A Premier Global Venture: OneMBA
By Kim Weaver Spurr

enan-Flagler has joined forces with four top-ranked business schools in Asia, Europe and North and South America to design and deliver OneMBA, a premier global executive MBA program that is radically different from the global programs offered by other leading business schools.

It is distinguished by its span of five business cultures, connecting a diverse network of executives living and working on four different continents.

"This is not a time for us to pull in our oars. We need to row even harder. As executives leading international businesses are met with increasing challenges and opportunities, we need to have a greater immersion in the world," said Kenan-Flagler Dean Robert S. Sullivan.

The OneMBA curriculum was developed jointly and will be taught by leading faculty from Kenan-Flagler and its partner schools:

• The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Faculty of Business Administration - ranked No. 1 in Asia in the latest Business Week and Financial Times rankings.
• Fundação Getulio Vargas, Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo, Brazil - consistently ranked among Latin America's top three business schools by América Economía magazine, a Dow Jones publication.
• The Monterrey Tech Graduate School of Business Administration and Leadership, Mexico - ranked No. 1 in Latin America by América Economía magazine, with the highest position among Latin American business schools in the Financial Times ranking.
• Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam School of Management, The Netherlands - consistently ranked among Europe's top five business schools by Business Week and Financial Times.

The rigorous 21-month program will begin in September with a global class of approximately 100 senior executives distributed across the OneMBA campuses around the world. They will study a common core curriculum at their home business schools. They will come together as a global class through virtual teamwork supported by distance learning - which comprises 25 percent of the Program - and during four experiential learning modules delivered in Asia, Europe, and North and South America.

Advanced MBA courses specific to the curriculum of each OneMBA business school complement the core curriculum. These specialized regional courses focus on the particular business needs and challenges of executives in each region. Graduates of the program earn an MBA degree from the home university which they attend as well as the OneMBA degree.

Topics covered during the residential experiential learning modules include logistics, sustainability, globalization of finance, cultural marketing, management of risk and uncertainty, political and economic transformation, knowledge management and entrepreneurship. Executives build their cross-cultural business skills throughout the program as they work together on global virtual teams.

Companies sponsoring participants in the OneMBA Program benefit from exposing their executives firsthand to best practices in four key regions of the globe.

"The MBA is no longer an American concept," Sullivan said. "This is the future of global business education. The Program will graduate executives ready to lead their organizations through the massive change and opportunities created by an emerging global economy. They'll be able to manage, source, sell and compete - anywhere in the world."

For more information: www.onemba.org.