dent immersion at the end of the first year, where students learn concepts such as cra- dle-to-cradle product design, green supply chain management, the application of blue ocean strategy to sustainability, and stakeholder value analysis. creating a memorable logo, an architect sketching plans for a dramatic building, or a sculptor shaping a piece of public art. But we want them to think of another important group of designers that don't often come to mind—the managers who give form to our organizations and economic systems. To teach our students the idea of "sustainable value," Weatherhead has created the MBA Institute in Sustainable Value and Social Entrepreneurship. The institute is an intensive Next, students begin two semesters of client-centered design studios—a concept we call a "sustainable design factory." In this phase, they work on collaborative design teams made up of students, faculty, and the internal and external stakeholders of a company seeking to create sustainable value. During these yearlong projects, students design solutions that apply sustainability to social entrepreneurship. For example, one team worked with Fairmount Minerals, a sand mining