Teaching Evidence-Based Management in MBA Programs: What Evidence Is There?

We examine the degree to which required management courses in U.S.-based MBA programs make reference to the emerging evidence-based management (EBM) movement. More than 800 required management course syllabi from 333 programs were reviewed for either explicit reference to the concept of EBM, or verbiage within course descriptions that was consistent with teaching evidence-based management principles. In addition, instructor, course, and institution-level characteristics were examined as potential correlates of references to EBM. Using a liberal operationalization of EBM (i.e., keywords or phrases that are consistent with evidence-based management principles), results suggest that approximately 25 % of core MBA management courses utilize EBM in some form. However, there are substantial differences across categories of course content and depending on whether the instructor has a PhD. Evidence-based management-consistent syllabi are most prevalent at the MBA level in organizational behavior and least in international management and entrepreneurship. Suggestions for future research, as well as an exemplary course description from an EBM syllabus, are offered. “The most obvious way that faculty research impacts practice is through education.” —AASCB International (Impact of Research Task Force, 2007: 37) “Strengthening the teaching–research nexus holds vast potential to deliver not only the skills needed to understand research to generations of upcoming managers, but also to instill values that recognize the validity of research.” —L. Burke and Rau (2010: 132) It is hardly news that many managers and organizations do not implement practices that academic research has shown to be positively associated with employee productivity and firm financial performance