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"Once we break out of our disciplinary silos, it's exciting to see how much higher our students' leadership aspirations become."—Joel Podolny, Yale School of Management good, because now people have started talking about how we can improve the curriculum." Saloner notes that, in many cases, business schools have been the victims of their own success. "As business schools become successful, they often adopt very similar paradigms across schools. That's a natural evolution and maturation of the MBA. Once a school gets to where it wants to be, momentum can take over," says Saloner. "But now, people are really stepping back and asking, 'Are we doing all we can?'" Eight Constituencies at Yale When Joel Podolny became the new dean of the Yale School of Management last year, he had a primary objec- tive: to transform Yale's old MBA curriculum and replace it with an entirely new model. Podolny wanted a curriculum in which faculty taught and students thought in ways that reflected how business truly worked. "There has been angst among business schools about the connection between their curricula and the demands of business today," says Podolny. "We talked to alumni, recruiters, and business leaders about the real challenges they face. Those conversations provided a broader back- drop and pushed us toward this very significant revision of the curriculum." In its new first-year curriculum, which launched in fall 2006, Yale completely abandoned traditional core courses like marketing and finance. Instead, for the first six weeks of the program, students take a set of courses called "Orientation to Management." The courses include basics of economics, basics of accounting, individual problem framing, careers, data and decision analysis, managing groups and teams, and interpersonal dynam- ics. The set of courses introduces students to the founda- tional vocabulary and knowledge they'll need to draw on later in the program. After students complete the introductory phase of the program, they will take eight courses over 12 weeks. This set of courses, titled "Organizational Perspectives," marks Yale's primary departure from the traditional MBA curricu- lum. Instead of basing each of these eight courses on busi- ness disciplines, Yale faculty chose to base each course on the following key internal and external constituencies that business managers must be able to engage: 48 BizEd MAY/JUNE 2007 External constituencies n Investor n Customer n Competitor n State and Society Internal constituencies n Employee n Sourcing and Managing Funds n Operations Engine n Innovator Once students complete the courses in the "Organizational Perspectives" series, they begin a six-week series of interdisci- plinary cases, called the "Integrated Leadership Perspective." Cases in this phase of the program focus on businesses of different type, size, and industry. In addition, students meet in small groups to participate in a mentorship program. In the mentorship program, students and faculty provide feedback and help students connect what they're learning to their indi- vidual goals and leadership aspirations. Students can then go into their second year of elective courses fully prepared to choose a direction for their careers, says Podolny. The new curriculum has inspired new approaches among students and faculty, says Podolny. In addition, the school has begun to develop its own material, because even most cases, he explains, tend to fall into disciplinary silos. The school has now created nearly 30 new cases that focus on the customer, investor, and other key constituent groups. "Once we break out of our disciplinary silos, it's exciting to see how much higher our students' leadership aspirations become. Students will say how effective it is for them to see how what they learn in the customer course relates to what's going on in the competitor course," says Podolny. "Because students are no longer bound by functions, they become entrepreneurial in the broadest sense of the word. Their aspirations are grounded, not just by one discipline, but by an integrated set of aspirations inspired by the challenges of business." Gauthier, Podolny, and Saloner agree that the time is cer- tainly ripe for a change in business education. At the heart of the curricular reforms at their schools is the idea that business graduates will need more than "know-how" to suc- ceed in the global business environment—they'll also need "know-what," "know-where," "know-who," and "know- why." To help them build that foundation of knowledge, these educators argue, business schools will need to adopt different mindsets about their curricula—and design radi- cally new approaches to the MBA. n z