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Three cheers for the part-time MBA! It is not a refrain you are likely to hear every day, I have to admit. But why does the full-time MBA receive all the accolades while part-time programmes are met with a rather embarrassed silence, even though the degree received by graduates is often the same?
请给在职MBA喝彩三声！我必须承认，这可能不是那种你每天都能听到的话。但是，为什么全日制MBA能收到所有的赞誉，而在职课程却只能面对相当尴尬的沉默，即便两类毕业生拿到的学位通常都是一样的？
This might seem an odd thing to write about in a magazine dedicated to the full-time degree, but I think it is worth asking the question. Why has the part-time MBA always been the Cinderella of the MBA market, and can and should that change?
在一家提倡全日制学位的杂志上写这件事似乎有些奇怪，但我认为，这个问题值得讨论。为什么在职MBA一直是MBA界的“灰姑娘”？这种状况能改变吗？应该改变吗？
It strikes me there is a real case to answer here. For what everyone has learnt in the past decade is that the MBA market has to offer more flexibility to students; it has to make better use of technology; it has to be more affordable; and participants need the security of a job at the end of the process. A further point is that is that there are too few women on traditional MBA programmes, and there is evidence that part-time programmes might help redress that balance.
我突然觉得确实有必要说一下这个问题。过去10年中大家学到的经验是，MBA市场应该给学生提供更大的弹性；应该更好地利用科技；应该更让人们负担得起；应该确保学员在课程结束时能获得一份工作。此外还有一点是，传统MBA课程的女学生太少了，有证据表明在职MBA也许有助于平衡男女比例。
But the one thing that has convinced me the part-time MBA should be revisited is a comment I heard some years ago from Kim Clark, the former dean of Harvard Business School, whose MBA is ranked number one in the world by the FT this year. He said that students do not turn down a seat at HBS to go to another business school; they do so because they have great opportunities at work.
不过，最终令我确信在职MBA应该被重新审视的一点是，多年前我听哈佛商学院(Harvard Business School)前院长金•克拉克(Kim Clark)说过的一句评价。哈佛商学院的MBA课程在英国《金融时报》2014年的全球MBA排行榜上名列第一。克拉克说，学生拒绝进入哈佛商学院不是因为要去其他商学院，而是因为他们不愿失去工作中的绝佳机会。
As economies recover around the world, this is clearly going to become a bigger problem, as corporations bid to retain talented staff. They may even be persuaded to sponsor part-time MBA students as part of that process.
随着全球各地经济复苏，企业出高价留住人才，这显然会成为一个更棘手的问题。他们甚至可能会为了留住人才，为读在职MBA的员工提供资金支持。
Of course, this idea is not new. When the Fuqua school at Duke University in North Carolina launched its Cross-continent MBA more than a decade ago, the then dean Rex Adams described the part-time degree targeting managers in their late twenties as “hitting the sweet spot”.
当然，这种想法并不新鲜。位于北卡罗莱纳州的杜克大学富卡商学院(Fuqua School of Business)在十几年前就推出了跨洲MBA课程，时任院长雷克斯•亚当斯(Rex Adams)把针对近三十岁经理人的在职学位形容为“切中了他们的脉搏”。
There are other very successful part-time programmes out there, often called Executive MBAs, that cater to this market. At Iese Business School, for example, the average age of participants on the Madrid EMBA is 31 — similar to those studying on a full-time MBA at Insead. And whatever business school I talk to, from France to Australia, part-time and executive MBAs are booming, while full-time degrees flounder.
为了迎合这个市场，商学院还推出了其他一些非常成功的在职课程，它们通常被称为“行政工商管理硕士（EMBA)”。例如，在ESE商学院(Iese Business School)攻读“马德里EMBA”课程的学员的平均年龄为31岁，与那些欧洲工商管理学院(INSEAD)全日制MBA学生的年龄差不多。而且，无论说起哪所商学院，从法国到澳大利亚，在职MBA与EMBA项目都在迅速发展，而全日制学位则陷入困境。
Of course, one of the biggest problems is that some of the most prestigious business schools — Harvard and Stanford are the most obvious examples — only teach the MBA in a two-year full-time format. But these two US schools are not the only two big brand name schools. If you go to China, the two big names are Tsinghua and Beida — or Peking University. And most of the students on the MBAs at those two universities study part-time, as is common in China.
当然，最大的问题之一是，有些最负盛名的商学院——哈佛和斯坦福最为明显——只开设两年制的全日制MBA。但是，并非只有这两家美国学校是大牌学校。如果你去中国，名声最大的两所学校是清华和北大，而在这两所学校攻读MBA的学生大多都是在职，这在中国很普遍。
So why are part-time degrees so disregarded? I think there are may be two reasons. First, part-time degrees tend to be local courses, taught in the evenings. But there is no reason at all why they cannot be taught in modules, in the same way as the top-notch EMBAs, in multiple locations. Fuqua has proven that.
那么为什么在职学位如此不受重视呢？我认为可能有两个原因。第一，在职学位往往是本地课程，在晚上授课。但是这些课程为什么不能像顶尖的EMBA课程一样，分单元、分地点开课呢？完全没有理由。富卡商学院已经证明了这一点。
Indeed, I can envisage a couple of enterprising business schools joining up to launch dual-city or even dual-country degrees. Why not a part-time degree taught alternate weekends in Chicago and New York? Or Paris and London?
事实上，我可以想象出几个富有进取精神的商学院联手推出双城、甚至跨国学位。为什么在职MBA不能在芝加哥和纽约轮流进行周末授课呢？或者在巴黎和伦敦开课呢？
The second thing is to do with branding. The power of the MBA is arguably because it is the best known degree brand in the world. But over the past few years, the EMBA has become a premium brand in its own right, largely due to the way it has been promoted by business schools.
第二个原因和品牌有关。MBA具有巨大的影响力，这可以说是因为它是全世界最知名的学位品牌。但是，在过去几年间，EMBA本身已经成为一个溢价品牌，这主要得益于商学院推广这一品牌的方式。
Institutions such as London Business School, IE in Spain and Kellogg, at Northwestern University in the US, are now trying to perform the same marketing trick with the Master in Management degree, or MiM. So why not the part-time MBA?
伦敦商学院(London Business School)、西班牙IE商学院、美国西北大学(Northwestern University)凯洛格管理学院(Kellogg）等机构，如今正在尝试运用与管理硕士(MiM)相同的营销手段。那么在职MBA为何不可呢？
Clearly the name is an issue — it needs a rebrand. Perhaps AMBA (alpha MBA) would work or MBA-HF (MBA for high-flyers). The potential list is endless.
显然，名字也是个问题——在职MBA需要重新命名。AMBA（阿尔法MBA）或许可以，或者MBA-HF（精英专属MBA）也不错。可供选择的名字数之不尽。
Then of course, there is one final tried and tested way of ensuring premium status and high brand recognition, a tactic that worked so well in the EMBA market: put the price up.
当然，接下来还有一个确保溢价和提高品牌认知的杀手锏，一个在EMBA市场行之有效的高招：提高价格。
