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BBS Now
First started in 1997 by the Kathmandu University, the Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree has spread across three other universities and about 40 colleges. What has been the experience?
 “Management education is about enabling normal people to do abnormal things, the genius is in short supply”, said Peter Drucker. With the business and economy modernising, the demand for trained management people expanded also in Nepal and universities started offering courses on modern business management. First it was a course in Master of Business Management (MBA) and now it is BBA as well.
The process of this backward integration in business education is soon to complete a decade calling for a review of the experience so far. Though Tribhuvan University (TU) and Kathmandu University (KU) are planning to start evaluation of the programme within the next six months New Business Age recently conducted a quick review of the programme and the findings are presented below:
Vision and Reality
While the importance of BBA education is not questioned by anyone, questions are raised about the quality of education imparted by these colleges. The sources of such concerns are the students and teachers as well as the employers. However, the authorities from the university and colleges claim otherwise (see quotes).
The main objective of the course, as all the four universities have stated, is to produce middle level managers of global standard. So far only KU and Purbanchal University have produced BBA graduates, and all these graduates contacted were found happy with the education they received. They have either found a good job or opened their own business while some of them have gone abroad for MBA. As other Nepali universities started this course late their products are yet to come out in the market. Students of TU’s trial batch are now working as interns in various organisations.
But there are indications that Nepal ’s BBA degree is facing the same problems as is there in the country’s MBA degree. Chandan Sapkota, a BBA student who transferred his credits to Dickinson College in USA from a TU affiliated college, says he found visible difference in the teaching methodology in Nepal and the US . According to him, the US education system is more liberal, students are free to choose courses and concentrate in one particular area, the activities are well planned with all the necessary material, information about the grading system and the exam schedules distributed to the students well in advance and the teachers given all the authority to grade the students. These are not there in Nepal , he laments. Obviously, the same complaints have arisen in other faculties as well.
The existing students in Nepal as well as graduates agree with Sapkota. They complain that though the BBA is supposed to be business focused, none of the skills needed for business management are imparted during the course. The teachers lack well-planned schedule and the grading system is arbitrary. As the college libraries are not well stocked, the teachers are over dependent on the text books and make students rote-learn the material. Moreover the final exam with 60 per cent of weight in the grading system is taken at the end of the semester and this is one shot exam. Thus, the system retains the same disadvantage of annual exams. Teachers argue that this system cannot truly determine the student’s capacity as the reasons for poor performance in such exam can be other than academic.
Some graduates have also shown dissatisfaction regarding the corporate culture of the country. Though undergoing a transformation, it still has not kept pace with the development of modern corporate culture. Family control over the company, low market orientation, disregard to market research and prevalence of a corporate bureaucracy have fuelled the frustration of fresh graduates. As this indicates to the lack of job opportunities after BBA education, it may be the main reason why BBA course is experiencing a high drop out rate among the students. Though the exact numbers could not be ascertained, the teachers, students and college principals generally agreed that it is very high.
That points out to the need for more practical approach in business education. For this purpose, it is a general practice globally to base business education on real life case studies. Nepali BBA colleges too are trying to follow the same, but the cases used are foreign, mostly from advanced countries, thus proving difficult for the students to understand and of no use in their professional life after they graduate. In fact, this has been the most important shortcoming pointed out in Nepal ’s MBA education as well.
An equally serious complaint is against the colleges themselves. Most of the students claim that the practical approach which BBA brags about hasn’t been practiced appropriately. They say guest lectures, workshops and case studies, field visits and research assignments are very rare. Colleges and teachers, in turn, complain that the Universities are not properly monitoring the colleges to ensure such exercises. Students (both graduates and currently studying) demand that the teachers be provided adequate exposure in real life business situations. Teachers agree to it and further demand opportunities to refine the concepts through further education or observation of the real businesses.
With the gradual growth in the economy and emergence of new business opportunities, the demand for middle level managers is sure to grow. Thus there should be no dearth of career opportunities for BBA graduates. But as Gaurav Man Sherchan, a BBA graduate from KU who is running his own research organisation Orion International successfully, points out that the employers in Nepal still prefer hiring MBA not just for middle level management but even for the junior officer’s level. This is compelling the BBA graduates to go straight for MBA whereas the general idea is that one should go for MBA only after a couple of years of experience in real life business management.
(Bibek Subedi & Manish Bikram Shah)
"There are many BBA colleges that are taking their students to field visits, providing access to international developments through various case studies, newspapers and magazines, making the students engaged in research activities and so on. Therefore, it is not true that our BBA lacks practical approach."
Purushottam Sharma
BBA Programme Coordinator, TU
"As we are producing manpower for the Nepali corporate sector, we have frequent interaction with the corporates. We even train our students as per the need expressed by the corporates and they are satisfied with our effort. Reality is that only a few of the Nepali organisations operate in a professional way. There is a gap between formally trained managers and the owners. Our aim is to reduce this gap."
Sadesh Raj Bhandari
BBA Programme Coordinator,
Little Angels College
(affiliated to Kathmandu University)
"Of course BBA course in Nepal is said to lack a practical approach, but it is a false allegation. We groom our students through practical experience. We inculcate the feeling in the students that they have to learn everything from scratch. However, we also realise that the six months provided for the internship is not enough and we are thinking of lengthening this period."
Govind Shethi
BBA Programme Coordinator, White House International College (affiliated to Purbanchal University)
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