In Pursuit of Practical Wisdom: A Qualitative Case Study of a Full Time MBA programme

Amidst the volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world in which straightforward scientific, technical and calculative solutions alone are not sufficient in solving real-world practical business dilemmas and paradoxes, management scholars have urged educators to cultivate the reflective and contextual decision-making capabilities of aspiring managers. Recently, Aristotle's concept of phronēsis has increasingly been cited as an antidote to the ethical and moral failures of management practice as well as a potential panacea for countering the increasing dominance of Artificial Intelligence. Yet the question of how phronēsis might be cultivated as part of the management educational curriculum remains unanswered and empirically unexplored. Responding to the dearth of empirical research, a qualitative case study was conducted in order to evaluate a UK based 12-month Master of Business Administration (MBA) programme, which attempted to cultivate phronēsis by developing the dispositions and capabilities said to improve managers’ chances of making appropriate choices in the testing circumstances of managerial life. The objective of this doctoral thesis was to address two research questions. Firstly, in what way did the dispositions and capabilities targeted by the programme transform the conduct of the students in the long term? And secondly, which pedagogic interventions were identified as either supporting or impeding factors in the cultivation process? To address these questions, a longitudinal research project spanning three consecutive MBA cohorts (between 2016 and 2019) was conducted. The qualitative data sets obtained from 30 students comprised of coursework and semi-structured interviews conducted during the programme and several years post programme. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was used as the main analytical tool since this methodology enabled the researcher to make sense of students’ subjective experiences during and after partaking in the MBA. The findings identified several significant areas of pedagogic traction evidenced by student’s long term personal and professional conduct with regards to their critical thinking, dialogical and reflexive capabilities. The thesis provides novel insights into how educators, practitioners and management schools can effectively develop managers capable of practically wise business judgements.