News

One of the most striking developments at the Business School over the past three years has been the growth of executive education. The Saïd Business School acquired executive education from Templeton College five years ago. Since then its development has been remarkable. During a period in which many executive education businesses in other schools have suffered declines, executive education at Oxford has almost doubled.

There are two parts to executive education at Oxford – open enrolment including diplomas and customized programmes. Open enrolment are the generally advertised programmes that you might see advertised in places such as the Economist. They fall under the heading of General Management, Leadership, Strategy and Change, and Finance programmes. The last few years has seen the development of a comprehensive and coherent suite of open enrolment programmes which put Oxford alongside the main providers. Within the open enrolment programmes some are modular in design and confer diplomas. Included amongst these are the Organizational Leadership, Strategy and Innovation, and Financial Strategy diplomas.

The second category of executive education programmes are customized for companies. The School currently has over 40 customized clients around the world. A majority of the clients are in Europe but the School has also been very successful in establishing a strong presence in the Middle East, which has been an important source of growth over the last few years.

There are three distinguishing features of executive education at Oxford which are widely recognized by clients and participants as being a source of considerable strength. The first is the central position of the Business School in the wider University. Executive education draws heavily on the intellectual base of the University in its programmes. It can offer a type of executive education that few other institutions provide reflecting the economic, environmental, political, scientific and social issues that business face as well as the traditional elements of management.

The second feature is the emphasis on the customization of programmes to the specific needs of clients. As well as drawing on the wider Business School and University, executive education has its own core staff of dedicated full-time faculty and part-time associate fellows who specialize in the design and delivery of programmes. They work closely in tandem with corporate clients in creating programmes that are dedicated to the needs of firms and ensure a direct and real relevance. Corporate clients invariably comment on the extent to which the Saïd Business School customizes programmes beyond the level that they experience elsewhere.

The final feature of the open enrolment programmes is something that they share with the degree programmes and that is the convening power of Oxford in attracting outstanding participants from all over the world and a wide variety of different backgrounds. This lands an unusual richness and diversity to the programmes.

In summary, executive education has had a remarkable start in the Business School and has strong ambitions going forward to make a fundamental contribution to executive education across the world. I hope that you will wish to come back to Oxford and experience some of the rich opportunities that the programmes offer to refresh and develop your knowledge.

With best wishes

Colin

Colin Mayer
Peter Moores Dean
Saïd Business School
University of Oxford