Interview #1: Roger Martin

Martin has served as dean of the Rotman School of Management at University of Toronto since 1998. He was formerly a director of Monitor Company, a global strategy consulting firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. During his 13 years with Monitor, he founded and chaired Monitor University, the firm’s educational arm and served as co-head of the firm for two years. In 2007, he was named by BusinessWeek as one of the ten most influential business school professors in the world. He is the author of more than 100 articles. His books include The Opposable Mind and The Future of the MBA co-authored with Mihnea Moldoveanu; most recently, The Design of Business that he will discuss in a second interview.

Morris: You were appointed dean more than a decade ago. Here are two separate but related questions. First, to what extent has the mission of graduate schools of business changed since then?

Martin: It has changed quite a lot in part because it has come under withering criticism for the first time since the late 1950s. At that time, business education was soundly criticized in a Ford Foundation study for being insufficiently academically rigorous. That study changed business education profoundly. The new criticism revolves around teaching MBAs to be amoral analysts rather than principled and creative idea generators and business builders. In addition, the students of today have a higher desire than I have ever seen for their career in business to have meaning, beyond just making an attractive remuneration.

Morris: Given your response to the previous question, what specific changes have occurred at Rotman since then?

Martin: We have embarked on a transformation of the business school curriculum to teach what we call Integrative Thinking. Rather than training students to see their roles in life as being great analysts of existing models – i.e. model choosers – we want to equip them in attitude and capabilities to be model builders, that is executives who generative creative new resolutions to the quandaries and tensions they face – including the apparent tension between economic outcomes and contribution to society; a false trade off, I believe.

Morris: Thomas Friedman asserts that the world has become “flat.” Assuming that you agree, what are the implications of that insofar as preparation for a business career is concerned?

Martin: Tom Friedman is a great writer and The World is Flat is a fun read with some important truths in it. However there is absolutely no question whatsoever that the world is getting spikier and spikier every day. Economic activity, research and innovation, centers of industries, etc. are agglomerating in certain places – and not others – to a greater and greater extent. Talent is not spread or spreading like butter across the world; it is agglomerating in a few places. To give Friedman due, there are some new places that talent is agglomerating in, such as Shanghai in design and Bangalore in software, but the name of the game for business talent is to upgrade skills at an academic institution that is recognized in the key business centers so you are seen as a globally relevant resource. This is why as the world globalizes, it is more important for a business school to be globally consequential; because the top 50 business schools in the world are going to attract disproportionately the top student and faculty talent in the world.

Richard Florida’s perspectives on the U.S. educational system

In his latest book, The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity published by Harper (April 27, 2010), Richard Florida observes:

“We’ve mythologized the histories of entrepreneurs such as [Bill] Gates or Steven Jobs or Michael Dell, constantly retelling the stories of these go-getters starting new businesses in their dorm rooms or garages in their spare time. Yet nobody ever asks the obvious question: Why were they doing those things in their spare time? Why isn’t the education system structured so that this kind of activity is the very goal? Humans have always essentially learned by doing. The idea that school is the only, or even the main, source of education is a relatively recent development. We need to understand that classroom education is merely one phase of a continuous process of learning, discovery, and engagement that can occur anywhere and anytime. We need a learning system that fuels, rather than squelches, our collective creativity.”

In my opinion, there is no one else who generates more and more valuable insights concerning the evolution of the U.S. culture than does Richard Florida.

He is the author of previously published bestsellers that include The Rise of the Creative Class (2003) and The Flight of the Creative Class (2007). He also serves as the director of the Martin Prosperity Institute and professor of business and creativity at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. He is also a correspondent to the Atlantic and writes frequently for The New York Times, the Financial Times, and the Globe and Mail. In addition, he is the founder of the Creative Class Group. You are cordially invited to check out the resources at http://www.creativeclass.com/.