Kelley School to help establish MBA program in Croatia U.S. State Department awards $320,000 grant 
 
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Indiana University's Kelley School of Business will help Croatia's four universities to establish an international-standard MBA program that will help build a climate for economic growth and foster stability among the nations of the former Yugoslavia. 
The U.S. State Department has awarded a $320,000 grant to the Kelley School, which will assist the Republic of Croatia's four universities in establishing an English-language MBA program. The Consortium of Faculties of Economics in Croatia (CFEC), which includes the University of Zagreb, the University of Split, the University of Rijeka and the University of Osijek, will work with faculty from the Kelley School to design and implement a viable, sustainable two-year MBA program that will serve the needs of Croatia and the wider region. 
"With this new program in Croatia, the Kelley School is building on its considerable experience in the transition economies of Eastern Europe and our experience in developing and implementing new degree programs to meet market needs and student expectations," said Kelley School Dean Dan Dalton. "We look forward to working with faculty from Croatia's universities to create an English-language MBA program. This effort extends and complements our previous program development efforts in Hungary and Slovenia." 
Bruce Jaffee, Kelley School associate dean for academics, will serve as the project's director, and many other faculty will participate. Establishing a successful MBA program also involves creating sound administrative policies and procedures. This project will provide opportunities for Kelley School staff to be integrally involved as well. 
One of the main problems facing Croatian enterprises is the serious lack of qualified managers, including practitioners and policymakers who are able to diagnose and solve current problems, and also to plan strategically for the future. In order to grow, Croatia's businesses must participate more actively and effectively in international markets, and expertise for doing so must be developed more broadly and at a higher level. 
In the last decade, more than 140,000 young college-educated Croatians have left the country, a trend that has severely impacted the nation's economic growth. In mid-October, Croatian President Stjepan Mesic called together representatives of the government and the business community to discuss the need to establish a stronger link between the country's educational institutions and the pressing needs of the labor market. 
This new centralized, English-language MBA program should contribute significantly to meeting these needs. Regionally-based, it also will play a central role in educating generations of business professionals who will form a strong network of personal and business relations. This network will be very important in building stronger economic ties among the countries of the former Yugoslavia and elsewhere. In doing so, it also will make a significant contribution to stability in the region. 
The program will lay the groundwork for an expanded network of faculty and graduate students in Central and Eastern Europe, a primary interest of the Kelley School for many decades. With strong partnerships in Hungary and Slovenia, Croatia's neighbors, the Kelley School will be able to include the CFEC program and its faculty and students in this active regional partnership. 
The program will be based in Zadar, a mid-sized city on the Adriatic coast (population 100,000). The mayor of Zadar, Bozidar Kalmeta, has provided a building for the program on the campus of the University of Split's Faculty of Humanities. These facilities will be upgraded to house case discussion classrooms, computers and interactive video technology, meeting rooms for MBA team work, and offices for the faculty and staff of the new program. 
The managers trained by the consortium's MBA program will have the combination of skills indispensable to foreign enterprises, such as knowledge of the local economy, culture and norms, and internationally recognized management skills. 
Croatian faculty already have traveled to the Kelley School to work with its faculty on curriculum development, experienced the delivery of this curriculum in classes, and met with key MBA administrators to learn about the organization of a top MBA program. Kelley School faculty will go to Croatia to conduct workshops and to work with CFEC partners on other aspects of curriculum design and delivery. 
  
Media Contacts: 
George Vlahakis 
OCM 
812-855-0846 
gvlahaki@indiana.edu 
Andra Klemkosky 
Kelley School of Business 
812-855-3202 
anjenkin@indiana.edu 
 
 
This is good news! Let's hope Croatia takes full advantage of it. 
If you noticed, they wrote of Croatia with Slovenia and Hungary, and if our 
people can get out of the communist mind-set and learn the Western way 
of doing business, (and I don't mean the Enron kind) it can only be to the good. 
A little optimism will also do you good! 
Hilda 
 
 
I am not so sure: It is better than nothing but ... 
Please correct me if I'm wrong but this is NOT Harvard or Stanford 
MBA nor is it Paris, MBA-Lausanne (2nd rating in Europe) or London ... 
 
So, Croatia will get some needed help, yet the ONLY way in the 
globalized society is to get THE VERY BEST, and with neighbors 
that Croatia has, only the best managers and experts in any field 
can guarantee regional survival, especially if EU continues 
with their direct or even inderect 'Balkania' schemes ... 
 
So, this is good but EXTREME caution required and the red light 
for most of us to bring the top quality to Croatia in all fields ... 
 
If I am wrong and it turns out that Keeley is top MBA and 
perhaps even specialized in transitional economies, then 
this is indeed excellent news; yet my above argument remains ... 
 
Davor 
 
To All: 
  
FYI, Indiana University has an excellent reputation and the business school should be very solid. Although it's not Harvard or Stanford, it will certainly give Croatia much needed help. 
  
Richard 
 
Thanks Richard, 
 
 
I appreciate your comment and to be fair I knew that Kelley MBA 
is very good, and I agree that temporarily it will help Croatia ... 
... however, just wait until the some megalo-serbs, financed 
-say- by Panic, bring Harvard business school & MBA to Belgrade ... 
or perhaps until the Bled MBA dominates the whole region ... 
I have no secret for anyone, my vision of the secure future of Croatia 
is very simple: we have to dominate every vital aspect of the 
national future and excellence in every area is crucial ... 
 
Finally, let me say openly what even all Wall Street or 
the Davos Economic Forum experts in New York know: 
The 'economy' is not ''science'' and the world economy can no 
longer be followed by old schemes and rules as it is effectively 
chaotic system that follows some of the laws of advanced physics 
or chaos at best (and usual economists do not understand that ...) .. 
 
... yet the CONTACTS (='old boys network'') in the MBA 'game' is MORE 
IMPORTANT than any ''knowledge'' you get from any of these courses ... 
... we all know how the USA influential 'elites' are formed ... and where ? 
 
Davor 
 
 
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