This is a special issue of the IESE Alumni Magazine.
It contains articles written by senior faculty, in
celebration of IESE’s 50th anniversary. Collectively,
we add up several centuries of service. Our experience
equips us to maintain the spirit that propelled
the school from the very beginning. And
we hope to also somehow update its message. In some cases
we focus on the school's aim and its evolution. In others, on
its history. And sometimes we discuss both issues at once.
My belief as coordinator of this issue is that we haven’t done
that badly. Readers will find plenty of what IESE has preached
through the years, what it still preaches today. We inevitably
end up also delving a bit into the memory chest with our
readers.
Articles in this special issue don’t get close to sharing a common
theme, focus or development. They are instead reflections
of the personalities of our contributors. But there is an
underlying cohesion: we have shared and continue to share
concerns and aspirations related to education and research,
and we have tried to channel those ideas here. As coordinator
of this issue, I am infinitely grateful to my colleagues for the
enthusiasm they have poured into this project. This has simplified
the process and made it fast and enjoyable. I deserve nocredit for this, then. The truth is that the project has pretty
much coordinated itself. I would have been entirely superfluous,
were it not for my role as proofreader, which makes me
solely responsible for any mistakes that might have slipped
through.
In this introduction I would like to first focus on how admirable
it was to launch IESE at a time when management was
so unfashionable that no one knew what the word meant.
Conventional economics circles in Spanish universities even
expressed a degree of disdain toward what we taught here. A
renowned professor labeled what IESE taught as a “watereddown
version of basic concepts for the semi-literate.”
ECONOMICS AND MANAGEMENT
Antonio Valero, the first dean of IESE, formerly economics professor
at the Engineering School in Barcelona, always stressed
that what we were teaching at IESE was completely different
to traditional economics taught in other schools. We tried to
get a grip on real-life problems and give executives the tools
to solve them. Economics, considered by many the king of
social sciences, was a structured discipline with a substantial
body of theory. In some subfields it was very well established
and elegantly developed.
Management was more modest and less structured. But it had
a much greater impact on the lives of millions of people and
was the motor behind all economic activity. Spain's evolution
cannot be understood independently from the development
of management, in which IESE can claim a significant role. If
any discipline has enjoyed success in recent years, in theory as
well as in practice, it is doubtlessly management.
In fact, shortly after it was founded, IESE was already making
a clear impact on the practice of management in its immediate
surroundings, which back then was essentially Barcelona.
Some of us veterans have observed how, in the late 60s and
early 70s, when we went to a company for research or consulting
work, it was obvious if someone in the company
had studied at IESE. For starters, they would communicate
in a common language. The task of creating this common
language is much more important than we normally admit.
Without a common language we cannot communicate. They
would also analyze problems in a certain way and would
demonstrate specific knowledge.
The school’s impact extended beyond Spain, even in the early
days. The school has had an international outlook from day
one. It collaborated in the creation of various schools, first
in Latin America and later in other countries. The following
institutions are proof of IESE’s international commitment:
IPADE in Mexico, IAE in Argentina, PAD in Peru, IEEM in
Uruguay, IDE in Ecuador, INALDE in Colombia, ISE in Brazil,
ESE in Chile, Lagos Business School, Strathmore Business
School in Kenya, TAYASAL in Guatemala and the School of
Management of the University of Asia and the Pacific.
A basic problem in management has to do with content.
There are plenty of opinions about it, and some of them are
incompatible. Some differences are ideological, while others
center on what it is exactly. Other differences focus on the
concept of human personhood and its practical implications.
And yet others have to do with the types of analysis and
solutions applied. It is therefore all the more remarkable that
management has been so wildly successful, as confirmed by
the number of students applying to study management at
Spanish universities.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
If we take a stroll down memory lane in Spain, modern management
was introduced through IESE and another Barcelonabased
business school, ESADE. It is commendable that what
both schools did has led to a frenzy of interest in the discipline
on the part of dozens of public and private institutions.
It is true that previously, schools of commerce had gained
ground in many areas such as accounting, for example. Their
efforts helped improve management in Spain. But what was
taught at these schools did not bear much resemblance to
what was gaining in popularity around the world back then,
what we could consider “the American concept.”
In the mid-1950s there were no American-style business
schools in Europe, let alone Spain. A widely known author of
the period, Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, in his book Le défi
americain, claimed that the U.S.A.'s economic superiority was
due to the existence of business schools there. This is where
IESE entered the stage 50 years ago, an anniversary we are
now celebrating.
Nevertheless, the American concept was not standardized and
cohesive. Various schools had different starting points, and at
times their teaching was considerably different. Some traits,
however, were shared by all the major schools, such as pragmatism,
perfectionism and the work ethic, attributes often
regarded as quintessentially American. But there were also
substantial differences in content, methods and conceptions.
For the Harvard Business School (HBS), the largest and best
known school, the case study method was its program’s cornerstone,
in research as well as teaching, although experts at
HBS are quick to point out that classroom cases and research
cases are two very different things. On the other extreme, for
the University of Chicago School of Business, the bedrock
course was economics, which gave an entirely different focus
to its approach. The next article will explore various concepts
of this discipline in the context of some current debates.
It is a well-known fact that IESE aligned itself much closer to
HBS than to Chicago, but retained some unique personality
traits which are the main focus of this special issue of the
magazine. It would be great if many of those initial traits — which are still valid today —would continue to exert the
influence they had in their day.
