On April 4, 10th Northern Dimension Forum took place in St. Petersburg. Head of School Konstantin Krotov, spoke at the first panel discussion on the results of the Forum’s tenth anniversary. He covered this topic from the point of view of business education in Russia.

 

 

According to Konstantin Krotov, Russian business education over the past 10 years has learned to copy the best foreign practices, and until recently this approach was appropriate. However, in order to occupy and maintain a leading position today, such a strategy can no longer be used , because changes occur too quickly, as the Head of the School explained.

 

The choice of the right vector of development should be based on analysis of existing trends, including technological innovations, sociocultural changes, as well as changes in business models. Business models are important because of the competition and globalization, — it becomes necessary to create management models that are open to the outside world. “Geographical remoteness no longer protects us from competition, anyone can compete with us. Online learning is everywhere, and any provider in the world can compete with us, just like we do,” explained Konstantin Krotov.

 

 

In his opinion, in order to ensure sustainable development, education should solve three main tasks: develop the ability to learn and relearn, to create new knowledge, and to change the approach on how and what to learn. Konstantin Krotov said that now GSOM SPbU moves from the “rocket model”, when professors put knowledge into students using the principle “the more we load, the higher he pr she will take off” to continuous learning.

 

“Unfortunately, the education system is not always ready for this, as well as for the creation of human capital,” said the Head of School, noting that the limitations appear from traditions, existing standards and other global difficulties. To overcome it, interaction at the institutional, organizational and personal levels is important.

 

Speaking about cooperation with companies, Konstantin Krotov said that recently at GSOM SPbU, thanks to the cooperation with Severstal, a Transformation Office was created: “I want to thank Alexey A. Mordashov, who responded to our proposal to create a Transformation Office. Based on the Severstal experience, we have launched this division. We cooperate with colleagues from this company, and recently began to attract other companies. We assume that such interaction will be especially effective in solving urgent problems of business and society. We are constantly experimenting and changing to fit the future. I believe that without it, sustainable development simply can’t exist.”

 

 

This year, GSOM SPbU became a co-organizer  of the Northern Dimension Forum for the first time. After the general plenary session, thematic round tables were held. Students, teachers and company representatives discussed energy, engineering, ecology, transport, logistics, medicine and tourism.