New 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø MBA Program Integrates Social Issues with Long-Term Business Success

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Vancouver, Wash. - Business professors at Washington State University Vancouver were seeking a way to update their Master of Business Administration degree, and to distinguish it regionally and nationally.

In consultations with colleagues from business and academia, conversation turned again and again to social issues and the larger impact of businesses on their many stakeholders, not just the owners and shareholders who have traditionally directed policy for pure profit.

The result was an MBA program in which the entire curriculum is designed around "stakeholder theory," which teaches that long-term business success in creating competitive advantage requires recognizing the vital interdependence between businesses and critical stakeholders such as employees, investors, customers, suppliers, and public constituencies.

"Our new curriculum includes the traditional courses of any MBA program, but it is also unique in the United States," said 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø marketing professor Joe Cote, one of the new program's architects. "Unlike other MBA programs that offer a few social or environmental classes, all of our courses stem from stakeholder theory. We teach an executive-level perspective in making decisions and taking actions that sustain strong relationships with these stakeholders."

Jerry Goodstein, 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø management and operations professor, said that students of the program, many from local industry, seem to find the approach "unique and refreshing."

For curriculum design guidance, Cote and Goodstein turned to the Aspen Institute, an organization that maintains resources for teaching social issues in business, and which has prompted inclusion of more these issues in many of the nation's top business schools.

"We believe that business leaders need to be trained to take a long-term approach and include social and environmental sustainability as part of core business strategy and practice," said Judy Samuelson, executive director of the Aspen Institute Business & Society Program. "The new curriculum at WSU [Vancouver] is directly in line with our beliefs and hopes for business education."

The institute is hosting a Web conference on the new curriculum, conducted by 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø business faculty, at 11 a.m. PST, Oct. 18. To participate, e-mail corporategovernance@aspeninstitute.org .

Goodstein and others will present an information night on the new MBA program at 6 p.m., Oct. 11, in the 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø Student Services building, room 129. Free parking is available in the Orange 1 lot.

Further information on the new 91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø MBA program is available through the Aspen Institute's CasePlace Web site, , and at
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91³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏÍø offers 14 Bachelor's degrees, 9 Master's degrees and 1 Doctorate degree and more than 35 fields of study. The campus is located at 14204 N.E. Salmon Creek Ave., east of the 134th Street exit from either I-5 or I-205. Visit us on the Web at