GBS: Goodbye to the Executive MBA?

Von am 4. Februar 2011

The Executive MBA program at the Goethe Business School (GBS) was already cancelled in 2010, on account of too few participants. This year the school isn’t even trying to run the program and is continuing its break. The full-time MBA with 18 students has also had to accept considerable losses. In 2009 the program had 29 students.

“We’ve suffered in particular from the decrease in demand from companies, which sent their employees to our program in previous years,” explains Andreas Hackethal, Dean of the GBS. Although this situation is now changing in the other direction, the program nonetheless has once again been shelved. Whether or not it will be restarted in 2012 after a two-year break is questionable. “With a restart we will also certainly make some adjustments to the structure,” explains Hackethal. There will not however be a lowering of the admission requirements (for example waiving the prerequisite of a Bachelors degree) under any circumstances. With this Hackethal alludes to the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management. The school successfully started an Executive MBA in 2010, but two thirds of the 32 participants did not have a Bachelors degree.

In 2005 the GBS started its flagship program, the “Duke-Goethe Executive MBA,” together with the renowned Fuqua School of Business at the US-based Duke University. The “Goethe Executive MBA in cooperation with Duke” was then created in 2008. Since then, graduates no longer receive an MBA degree from Duke but rather merely an MBA certificate. The poor student numbers were no doubt a significant reason for this change.

Just 18 participants began the full-time MBA last year. In the previous year there were 29 students. Some potential students pulled out at the last moment because they received attractive scholarship offers from competing schools, says the GBS Dean. The GBS in contrast has very few scholarships to award. The number of applicants however is currently on the rise.

While the MBA programs suffered a clear set back over the past year, the demand for Executive Education and the Masters program in Finance is “buzzing,” according to Hackethal.

www.goethe-business-school.de

Foto Bärbel Schwertfeger, MBA Journal

Über Bärbel Schwertfeger

Bärbel Schwertfeger ist Diplom-Psychologin und seit 1985 als freie Journalistin im Bereich Management, Weiterbildung und Personalentwicklung tätig.