Thirteen adult students came to Bluffton (Ohio) University Aug. 11 from as far away as Iowa, Washington D.C. and Ontario, Canada. They went home four days later as one close-knit group.<\/p>\n
The one-week residency at Bluffton was only the beginning of a two-year journey for the first students in a new Collaborative Master of Business Administration (MBA) program<\/a> teaming Bluffton with Eastern Mennonite University and Goshen (Ind.) College. Most of the program will now be taught via interactive videoconferencing, but the brief time together on campus left an impression on members of the first cohort.<\/p>\n In addition to an orientation\u2014including an introduction to videoconferencing\u2014they completed their first class, on \u201cLeadership and Management for the Common Good.\u201d The \u201ccommon good\u201d concept is the basis of the Collaborative MBA curriculum, with emphasis on six values\u2014spirituality, community, leading as service, justice, sustainability and global citizenship.<\/p>\n Group members also heard Jim Smucker<\/a>, PhD, program director and the vice president and dean of graduate studies<\/a> at Eastern Mennonite, outline the philosophy of \u201cleadership for the common good.\u201d It is, he said, \u201ca belief that developing authenticity in people is the way to help them transform their world\u2014that the common good is established each time a person, organization or community reaches beyond individual self-interest for the sake of the greater whole.\u201d<\/p>\n After the residency, \u201cI think I\u2019ll have more courage to speak about my values,\u201d said Freeman Edwards, a cohort member from North Ridgeville, Ohio. Edwards added that he considered other MBA programs but the new collaboration among the three Mennonite institutions seemed \u201cthe most ethical.\u201d<\/p>\n For Marsha King, the Collaborative MBA is \u201ca bridge\u201d between her Mennonite background and corporate America, where she works in medical device sales.<\/p>\n King, from Goshen, Indiana, said the residency provided a community experience as a group with \u201cconnected values.\u201d<\/p>\n Liz Klassen said she, too, took a sense of community and cohesiveness from the residency as she prepared to return home to Kitchener, Ontario. She had looked at MBA programs that have \u201cthe dollar being the bottom line,\u201d but that approach \u201cdid not fit, when I\u2019m in a people business,\u201d explained Klassen, executive director of a seniors\u2019 community within Tri-County Mennonite Homes<\/a>, New Hamburg, Ontario.<\/p>\n The diversity of the cohort members\u2019 backgrounds, as well as ages (28-69), was beneficial to the group dynamic, added Mark Leinbach and Doug Zehr. Leinbach is executive director of SpringHaven Counseling Center<\/a>, Dundee, Ohio, while Zehr is a Foosland, Illinois, farmer who will soon start a job with Orrville, Ohio-based Venture Products Inc<\/a>.<\/p>\n Spending a lot of time together outside class was also part of the benefit, said Ruth-Ann Shantz, from London, Ontario. Group members ate every meal together and found \u201cthey could bounce significant day-to-day issues off each other,\u201d noted George Lehman, PhD. Lehman is the\u00a0Howard Raid professor of business at Bluffton and served as instructor of the \u201cLeadership and Management for the Common Good\u201d class.<\/p>\n \u201cWe packed a lot of content into five days,\u201d said Lehman about the class, which included a one-day visit from Bill Grace. Grace wrote the 2011 book, \u201cSharing the Rock: Shaping Our Future through Leadership for the Common Good<\/a>,\u201d which summarizes 25 years of study on how businesses and other organizations develop leaders.<\/p>\n The content, including a self-assessment by each individual of \u201cwho you are as a leader,\u201d proved challenging, according to Chris Paterson, who works for the Community Initiatives<\/a> network in Iowa City, Iowa.<\/p>\n Cohort members studied leadership styles and discussed both where they\u2019re going as leaders and where they would ideally like to go, Zehr explained. \u201cThis will be a journey in getting there,\u201d he acknowledged, but, said King, \u201cI\u2019m glad we have this framework to operate from.\u201d<\/p>\n It was good to hear that there\u2019s a \u201chigher purpose\u201d as a leader in an organization, added Dominique Burgunder-Johnson, director of online campaigns for the National Wildlife Federation<\/a> in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n Paterson said he has worked for 10 years with community leaders who have tried to approach issues differently but haven\u2019t been quite sure how to do it. The Collaborative MBA shows \u201cthere are ways you can be leaders for \u2018the common good,\u2019\u201d he said, predicting \u201ca large potential audience for this.\u201d<\/p>\n Paterson and his peers\u2014alumni of the three collaborating institutions as well as others\u2014will jointly take nine of the 12 courses in the program, which has been in the planning stages since fall 2010. Faculty from Bluffton, Eastern Mennonite and Goshen will each teach three of the nine courses via videoconference. Students will take the remaining three courses, in their respective concentrations, from the institution where they are offered. Program concentrations are leadership; health care management; accounting and financial management; leading nonprofits; conflict transformation; sustainability; intercultural leadership; and a self-designed concentration.<\/p>\n The shared experience of the residency reinforced the value of \u201cwalking together and not alone,\u201d said cohort member Bethany Nussbaum, advancement director at Central Christian School<\/a> in Kidron, Ohio. \u201cThis is just a reminder that it\u2019s so important.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"