JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT EDUCATION / February 2000 Conger, Xin / EXECUTIVE EDUCATION IN THE 21ST CENTURY EXECUTIVE EDUCATION IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Executive education is undergoing a gradual but radical transformation. Programs operating today are far more innovative, learner centered, and rele-vant to immediate company needs than ever before. In the new century, executive education has the potential to play an even greater role as an essen-tial lever to facilitate strategic transitions. No longer simply a reward for high potential executives or a chance to renew an individual’s knowledge base, programs are increasingly harnessed as opportunities to recast the world-views of executive teams and to align organizations to new directions. Through educational forums, CEOs are likely to discover that they often are better positioned to communicate and implement corporate strategy, to build strategic unity throughout the company, and to create a cadre of change agents (Bolt, 1993; Conger & Benjamin, 1999; Ready, 1995). Executive edu-cation has the potential to become a truly strategic tool. Indeed, in our survey on executive education trends among member organizations of the Interna-tional Consortium for Executive Development Research (ICEDR), a strong majority of respondents held that “the executive education programs in my organization are designed to enhance overall leadership and change manage-ment effectiveness.