Online MBA Programs: What The Profs Think

Students during KelleyConnect week

‘ARE YOU GUYS CRAZY? THIS IS JUST NOT SCALABLE’

When Geoghegan first came to Kelley, he concedes to being baffled by the format. “I thought, ‘Are you guys crazy? You have to write four case studies a year? That is just not scalable.’ Then I experienced it and the value students get. It was a hugely rewarding experience to write the case and get the coaches and people involved. The feedback from the students is pretty affirming, and the client gets huge benefits because they have 100 to 200 students problem solving for their organization over a week. It is not a cookie cutter experience.”

Both professors continue to teach in traditional classroom settings. Which do they prefer? “I love to do both,” maintains Geoghegan. “Both my resident and online classes are really rewarding in different ways. I don’t think I have a preference. It’s mostly for me and my personality a healthy mix. If i was exclusively in one or another, I would feel that there is a game that I am not involved in and I’m missing something..”

Williams believes it’s “an apples and oranges comparision in terms of the value you get out of either one. I teach strategy as well as design thinking in the traditional MBA program. That can be exciting and dynamic to interact with all the students in a traditional environment. I am energized by that. On the flip side, online MBA students are taking the things they learn and literally applying them on the next day. In the culminating online project in our course, they need to take all of these focal paths and come up with a strategic plan for their organization. The majority of students come back and say they pitched it to their boss and their boss was blown away. So that is particularly rewarding. So I am a fence sitter as well.”

The live online class sessions, held when they are most convenient for students, sometimes keep Kelley profs at work until 10 p.m. or 11 p.m. “My wife is delighted to get rid of me at any opportunity,” quips Williams. “So she would prefer me to do online classes because that would mean I was missing more evenings. I am completely joking. When I finish at 11 p.m. and arrive home smiling, she knows I’m doing what I really enjoy.”