Work and Career in Business Schools
Location & host: Aalto University School of Business, Helsinki, Finland
Timing: April 14-16, 2025 (Aalto University School of Business, Helsinki)
Credits: 6-7,5 ECTS
Grading: Pass/Fail
Format: 3-day intensive course
Language: English
Faculty: Kimmo Alajoutsijärvi, Professor, University of Agder, School of Business and Law, Norway. Henrikki Tikkanen, A. I. Virtanen Professor, Aalto University School of Business, Helsinki, Finland Kerttu Kettunen, Associate Professor, University of Agder, School of Business and Law, Norway. Guest Speaker N.N. (tbd)
Number of students: Max. 25 PhD students
Application process: We welcome applicants with various disciplinary backgrounds in business and management studies. Only doctoral students are eligible. Each applicant must submit an application, including basic information (name, contact information, place of study), motivations for applying, and a personal reflective career plan beyond completion of the doctorate (3-4 pages). Please e-mail the application to both persons mentioned below before the end of February, 2025. To apply, email your application to both kerttu.kettunen@uia.no and henrikki.tikkanen@aalto.fi
Welcome to the dynamic world of business schools!
Work and Career in Business Schools is about scholars, professions, research, teaching, debate, relevance and much more, preparing participants for careers in the global business school industry. The course is a wide-ranging guide that surveys important topics relevant to the world of academia, such as publishing, pedagogy, networking, passion, and of course, competition, status, power, and money.
On a practical level, this course is both rigorous and relevant, aiming at helping early-career business scholars to find their way in the academic world which is full of credentials, citation indices, impact factors and research assessment exercises, but which is also the home of research and education of high societal importance and pertinence. Indeed, the academy and scholars also have a responsibility towards mankind that is not best served through A-journal publications alone. As a counterpoint to publish and perish cultures, this course will contribute to reflections about what a meaningful (i.e. successful, impactful, self-standing) scholarship is, and what alternative routes exist to achieving this. Upon opening the discussion about the means and consequences of ‘playing the game’ in academia, special attention in this course is given to career planning with practical and professional implications.
The business school industry is globally the most substantial, international, and extending sector in higher education. Despite digitalization, MOOCs, mergers and closures, cash cow roles, and public budget cuts, management education offers plenty of career opportunities. However, more and more Nordic doctoral students will find their path to a somewhat odd mix of schools ranging from Ivy League élite universities to stand-alone entrants in educational hot spots around the world.
This course draws more general attention to the fact that there are altogether 15,000 business schools globally. These institutions − as well as their scholars – operate in a complex and competitive world of rankings, credentials, publish or perish tenet, and public criticism. Indeed, increasing globalization and marketization of higher education is transforming business schools and academic work. At the same time, some argue that in ever more competitive global higher education markets, signaling status and quality has become more important than being so.
Our reflection on this complex context starts from familiar institutions operating in the Nordic countries followed by other Western contexts and global educational hot spots all the way to developing countries. We assert that despite notions of ‘global mimicry’ and convergence, the management education industry is a massively stratified and diverse milieu. Indeed, navigating in this terrain is not only difficult but also potentially disastrous.
The course welcomes students with various disciplinary backgrounds in business studies. The broad aim of the course is to develop the participants’ understanding of the past, present, and future of business schools as academic institutions and sites for making own decisions about life choices. This is of utmost importance, since there is little evidence-based knowledge, either conceptual or anecdotal, about the paths that academics choose to follow across the course of their careers (see Frost & Taylor, 1996; Hällgren, 2014 and Fleming, 2019 for exceptions).
Organization & Facilitators
The course is designed as a three-day intensive doctoral seminar. The course is prepared in collaboration with three scholars + a guest speaker who have studied business schools and management education and held significant administrative responsibilities in their institutions.
Kimmo Alajoutsijärvi (kimmo.alajoutsijarvi@uia.no) is a professor of project business at the University School of Agder. He is also the former dean of Oulu Business School. His recent research interests are business schools, management education, and accreditations. He has published in Academy of Management Learning & Education, Studies in Higher Education, International Business Review, Information & Management, and Industrial Marketing Management. He has also conducted executive seminars in several countries like Indonesia, China, Russia, Estonia, Sweden, Mexico, Germany, Italy, Canada, and the UAE.
Henrikki Tikkanen (henrikki.tikkanen@aalto.fi) is the A. I. Virtanen professor of consumer research since 2017 and a professor of business administration (in marketing) at Aalto University School of Business, Department of Marketing since 2004 (until 2010 Helsinki School of Economics). With more than 80 journal publications (e.g. in Journal of Marketing, Strategic Management Journal, Journal of Management Studies, Business History) in the areas of strategic management, marketing, leadership, and organizational history, prof. Tikkanen is one of the most published academics in the Nordic countries in the topic areas of the course. A business historical research approach is a common denominator in many of prof. Tikkanen’s studies. He has also served as a professor at Stockholm University, Helsinki University of Technology, University of Oulu and as a visiting professor at ESCP Europe (Paris), Asian Institute of Technology (Bangkok) and ESC Lille, France. Prof. Tikkanen holds a D.Sc. in Business Administration from the Turku School of Economics (Finland, 1997) and a Ph.D. in Economic History from the University of Jyväskylä (Finland, 2020).
Dr. Kerttu Kettunen (kerttu.kettunen@uia.no) works as an Associate Professor at Department of Management at the University of Agder School of Business and Law. Her research lies in the intersection of organization theory and marketing studies. She is experienced in institutional theory and historical organization studies and has applied qualitative research methods, such as case studies and ethnographic research methods to the study of institutionalization processes at micro, meso and macro levels. She is experienced in the history of management education, business school leadership and accreditations. She has published for instance in the Academy of Management Learning & Education, the Studies in Higher Education and the Journal of Management Inquiry.
Learning outcomes
On successful completion of this course, students will increase their knowledge of different career alternatives for business school PhDs. As an outcome, the participants will be better equipped to make well-informed and clearly evidenced career choices. They will be supported to plan and build international careers in academia. More specifically, participants will be able to:
Understand the differences and intersections between academic and corporate careers, and critically evaluate pursuing a career in a business school,
Appreciate the global business school landscape within different types of institutional and national contexts,
Apply a professional map of roles in business schools, including deans, administrators, professors, scholarly academics, professional instructors, and contingent workers,
Gain confidence in identifying their own strategic space in navigating today’s globalizing business school sector to design and implement appropriate career plans
Recognize the importance of early career actions and timely publications with a greater multiplier later in one’s career.
Learning methods
This workshop is an intensive three-day course. Each day comprises two or three modules. Learning methods are a combination of lectures and interactive group discussions about the pre-readings and assignments.
Pre-readings
Academic discussion on the assigned pre-readings and completion of the related pre-assignment are important parts of class participation and passing the course. To be appropriately prepared for the three course days, the students are expected to complete all pre-readings assigned to the modules. This reading package comprises essential journal articles/book chapters and interesting web sites.
Class participation and discussion
All the participants are expected to participate in class and contribute constructively to the group’s learning experiences. The pre-readings are carefully selected to stimulate constructive discussions on each topic, and the instructors will facilitate discussions in a pair/team-teaching format. The overall aim of the readings is to help the students understand the business school institutions that have a fundamental impact on our careers. While the aim of the course is to develop critical thinking and debate, the question of whether business schools are functional or dysfunctional as academic institutions and whether they should be replaced by more effective institutions is a secondary topic of interest.
Learning diary
After the three-day course, students are expected to complete an independent learning diary. The learning diary should reflect both overall course experience and learning from the pre-readings, pre-assignment, and class discussions. Therefore, it is highly recommended that participants take notes on their learning, new ideas and questions raised throughout the course. The learning diary should be a maximum of 10 pages.
Summative Assessment
To complete the course successfully, students are expected to:
Read the assigned pre-readings for each module (prior to the course).
Attend all three intensive course days and participate actively in class discussions (during the course).
Complete and return an independent learning diary within 8 weeks after the course.
Assessment Criteria
Feedback will indicate the degree to which participants have analyzed, synthesized, and integrated ideas and conceptual positions in a way which contributes to their knowledge and understanding of this course. Emphasis is on the student’s ability to engage with relevant academic literature as a means to personal and professional reflections and development and being responsible for taking action in their own career strategies.