ABSTRACT
The whole ethos of business schools is based on the assumption that there exists body of knowledge encompassing ‘basic general principles of management’ which can be taught to aspiring managers, irrespective of which business or industry they will be involved in. Examination of the background of students enrolled in the master’s programme at many business schools reveals that they constitute a very mixed bag in terms of ability, experience and motivation. The danger is that students would actually believe the sales pitch, namely that a master’s course of one or two years’ duration can convert them from being nobodies to becoming super-professionals. A group of students was assigned a real enterprise to study and given 2-6 months to write a report. Apart from guiding students in the pursuit of their investigations and during the report-writing stage, there was a fair amount of briefing required before the consent of CEOs could be secured to proceed with the studies of their companies.
