With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1181452
S p e c i a l F e a t u r e Sauder, points out that "the market is demanding all sorts of things for which we're still developing solutions. Executive education and professional development in general is being disrupted. For example, there is an enormous amount of content available online, much of it for free. But simply consuming information does not mean that you've acquired knowledge and can apply the learning. That learning still needs to be tied to outcomes and we still need to be able to measure the impact. So while technology is disrupting the way we deliver content, it also represents an opportunity to transform how we foster learning communities and ensure the outcomes are achieved." The bustling landscape of education for professionals is benefitting smaller institutions too. "We used to think of ourselves as the best kept secret in town, but that's no longer the case as we have grown over our past 10 years in Vancouver to the point where we'll soon have to locate to a bigger facility," says Sinan Caykoylu, associate dean for NYIT – Vancouver's MBA program. Brock Dykeman, president of University Canada West, says the popularity of his institution's MBA programs has contributed to its success— and necessitated a move next year to a bigger campus in downtown Vancouver. "Currently we're enjoying great feedback with our focus of fusing tech elements into our MBA courses via Salesforce, Tableau, IBM Design Thinking and so forth," he says. "It's another way of ensuring that when our students graduate and get jobs, they will have the hands-on skills required to hit the ground running." Stephanie Howes, dean, KPU School of Business (Kwantlen Polytechnic University), describes Kwantlen, which has grown to accommodate 21,000 students, "as a big institution with small-institution benefits, coupled with the polytechnic ethos of thought meeting action. In addition to offering new and updated diplomas, we're focused on making our programming even more accessible to adult learners, in order not to disrupt their jobs or lifestyle." If there is a common goal linking the diverse program offerings from Sauder, NYIT – Vancouver, University Canada West and KPU School of Business, it is preparing would-be professionals with practical work experience and advanced skills, and in that regard Porto describes several new initiatives at Sauder as being "the most exciting things that have happened with our full-time MBA programs in years." Porto is referring to the Technology and Analytics Leadership (TAL) track, which brings a unique skill set to MBAs with a solid understanding of technology and business, setting students up for success with firms that have advanced technology products or services. TAL- track students learn the fundamentals of business administration and technology and their applications in several industries, including FinTech, healthcare, automation, customer analytics, and much more. "Our MBA students with a TAL track will be adept in technology and business analytics, which is critical to leadership in today's business world," says Porto. Another initiative is Sauder's exclusive Global Network for Advanced Management, which allows MBA students during their second year to study business at one of the institution's 34 global partner schools around the world, with no extra tuition cost. "We're the only institution in Canada with this partnership, and it's a great way for students to be exposed to other offerings and professors," says Porto. New York Tech – Vancouver is equally dedicated to preparing its students for the professional world, and it also welcomes enrolees who have only one or two years of work experience. "This is important, because many of the bigger, iconic universities only accept people into their MBAs who have four to 10 years of continued from pg. 49 E D U C A T I O N F O R P R O F E S S I O N A L S