We are not as cosmopolitan as we assume

The demand in the market for MBAs is shifting away from the classic MBA towards classes for younger, less experienced students. According to the Graduate Management Admission Council, which administers the GMAT, 53 per cent of western European test-takers in 2012 were younger than 25 - up from 40 per cent in 2008.

Some people may argue that you can’t learn how to be an entrepreneur or an innovator in a classroom. Surely enough people like Richard Branson, Bill Gates or Steve Jobs didn’t attend an MBA programme. But while the spirit to innovate and create might indeed be in your genes at birth, the methods, strategies and basics of business and management are not. And some other tricks and can certainly be learnt as well

The Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is the entrance exam that most business schools ask you to attend, when you apply for a place. It is administered by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) at test centres across the world.

Melbourne has taken an important step to strengthen its position in business education in the Asia Pacific by announcing a collaboration between the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Business and Economics and Melbourne Business School.

Last year’s winners in the Financial Times ranking for open and customised executive education programmes clambered back onto the top spot: IMD in the open category and Duke Corporate Education in the customised table.

Business school Insead, which hosts campuses in France, Singapore and Abu Dhabi, launched its new Master in Finance degree at the beginning of April. The new programme is designed for experienced financial industry professionals and its curriculum aims to provide a global experience with students coming from all over the world.

Cass Business School at London’s City University will offer an MSc in Leadership from September onwards. The leadership Masters programme will be taught together with the Inspirational Development Group (IDG), a training company, and the Royal Military Academy in Sandhurst.

Germany with its 82 million people is Europe’s powerhouse. The country is the largest national economy in Europe and the world’s second largest exporter. Exports account for more than one-third of the national output and Germany is home to world-renowned companies such as BMW, Allianz or Siemens.

What do you do if you have no time for an MBA, not even if it’s taught as a part-time class, but you still need to brush up your Shakespeare when it comes to management knowledge? What if you are already in a senior management position with no need for a full MBA programme, but you are still interested in better leadership skills? For many people the answer to these questions is still business school – but rather in the form of an executive education course than a full-blown MBA programme.

The Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan is the second school to try team-based interviews as part of its MBA admissions process for 2014. The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School has launched the method last year.

The Kelley School of Business at Indiana University is launching a Business of Medicine MBA to help physicians meet the increasing demand for business knowledge in their profession. The first class starts in September 2013.

The Graduate Management Admission Council has published an updated version of the GMATPrep software. GMATPrep is a free preparation programme for the GMAT exam that is used in graduate business and management programmes around the world.

Before applying to business school, you need to get as much information about a school as possible. Websites and information packs, b-school fairs and chats with alumni will help you make up your mind.

The American publication US News is true to its name: Its MBA ranking focuses only on business schools in the United States. According to the latest for 2013, Harvard, Stanford and Wharton at the University of Pennsylvania lead the pack.

With more than 35,000 alumni, Henley Business School has one of the largest alumni networks worldwide. It is ranked number 1 worldwide in terms of “Potential to network” according to a study from the Economist Intelligence Unit in 2012. Armin Rau, head of Henley’s alumni organisation in Germany, feels that for Henley’s alumni “brand and pride” are very important.

The University of Washington Bothell School of Business launches the concept of a Mini-MBA series. The programme is supposed to provide the unique opportunity for participants to travel to countries that are developing into leaders in the world economy.

Vlerick Business School in Belgium for example considers its alumni network as a very valuable stakeholder of the School and encourages students to contact the community of more than 17,000 people working in over 100 countries throughout the globe.

Answering a growing demand from the Asian market Essec Business School will build a second campus in Singapore. The school opened its first campus in the Asian metropolis in 2005. The new campus will be able to host around 1500 students and participants to its programmes per year and is supposed to open in 2015.

Not so long ago, management expert Lucy Kellaway wrote in her column for the Financial Times about “embracing the network effect”, finding that hiring someone you know is not nepotism but a good thing. She argues that an “old colleague can judge you better than someone who doesn’t know you.”

How do you identify and develop leadership skills? What soft skills are necessary for someone who wants to be at the head of a successful team? The Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) might just have the answers to these questions. GMAC, which is the institution that administers the Graduate Management Admission Test, used in graduate business and management programmes worldwide, partnered with Hogan Assessments.

Swiss business school IMD has signed a deal with the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) to run executive short courses. CKGSB was China’s first private business school. The programme, China Strategy Challenge, will be taught in Lausanne by IMD and CKGSB professors and addresses senior European executives who want to learn more about business in China.

The Henley Business School will officially launch its new MBA in the Music Industry in Hollywood in May. The programme is a core MBA based around experiential learning and a contextualized application for the Music Industry.

Reims Management School will cooperate with Politecnico di Milano from winter 2013 onwards to offer a new Master in Luxury Management. The programme will be taught in France and Italy and is a 12-month course, taught in English.

The MBA trend in China started nearly 10 years ago and opened up a new market for business schools. In China, so far, only a handful out of the total 233 business schools have been able to achieve one of the highly regarded accreditations from Equis or AACSB, and therefore many aspiring managers fell into the arms of foreign business schools.

ESCP Europe will expand its start-up initiative „Blue Factory“ to Berlin. So far the initiative was running successfully at ESCP’s locations in Paris and Madrid. The programme accompanies young entrepreneurs during the founding process of their companies and allows them to network and exchange ideas and support on an international basis.