Internationalization Strategies of Business Schools : How Flat Is the World?

Business school strategy has become extremely complex, especially regarding internationalization. Using different paths, experiencing failure and success, business schools have internationalized, attracting many of the international students who contributed $27 billion to the US economy in 2014.Some business schools are global, training global managers, while others serve national markets. How do business schools strategize about internationalization? Can we use existing models to explain this process? Are internationalization and globalization similar? Using a comparative analysis of six case studies in the United States and Europe, we found that the engine of internationalization influences its paths and outcomes. We contribute to international business (IB) research by discussing how business schools strategize their internationalization toward uniformity or diversity under isomorphic pressures from accreditation bodies (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business [AACSB], 2011) and rankings. The so-called Uppsala model should be extended to address three tensions: internationalization versus globalization, enacted dimensions of audiences, and respective risks of different internationalization pathways