A completely new direction

Lorange admits he knew that, with the GSBA, he was buying a school with an amply controversial reputation. But the 66 year-old also admits to underestimating the extent of clean-up necessary. He is even planning to rename the school.

Lorange was President of the IMD in Lausanne from 1993 to 2008. Under his leadership, the school enjoyed success and increased its profits from 35 million Swiss francs to more than 115 million. The largest portion of this was achieved through IMD’s Executive Education. Today the MBA program is also among the best in the world. Lorange had to give up his IMD position due to age restrictions in April 2008.

Now he wants to make the GSBA into one of the best business schools in Europe and he has already cleared up the programs significantly. The dual degree MBA with the University of Maryland is over for good. Started last year with a lot of buzz, the World Executive MBA in which participants can take individual courses at international schools is being stopped. The undergraduate programs (Bachelor) are also set to end and the PhD program is under review.

The Executive MBA as well as six specialized programs for the Executive Master of Science remain. The admission criteria have been sharpened and clearly defined. “In the future, there won’t be any more loopholes,” emphasizes the GSBA President. Executive education programs in fields like wealth management, luxury goods marketing and shipping are also in the works.
   
The GSBA President, who sold his shipping company two years ago for roughly 45 million Euros and does not receive a salary at the GSBA, has a problem with the Masters degrees, however, which can’t be solved that quickly: the GSBA is not a recognized university in Switzerland. That is why he is hanging on to the cooperation with the University of Wales – it validates the GSBA’s Masters programs. This means that – in exchange for a corresponding fee – it recognizes the degrees as having the same value as its own degrees and provides a Masters title for them. The University of Wales however is by no means among the top schools in Europe – a considerable hurdle for Lorange’s ambitious goal to make the GSBA number one in Europe in five to ten years.

“I am currently working hard to find good professors,” says Lorange, who is very well connected with many top schools. The professors must be top talents in both teaching and research. He also wants to realize a new business school model at the GSBA. According to this model, the schools will not have any permanent faculty but will work exclusively with a stabile network of professors from leading business schools. They will not only teach and research at the GSBA but will also be closely involved in the school’s governance.

Lorange wants to achieve one thing above all with the network model: lifting the borders between subject disciplines and encouraging interdisciplinary work. “One of the biggest problems, in my view, are the silos that professors hide in,” explains the GSBA President. He also wants to take a different route with remuneration and pay both the professors and the school. According to Lorange, deans and professors from top schools like Wharton and Chicago are already showing great interest in the model.
even the school’s name is set to change.