What Global Companies Need from Business Schools
As sustainability becomes more integrated within the business strategies and operations of global companies, the specific skill sets these companies require to support innovation, product development and other attributes of value creation become increasingly important.
Marketplace dynamics and economic trends, government policies, technological change and the expectations of current and future employees and customers all create a highly dynamic business environment. A company’s ability to stay focused on executing its business plan while demonstrating resilience and adaptability to marketplace and societal changes becomes a greater strategic imperative.
In this setting, the World Environment Center and Net Impact have partnered to identify the core skills needed by business school students to prepare them better for future employment in companies with strong sustainability agendas. Unlike traditional business competencies such as finance and marketing, sustainability is not currently institutionalized within the required curricula of many business schools, giving way to inconsistencies in its teaching.
These inconsistencies need to be addressed given the role of sustainability as a major source of value creation and for the preparation of future business leaders who will be expected to demonstrate greater competencies in the implementation of sustainable business strategies.
