With the rapid pace of change businesses are experiencing — both technological with the rise of artificial intelligence and organizational with the evolving nature of remote work — employers are more eager than ever to hire professionals skilled at embracing innovation.
The 2023 Corporate Recruiters Survey released by the Graduate Management Admission Council found that 47 percent of employers hiring master of business administration graduates recruit them to work in strategy/innovation positions. Businesses are more likely to hire MBAs for these positions than they are for human resources, project management, or even general management.
Innovation is a skill that employers have always sought from their hires. The ability to look at a problem and find a unique solution or to identify opportunities to grow the business is immensely valuable to an organization. While innovation is often considered a skill people inherently have or they don’t, is it something that can actually be taught?
Institutions like Kennesaw State University say yes. Beginning fall 2024, Kennesaw State’s Michael J. Coles College of Business is launching a new degree path in its Evening MBA Program focusing on entrepreneurship and organizational innovation.
Uncertainty breeds innovation
One of seven concentrations available in the MBA program, the entrepreneurship and organizational innovation path teaches students to master the art of launching and growing new ventures, whether as entrepreneurs or working within an existing organization. The same skills entrepreneurs use to nurture a product from conception to release can help management in an established business develop new products or reposition their resources to respond to changing market conditions.
“Every organization wants to be a disruptor, but no organization wants to be disrupted,” said Birton Cowden, associate professor of entrepreneurship and the academic director of Kennesaw State’s Robin and Doug Shore Entrepreneurship and Innovation Center. “Changes to the economy leave everyone vulnerable. Every organization needs more creative, entrepreneurial, and innovative employees.”
Cowden, who teaches in the program and co-designed the curriculum, said the concentration is a response to the incredible pace of change the business world has seen in the last five years. The sudden rise of artificial intelligence, the continuing evolution of blockchain technology, and global shocks like the pandemic have revealed the importance of being able to respond quickly to changes in the economy.
Innovation joins the curriculum
MBA students who concentrate on entrepreneurship and organizational innovation learn to identify new revenue streams, create and launch new products, and to encourage others in their organizations to be more innovative and entrepreneurial.
“These skills are hard to replace, hard to have AI do for you, and are highly transferable when you decide to change organizations or to create your own business,” Cowden said. “On a more advanced level, we’re seeing evidence that large Atlanta-based companies like Delta Airlines and Chick-fil-A are creating dedicated departments for new entrepreneurial endeavors for their brands. We hope to be one of the first programs to prepare the workforce to fill those roles.”
The new concentration achieves this by keeping the MBA program’s existing core business courses and adding classes on entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity; organizational entrepreneurship; new venture creation and growth; and launching new ventures.
The future is specialization
Kennesaw State’s launch of the entrepreneurship and organizational innovation concentration is part of the Evening MBA program’s move towards greater specialization. In addition to this new path, the program also offers concentrations in accounting, digital marketing, finance, fintech, general management, and information security and assurance.
“Concentrations and specialized master’s programs have gained popularity among many business schools nationwide over the past five years, and we are in step with the market,” said Renee Bourbeau, executive director of MBA programs for Kennesaw State. “Specialization is an important vehicle for meeting industry demands because it enables our MBAs to develop expertise and a depth of knowledge that leads to greater innovation, problem solving and increased efficiency for employers.”
The rapid changes in technology that have led to much disruption during the last several years show no signs of stopping. Institutions have recognized that fact and are now not only baking innovation and entrepreneurial thinking into multiple disciplines but are recognizing them as disciplines all their own.
Discover how the MBA programs at Kennesaw State University are teaching professionals to embrace innovation and develop the skills employers are looking for today.
The Michael J. Coles College of Business is the second-largest university business school in Georgia, offering 10 undergraduate degree programs and seven graduate programs. Coles College is among the top two percent of business schools to earn accreditation in both business and accounting by AACSB International, the world’s most prestigious accrediting body for business schools.
Patrick Harbin is director of creative communications at the Michael J. Coles College of Business at Kennesaw State University. A former newspaper journalist and trade publication author, Harbin is now committed to helping tell the Coles College story and elevating the successes of the College's students, faculty, and programs.