China from a global perspective, interview with IMD President

China from a global perspective

Interview with Peter Lorange,
President and Nestle Professor of Strategy at the IMD

PETER Lorange, president and Nestle Professor of Strategy at the International Institute of Management Development, was born in Oslo and holds degrees from universities in America, Hungary and his native Norway.

In an exclusive interview with The China MBA Guides in Shanghai, Dr Jonathan Di Rollo, executive director, and www.WhichMBA.net Managing Editor Ying Zhao, Dr Lorange talks about what makes IMD different from its competitors and how the institute addresses the needs of executives in China.

Q: The most recent rankings by the Financial Times of executive education sees IMD at No. 2 globally. What does this mean to you?

A: Of course, consistently high rankings makes us feel good but what is more important, to me, is the steady growth in our revenue globally from our executive education, executive MBA and full-time MBA programs. This means our customers accept us.

Part of what makes IMD different is it is run as a business, with revenue mostly from executive education funding us. What is more interesting is that our revenue is global because IMD is a global meeting place. About 30 percent of our revenue currently comes from Asia, our fastest growing market.

Q: IMD's programs are very highly priced. How does IMD differentiate the value it delivers compared to other business schools?

A: Firstly, we deliver thought leadership that is practical; real world, real learning. That means stimulating innovation, for example, by treating customers differently or thinking about a market or product differently and the confidence to promote those ideas. Companies are market leaders because they were first thought leaders.

Secondly, we provide a global meeting place for executives from all over the world. Currently 26.9 percent of IMD's costs are going into research and development; practical, cutting edge research, but we only have 55 professors in total, so it's the higher value per professor that creates our revenue growth.

Q: Are IMD's offerings relevant for China's executives?

A: Research leading to thought leadership has to be done in China. To be relevant, we have launched a China Research Center in Shanghai. What matters is that you come up with thought leadership issues based on your research. Looking at the dilemmas with an in-depth China context in mind, we then bring these issues to the global meeting place in Lausanne, Switzerland. Here they are debated as perspectives that are challenged by people globally. This is where our value shows.

We host CEO roundtables and dinners in China where Chinese and expats can get together. This is one of our local, global meeting places where we learn a lot by listening. There are many executives in China who say that China is different and they have their own solutions. While we listen to them, we believe that this must be tested out globally. The global meeting place perspectives are challenged by executives from Cape Town, Sao Paulo, and so on. The end point of our research is global and this is key, because it is not that more China research is required. It is about the position of China research in the global context. We will also launch other research centers in Mumbai and Latin America this year.

Q: IMD is located in Switzerland. What makes IMD people different from competitors like INSEAD, London Business School and schools in the United States?

A: Our offerings are predominantly short, executive education programs and EMBA, compared to full-time MBA, emphasized by INSEAD and LBS. Let me add though that our MBA program is very important to us content wise and was recently ranked No. 1 globally by a "ranking of rankings" by combined global media. Also, our professors teach across all our programs, degree and non-degree, as one team. So we are like one orchestra playing a symphony rather than several chamber orchestras playing different compositions. Also, we don't believe in hierarchy, so our professors don't have titles and we don't have departments because we believe in eclectic thinking. One benefit of this to participants is that our faculty can talk about integrated themes of strategy, accounting, marketing and more, rather than just one area of expertise. The quality of the top executives we attract is similar to other schools but we have a more global mix compared to, say, top US schools.

Q: Personal development is an increasingly important field in executive education, what is IMD's view?

A: What matters is the personal development journey, where new thought leadership is being brought to the individual who sees new things all the time, and that it is practical, research based. With so many business schools saying the same thing, reputation and word of mouth are important, and we work closely with our alumni and corporate clients on these.