Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/57464
Earning by Sharon Shinn E ach year, thousands of students enter business schools to pur- sue their MBAs, credentials that indicate they've developed the skills and mindsets to become highly successful business lead- ers. And each year, business schools around the world begin seeking their own external credentials as they undertake the process of pursuing accreditation. But if a school puts its staff and stakeholders through the grueling process of pursuing accreditation, what are the true rewards likely to be? That question recently was Excellence answered by the deans of business schools at four very different stages of the pro- cess, from those still working toward the goal to those that have held the designation for more than half a century. No matter where they stand in the process, all agree that achieving accreditation offers powerful benefits. But that's not the only reason to pursue accreditation, they say. The journey itself provides just as many rewards. Nakiye Boyacigiller of the Faculty of Management at Sabanci Univer- sity in Istanbul, Turkey, is currently shepherding her school through ini- tial accreditation with AACSB International. She is most impressed by how the accreditation process forces a school to examine its systems and meet its own goals. "It's very easy to write in our strategic plan that we will be at X level of internationalization by a certain time, and then be loose about measuring ourselves against the plan," she says. "Accredita- tion holds us accountable on the things we say we want to do, so we have to be careful about what we promise." Achieving accreditation helps a school set itself apart, attain a high level of quality, and earn international recognition—while learning valuable lessons along the way. 26 BizEd SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2008