For 20 years the Journal of Integrated Marketing Communications has been the policy, strategy and tactics voice of the Medill School’s Department of Integrated Marketing Communications. The JIMC has been supported by thousands of hours of volunteer time by IMC students and nearly 200 authors to produce its annual content. It has also been supported by more than 500 graduate students who raised more than a quarter of million dollars to fund 90% of the cost of the Journal’s publication. Over the last two decades, the distribution and readership have grown to a total of nearly eighty thousand.
IMC faculty are strengthening the communications standards of graduate (and now undergraduate) IMC education at Northwestern. The core graduate classes such as marketing are requiring that the graduate student be as strong in rigorous research methods (statistically analytical as well as ethnographically precise) as they are in persuasively communicating the results or interpretation of the research.
With this celebration comes a warning that the cost of graduate professional education may be exceeding its value and benefit to some students. My concern is not as a naysayer but as a professor concerned that the rapidly increasing tuition and total costs of graduate education are rapidly exceeding the value to the student of earning an advanced degree in management, journalism, law, education, IMC and other fields.
Of course the decision of the value of earning an advanced degree belongs to the student - not to the school. However, some schools need to reexamine the marginal costs of earning a degree from their programs. A recent article in The Economist (October 17th 2009) noted that, for the elite school MBA, “(t)he long term benefits sound substantial…But the short-term costs are also weighty.” The Economist concludes that “on balance, the benefits probably outweigh the cost, particularly in straitened times”. What The Economist surprisingly missed is even a rudimentary effort to help a student decision-maker to calculate the short-term and lifetime costs and benefits of an advanced degree. Ironically,the same skills to calculate the ROI are taught to our IMC students and many MBA students. However the corporate teaching does not offer a personal tool or widget for a student to “run the numbers”. I will quote a new graduate professional student from a midwestern public school that I spoke with recently. After I asked him if he had calculated the cost and value of his degree, he responded, “No, I assumed that a prestigious university and school would not offer a degree that was not economically viable”. His comment cut to the quick.
We should be terribly concerned for the future of colleges and universities that are either private or “pubvate” (historically public state universities embarrassingly nearly unfunded by state taxpayer dollars). The cost of education at a 6% increase for many years for my grandchildren or your children may well exceed any rational logic of earning an advanced degree or, even more frighteningly, an undergraduate degree. The necessary formula for a student to make an informed decision is on this blog as a “return-on-investment calculator. Of course educators and economists have long demonstrated the long-term value of graduate education. However, I don’t believe these generalized models are specific enough to permit a student to estimate the actual and expected costs for their decision. My colleague Jim Carey and I offer the interactive tool with the hope that students will find it useful to make a specific decision about a full-time or part-time advanced degree.
My confidence in the next generation is often stronger than my confidence in my own generation of educators and leaders who seem so dutifully wedded to the past trappings of higher education. We seem to still see the Gothic towers, large, tiered lecture halls, book driven libraries, full-time degrees, country club campuses, entertainment, upscale living units, restaurants and super sports for alumni as core purposes of an antiquated educational model.
I should probably leave my concerns to the next generation of university students, leaders and faculty in hopes that they will consider more part-time degrees, challenging digital distance learning and other learning and delivery systems. However, I don’t want to be worrying about this topic when I author the publisher’s essay for the JIMC’s 40th anniversary edition. Finally, for 2009 and 2010, please follow my best advice: Hire my students!
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Friday, October 2, 2009
Teaching communications in MBA programs may be moot
Reference to debate over more PR being taught in MBA programs athttp://www.awpagesociety.com/awp_blog/comments/pr_education_a_most_un_businesslike_proposition1/
This is one of the longest discussions we have had on the evergreen topic. Given the economic realities of the market and the cost of education; I will argue that we may be too late to even include communications in business schools. First, I have some history for you.
Our A.W. Page B-School Committee has debated the topic for over a decade with all the frustrations demonstrated above. At a personal level most of you know that I moved from teaching at the Business School at Wisconsin-Madison to the Medill School of Journalism. With a joint doctorate in Business Management and in Journalism Mass Communications (PR and Advertising and similar joint undergraduate work), I was recruited to teach graduate PR, marketing and management. Our goal was to create the new Integrated Marketing Communications program in response to chaos in the industry and in Schools of Journalism and Communications. We knew that we could offer the best of a business management degree since we had been on the campus long before Kellogg and could make an agreement to use communications as the strategic field of study. We received a great deal of valued publicity when our work was attacked by the biggest academic names in Communications and PR for “getting in bed with marketing”.
We have not looked back since that time and have given students tremendous opportunities to use communications as a strategic advantage in business and complex organizations. Our agreement with the Kellogg School of Management (including joint appointments for IMC faculty there and in Engineering) have given our students a competitive advantage. Our students are “terminal degree” candidates with business and political experience like MBAs who don’t want to use the masters as a pre-doctoral degree. At Medill IMC we now offer a program for undergraduates in IMC with PR since Kellogg does not have an undergraduate degree (they have a very small certificate program for some undergrads).
However, in the business schools and other professional schools; the issue has dramatically changed. The private schools may face the issue of “return-on-investment” for a professional graduate degree not being worth the risk. Even the “pubvate” schools (a term for public schools that are no longer substantially supported by state aid) are raising tuition and fees more rapidly than the private schools. The issue is compounded the failure of state taxpayers and legislators to support higher education but to still muddle in the work of the university. For example, only 20% of the support for the University of Ilinois-Urbana is from state funding. The private schools like Northwestern consider all pubvates direct competitors for federal money, grants, alumni dollars, tuition. At many private schools and increasing numbers of pubvates tuition costs for an MBA or IMC degree exceed a reasonable payback period. I am developing a website “widget” for students to calculate before returning to school the real costs and benefits of a professional graduate degree. The breakeven point on the degree can be over a decade which means that many students may never pay back the degree costs from their career income. They also still have loans outstanding from their undergraduate work which I do not challenge with the ROI message. While education has some non-fiscal values, we are asking the same questions that allowed the preparation of economic impact and social impact statements on national and state legislation. My preliminary conclusions are that the only business related graduate degree that has a potentially positive ROI is a part-time degree that allows the student to work and avoid the opportunity costs of leaving their income producing job.
We can worry about communications being a critical function in business (and I agree) but the key issues are whether your companies will 1. support education and training for your employees, 2. how students can repay outrageous business degree costs (compared to your degree costs many years ago), 3. support higher wages for professional degree holder from MBA and IMC programs to get the talent you want, 4. support extensive research (not just case studies) on the real value of communications in business decision-making, crisis management, political risks to business, etc.
By Clarke L. Caywood, Ph.D. on October, 02 2009
This is one of the longest discussions we have had on the evergreen topic. Given the economic realities of the market and the cost of education; I will argue that we may be too late to even include communications in business schools. First, I have some history for you.
Our A.W. Page B-School Committee has debated the topic for over a decade with all the frustrations demonstrated above. At a personal level most of you know that I moved from teaching at the Business School at Wisconsin-Madison to the Medill School of Journalism. With a joint doctorate in Business Management and in Journalism Mass Communications (PR and Advertising and similar joint undergraduate work), I was recruited to teach graduate PR, marketing and management. Our goal was to create the new Integrated Marketing Communications program in response to chaos in the industry and in Schools of Journalism and Communications. We knew that we could offer the best of a business management degree since we had been on the campus long before Kellogg and could make an agreement to use communications as the strategic field of study. We received a great deal of valued publicity when our work was attacked by the biggest academic names in Communications and PR for “getting in bed with marketing”.
We have not looked back since that time and have given students tremendous opportunities to use communications as a strategic advantage in business and complex organizations. Our agreement with the Kellogg School of Management (including joint appointments for IMC faculty there and in Engineering) have given our students a competitive advantage. Our students are “terminal degree” candidates with business and political experience like MBAs who don’t want to use the masters as a pre-doctoral degree. At Medill IMC we now offer a program for undergraduates in IMC with PR since Kellogg does not have an undergraduate degree (they have a very small certificate program for some undergrads).
However, in the business schools and other professional schools; the issue has dramatically changed. The private schools may face the issue of “return-on-investment” for a professional graduate degree not being worth the risk. Even the “pubvate” schools (a term for public schools that are no longer substantially supported by state aid) are raising tuition and fees more rapidly than the private schools. The issue is compounded the failure of state taxpayers and legislators to support higher education but to still muddle in the work of the university. For example, only 20% of the support for the University of Ilinois-Urbana is from state funding. The private schools like Northwestern consider all pubvates direct competitors for federal money, grants, alumni dollars, tuition. At many private schools and increasing numbers of pubvates tuition costs for an MBA or IMC degree exceed a reasonable payback period. I am developing a website “widget” for students to calculate before returning to school the real costs and benefits of a professional graduate degree. The breakeven point on the degree can be over a decade which means that many students may never pay back the degree costs from their career income. They also still have loans outstanding from their undergraduate work which I do not challenge with the ROI message. While education has some non-fiscal values, we are asking the same questions that allowed the preparation of economic impact and social impact statements on national and state legislation. My preliminary conclusions are that the only business related graduate degree that has a potentially positive ROI is a part-time degree that allows the student to work and avoid the opportunity costs of leaving their income producing job.
We can worry about communications being a critical function in business (and I agree) but the key issues are whether your companies will 1. support education and training for your employees, 2. how students can repay outrageous business degree costs (compared to your degree costs many years ago), 3. support higher wages for professional degree holder from MBA and IMC programs to get the talent you want, 4. support extensive research (not just case studies) on the real value of communications in business decision-making, crisis management, political risks to business, etc.
By Clarke L. Caywood, Ph.D. on October, 02 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Welcome to Chinese CEO Club
Welcome to Northwestern University and one of the classrooms that you will be visiting this week. My colleagues and I at Northwestern welcome you to one of the key centers of management, marketing and business education in the United States. For most of your time in Chicago you will be with your own classmates, but we will bring you together as we are doing this morning to listen to our most senior and prestigious faculty. For several business visits you will be with your classmates but for a unique visit to the Chicago Stock Exchange, a brand new opportunity to visit Navistar Headquarters who make international harvester trucks. You will hear from a manager Mr. Zheng on .....issues of world finance. You will also be together for a special wine party with several luxury stores including Louis Vitton and a Rolex jewelry store in a world class shopping mall.
During the week you will also visit Motorola for a meeting with their leadership as well as the world's largest publicly traded distribution company Grainger. There will be some variation in your You will be with Don Schultz this morning. Don Schultz who has been called been called one of the emperors of branding in a recent book featuring his work and the father of integrated marketing communications will speak with you this morning. Don has traveled all over the world and much of China.
You will discuss consumer marketing issues with Professor Bobby Calder from the Kellogg School of Management. Professor Calder is the author editor of a new book Kellogg on Advertising and Media and also the academic genius behind one of the most commonly used management and marketing research techniques -focus groups.
Using extremely productive Kellogg and Harvard cases you will be lead by Department Chairman in Kellogg and Professor Paul Hirsh. All our faculty including me have spent significant time teaching at EMBA programs in China, Asia and the rest of the world. I have taught MBA and IMC students for 30 years. While much of my work has been with business to business issues I also appear on television to speak about politics in the U.S. and the implications of politics and business.
During your visit to Chicago (how many of you is this the first time in Chicago) you will visit our beautiful new city park, take a boat tour to see our newest and historical skyscrapers, We will take you on a tour of our campus. NU is ranked one of the top dozen universities in the U.S. for undergraduates but we rank number one in many fields including Business, fields of engineering,theater, journalism, IMC. We know that you will want to come back to Chicago for the 2016 Olympics (we will know the city on Friday). We have many more corporations to visit, many more world class faculty and much, much more to see and eat.
During the week you will also visit Motorola for a meeting with their leadership as well as the world's largest publicly traded distribution company Grainger. There will be some variation in your You will be with Don Schultz this morning. Don Schultz who has been called been called one of the emperors of branding in a recent book featuring his work and the father of integrated marketing communications will speak with you this morning. Don has traveled all over the world and much of China.
You will discuss consumer marketing issues with Professor Bobby Calder from the Kellogg School of Management. Professor Calder is the author editor of a new book Kellogg on Advertising and Media and also the academic genius behind one of the most commonly used management and marketing research techniques -focus groups.
Using extremely productive Kellogg and Harvard cases you will be lead by Department Chairman in Kellogg and Professor Paul Hirsh. All our faculty including me have spent significant time teaching at EMBA programs in China, Asia and the rest of the world. I have taught MBA and IMC students for 30 years. While much of my work has been with business to business issues I also appear on television to speak about politics in the U.S. and the implications of politics and business.
During your visit to Chicago (how many of you is this the first time in Chicago) you will visit our beautiful new city park, take a boat tour to see our newest and historical skyscrapers, We will take you on a tour of our campus. NU is ranked one of the top dozen universities in the U.S. for undergraduates but we rank number one in many fields including Business, fields of engineering,theater, journalism, IMC. We know that you will want to come back to Chicago for the 2016 Olympics (we will know the city on Friday). We have many more corporations to visit, many more world class faculty and much, much more to see and eat.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Welcome to the Graduate Class of 2010 Medill IMC Northwestern
As a member of the faculty, I have been welcoming you and your peers since 1989. My reason for coming to Northwestern was to build the new IMC program with my senior colleagues Martin Block, Ted Spiegel, Don Schultz and Paul Wang. Other faculty who are retired still advise us including Emeritus Professor Ray Ewing. Ray thankfully thought that I would be a good addition to Medill with my recent joint doctorate from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in both Business and in Mass Communications (PR and Advertising). Having taught marketing communications in schools of business, I was anxious to show students and business leaders that a program in marcom rather than only a single course would be of great value to them.
It is still our goal with new full-time faculty including senior faculty Frank Mulhern, Ed Malthouse,n to educate and train each class of this successful program that Kalyan Rama will allow you to lead in businesses and other organizations with your knowledge and skills in strategic communications. I will talk about our next generation, extremely gifted junior faculty in a forthcoming blog. No MBA candidate in the current class of 110,000 for 2010 or in past classes will have as much knowledge of business and strategic communications. No MBA will have as much knowledge of both customer purchase behavior databases and stakeholder databases of quotes, comments and promises as you will have in the next 15 months and 25 years.
I suggest that you consider some resources as part of your weekly personal assignment. And, I suggest that you write to as many of your colleagues from work, your classmates, family and friends in business to tell them where you are, what you are doing and when you will graduate. Share websites,articles, lecture notes or quotes with them over the next 15 months so they can help you handle the stress of graduate school and find job opportunities for you.
1. Consider the reading room in Medill for old fashioned "ink on paper" newspapers but use our IMC reading room, the computer station there or your laptop for current trade publications in IMC including public relations, advertising, direct marketing, interactive marketing, marketing and more.
2. Use the wwww.prsa.org website for professional activities and job advice
3. Monitor this blog site IMCProf for IMC insights or Twitter "IMCProf" for more of my comments on IMC and life.
4. Sign-up today on www.linkedin.com and the IMC community on that site to maximize job and internship opportunities.
5. Read www.culprit.com, and www.edelman.com/speak_up/blog/ for top notch comments on the state of marcom and PR.
6. Go to www.awpagesociety.com, www.prsa.org, http://www.instituteforpr.org/, http://www.prfirms.org/, http://www.iabc.com/, http://www.prsa.org/JobCenter, http://www.prquickstart.org/, http://www.vss.com/ more to come
7. Watch the development of the new Integrated Marketing Communications Association (you are automatically members) by following their first summit on IMC and Branding at www.GBSconference.com
8. Consider reading the books of your faculty on display in the glass case of IMC. We are a prolific faculty worth reading.
9. Work to create an IMC social action program (volunteers) to help others around the world while you are here. Take a look at www.aidmatrix.org as a possibility.
10. Sign-up for the Journal of Integrated Marketing Communications. It is the most successful, longest running independent IMC student program involving the greatest number of students. Be sure to attend the 2010 JIMC "launch" this Fall.
Welcome to Northwestern University, Medill and IMC. More to come.
It is still our goal with new full-time faculty including senior faculty Frank Mulhern, Ed Malthouse,n to educate and train each class of this successful program that Kalyan Rama will allow you to lead in businesses and other organizations with your knowledge and skills in strategic communications. I will talk about our next generation, extremely gifted junior faculty in a forthcoming blog. No MBA candidate in the current class of 110,000 for 2010 or in past classes will have as much knowledge of business and strategic communications. No MBA will have as much knowledge of both customer purchase behavior databases and stakeholder databases of quotes, comments and promises as you will have in the next 15 months and 25 years.
I suggest that you consider some resources as part of your weekly personal assignment. And, I suggest that you write to as many of your colleagues from work, your classmates, family and friends in business to tell them where you are, what you are doing and when you will graduate. Share websites,articles, lecture notes or quotes with them over the next 15 months so they can help you handle the stress of graduate school and find job opportunities for you.
1. Consider the reading room in Medill for old fashioned "ink on paper" newspapers but use our IMC reading room, the computer station there or your laptop for current trade publications in IMC including public relations, advertising, direct marketing, interactive marketing, marketing and more.
2. Use the wwww.prsa.org website for professional activities and job advice
3. Monitor this blog site IMCProf for IMC insights or Twitter "IMCProf" for more of my comments on IMC and life.
4. Sign-up today on www.linkedin.com and the IMC community on that site to maximize job and internship opportunities.
5. Read www.culprit.com, and www.edelman.com/speak_up/blog/ for top notch comments on the state of marcom and PR.
6. Go to www.awpagesociety.com, www.prsa.org, http://www.instituteforpr.org/, http://www.prfirms.org/, http://www.iabc.com/, http://www.prsa.org/JobCenter, http://www.prquickstart.org/, http://www.vss.com/ more to come
7. Watch the development of the new Integrated Marketing Communications Association (you are automatically members) by following their first summit on IMC and Branding at www.GBSconference.com
8. Consider reading the books of your faculty on display in the glass case of IMC. We are a prolific faculty worth reading.
9. Work to create an IMC social action program (volunteers) to help others around the world while you are here. Take a look at www.aidmatrix.org as a possibility.
10. Sign-up for the Journal of Integrated Marketing Communications. It is the most successful, longest running independent IMC student program involving the greatest number of students. Be sure to attend the 2010 JIMC "launch" this Fall.
Welcome to Northwestern University, Medill and IMC. More to come.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Get away from your town to all the other "Americas"
It must be the most fascinating part of running for national office to criss-cross the country meeting with Americans. We teach at IMC that you must understand that most of the customers and stakeholders relevant to your organization are not like you. If you think health care and the stock market are the only topics in the U.S. you would be mistaken. Seven hours from Chicago via highway 90 to Rockford Illinois and then highway 20 to NW Iowa; the topics and focus changes. In Sac City and Fort Dodge, in Sac County and Kossuth County the topic is weather. Not the casual issue of “should I bring my umbrella to work?” but the land, crops, jobs and future conversation. Enter a weekend breakfast spot in Fort Dodge and listen to topics that most
Americans do not consider “talking points” or even see in their newspapers (which seem to still be read in rural communities). Corn, beans, energy alternatives, leasing fees for windmills ($5000-6000 per year for 50 years or a share of the kilowatt production). A “small continental divide in Western Iowa where some the land divides NS rivers flowing west to the Missouri or east to the Mississippi give some farms ideal positioning for capturing wind on higher points. Eminent Domain exercised by the State of Iowa for the expansion of State Highway 20 from 2 lanes to 4 to Nebraska. Discussions are about the logic of the DOT (Department of Transportation) policy of planning highways through the middle of rich farmland rather than on the margins or between farms. And, debates are constant over the value of land. The stock market, hedge funds and Ponzi schemes do not seem top of mind, but rich topsoil in NW Iowa from glaciers or blown by wind from the Missouri River basin a million years ago is on their minds. Top acreage with great drainage, county and farm tiles and satellite pictures of soil depth may sell for $6000 per acre or $3300 per acre in an auction. “Cash rent” paid by renters of hundreds or thousands of acres may be $200 per acre, earning 3% on the estimated value of the land taxed at $15 per acre and managed at 5% plus repairs etc. The future is based on increasing value of the land; not income. On other topics, diversity is defined as the Hispanic population increasing from 3% to 23% in the local schools over the past 20 years. Families talk about the loss of thousands of young people moving out of the area after earning their degrees at Iowa State, Iowa, University of Illinois and other schools. The importance of bio fuels in Iowa (and Illinois) does not make President Obama a popular figure and chaos over health care for the elderly has not helped his rankings. However, Obama’s visit to a local community grade school in 2008 is still the topic of discussion. It is still America; it is just a different one than your daily conversations might reveal.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Global Brand Summit GBS in Chicago growing October 20-21
www.gbsconference.com With world-wide acknowledged branding and marketing professor Philip Kotler as keynote speaker, the Summit will be launched with the strongest possible message. Professor Kotler of the world famous Kellogg School of Management will discuss his recent work for the book "Chaotics - The Business of Managing and Marketing in the Age of Turbulence" with co-author John A. Caslione for AMACOM 2009. The bi-lateral business conference for 200 Chinese business leaders and 200 U.S. business leaders includes others key speakers such as Al Golin, founder and Chairman of Golin Harris (the MacDonald's brand reputation agency) and Michael Morley, former President of Edelman Worldwide and author of "Branding" with a highly relevant case study on the sale of the IBM brand ThinkPad to China's Lenovo. The conference continues to build around the concept of using a wide range of translators from the Kellogg and Medill School's Integrated Marketing Communications Departments (with Chinese students) to help U.S. and Chinese business leaders "strike business deals" or at least begin the relationship face-to-face. More to come.
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