MBA and ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT : Management education for engineers in the Swedish industry sector

MBA and ENGINEERING

MANAGEMENT

Management education for engineers in

the Swedish industry sector.

MASTER THESIS WITHIN: General Management NUMBER OF CREDITS: 15

PROGRAM OF STUDY: Engineering Management AUTHORS: Robin Iversen and Tobias Andersson TUTOR: Tommaso Minola

Acknowledgement

We would like to acknowledge the assistance of all people who made this thesis pos-sible.

Firstly, we would like to thank our tutor, Tommaso Minola for his guidance and ad-vises during this process. Tommaso has provided both criticism and praise which we believe has raised the quality of this thesis and strengthen our academic perspective. Secondly, we would like to thank our peers within the seminar group. They have pro-vided beneficial and critical comments to our thesis, that in some cases opened up for additional improvement.

We would like to thank the six interviewees, as during difficult times due to the Co-rona virus, took their time to participate in our study. Without their contribution, this study would not have been possible.

Master Thesis/Degree Project in General

Manage-ment

Title: MBA and ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT

Management education for engineers in the Swedish industry sector. Authors: Robin Iversen & Tobias Andersson

Tutor: Tommaso Minola Date: May 2020

Key terms: MBA, Engineering Management, Leadership, Career, Additional education Background:

Engineers is generally perceived as persons that lacks interpersonal skills. Education can be seen as the most efficient way to gain interpersonal skills and, thus, bridge the gap towards efficient management. Through a management education like Engineering Management or an MBA, theory has shown that the knowledge-gap can be fulfilled by an education.

Purpose:

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the perception of engineers that has cho-sen to enroll in an Engineering Management or an MBA program, by the eyes of re-cruiters and how it impacts the recruitment process. Furthermore, important individual characteristics is identified and how well these matches with the current curriculums. Method:

The thesis has a qualitative approach and is conducted by both, interviews with open-ended questions and online archival research. Patterns has emerged by the use of con-tent analysis and incentivized argumentation for our conclusions.

Conclusion:

The findings from our study, regarding the two research questions shows that a MSc in management is perceived positive and increase the expectations of the engineer. It in-fluences the recruiter in different ways depending on two aspects, internal or external recruitment and the level of the managerial role. The individual learning associated from EM and MBA match the desired traits in a high extent, where traits and skills like communication, team player and structured are the most desired ones.

Table of content

Table of content ... iv

1

Introduction ... 6

2 Literature review ... 9

2.2 MBA RELATED MANAGEMENT ... 10

2.3 MBA EDUCATIONAL STRENGTHS ... 10

2.4 MBA ... 12

2.4.1 EMBA ... 14

2.4.2 Accreditation ... 14

2.4.3 Future direction of MBA ... 15

2.4.4 MBA in Sweden ... 15

2.5 ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT ... 16

2.5.1 Design, characteristics and curriculum ... 16

2.5.2 Accreditation / certification ... 17

2.5.3 ABET – accreditation in EM programs ... 17

3 Methodology and method ... 19

3.1 QUALITATIVE RESEARCH APPROACH ... 19

3.2 DATA COLLECTION ... 21 3.3 RESEARCH DESIGN ... 21 3.4 SAMPLING ... 22 3.5 INTERVIEW ... 22 3.6 DATA ANALYSIS ... 23 3.7 ETHICAL CONSIDERATION ... 23 3.8 TRUSTWORTHINESS ... 23

4 Empirical Findings ... 25

4.2 CURRICULUM AND ASPECTS ... 27

4.3 INDIVIDUAL CHARACTERISTICS ... 32

5 Analysis ... 34

5.1 PERCEPTION OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATED ENGINEERS ... 34

5.2 CURRICULUM AND ASPECTS ... 35

5.3 INDIVIDUAL CHARACTERISTICS ... 37

6. Discussion ... 39

6.1 PERCEPTION OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATED ENGINEERS ... 39

6.2 CURRICULUM AND ASPECTS ... 40

6.3 INDIVIDUAL CHARACTERISTICS ... 40

7 Conclusion ... 42

8 Reference list ... 44

Appendices ... 47

1 Introduction

In this section we will first explain the background and history of Engineering Manage-ment and MBA. Following by the research problem within manageManage-ment and state our research purpose that lead us to our research questions, after identifying gaps in the current literature.

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1.1 Background  

The education of EM - Engineering Management and the formal degree has its roots back in the mid 1940s, the combined engineering and management field has been taught long before that. As early as 1902 there was a program at Stevens institute of technology, that had pinpointed a need for engineers to become efficient managers (Kotnour & Farr, 2005). Thus, a demand for engineers who are knowledgeable and can effectively practice leadership has been known for a long time. Post-world war two, the number of Engineering Management educations started to grow and in the 1960s and 1970s, the increase was rapid. The trend of this growing segment has continued since then, and the demand as well. In the 2010s the number of both programs and graduates increases upwards, but from low numbers (Daughton, 2017). To more easily grasp and understand the meaning of the topic Engineering Management, there is a need to de-fine it (Cassandra , Elrod , Daughton, Flachsbart, & Flaschsbart, 2010). In the literature, it has not been defined that often but (Kotnour & Farr, 2005, p. 17) proposes a definition that describes the subject: "Engineering management is designing, operating, and con-tinuously improving purposeful systems of people, machines, money, time, information and energy, by integrating engineering and management knowledge, techniques, and skills to achieve desired goals in technological enterprises through concern for the en-vironment, quality, and ethics". (Omurtag, 2009) suggests that an MSc in Engineering Management leads to broader career options for a graduate, the salary is higher, and the career path is more efficient and effective compare to an engineer, who has chosen an-other technical supplementary education. The skillset from a management degree can be achieved through multiple types of educations, another example is the MBA - Master of Business Administration. The aim of Engineering Management is to bridge the gap from the science to the idealist philosophy, that management is found upon (Omurtag, 2009). Engineering management and the MBA can be seen as competitive in that way, but in the end they both fulfill the gap of a management education (Kotnour & Farr, 2005).

World-wide, the title MBA has become one of the most popular academic qualifica-tions, designed to develop skills within business and management. It is considered to be the flagship within business education, and in the management profession as the most notable advanced qualification (Subhash & Stopford, 2011). MBA is a collective term, there are several different types such as: full, part time or Executive MBA and the curriculum could vary pending location and elective courses of interest by the partici-pant (Baruch, 2009). The core usually consists of finance, accounting, economics, mar-keting, organizational behavior, operations, management and business ethics (Baruch, 2009).

The first MBA program was created in the USA at the beginning of the twentieth cen-tury, in the second half of that century it started to spread, and in the 1970s new business schools started to emerge in the UK. It continued to spread further within Eu-rope and reached Australia and in the 1990s it had reached Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan (Baruch, 2009). In Sweden the first MBA was offered in 1977 by the Gothenburg School of Business, Economics and Law.

There are about 300.000 students each year enrolled into MBA programs worldwide, an MBA could cost up to 50.000 USD per year on the most prestigious business schools (Gupta & Bennett, 2013, p. 451). The tuition fee drops significantly when comprising the accreditations and reputation of the business school. The quality of a business school could be measured in accreditation, the most prestigious schools in the world withholds a triple accreditation: EQUIS, AACSB and AMBA, also called triple crown (Gupta & Bennett, 2013). In Sweden there is only one school with this accredi-tation, Gothenburg School of Business, Economics and Law (Guexed, 2020).  Jonkoping International Business School is currently holding a double accredita-tion, EQUIS and AACSB (JU, 2020).

As the MBA is on a global scale the views about the MBA´s nature and content are subject to criticism by well-known academic such as Mintzberg, Pfeffer and Porter with statement such as “MBA programs do not just fail to develop managers, but also un-dermines organizations and societies” and “Newly minted MBAs have been labeled as arrogant with poor interpersonal skills” (Singh Kang & Sharma, 2012, p. 78).  (Hühn, 2013, p. 531) argues for the lack of ethics within the business profession as “MBA stu-dents are taught what to think, not how to think”. Their criticism could be fair as only about one quarter of the AACSB accredited business schools, have ethics as a mandatory course (Hühn, 2013).

1.2 Research problem  

 A common saying is that when an experienced engineer strives for a managerial posi-tion and gets promoted, it is a loss for the organizaposi-tion and the company because they “loses their best engineer and gains the worst leader” (Jansen Perry, Hunter, Curall & Frauenheim, 2017, p. 99; Eschenbach, 2013; Daniels, 2009). This saying implies that there is a need for engineers to gain knowledge and experience about interpersonal skills to become efficient managers and lead the organization towards its vision (Pons, 2016).  These attributes can be obtained either through education or by experi-ence, (Richter & Koza, 1988) suggests that the transition from a technical role to a man-agerial is hard to achieve only by experience. The crossing will be more efficient if the engineer is provided with an education.  The education will advantageously contain in-terpersonal skills, people-relating skills, communication skills, marketing and finance (Richter & Koza, 1988; Chenea, 1981). This is supported in other research (Riley , Cudney, & Long , 2013) where communication (Nylen & Pears, 2013; Roeckel, Parra, Donoso, Mora, & Garcia , 2004) and trust are described as the main features for an efficient manager.  

As can be seen below in Figure 1 (Kotnour & Farr, 2005, p. 17) an education in Engi-neering Management could be one way to bridge the gap between engiEngi-neering and man-agement disciplines. An additional way to enquire manman-agement skills is to enroll in an

MBA program (Kotnour & Farr, 2005), it could also be considered the better choice for an engineer if one plans to leave the technical work environment entirely (Omurtag, 2009). 

Figure 1 - Engineering Management as the bridge between engineering and manage-ment.

To embark a managerial career, a university degree in management could be seen as a prerequisite as there is no legal professional qualification to be a manager. The MBA could be seen as the nearest option to withhold this qualification (Baruch, 2009). (Singh Kang & Sharma, 2012) suggest that an MBA is a globally recognized education and brand, compared to Engineering Management. We noticed that the course content and the overall objectives have similarities. Therefore, we find it important to investigate how Swedish faculties have formed their curriculum to best prepare engineers and bridge their knowledge gap in management. Limited research has been carried out in Sweden, and based on the literature review we have identified gaps that are stated be-low, as our research questions. We will look post education and investigate how the engineers are perceived, by recruiters for the Swedish industrial sector.

1.3 Research purpose

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the perception of engineers that has cho-sen to enroll in an Engineering Management or an MBA program, by the eyes of re-cruiters. How does these supplementary educations affect the recruitment process for the individual engineer in managerial roles for the Swedish industrial sec-tor. What differs the programs and how well does it match with the expectations on managers in the Swedish industrial sector. We aim to identify important individual characteristics, that the market is currently requesting. To narrow the broad filed of en-gineering, this thesis will focus on engineers in the industry sector. We have se-lected this area as it covers a significant amount of industrial jobs in Sweden. This led to the following research questions:

RQ 1: What influence has EM or MBA on recruiters, when recruiting engineers for managerial roles?

RQ 2: Upon recruiters' perspective, which aspects of individuals' learning (skills, com-petence) are associated in the EM and MBA curriculums?

2 Literature review

In this chapter we have reviewed current literature about Engineering Management and MBA to gain more knowledge and get a deeper understanding of the topic. We will use the below theories and compare with our empirical findings to answer the above stated research questions.

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2.1 General Management

Within a technical organization, one of the most challenging things is the transition for an engineer to an advanced managerial role (Riley et al., 2013). While an engineer be-fore dealt with technical problems, where the characteristics of the problem is rigid, analytical, and technical language prevails (Solem , 1984). The focus has now moved towards problems relating to people with diverse non-technical backgrounds, that the engineer in the former education never gets exposed too (Baker , 2009). Studies indicate that in the USA, most of the engineers will in some form have a management role during the career (Richter & Koza, 1988; Kocauglo, 1984). Managerial problems are more diffuse and intangible, which could be seen uncomfortable because of an engineer's technical background. The manager related problems require more attention and need to be treated differently depending on the person (Richter & Koza, 1988). (Farr & Bra-zil, 2009, p. 4) suggests nine independent leaderships attributes that are broad, and frame efficient management.

Figure 2 - Nine leadership attributes.

The work-related subjects are also moving into other fields and the attention needs to move to a more general view of the company. The task merges to handle and evaluate the overall economy of the company, the organization's position in the market, a goal to expand and generate a stable growth, and the problem gets more general as a man-ager. The engineer's more special technical focus sets aside, and he cannot fall back upon comfortable traits anymore (Richter & Koza, 1988).

According to (Farr & Brazil, 2009; Hicks , Utley , & Westbrook, 1999) a globally com-petitive environment has contributed to competing on many more variables, and the competitiveness places higher demands on leadership skills. The global competitive

gets clearly expressed when comparing wages worldwide, in an article by (Farr & Brazil, 2009) one engineer in the USA is compared with an engineer in India. The com-parison shows that one American wage equals eight wages in India. This put high de-mands of efficient leadership, importance of distributing work and the use resources more efficiently in the USA. To better meet those variables, leadership development is required, the management education and programs that are offered have been criti-cized for not developing efficient leaders (Mintzberg, 2004). The motivation to develop or to be an efficient leader needs to come from a personal driving force with the correct mindset (Farr & Brazil, 2009). A management role requires communication and high interpersonal skills, something that engineers are usually not educated in. For an engi-neer, a challenge and a key component to becoming an efficient leader are to challenge themselves. They will not improve their interpersonal skills if they do not expose them-selves into challenging environments (Farr & Brazil, 2009).

2.2 MBA related Management

(Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011, p. 476) suggests that management is open to everyone as it does not require any formal education, therefore management could be seen as “one of the last refugees for gifted amateurs”. According to (Gupta & Bennett, 2013, p. 454) “the primary objective of management education is to prepare people to be out-standing managers, leaders and professionals” and the main purpose for business schools are to turn management into a profession (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011). (Baruch & Lavi-Steiner, 2015, p. 218) suggest that “management education can result in significant tangible and intangible outcomes for graduates” and that management studies are a way to gain human capital. There is strong evidence that human capital enhances the undergraduates career objectives, this is supported by (Hühn, 2013), as MBA graduates gets influential positions faster that non-MBA graduates.

To gain the most out of the program, it is of importance that the educational institution customizes the curriculum to the same level as the learner’s level of knowledge (Baruch & Lavi-Steiner, 2015). (Varela, Burke, & Michel, 2011) suggest that managerial skills are moldable, gained through experience over time and are in continuous development. Therefore (Varela et al., 2011, p. 435) “in effect, skills develop via acquisition of factual knowledge and understanding of how to interconnect and apply this knowledge”. De-pending on the nature of the skill, to develop expertise as a result of prolonged practices in an area takes between 100 hours up to ten years and “managerial skill development is an ongoing and, in some skill domains a life-long process” (Varela et al., 2011, p. 438).

2.3 MBA Educational strengths

A corporation is never better than its employees, therefore according to (Baruch, 2009) they look for the best people and better ways to increase knowledge in their managerial inventory. Employees with the mindset to become efficient managers, strive to gain skill, competencies and qualifications. To accomplish this, both individuals and corpo-rations seek to make investments that give the best return. The aim of an MBA is to develop better managers (Baruch, 2009) and according to (Baruch & Lavi-Steiner, 2015; Gander, 2015; Mihail & Elefterie, 2006; Baruch & Lemming , 2001; Baruch &

Peiperl, 2000; Ainsworth & Morley , 1995) a MBA is suggested to improve the under-graduate’s human capital and contribute to the success of the organization (Gupta & Bennett, 2013).

The primary benefit of an MBA program is management development, skills in finance, accounting, innovation and strategic planning. There is a documented success of MBA graduates as entrepreneurs therefore (Baruch, 2009) suggest that it should be promoted as an education. Due to, new start-ups and ventures is a source for new jobs and could grow to be the futures large corporations. (Gupta & Bennett, 2013) suggests that MBA programs can be of interest to a state as MBA educations could gain the government in significant returns. The GMAC – Graduate Management Admissions Council is one of the leading institutions within gap studies in management (Van Auken, Chrysler, & Gricenko Wells, 2016). In Figure 3 (Van Auken et al., 2016, p. 33) attractive skills are listed that has been identified by using data collected from recruiters. Its displayed as attractiveness levels and strengthening needs and it could be used as a guide towards management programs as some variables are considered more attractive than others.

Figure 3 - Skills and abilities in terms of their attractiveness and need for strength-ening.

As suggested by (Baruch, 2009) an MBA could be a significant factor to reduce various forms of discrimination, as it is considered to be a professional qualification. The title MBA gives the perception of a professional manager and focuses less on gender or ethnic minority according to (Gander, 2015; Baruch, 2009). An MBA is suggested by (Gander, 2015; Branden, 1998; Bandura, 1997; Mithcell & Gist , 1992; Bandura 1977) to increase self-confidence, self-esteem, self-efficiency and these attributes are proven to enhance both work performance and career success (Gupta & Bennett, 2013; Baruch, 2009).

2.4 MBA

Worldwide there are over 3000 MBA programs to choose from (mba.com, 2020) and about 300.000 students are enrolled each year (Gupta & Bennett, 2013, p. 451). The MBA has become one of the most popular academic educations (Subhash & Stopford, 2011) and it is considered to be the most notable and prestigious management education (Baruch & Lavi-Steiner, 2015; Gander, 2015; Baruch, 2009). (Mazza et al., 2005, p. 472) states that “throughout the world, obtaining an MBA is seen as a main route to a senior executive position”. The content, concept and its actual contribution has been subjected to strong criticism and questioned if it is the best way to prepare mangers (Mintzberg, 2004; Fong & Pfeffer, 2002; Porter & McKibbin, 1989).

The label MBA is not protected the content and program set-ups will vary around the world (Mazza et al., 2005). According to (Rebalancing MBA education towards "doing" and "being", 2013; Varela et al., 2011; Mazza et al., 2005) there are many prac-titioners that find MBA programs to lack soft skills, such as interpersonal skills, global outlook, cross cultural sensitivity and ethics. This is supported by (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011) as soft skills always have been a very important trait for successful managers and due to the increase of business with multiple shareholders worldwide, the importance of soft skills is likely to increase in the future.

(Gray, 2011) suggests that management skills are learned through experience and re-flection over time. How managers should be prepared is a debated question that many researchers are seeking to determine. Should it concentrate on above mentioned soft skills or hard skills, such as analytical skills, project implementation and goal setting (Gupta & Bennett, 2013)? According to (Subhash & Stopford, 2011 p.347) a study con-ducted by AACSB found that MBA graduates considered communication to be one of the most important skills in their careers. Approximately 6% of the business schools were effective in teaching this skill as most of the programs solely focused on hard skills, such as analytical skills and delivering courses in finance, accounting and mar-keting.

Despite the critics, a global survey conducted by GMAC concluded that students rated the overall value of an MBA as outstanding or excellent (Brewer & Brewer, 2012). An additional study also revealed that 99% of the employers was satisfied with the MBA employees, and the value they brought to their corporation (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011, p. 474). (Singh Kang & Sharma , 2012) suggest that employees with an MBA degree have better interpersonal skills and are better in decision making, handle respon-sibilities, leadership qualities, learning new things and easier adapts during change, if compared to non-MBA employees. The researchers also suggest that MBA graduates demand higher pay, change job more often and act of self-interest instead of what’s best for the organization. (Singh Kang & Sharma, 2012, p. 78) “the purpose of business schools was to teach students how to think, not how to get rich”. This points towards that MBA-employees are better, but not loyal and when a newly minted MBA is com-pared to MA or MSc, it is not more diligent or have any greater sectoral understanding. (Varela et al., 2011) suggests that the primary role of an MBA program is to equip learners with knowledge, structure’s and learning mechanism’s that emphasis a life-long skill development beyond the graduation.

The business leader of the 21st _{century needs to be different and (Subhash & Stopford,}

2011) has addressed three important drivers that suggests preparing the MBA students to maximize the benefit for all stakeholders.

• Environmental shift, such as political trends.

• Professional skills for global contexts, such as managing relationships in cross cultural settings.

• Sustainability concerns, such as poverty and global warming.

As a response to this, Figure 4 (Mazza, Sahlin-Andersson, & Strandgaard Pedersen, 2005, p. 350) is an attempt to present a suggested curriculum for MBA programs to tackle the above-mentioned issues and concerns. (Hallinger & Lu, 2013) supports the above-mentioned and suggest that a global cooperation is developed, as many of the of the world problems only can be solved through a world-wide cooperation.

Figure 4 - Proposed MBA curriculum

Suggested by (Brewer & Brewer, 2012; Baruch, 2009), to study an MBA takes a sub-stantial investment and the cost versus benefits need to be considered. However, if the degree is not taken at a top business school the graduate should not expect financial compensation for the degree or even a return on the investment. As the typical MBA full-time program takes between one to two years to complete. If potential loss of in-come and investment made, are taken into the equation many programs do not deliver. On the other hand, suggested by (Gupta & Bennett, 2013) if the MBA is sponsored it shows a clear message that the corporation invests in its people and value the benefits of an MBA in the organization. It can also be a way to secure the availability of talented personnel for internal career promotions (Baruch, 2009). For the individual an MBA could help to improve income as an additional qualification, and that is not necessarily restricted to the top business schools (Gupta & Bennett, 2013).

The expectations of an MBA versus a non-MBA employee are higher, they are expected to have a balanced set of skills, better strategic perspective and more sophisticated knowledge. An MBA graduate is in general a better manager and the organization will benefit from their competencies and perform better (Baruch, 2009). According to (Gupta & Bennett, 2013; Baruch, 2009) more than half of the CEOs of large companies in the USA has an MBA, it is an ideal way to acquire social capital, expand the current network and generating a web of personal contacts. Jack Welch former CEO of General

Electrics also emphasized the importance networking with the words: “Just concentrate on networking, everything else you need to know you can learn on the job” (Mazza et al., 2005, p. 349).

According to (Baruch, 2009) there are people who will find that an MBA may not be interesting or relevant in their profession, as it can be quite the effort due to other obli-gations, such as family. In accredited programs there is a dropout rate of about 10% for campus-based MBAs and as high as 40% for online-only MBAs (Gupta & Turek, 2015, p. 280). For a CEO or top executives, the MBA could be considered a waste of time because it does not enrich their managerial experience as it would with younger people or personnel in lower management positions.

2.4.1 EMBA

For a CEO or senior executives there is a special program called EMBA – Executive Master of Business Administration, the EMBA program was first introduced in the 1940s in the USA. The main benefit of this program is that experience and ideas can be shared with people on the same level (Petit, 2011; Baruch, 2009). Worldwide there are around 400 EMBA programs to choose from (mba.com , 2020). The program has tra-ditionally been different compared to a regular MBA, as it is developed for the full-time working senior manager and it can be completed while remaining on the full-full-time job. Historically the program was fully sponsored by the employer, as sponsorship was a requirement for admission (Petit, 2011). As time changes the sponsorships has de-creased and in 2010, only 30% of the enrolled EMBA-students in the USA were fully sponsored by their employer. This forces business schools to rethink their premium price strategy to attract people and secure revenue. The EMBA-programs have also been criticized and called MBA light as a manager can complete the program within one and a half to two years, compared to a part-time MBA that can take up to five years (Petit, 2011, p.19).

2.4.2 Accreditation

Accreditation could be seen as a quality mark; therefore, universities and business schools are always striving to improve their position in rank and accreditations (Baruch & Lavi-Steiner, 2015). (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011) suggest that institutions such as AACSB, EQUIS, AMBA and GMAC should take the increasing globalized context in consideration when setting the future roles of business schools. (Subhash & Stopford, 2011) suggests that MBA programs should strive to include more comprehensive global aspects. Because of time limits and financial resources not all MBA students are able to or will travel overseas to gather business experience and engage in experimental think-ing. This is supported by (Busing & Palocsay, 2016, p.77) as “most programs fail to cultivate a global view of business among their graduates”. To get an accreditation, the program needs to meet several prescribed criterions (Mazza et al., 2005). The accredi-tation institutions are briefly described below:

AACSB - The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business was founded in 1916 and aims “to foster continuous quality improvement in the three vital areas: en-gagement, innovation and impact” (Lagrosen, 2017, p. 470).

EQUIS - European Quality Improvement System is managed by the European Founda-tion for Management Development and are a non-profit organizaFounda-tion. The accreditaFounda-tion is given after a thorough “evaluation of all the activities, the resources and the learning infrastructure”(Lagrosen, 2017, p. 472).

AMBA - Association of Master of Business Administration, established in 1967 was originally not an accreditation institution, but due to pressure from new MBA providers the organization developed an accreditation scheme. AMBA’s objective is “to advance management education at postgraduate level” (Lagrosen, 2017, p. 474)

2.4.3 Future direction of MBA

(Baruch, 2009, p. 401) suggest that the future direction “for the MBA should be based on both stability and the overall recognition it gained so far, coupled with the constant need for renewal”. (Busing & Palocsay, 2016) suggest that MBA program are under pressure to increase efficiency and offer a revised curriculum that is error-free and in relevance of today’s marketplace. A need to lower the tuition fees, as more business schools loses government funding and the sponsorships by employers are decreasing.

As there is an increase of one-year MBA programs the importance of the course content is of the outmost significance (Van Auken et al., 2016). According to (Gupta & Bennett, 2013; Hallinger & Lu, 2013; Rebalancing MBA education towards "doing" and "being", 2013; Mazza et al., 2005) there is a need for western business and management schools to adopt a global mindset and include non-western business perspectives, this his is also one of the focus areas for the AACSB accreditation. (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011) argue for that business schools fails to develop learning experiences of cross-cultural understanding due to the increasing globalization, as the world is differ-ent in social, ethical and ecological ways. There is an ongoing challenge for business schools to provide guidance, of how future managers should tackle the pressing is-sues. (Schlegelmilch & Howard, 2011) suggest that if students at business schools are exposed to complex decision problems, the students will exercise their managerial judgement and increase their professionalism.

2.4.4 MBA in Sweden

In Sweden, the first MBA was offered in 1977 by the Gothenburg School of Business, Economics and Law (Baruch, 2009). According to (Mazza et al., 2005), Uppsala in Sweden started their executive program in 1980 and the target audience was engineers with a basic degree that worked in Swedish companies. The program was set-up by researchers who believed that their work could contribute to the business commu-nity and establish a better network of contacts. At the start the program was funded by the government, but in 1984 the funding was cut, so the participants employers had to start covering the tuition fee. The program had a focus on international business and as a tuition fee was added, the university felt a need for an English title and started to use the unprotected label MBA. As Uppsala university is state-regulated and the pro-gram fees are not covered by the Swedish government, the university set-up a standard of requirements for enrollment. The requirements were work experience,

recommendation and sponsorship by employer. This was done to guarantee financ-ing and survival of the program.

2.5 Engineering management

The purpose of the first education in Engineering Management was to educate manag-ers to be efficient in handling typical engineering problems, this purpose has been the base throughout the century (Omurtag, 2009; Kotnour & Farr, 2005). The EM educa-tion had a rapid growth between the 1960s and 1970s, the underlying cause consists of three main reasons that can be identified and divided into different levels (Kocauglo, 1984).

• National level – A rise of competitiveness in a global context and growth of new technologies has led to an increased demand to understand technological systems combined with the ability to lead people efficiently.

• The industry level - Old prejudices that managers are only a manager, or an engineer are only an engineer is being disproved and the benefits are becoming more and more visible from a combined knowledge in both fields.

• The individual-level – Has become more and more evident that an engineer can-not rely on his technical skills when it comes to management responsibility (Richter & Koza, 1988; Kocauglo, 1984).

2.5.1 Design, characteristics and curriculum

The course content of an EM program can vary as there are no standard set and an in-ternational agreement of the program content is not developed, therefore the concept of EM is not well understood (Cassandra et al., 2010; Pilkington, 2008). The most frequent topics are; operations research, finance, engineering economics and manage-ment. The curriculum for an EM program should focus on the management side, which is qualitative oriented. However, in order to tie both disciplines together, some element of quantitative features is suggested (Kocauglo, 1984).

Suggested by (Kocauglo, 1984), a part of the EM-program should be designed and guided from local enterprises demands. Local demand should control a part of the con-tent to match the company's expectations of a new graduate. Furthermore, the courses should have a distinctive feature of demonstration of oral and written communica-tion and should be put in relacommunica-tion to a global context. (Waters, 2010) argue for the im-portance of entrepreneurship as it forms the basis, for a large part of all new jobs created and to help maintaining a steady job growth, EM-programs should focus on innovation and entrepreneurship.

(Kocauglo, 1984) states that a significant characteristic for an EM program that differs from other supplementary educations is the part/full-time option. This option enables people that works as an engineer at the same time, educate oneself in parallel with the employment.In the USA, most of the graduates have work experience when they start the program, and they see this program as an additional education based on prior

knowledge from work. Outside the USA, programs are seen as an education that comes naturally after their bachelor's degree and is more academically embossed. A universal name has not been formed and established. The core of the program originates in the same area. To be considered as an Engineering Management type of program, the titles need to be extended. Other related names are Engineering Administration or Industrial Engineering. The broader view means that the content of the program considers the extent to be an Engineering Management type of program and not the title itself (Kotnour & Farr, 2005; Kocauglo, 1984).

2.5.2 Accreditation / certification

The EM program has so far only guidelines about the course content, and each univer-sity can design the programs in the way that suits their needs. With an ill-defined con-tent structure combined with the high interest of the program, the ASEM - American society for Engineering Management saw a need to make a standard and therefore an accreditation to gain reputation and quality. The standard covers faculty, curriculum requirements, students and administrative support. The ASEM-certification introduced the accreditation in 2000, fifteen years later the certification had not to turn out as ex-pected and the number of certified programs was 5,4% (Daughton, 2017, p. 57).

In EM a significant part of the program is management oriented. If the program is exe-cuted in a school that is ABET-accredited - Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology, the skillset is equated to an engineer from a classical discipline with an additional MBA. Therefore, the MBA and the EM could be equivalent and fulfil the same need (Omurtag, 2009; Kotnour & Farr, 2005). (Omurtag, 2009) believes that EM programs are starting a transition from being educated on the school of engineering to the school of business. More and more focus is now on the management part and to-gether with a business school that is accredited with an AACSB, the way to bridge the gap between engineering and management is predicted.

2.5.3 ABET – accreditation in EM programs

In the early 1930s, an accreditation was created to ensure the quality of the engineering teaching programs. It has since then been the only accreditation agency according to the US Department of Education to accredit engineering programs in the USA. The accreditation will secure the quality of the program overall, but more specifically a val-idation of the curricula, program viability and the funding of the university are taken into consideration. The accreditation is called ABET and has gone through a renewal in terms of content and complexity. The new version is slimmer and compared to the older version, the number of words has been reduced significantly. The structure and content have changed as well, from very specific and detailed content with a rigid in-terpretation to a more customer-oriented approach. The content is then easier to grasp and the whole process is more facilitated, the new version is called ABET-2000 (Farr & Bowman, 1999, p. 9).

There is a lack of accredited EM-programs at both undergraduate and graduate level. One of the main reasons is that the schools are only allowed to accredit one of the levels in the program. Many schools choose the undergraduate level to ensure the quality of

the graduates. The extent of accreditation has not gone as expected, numbers of accred-ited schools are still low while the numbers of EM programs over the last 50 years gone from 20 to 102 in 2015 (Daughton, 2017, p. 56). The reason for the low level of ABET-accreditation in EM programs is according to a survey caused mainly from three com-mon opinions. The survey asked program managers their perception of the accredita-tion and it shows that the heaviest argument of not seeking accreditaaccredita-tion is because it is not a goal for the institution. The second argument is the content of the curriculum, it needs to follow a certain content-guideline to fulfill the accreditation criteria. The criteria set requirements on a certain background of the students who are accepted are in a specific field of engineering. The third argument is concerning the payoff for the investment, an accreditation does not outweigh the benefits. Overall an accreditation does not provide the added value desired from the effort required to get it (Farr & Bowman, 1999).

3 Methodology and method

In this chapter we will present our research approach and design, starting with the re-search philosophy and epistemology that we have chosen. We will describe our meth-ods, why they were selected and suggest strengths and weaknesses. Research ethics and quality assurance has also been implemented through our research plan and will be dis-cussed in this section.

_____________________________________________________________________

3.1 Qualitative Research Approach

Figure 5- Trunk of the tree

Before conducting research, it is important to select the philosophical approach as it re-flects how the research will be executed. (Easterby-Smith, Thorpe, Jackson, & Jasper-sen, 2018, p. 62) has explained this in a pedagogical way using the trunk of a tree,

Fig-ure 5. The inner ring of the heartwood is the ontology, and that is the “philosophical

assumptions about the nature of reality” - what is reality? (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 63). We have selected relativism as ontology, we believe that “there are many truths and facts depend on the viewpoint of the observer” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 67). The strengths of our choice could be flexibility, and the weakness could be large dif-ferences of viewpoints, as they depend on the observer.

Epistemology is the second ring in the heartwood and could be explained as “a general set of assumptions about ways of inquiring into the nature of the world” - what is knowledge? (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 63). In our research we have se-lected the epistemology called social constructionism, as it “focuses on the ways that people make sense of the world – especially through sharing their experiences with oth-ers via the medium of language” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 70). We selected this epistemology as it will increase our understanding, as there could be many truths, we

need to gather facts from different sources. The strengths in our choice of epistemology could be that “values of multiple data sources enable generalizations beyond present sample” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 75). The suggested weaknesses could be, “ac-cess can be difficult; cannot accommodate institutional and cultural differences” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 75).

Methodology is the third ring and could be explained as “a combination of methods used to enquire into a specific situation” - what selection of methods can best answer our research question? (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 61). We have chosen a qualita-tive methodology, because we believe that our purpose and research questions are best answered with qualitative methods. A qualitative interview is done in a way where a conversation and interaction occur, the topic should be specified. The aim of the inter-view is to gain and develop an understanding of the respondent's perceptions and in-sights into the topic. The characteristics of the interviews could pend from a very rigid approach where the questions control the interview in a predetermined man-ner to the other side of the scale, where the extremity could resemble an everyday con-versation (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). An understanding and interpretations of the respondent’s perception need to be gained. This understanding will be gained by con-ducting semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions. The strength of this choice could be that face to face interviews will provide us with information of higher quality. In comparison to a quantitative study where the information is gathered through surveys. With a qualitative approach we can interpret the interviewees non-verbal be-havior, such as body language and voice reflection, it could also open for additional questions that we did not consider beforehand. The weakness could be that generaliza-tion cannot be made as the number of interviews are low, in comparison to a quantita-tive study (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018). Due to the pandemic outbreak of the Corona virus, all of our six interviews were carried out via skype. This limited us to record the interviewees body language, instead we focused on their facial expressions and voice deflections.

Method and techniques are the outer ring and could be explained as “the instruments and processes for gathering research data, analyzing it and drawing conclusions from it”- how should I collect, is this method appropriate and will it answer my research questions? (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 63). As discussed in the methodology part we have selected a qualitative approach and our data collection will consist of “mainly words with some numbers” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 72).

3.2 Data Collection

The literature that was collected for our literature review can be found in JU PRIMO using different sets of key words, filters and sorting after relevance as displayed in

Ta-ble 1. To ensure that quality papers were used, only peer reviewed journals were

se-lected. In some of the used articles, additional references were found interesting that lead to additional articles, all found in the reference list.

Table 1 – JU PRIMO search

Search phrase Hits / relevant articles Filter "engineering management"

AND what 326 / 21

IEEE.engineering management, Me-chanical engineering, Engineer-ing.management journal, Eng-lish, Peer reviewed, Articles

"engineering management"

AND education OR brand 245 / 11 English, Peer reviewed, Articles "engineering management"

AND education 70 /11

Engineering.management interna-tional, English, Peer reviewed, Arti-cles

"engineering management"

AND education 74 / 2

European Journal of engineering edu-cation, English, Peer reviewed, Arti-cles

"engineering management"

AND graduate 140 / 13

Engineering.management jour-nal, English, Peer reviewed, Articles "MBA" AND what 1 / 1 Swedish, Peer reviewed, Articles "MBA" AND management 781 / 12 2010-2020,_{ates, English, Peer reviewed, Articles} .MBA,.MBA.and gradu-"MBA" AND purpose 912 /13 MBA, MBA and graduates, English, _{Peer reviewed, Articles, Full text}

We collected primary data through semi-structured interviews with open-ended ques-tions. Secondary data, such as information on different EM and MBA programs were collected through archival research online. To strengthen our data collection have ad-ditionally gathered information from online job listings. Comparisons or triangulation could help us to interpret the data in able due to draw conclusions. The strength in tri-angulation could be that it will provide us with a more complete understanding as we connect different elements. The weaknesses in our selected method and techniques could be that generalization cannot be made. Because the number of interviews is low in comparison to a triangulation in a quantitative or mix methods approach (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018).

3.3 Research Design

In the qualitative approach, there are several different ways to gather data, where all the ways have a specific characteristic that fulfils different needs. The need in this paper is

to get an in-depth understanding of a specific phenomenon. A case study fulfils the need since the interviews conducted in this paper focus on a narrow subject. The goals are to communicate the representatives view, described as fairly and faithfully as possible, and the focus is to get a deep understanding.

The purpose of a case study is not to verify a hypothesis. It is to find patterns and ex-planations in the specific case. In some limited extent, the conclusion of the study could be valid in similar situations, but a limitation of a case study is the low-level of gener-alization (Yin, 2018; Stake, 1995). The paper takes an inductive approach, since the outcome of the paper is compared and put in a relation with a framework where simi-larities and differences are highlighted, rather than creating a new theory to be general-ized (Ketokivi & Mantere, 2010).

3.4 Sampling

Sampling strategy in research could be defined as: “sets out the criteria to be adopted by a researcher when selecting a subset or sample from a wider population of individ-uals, organizations, industries” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 104). To be able to gen-eralize the research findings the sample, explained as a "subset of the population from which inferences are drawn, based on evidence” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 404) should be accurately selected. The word student can be seen as a weakness and could give the following impression: “unskilled amateurish inquiry which may be a waste of time, although unthreatening” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 191). There-fore, to strengthen our research, we have selected the snowball sampling strat-egy, it could be described as “selected participants recruit or recommend other partici-pants from among their acquaintances; useful strategies in setting with limited/difficult access”. Through our social network, we have used online channels like LinkedIn and Facebook to get in contact with recruiters that could provide us with high quality infor-mation, that could possibly best answer our purpose and research questions in this the-sis.

3.5 Interview

Our interview topics is based on a list of questions, constructed from our literature re-view and purpose. As we are conducting semi-structured interre-views with open-ended questions, we have a chance to use the laddering technique. Laddering-up could be done by asking why-question. It gives us the opportunity to “move upwards from statements of fact or descriptive accounts about the questions posed so as to begin to reveal the individuals value base” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 188). The why-ques-tion could open for new interesting subjects, as we apply the laddering - down tech-nique “which can elicit examples that evidence general statements, views or values ex-pressed in interview responses” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 188). By asking, could you please tell us a little bit more about that? The strength in our qualitative ap-proach, and the use of the laddering technique can in comparison to a quantitative method, where the data collection is conducted via surveys. Give us “significant in-sights into the topic under investigation” (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 188). A weak-ness could be that it is difficult to execute and time consuming to analyze.

3.6 Data Analysis

To frame our data, we used content analysis, it is an approach that is mostly used for textual data, such as interview transcripts, records and reports. (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 239) explains it as “an approach that aims to draw systematic in-ferences from qualitative data that have been structured by a set of ideas or con-cepts”. (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018, p. 240) suggest that the first step could be to “de-termine a number of criteria for the selection of relevant material based on the main research questions of the study”. The second step would be to analyze the collected data and investigate what emerging factors or concepts that could answer the research questions. The factors could be based on existing theory, stated research questions or identified and evolved during the analyzing process of the collected data. The strength in content analysis is the flexibility and the aim for clarity. A weakness could be the re-liability, based on the low number of interviews in a qualitative approach. Hence, gen-eralization could be difficult (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018).

3.7 Ethical Consideration

In our thesis, two dimensions of ethics are taken into consideration. In the first dimen-sion, the topic, considered from the society's point of view. The topic of the thesis, con-cerning how well the educational program of EM and MBA meets the requested need of recruiters in the Swedish industrial production sector. In this point of view, there could be a conflict of interest.

The second dimension considers how the empirical data was collected. According to (Guba & Lincoln, 1985) a cornerstone in the ethical part is how well the respond-ent is informed, in beforehand about the topic and the purpose of the study. To ensure this part, the respondent will be informed and given a presentation of us, the topic and the purpose of the study. If there is any concern, the respondent could ask or select to reject the entire interview, or a question during the ongoing interview, hence the con-sents are maintained (Guba & Lincoln, 1985).

Furthermore, one aspect of the ethical part is to protect the privacy and anonymity of the respondent and the organization. In the analysis part, the respondent will be coded so that the origin cannot be traced. The anonymity will be promised, kept and prevailed throughout the whole thesis. The respondent will be informed before the interview about these parts. This could result in openness without any worries to harm other per-sons or relations (Guba & Lincoln, 1985). The results and conclusion will be derived from interviews, the analysis is executed by a standard method called content analysis, which will ensure that no misleading findings derives. It will also help to maintain a low level of bias and increased transparency (Easterby-Smith et al., 2018).

3.8 Trustworthiness

This thesis has a qualitative approach, which by its nature means that we are mainly dealing with interceptions of the studied phenomena. This can be described as soft val-ues and are in opposition to absolute numbers, where the outcome sets in relation to a defined scale. The qualitative approach is more flexible and provides room for

interpretation. Therefore, it is essential to address how and why the thesis was con-ducted in this particular way. Trustworthiness is a composition of several subheadings that creates an overall impression of the paper and evaluate the data collection of how reliable the results are. The subheadings are described as a criterion to get trustworthi-ness. The criterion is credibility, transferability, dependability, confirmability. To ex-amine the level of trustworthiness, each of these criteria needs to be considered and evaluated separately (Guba & Lincoln, 1985).

The credibility is the level of truth of the findings of the empirical data. The empirical findings are influenced to some extent by the chosen method. The level of credibility can be affected from the beginning of a study by choosing a suitable method and then strengthen with another additional method, called triangulation. The results are then compared and validated (Guba & Lincoln, 1985). In our thesis, the primary data col-lection consists of interviews with independent respondents. Secondary data trough websites for EM and MBA programs and job listings from managerial roles in the in-dustry sector. Referring our findings in the literature review is an additional way to strengthening the credibility.

The transferability is depending on how well a study could apply to another context, which means how well the study could be generalized, this depends on the chosen method. A qualitative approach has in general, a low generalization (Guba & Lincoln, 1985). This paper considers the educational programs of EM and MBA. The range of these programs in Sweden is limited, and there are only a few in total. Therefore, the respondents could be, according to the limited range of programs considered to be rep-resentative of the whole field.

Dependability capture the level of reproducibility provided that the same conditions and assumptions prevail. If the study gets reproduced, how consistently do the findings from the study goes in line with the new one. The ability to reproduce the study are further depending on how well the way of the collected data is described and how the next step of the analysis is performed (Guba & Lincoln, 1985). The collection of em-pirical data will be collected in multiple ways. In the literature review, the specific key-words, filters, and the numbers of hits are shown in Table 1. The analysis part is exe-cuted by a method called content analysis, the conclusions are derived and clearly shown step by step. Document studies will be collected online, due too easy access.

According to (Guba & Lincoln, 1985), confirmability capture the level of how well the findings are independent of the specific situation or is the outcome influenced by the situation and cannot be universal. The confirmability is then a measure of how well the findings are derived from the participants one narratives rather than an indication of the authors own opinions. To reduce this the interviews will be recorded and transcribed to identify patterns and combine the interview and the outcome in a more faithful way.

4 Empirical Findings

In this chapter we will present the empirical findings from the primary and secondary data collection, identify codes and categorize the findings into themes. The exploded view of execution can be seen in the figure below:

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4.1 Perception of management educated engineers

After contacting fifteen HR-recruiters via telephone and email, that we got in contact with via Snowball sampling, six HR-recruiters were willing to participate in our study. The interview table below displays independent HR-recruiters from different compa-nies as P – person. All recruiters that participated were recruiting engineers for the in-dustrial sector, all international to some extent. The interview guide is attached in ap-pendices.

Interview table

Interview Years of experience Sector Duration of interview

P1 4 Construction 1 h P2 10 Supply chain 1 h P3 22 Independent recruiter 1 h P4 11 Manufacturing 1 h P5 4 Energy 1 h P6 17 Classification 1 h

The common assumption of an engineer is that they want to create and build, not man-age people (P1; P5; P6). Engineers have a good presumption to be manman-agers due to their technical competence, due lack of natural interest in humans a management edu-cation can be used to develop additional interpersonal skills (P1; P3). According to (P3), recent engineer graduates has a better set of soft skills compared to engineers that grad-uated twenty years ago.

Engineering management is one way to show the HR-department that the engineer has a drive and wants to develop and grow into a managerial position (P3). According to (P4; P6) an Engineering Management education shows that the engineer has learned to understand complex leadership theories, that could be used in practice from an aca-demic point of view. According to (P2; P4) a MSc in management could strengthen the individual's ability to use academic research when presenting facts or crating reports for top management and stakeholders. Their communication and leadership skills are usually better, and their human capital is more developed (P3; P6).

Management educated engineers, are perceived as highly valuable according to (P1-P6) especially if the engineer has a couple of years of work experience. If the engineer is newly minted, a management education can be seen as valuable (P1; P3; P6) and a drive for career development (P1). According to (P1; P5; P6) when recruiting externally, a management education makes the CV to stand out and shows that the engineer has an interest towards managerial roles.

According to (P1; P2; P4; P5) during internal managerial recruitments, a management education has limited effect and more focus is put on the engineer's achievements and current people skills. The recruiters don’t want to force someone towards a new posi-tion; therefore, weaknesses are identified and proper training is planned for the engi-neers to be comfortable in the new position. This is most applicable for larger corpora-tions with established internal training programs.

According to (P2), when recruitment for top level management, the CEO takes part in the interviews during the recruitment process. The CEO at this company values a MSc in management as an achievement and as a minimum requirement for a managerial position. A high-level management position require strength in pedagogy, organization and structure, to achieve efficiency (P3; P4). According to (P3; P4) an MBA education is highly valuable and desired for top level management. If the MBA is carried out early in the engineer's career, it gives an incredible push towards strategic thinking (P4) and a “fast track” in career development (P4; P6). The MBAs importance depends on the size and internationalization of the company (P3; P5).

According to (P3; P4; P5; P6) if the wrong person is recruited for a managerial role it can be very costly and time consuming for the organization. A Swedish MSc or MBA could be one way to reduce one of many recruitment errors as the engineer already has been through managerial training. (P1-P6) focus about 60 % on education and 40-60 % on the previous experience when recruiting engineers for managerial roles. Ac-cording to (P4; P6) organizations is now moving towards focusing on people skills in-stead of technical skills when recruiting engineers for managerial positions. (P4) sug-gests that when applying for a managerial role, a management education could give the perception of a certain set of skills. When recruiting, the competing variables gets more obvious and it is easier to not unconsciously discriminate in any form.

4.2 Curriculum and aspects

According to (P2; P5) the content of a management education is not as important as the accomplishment of the actual graduate certificate. According to (P3; P4) it is not important in Sweden, on what institution the education is accomplished. The accredita-tion is of little value, as most schools in Sweden has high standards.

(P1; P2; P4; P6) expects that the program enhances the engineer's interpersonal skills and confidence to build and engage others, towards efficient teamwork. Mostly because engineers are seen as “square” and has difficulties to engage others (P1; P5).

(P1; P2; P4) as our organizations is international, we highly value the understanding of a global context, ethical consideration and multi-cultural understanding. Subjects like sustainability, environmental consequences and to see the organization as whole is im-portant. The understanding of budgets and supply chain management in our organiza-tion is a must. Addiorganiza-tionally, according to (P4), strategic thinking and organizaorganiza-tional development is a key role for managers in order develop growth in the business field. To understand the business to business concepts on a global scale and manage and de-velop business relationships is highly valuable.

(P3) Suggests that a managerial program needs to focus on team building and make the engineer more confident in interactions, as “communication is key to success”. There-fore, a management program should focus on communication skills, business acumen, problem solving and leadership. (P3; P5; P6) If an experienced manager is recruited for a top-level management position, the program needs to be formed for that purpose, oth-erwise it could be a waste of time and investment.

MBA

According to (Universityadmissions, 2020) there are two options for MBA programs in Sweden. Option one, BTH- Blekinge Institute of Technology that offers an online 60 credits MBA at 50% pace, hence it takes two years to complete. The idea that the pro-gram can be carried out at the same time the participant is working. This MBA focus on engineers and the requirements prior to the application is that the student has a bach-elor's degree within a technical subject, two years working experience and minimum five credits in business administration. Table 2 shows the course content:

Blekinge Institute of Technology MBA program

Courses Credits

Principles of Leadership and Management 7.5

Corporate Finance 7.5

Managerial Economics 7.5

Strategy and Control 7.5

Management Science 7.5

Research Methods in Industrial Economics 7.5

Master Thesis 15

Degree = Master of Science in Industrial Economics and Management 60

Table 2 – course content Blekinge Institute of Technology MBA program.

The core of the program is designed to increase analytical and managerial skills. The course given in corporate finance is described as; learning how to optimize the company

and maximize financial returns. In the management science course, quantitative models are used to educate the participant into solving organizational issues. The course in principles of leadership and management deals with different types of leadership styles of how it impacts the organization and how it could enhance a subordinate’s motivation. The program is international and taught in English (BTH, 2020).

Option two, by the University of Gavle. The criteria to apply to the MBA programs require a bachelor's degree, with a major in business administration. Therefore, this option is not applicable for this study (Hig, 2020).

EMBA

The EMBAs in Sweden is not government funded, a candidate can only be enrolled into the program by having a sponsorship by the corporation, where the candidate is em-ployed. The most well-known programs are discussed below.

In Uppsala, the program is only given as a commissioned education and the criteria's to be enrolled is a bachelor's degree in business administration and three years of working experience within the field. Alternatively, any bachelor's degree and five years working experience within business administration. The program focuses on strategic thinking in a global context (UU, 2020).

The EMBA program at the School of Business, Economics and Law by the University of Gothenburg is triple accredited. The program is international and runs part-time over twenty-one months, it contains overseas courses in China and India. The program has an Asian-Nordic focus and is directed towards business leaders or executives with min-imum three years managerial experience. Enrollment requires a full sponsorship from the employer and the current fee is 485.000 SEK excluding VAT. Additional require-ments are a bachelor's degree or extensive experience that is equivalent to a bachelor's degree. It is not necessary to have a background within business administration; hence the program is suitable for career focused engineers and on average there are 30% women in the program (Guexed, 2020). The courses in the program is divided into dif-ferent modules displayed in Table 3.

EMBA program at the School of Business, Economics and Law by the University of Gothenburg

Term 1: Term 2:

Strategic Management Accounting

Management Accounting Marketing

Organizational Behavior and Leadership Digitalisation and IT Governance Organizational Structure and Culture Human Resource Management Qualitative and Quantitative Methods Corporate Finance

Change Management Residency in China

- Supply Chain Management

- -

Term 3: Term 4:

Innovation Management Residency in India (on site)

Commercial Law Creative Leadership (on site in India) Financial Markets International Business

International Development Prior to Thesis work, one elective course: Intellectual Property Global Leadership

Corporate Social Responsibility Organizational Change

Applied Economics Managing Processes

Degree = Master of Business Administration 60 credits

Table 3 – Learning modules in EMBA program, Gothenburg.

Stockholm School of Economics offers a part time EMBA program over eighteen months. The program is international and the requirements for enrollment are a bache-lor's degree or higher, minimum five years relevant experience and sponsorship by the employer. The current fee is 495.000 SEK excluding VAT and the program is suitable for career focused engineers (hhs, 2020). Some modules of the program will take place in Latvia and filed trips to Hong Kong and China are incorporated.

According to their webpage (hhs, 2020) the average salary increase for an alumnus after the program is 46%. Benefits for employers are suggested to be, a more complete busi-ness leader with a more holistic view of the busibusi-ness and increased traits, such as in-creased confidence and human capital. The program also suggests an inin-creased network and multi-cultural experience and on average there are 40% women in the program. The courses in the program is divided into different modules displayed in Table 4.

EMBA program at Stockholm School of Economics Module one Preparation and foundation

Module two The business context: Sustainability Management, Economics and Business Law

Module three Accounting and finance

Module four Value creation: Strategy, Marketing, Operations, Organiza-tion and Change

Module five Elective between Financial management or innovation and en-trepreneurship

Module six The global context

Module seven Capstone: Set various modules in context