- Graduate readiness is a key priority for educators and employers?
- New hires are being given more difficult tasks than previous years?
- Collaborations between schools, or between industry leaders is helping to shape the right education for graduates?
Donning a cap and gown marks a significant milestone in every graduate’s life. It is a chance to reflect on new skills gained, congratulate themselves on a job well done, and close the chapter (at least for now) on their academic lives, turning their focus to what comes next… building a career.
Unfortunately, many graduates are doomed to stumble before they’ve taken their first step into the professional world. According to job search site Indeed, the number of available graduate roles has dropped by 33% – hitting its lowest level in seven years and making that new dream job even harder to come by.
The reason? The online job-search platform Indeed suggests that employers are pausing, or even halting, typical hiring cycles and instead focusing on how AI can be deployed to best fulfil their needs. It’s a bleak reality not only for 2025’s graduating class, but also for educators, who hold a responsibility to ensure their students exit education with the best chance possible of securing their desired role.
For business schools in particular, charged with creating talented professionals to not just meet modern industry needs, but lead them into the future, the challenge has never been greater. Educators are under constant pressure to keep course content ahead of the curve – balancing academic rigour and core knowledge with building new skills such as literacy with new digital tools, and an understanding of complex global challenges like climate change and the impact of geopolitics.
To help keep track of current trends and priorities, AACSB International’s State of Business Education (SOBE) report analyses data gathered from AACSB’s global network and highlights the critical forces reshaping institutions around the world.?
Keeping education future-focused
The report finds that graduate readiness is amongst the highest priorities for educators and employers alike, with 86% of respondents agreeing that “graduate readiness and employability have a high or critical impact on the operations, strategy, and/or outcomes of business schools today”.?
The report details the key shifts in the demand for future skills, noting, unsurprisingly, that tech-driven disciplines such as AI, big data, cybersecurity and technological literacy are most in demand.
However, the report also highlights the value of human talents such as creative thinking. One respondent, a talent acquisition specialist from KPMG, shares that in this era of digital transformation, the work that used to be given to new hires is increasingly being taken on by AI. As a result, new graduates are charged with taking on more complicated tasks which previously would have been undertaken by staff with a greater level of experience. To succeed, graduates must not only understand the technology but also possess the human instincts and reasoning to interpret and apply it to have the most beneficial impact for their organisations.
Graduates, and the institutions that have prepared them, have a harder job than ever to make an impact on industry. So, how are business schools rising to meet the challenge??
Using tech to make business teaching business ready?
New hires need to be able to not only harness the tools which can interpret complex information, but collaborate and communicate this across different disciplines, and all whilst making sound, ethical decisions. With this in mind, business school applicants are increasingly seeking out educational experiences that not only use modern tools effectively, but which are also adaptive to changing industry needs. For instance, the Beijing Jiaotong University’s School of Economics and Management leverages AI and VR within the curriculum, the School has created experiential learning opportunities for its students via the V-Bridge platform.
The platform provides a virtual simulation tool for business experimentation and AI collaboration. This bridges theoretical learning with real-world industry demands by replicating business operations, enabling students to test decision-making strategies and explore human-AI collaboration through real-world challenges. To keep learning fresh, a built-in feedback loop also collects simulation data, enabling continuous optimisation and innovation of the platform.
Bridging the gap between theory and practice ?
But not all learning can happen within a classroom (virtual or not) setting. Increasingly, business schools also are seeking opportunities for industry collaboration to ensure that teaching keeps pace with global business practice. The recent partnership between ESSEC Business School and Mistral AI is a key example of industry leaders joining forces to provide educational excellence. The partnership aims to accelerate the integration of AI into ESSEC’s research, teaching, and pedagogical innovation, and to encourage the controlled and reasonable adoption of AI tools, placing people at the heart of the solution.?
Being positioned at the heart of a global network of business schools, AACSB is also committed to supporting collaborations between educational institutions and global organisations that bridge the gap between theory and practice. In particular, a collaborative project between Deloitte and Quinnipiac University School of Business identified critical skills gaps in the market and used this knowledge to adapt curricula to fill them. As a result, graduates were better prepared to join organisations and hit the ground running. ??
Further areas for improvement identified by the project included opportunities for faculty-employer collaboration, career learning integration, and joint programme creation. By joining forces with corporate organisations, the team suggested, business schools can better ensure every graduate leave university with the skills to forge a successful career. ??
Teaching leadership during times of uncertainty?
Tech prowess and business know-how, whilst invaluable, are not enough for today’s graduates to rise above the competition. As AACSB’s report points out, those entering the workforce after concluding their studies need to also build the very human reasoning skills required to navigate increasingly choppy waters. ?
In times of uncertainty, strategic decision making and preparedness are key. Aalto University Executive Education and Professional Development has returned focus to the core values of good business, aiming to equip its participants with the confidence and critical thinking mindset to be prepared for anything.?
Its “Strategic Foresight in Business Management” programme coaches learners to build the mindsets, perspectives and resilience to anticipate challenges, identify potential business opportunities and ensure that their leadership doesn’t falter during tough times.?
Similarly, at INSEAD, all students are required to take the Personal Leadership Development Programme (PDLP) for precisely this reason. Whilst MBA student Wei Low initially felt skeptical, as outlined in her blog, she very quickly learned that being a good leader means taking time for self-reflection, humility and embracing the reality that leaders do not always have the right answer. Regular access to a coach and setting aside time during her more typical studies to explore relationship building will give her leadership capabilities a positive boost, she writes.?
Developing the means to keep learning?
Short-courses, building-block learning opportunities and non-degree micro credentials are coming to the fore in providing a means for graduates to keep enhancing their capabilities. AACSB’s report identified a growing number of schools exploring skill-specific certificates, stackable programs, and modular learning pathways that allow learners to update their skills throughout their careers.?
2024 Application Trends Survey, compiled by the Graduate Management Admissions Council identified a similar trend, reporting that some 62% of business schools worldwide now offer some form of non-degree credentials in order to keep pace with changing industry needs and attitudes. ?
Such courses offer training in a wide array of key topics and disciplines beyond AI and digital transformation. This includes developing “soft skills” which could perhaps better be described as “transferable skills”. These human centric proficiencies like critical thinking, communication, emotional intelligence, adaptability and resilience will be increasingly important for professionals across all sectors, as organisations restructure in response to new regulations, technologies, and supply chain disruptions.?
For instance, in a world increasingly dominated by AI, there is a very real danger of human touch and rationale being lost. According to a Workday study, 83% of respondents agreed that the growth of AI makes human skills even more vital.
Where AI proficiency is touted as the pinnacle of future-focused education, schools would do well to remember that finding a balance between human and technological capabilities is the key. ?
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