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TheB-Schoolat Company Corporate universities are focused, committed to employee education, and here to stay. Traditional business schools must learn how to work with them in creative and productive partnerships. universities would be a brief and passing phase. It turns out that neither expectation was true. Today's corporate universi- ty is an entrenched part of the business landscape, working hard to satisfy both its students and the CEOs of its parent organizations by providing targeted education that can demonstrably improve performance in the workplace. Today's corporate university also draws heavily on the expertise of tra- ditional four-year universities—and some people believe that broader and stronger partnerships between schools and businesses will shape the future of company-based education. While the phrase "corporate university" has A bout ten years ago, when corporate universi- ties were exploding onto the scene, sentiment was deeply divided between fear that such institutions would rob business schools of all their students and conviction that corporate The Corporate Goals Corporate universities exist to fulfill four main goals: to teach topics like leadership and communication to executives; to standardize skills and knowledge for certain jobs within the company; to help the company as a whole develop a unified culture; and to develop strong networks among employees. Developing "soft skills" is something corporate universities by Sharon Shinn illustrations by Sean Kelly been used to mean everything from a revamped training department to a degree-granting branch of a major corpora- tion, it's possible to come up with a more exact description. One good definition comes courtesy of Mark Allen, director of executive education at the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University, Culver City, California, and co-author of The Corporate University Handbook. He believes a corporate university must be a strategic tool that helps the parent organization achieve its mission through educational activities. What's key, he stress- es, is that whatever training or learning is involved be tied directly to the strategic mission of the company. In other words, nobody goes to Corporate U just to kill a few hours. Such a school offers learning with a purpose— improving a specific employee's performance in a specific area of the job in a way that's measurable. 32 BizEd MAY/JUNE 2004 do very well, saysMikeMorrison, dean of associate education and development at University of Toyota in Torrance, California. "Part of it is, we have to," he says. "Once people are in the work environment, they see that the work world is very relational. Problem-solving skills, creativity and innova- tion are inmuch higher demand, and the ability to self-design work is critical." Also critical is the ability to provide mission- University in Dayton, Ohio, says, "Each of our courses is aligned with the strategic products, services, or value propo- sitions that we take to themarketplace. There are no electives. You don't have to have a physical education unit to get through." Just as important to many corporations is that their uni- specific education with instant relevance. Tom Doyle, director of Menlo Worldwide's Menlo ment and poor purchasing strategies, and obviously the mes- sages we were communicating weren't always the same," says Doyle. "So we created the corporate university, which now is the sole source for training in leadership, sales and sales man- versities help them create a single image of the company or a standardized protocol. Sometimes, as withMenlo University, the school is a consolidation of a disparate collection of train- ing programs that used to be centered in different depart- ments or physical locations. "It was costing the company tremendous time in develop-