This is the author’s version of a work that was submitted/accepted for pub-lication in the following source:
Finsterwalder, Jorg, O’Steen, Billy, &Tuzovic, Sven (2010)
Service-learning through multiple client-sponsored projects in an MBA marketing course.
New Zealand Journal of Adult Learning, 38(2), pp. 71-91.
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Service-Learning through Multiple Client-Sponsored Projects
in an MBA Marketing Course
Jörg Finsterwalder, Billy O’Steen and Sven Tuzovic
Abstract
This paper outlines an approach for teaching Marketing Principles in an MBA course through service-learning to enable adult learners to connect the lectures’ marketing content to a real-world marketing project. During the course, 40 students in groups of four to five individuals were involved in eight different client-sponsored marketing projects executed simultaneously. The rationale, planning and management of this approach utilised current research on service-learning, living cases and client-sponsored projects in marketing education. The experimental curriculum design is presented in a timeline that mirrors the preparation and management of the group projects and the considerations to be taken into account when initiating and
facilitating the projects. Reflections from this iteration of the service-learning design suggest the importance of: detailed project planning, the involvement of students in choosing the projects, the introduction of forms and feedback loops, the role of the instructor in facilitating the students and managing expectations, and the role of the company representative in
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Introduction: The Teaching Challenge of Bringing Marketing to Life
“Being involved in an independent project is a much greater learning experience than just memorizing for a test” (student’s comment, cited in Humphreys 1981, p. 12). This comment seemed to the authors of this paper to be particularly relevant for MBA students who are adult learners with professional backgrounds and usually seek immediate relevance in applying the theories that are taught in the classroom. Their practical experiences often provide them with knowledge and interest in project work, planning and execution. In the authors’ experience, some of these students, who have been out of the educational system for a while, appear to find it difficult to connect with abstract theories or models if there is no clear practical
application. Therefore, it seems important to link marketing theory with practise so that MBA students can bridge the gap between theoretical marketing principles and ‘real-world’
applications. One way of doing this is to involve students in “living cases” (LeClair and Stöttinger 1999, p. 31) with companies.
By bringing marketing to life through company projects, students may be more likely to find the classroom content relevant by relating it to a specific company’s context and ultimately to their own professional experiences. A study by Bourner et al. (2001) shows that students highly value the fact that a project in their course involves a real organisation and according to De los Santos and Jensen (1985), students involved with company-based projects become more interested in learning. As McEachern (2001, p. 211) states, “Client projects [seem to] challenge students in ways that not even the best-written case study or end-of-the-textbook-chapter-exercise can duplicate.” Influenced by these findings, one author of this paper, who was also involved in coordinating an MBA course, sourced eight company projects in order to facilitate “problem-based learning” (PBL) (Barrows 1986; Biggs 2003; Boud 1985; Edens 2000; Wee et al. 2003) and “deep learning” (Prosser and Millar 1989; Ramsden 2003) by having students apply the course content in business settings. This approach of providing
3 opportunities to apply marketing concepts and strategies in actual business settings seemed particularly appropriate for adult learners who already have professional experience and may struggle with engaging in learning that could feel limited to a university classroom.
This paper begins with a literature review of service-learning, live cases and client-sponsored projects. It then explains the context for the teaching and learning approach in the Marketing Principles course. In the next section recommendations for facilitating this service-learning approach are outlined. The paper then continues with an overview of how the company projects were implemented according to a timeline and with specific tasks for the instructor, the companies involved and the student groups. The next section describes the reflective assessment of the teaching approach’s effectiveness before it discusses problems and questions encountered during the projects. A summary concludes the paper with the suggestion that this teaching and learning approach can be particularly effective for adult learners in making course content relevant. It is also acknowledged that this approach does require substantial front-end organisation and the establishment of feedback processes throughout by the instructor.
Service-Learning, Live Cases and Client-sponsored Projects in Marketing Education
Three streams can be found in the literature relating to student learning with the integration of “out-of-class experiences” (Strauss and Terenzi 2007, p. 967) by involving companies: (i) service-learning, (ii) live cases and (iii) client-sponsored projects.
Service-learning has been defined as an educational approach that stems from the
philosophical tenets of experiential education (Dewey 1938; Eyler and Giles 1999; Klink and Athaide 2004) and active learning (Hagenbuch 2006). Researchers (e.g. Petkus 2000; Rama et al. 2000) have generally agreed that its implementation centres on students’ involvement in
4 community service projects within the structure of credit-bearing educational experience (Berry and Workman 2007; Govekar and Rishi 2007; Petkus 2000; Steffes 2004; Still and Clayton 2004). Service-learning has been regarded as a reciprocal approach as it benefits the community or company (service recipient), the student (service provider), the course
instructor (service-learning facilitator) and the educational institution (service-learning
governing body) (see also Jacoby 1996). Service-learning programmes “ensure equal focus on both the service that is being provided and the learning that is occurring” (Furco 1996, p. 5). Community members, or the companies in this case, usually define the service need, which should be supportive of course objectives, and students are asked to reflect on the service in light of those objectives (Weigert 1988). Dewey (1938) suggests that projects like these enable participants to broaden their educational and civic horizons (see also Berry and Workman 2007). Service-learning seems to have the potential to enhance technical and cognitive capabilities and outside-of-the-classroom skills among students (Rama et al. 2000). Other research has shown the significant impact on students’ general problem-solving
capabilities (Friedman 1996), the development of a sense of responsibility (Boss 1994; Eyler and Giles 1999), and the promotion of self-efficacy (Moore and Sandholtz 1999; Shalaway 1991). In addition, service-learning is intended to and seen to improve relationships between students, their educational institution and the community (Arney and Jones 2006). Literature further indicates that the concept is used by many teachers due to its potential to provide students with a direct link to real-world work skills, while enabling them to enhance and practise the concepts taught in class (Bringle and Hatcher 1996; Hingorani et al. 1998; Kenworthy-U’Ren 2000).
Live cases incorporate traditional components of case studies with the unique aspect of
working in real-time with an organisation (Burns 1990; LeClair and Stöttinger 1999). Live cases can be designed to be executed independently of an organisation or with full
5 collaboration. The key characteristics of a living case are the present nature of problems and opportunities within a company (LeClair and Stöttinger 1999) and an interaction among student groups, company personnel and the instructor. “Students are not working in a clean, tidy environment when dealing with a live case; rather, they are dealing with variable situations, uncertainty, and incomplete information. (…) it is clear that live cases have the potential to be an excellent experiential learning vehicle” (Elam and Spotts 2004, p. 52). This uncertainty is a vital element of working within any organisation, and developing the ability to deal with uncertainty can help students learn to solve the complex and unstructured problems (Kennedy et al. 2001) that they will face in the workplace. In addition, students are usually asked to resolve the live cases in groups of learners. This not only helps to develop interpersonal skills and increases motivation and involvement (Kennedy et al. 2001), but teamwork also promotes greater commitment to each other and the project among students and facilitates higher levels of achievement (Johnson et al. 1998). Furthermore, connecting students with the business world is educational in and of itself by providing an opportunity to learn more about corporate culture and professional expectations (Kennedy et al. 2001).
Live cases are sometimes also called client-sponsored projects (Humphreys 1981). They can be sponsored by companies having a dedicated member of the company oversee the case and providing information or they can connect students with other areas of the company. In addition to the purely manpower- and time-based provision of resources, students can also be compensated for their efforts financially. Ideally, companies should be willing to reimburse project-related expenses (Razzouk et al. 2003).
In addition to the research findings which indicate the positive effects of service-learning, live cases and client-sponsored projects, service-learning in particular has been found to be a teaching practice that has a high impact on student engagement (Carini et al. 2006; Harper
6 and Quaye 2009a; Kuh 2003; Kuh 2009; Pike and Kuh 2005; Zhao and Kuh 2004). Within the increasingly focused upon area of student engagement with regard to research and teaching, university administrators in Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the US are focusing their attention on “educationally effective practices, both inside and outside the classroom, which lead to a range of measurable outcomes” (Harper and Quaye 2009b, p. 2). Thus, designing and researching a service-learning approach is an important contribution to this growing field of exploring effective practices on student engagement.
These three streams of research suggested the use of three complementary components for the MBA course: companies’ full participation in the cases, students’ involvement with the companies and the projects’ facilitation by dedicated company representatives. For the purposes of this paper and because of the blended nature of this approach, the terms service-learning, living cases and client-sponsored projects will be used interchangeably throughout the text.
The Context for this Service-Learning Approach
The MBA programme module ‘Marketing Principles’ is taught as a core course for all
students in the trimester-long study programme and is followed by the completion of a project for a client organisation as the capstone of the programme. This structure is similar to a number of MBA programmes in New Zealand (see MBA Programs in New Zealand 2010). The course content focuses on the basics of marketing with the learning goals centred around students being able to describe and apply marketing strategies and tactics employed by organisations. Other learning goals for the course are for students to enhance their
communication and teamwork skills. For the 2009 course, 40 students were enrolled, either as part-time (15 months) or full-time (two and a half to five years) students, and came with various educational, international and professional backgrounds. Each student was required to
7 have a minimum of five years of professional experience in a business, a standard similar to most New Zealand MBA programmes (see Infozee 2010) whereas universities in other countries only require around three years of work experience (Studylink 2010).
There are two major assessments in the course designed to encourage students to combine individual and group work (for a comparison of individual and group projects, see Dommeyer 1986): a group project (worth 40 %) and an individual research report (worth 60 %). The focus of this reflective paper is the group project. For this assignment, the 40 students in groups of five were involved in eight different client-sponsored marketing projects executed simultaneously. The companies involved were in the business and business-to-consumer fields of technology and telecommunications, software, consulting, agricultural supplies and clothing. Each group project had three parts: a re-briefing memo (worth 4 %), a project presentation (worth 10 %) and a final project report (worth 26 %). The re-briefing memo serves as a early check of students’ understanding of their company project. It is also designed to be similar to the standard company practise of consultants or agencies verifying project briefs with their clients. The project presentation is a summary of the project findings and provides student groups with feedback that they can integrate into their final reports, which are due soon afterwards. As with the re-briefing memo, the final report is designed to be similar to reports written by a consultancy or agency, however, it also requires a
connection to marketing theories from course lectures, textbooks and other scholarly sources.
Because the students in this course are all adult learners, the design of focusing a major part of their course assessment on the service-learning experiences follows the recommendations of Kasworm and Marienau (1997, p. 14-15) that, “adult-oriented assessment suggests that affective outcomes, self-directed learning, and responsiveness to adult life circumstances are key areas to be considered beyond the traditional cognitive pre-test and post-test efforts of
8 many programs.” Further, this assessment of students’ experiences with the service-learning projects exemplifies the following Principles for Adult-Oriented Learning Assessment developed by Kasworm and Marineau (1997, p. 7):
1. Learning is derived from multiple sources.
2. Learning engages the whole person and contributes to that person’s development. 3. Learning and the capacity for self-direction are promoted by feedback.
4. Learning occurs in context, its significance relates in part to its impact on those contexts.
5. Learning from experiences is a unique meaning-making event that creates diversity among adult learners.
Through the course syllabus and introductory session, it is communicated to students that the course aims to implement a particular teaching approach – the PBL approach (see for example Biggs 2003; Boud 1985; Wee et al. 2003) and move away from the “fill-up-the-tanks model of knowledge acquisition” (Biggs 2003, p. 232). The goal is for students to see the rationale for this approach along the lines of, “Problem-based learning reflects the way people learn in real life; they simply get on with solving the problems life puts before them” (Biggs 2003, p. 232). This implies that, when working on a marketing problem – such as the company case, which might be “ill-defined” in part – students are required to find the appropriate marketing material themselves. This may include marketing textbooks and scholarly articles, company reports, publicly available statistics or conducting own research. As it is quite different from a typical lecture-centred course where information is presented to students by the instructor in a linear fashion, students are informed that this teaching approach will often require them to find relevant content on their own. In so doing, they will be immersed in PBL by not only solving the marketing problem but also by learning more about the process of problem solving (Biggs 2003).
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Recommendations for Facilitating the Service-Learning Approach
Instructors planning a marketing principles course can find general recommendations
(Tomkovick 2004) and more specific ones about: integrating service-learning through living, client-sponsored cases (e.g. Humphreys 1981; Lopez and Lee 2005), choice criteria for
selecting clients (McCain and Lincoln 1982), examples (e.g. LeClair and Stöttinger 1999) and comparisons of costs versus benefits of real-world projects (e.g. De los Santos and Jensen 1985; McCain and Lincoln 1982; Parsons and Lepkowska-White 2009). In addition,
Humphreys (1981) offers insights into the selection of clients, the screening of projects, the organisation of student teams and the assignment of projects, the integration of the project into the course, the instructor’s role during the project with regard to project control and student evaluation, while Lopez and Lee (2005) provide five principles for workable client-based projects. Their five principles are: the selection of clients, the design of the projects, the advance planning process, the management and setting of expectations and the provision of periodic and productive feedback.
From that range of suggestions, the following adaptation from Humphreys (1981) and Lopez and Lee (2005) served as the most appropriate considerations for preparing and managing the eight live case group projects in this course.
Selecting Project Companies. Recruiting and selecting suitable clients is a crucial step to
achieving successful student projects. It is essential that companies eager to collaborate with the university are selected and these might be more easily identifiable by an external relations officer within the institution. Choosing companies with an existing history of university affiliation can help to ensure that they understand the educational mission and context.
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Screening and Selection of Suitable Projects and Integration into the Course. It is
important to acquire projects that include an area that is a current challenge to the company to ensure their ongoing engagement. Therefore, companies in the 2009 iteration were asked to submit brief project proposals (one to two pages) to the instructor, which were checked for suitability, manageability and relevance to course content. Firms are often looking to cover a lot of ground in these projects so it is crucial for the instructor to focus their scope. In order to assist companies, it is helpful to provide a proposal template requesting: the project title, company name and background, key challenges, project scope and objectives and contact details of the sponsor. The topics for the company project can be derived from various areas of marketing due to the broad scope of a marketing principles course. In 2009, students worked on marketing plans, did small research projects, elaborated on a new marketing or product/service strategy, focused on a specific element of the marketing-mix or on other marketing applications. For these reasons the integration of company projects into the course must be flexible as it cannot be guaranteed that all of the course content will have been covered when working on specific problems of the project. Potentially, each project can be connected to several topics covered in the course.
Planning and Management Process of Multiple Company Projects. When planning and
managing projects, it is important to keep the perspectives of students, companies and the instructor in mind. For students, there must be clarity about the sequence of events and output expectations and these can be outlined in the course syllabus. It is also helpful to provide students with feedback opportunities (as detailed in a subsequent suggestion in this section) and a template and/or instructions they can use for their project report and re-briefing memo. For companies, committing to a clear and definite timeline helps ensure that the logistics of the project, such as the submission of project proposals, are understood and met by both sides. This can be achieved by communicating the timeline to companies and asking them to agree
11 to it. In addition providing feedback opportunities for the students, it is important to provide the same for company representatives. Some companies may desire non-disclosure
agreements in order to feel more comfortable about divulging company information (for a discussion of confidentially-related issues, see Schlee and Van Duzer 2007). In addition, a waiver of responsibility document should be created which can be signed by the students, company and instructor on completion of the project. This is a preventative measure to stop the company from suing the university or student teams should any implemented
recommendations by students not meet with any desired output. And, for instructors, no more than six to eight simultaneous projects are recommended.
Forming Student Teams and Assigning Projects. Forming teams and assigning projects can
be a highly sensitive topic, so including students in the selection process by inviting their preferences for projects can increase their buy-in and motivation and assist with finding good matches. Students employed with firms in a competitive situation with project companies or currently employed by one of the project companies, should not be assigned to that particular company. Similarly, inviting students to form their own teams can lead to other challenges like the formation of ‘A grade student’ teams. While it is the instructor’s decision to
determine an appropriate method for assigning groups, there are research-based guidelines to facilitate the process (see, for example, Ringer 2002). For this course, the instructor decided on the team configurations based on the students’ project preferences indicated on a project preference form distributed at the beginning of the course. Regardless of the method chosen for assigning groups, it is helpful for a team to nominate a leader to liaise and communicate directly with the instructor.
Built-in Feedback Mechanisms, ‘Safety Nets’ and Project Controls. Feedback
12 the project should allow for feedback from the instructor. The re-briefing memo is an early safety net in order to provide student groups with more guidance and direction in their projects if necessary. In addition to face-to-face feedback processes, technological
opportunities (via online platforms like Blackboard or Moodle) can be created. Companies are also asked to provide feedback to the instructor during the projects and after their conclusion.
Implementing the Service-Learning Approach through a Project Timeline
Table 1 depicts the service-learning project timeline in this marketing course. It differentiates activities required by the instructor, the companies and the students prior to, during and after the completion of the projects. Dotted lines around fields indicate no activity by the respective party. Bullets highlight the party to whom the activity is directed, supported by arrows.
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Assessing the Effectiveness of the Service-Learning Approach
In addition to the regular standardised course and teaching surveys, which provide limited opportunity for qualitative feedback, preliminary conclusions on the effectiveness of this service-learning approach have been drawn from a comparison of the 2008 and 2009 courses and online feedback provided by students as well as reflective comments from company representatives in 2009. Comparing the 2008 and 2009 implementations of the course, the key changes that seemed to have positively impacted on student interest and the project outcomes were: i) the introduction of a detailed timeline and a question and answer session about the project in week two with an emphasis on managing students’ expectations, ii) the opportunity for students to choose their preferred projects, iii) the introduction of new forms (e.g. project preference form) and documents (e.g. non-disclosure agreements), and iv) the establishment of systematic feedback processes and ‘safety nets’.
As stated above, all students were asked to provide reflections on their experiences
throughout the course. Feedback was sought from the students at two different times by using an anonymous feedback forum on the course’s online platform created on Moodle. The first feedback forum occurred four weeks into the project and the second after the completion of the group project at the end of the course. Students who replied to the first call for feedback (the response rate of 22.5% can only indicate a tendency due to the low and
non-representative number; compare Institutional Assessment Resources 2010), stated how important it was that the projects were well presented, organised and implemented, with comments such as:
“The first phase was will [sic] designed and a methodic [sic] outline was implemented to give us good structure to our project. I felt we had a good plan and knew what to do.”
15 “I would say that it began in the right sense. The coordination was good amongst the Group members and it started off smoothly.”
“The idea of having to research marketing concepts prior to covering them in class is, in my opinion, an effective way of learning. It simply wouldn’t work waiting until the end of the course when all material was covered before setting project work.”
In their final feedback (the response rate of again 22.5% is too low for generalisation), students reflected on the positive aspects of the service-learning approach by focusing on the aspects of company support, the instructor’s facilitation of the projects as well as their own and other group members’ performance. Some excerpts of feedback provided indicate their view. In regard to company support students stated:
“Very supportive company rep[resentative]. [He/she] understood that the target audience was [the] instructor as well as [the] company.”
“I think the main benefit is that the sponsor had a real appreciation of what we were going through as MBA students. They had appreciation for our time, were realistic with their expectations about what we could produce for a report given our timeframes and experience.”
“[Name of company representative] was excellent, very supportive and very clear about his needs especially with such a technologically advanced product.”
“The company responded to our correspondence and made themselves available in person.”
These comments indicate that a good support system provided by some of the companies included reasonable expectations and functioning two-way communication.
Students also provided feedback relating to their own contributions as well as their perceptions of other group members’ performance (see also Dommeyer 1986) with:
“I contributed ideas and coordinated with some key people in the industry to extract information for our report. I could have contributed more by making more visits to the company (…).”
“I contributed well and pulled my weight. I was fortunate to have one particular team member that was excellent so I learnt much from him.”
16 “Admittedly, there was disparity of ability amongst our group which is to be expected. However, I feel that all members made a genuine effort to participate, take ownership of their assigned work, offer assistance to each other, and meet agreed milestone deadlines.”
These comments show that some student groups organised themselves well and that
individual members contributed actively but also critically reflected (see Berry and Workman 2007; Brookfield 1987; 1995) on group heterogeneity and the development of cohesiveness (Tuckman 2001), and their own learning and performance (see Wee et al. 2003).
The course instructor’s support throughout the group project received some of the following comments:
“There were several timeslots available during the project for booking one-on-team time and this is enough support to be satisfactory.”
“You were (..) very open (…) to new ideas and concepts and that is encouraging in a instructor.”
“I really appreciated the final feedback that was given (…) at lecture time (…).”
The students’ reflections indicate that the instructor’s role was viewed as a facilitator. This is in line with the PBL approach where instructors are not expected to give answers and
directions but to assume a more supportive and guiding role (Wegner and Holloway 1999). Finding this balance of providing support while not directly influencing students is in line with Vella’s (1994, p. 13) suggestions that teachers of adult learners should not “ever decide what the learner can decide. Teachers must be careful not to steal that learning opportunity from the adult learner.” The challenge is to strike the right balance.
While it was clear that students saw the value of learning marketing concepts through the direct application in company projects, there are areas for improvement for the next iteration, which will be described in the next section.
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Problems and Questions Encountered during the Service-Learning Projects
Some students’ comments from the final feedback forum suggest that an area for
improvement in the service-learning projects was related to the instructor’s expectations and guidance for their project with comments such as:
“Would have benefited from more direction – each project [is] unique and at that time in the term we we[re] rather unclear of expectations.”
“Felt disconnected from instructor even though [the instructor] was available to meet with groups at their request. I think scheduled team meetings should be factored in to the group work process (2 per group and any more by request) so that groups can be “mentored” through the assignment.”
“There was a lot of not productive early effort as I don't think we grasped what we were supposed to achieve (…).”
These are important matters to consider for the next iteration of service-learning projects in this course and for project-based work in general. As each project was an individual one, there was no predetermined set of expectations per project by the instructor and that may have been particularly unsettling to students who view the instructor as the ultimate authority in the learning experience. Thus, it will need to be clearly communicated to students, early and often, that in this course a substantial part of their learning will occur during the process of applying marketing knowledge and during work on the projects. This learning goal relates to PBL (Barrows 1986; Boud 1985; Wee et al. 2003) and does not interfere with giving students general support by outlining how to work on such projects by holding sessions for questions and providing direction about the potential structure of the report. This would be important in order to lower students’ resistance (see also Margetson 1997) to this learning approach and also to convey the feeling that they are not completely alone: “Students need to learn not to fear the PBL approach” (Wee et al. 2003, p. 160). The development of a toolkit for students as suggested by Wee et al. (2003) may help to reduce students’ perceptions of barriers. The toolkit provided for this course consisted of templates, sample marketing plans, links to online
18 sources and the offer of consulting sessions with the instructor. For the latter, it was made clear to the groups that they could book one-to-team sessions with the instructor to discuss their project progress. Surprisingly, as indicated in a student’s comment above, some students felt there should be scheduled meetings with the course instructor. This problem can be resolved by providing time slots for students throughout the project and communicating this in the syllabus. This should also cater for the third student comment listed above although it is quite normal for a group to take some time to orientate itself towards the task (see Tuckman 2001).
Another challenge related to students taking more ownership of the projects had to do with their relationships inside of the companies. A potential conflict emerged in several groups as students tended to follow the company representative’s instructions rather than working on their solutions for the case. This situation is not unusual and is highlighted in the literature on role conflict (see, for example, Hallberg and Schaufeli 2006; Rizzo et al. 1970) and from a comment obtained from the final feedback forum:
“(…) we had to ask before we realised it was ok to stray away from the client’s brief and get creative. [The] brief gave the impression the client’s needs should be adhered to.”
Another key element related to the service-learning project is group work, as comments from feedback during the early stages of the project suggest:
“Different styles, personalities and abilities took a while to work out (…).”
“I found that two of the group members had an idea of what was required that differed from the rest of the group and, where each of us spoke for ourselves this couple stuck together and defended and supported each other to the point that it was hard to effect change or get on the same page unless it was their page.”
Similar feedback is also evident in the postings from the second feedback forum:
“The group project was a big commitment; it was hard to co-ordinate a group of that size over such a long period. As a group we had to keep focused at making deadlines.”
19 “I realised soon that there was dominance from one group member, and there were punctuality issues with other group member for all meetings. I strongly feel that for a high effective team performance, there has to be complete unity amongst the group members and mutual respect for each other.”
“There was some clashing of ideas at the start as we were unsure how to meet the perameters [sic], but that all came together once we realised there was more scope for originality.”
Although these group conflicts, which can also be found in Bourner et al.’s (2001) study, may have been perceived as being very challenging for the students, it is important for the
instructor to not immediately interfere with the group processes but for the students to go through the different phases of group dynamics as groups would naturally do when
developing group cohesion (see Tuckman 2001). Enhancing team-work skills and learning to collaborate effectively were learning objectives communicated in the course syllabus
(compare also Wee et al. 2003). As a group, this requires them to work towards given
timelines, set project milestones, distribute the workload evenly amongst group members and work through group issues. The student group leaders (each group was asked to determine a contact person to the instructor) should therefore be encouraged to initiate a planning process for the project and define a ‘work contract’ together with the other group members. Group conflicts which seem to be a common element of most groups (see Tuckman 2001) should be addressed within the group at an early stage because hostility among group members may make individuals in the group more resistant to the task-related ideas expressed by other group members (Pelled 1996) and could block the progress of the project. Group conflicts, if at all possible, should be self-managed in the group, as indicated by researchers (see, for example, Behfar et al. 2008) and only be facilitated by the instructor if necessary in order to preserve the dynamic where “decision-making power about team processes is shifted from a [instructor] directly to team members” (Behfar et al. 2008, 171). Although this can be clearly communicated in the project timeline, reminding students to bring forward non-resolvable
20 group issues at an early stage is important to ensure that the group does not get completely stuck.
Company representatives indicated that students should keep in close contact with the sponsor through the duration of the project so that its outcomes would meet the sponsors’ needs. This may lead to further role conflicts of the group due to the different power relationships
between instructor and students, company and students, and instructor and company. “[P]ower as a dynamical social process affecting opinions, emotions, and behaviour of (..) groups” (Boonstra et al. 1998, p. 99) may also have impact on the groups’ actions as they are completing a project to satisfy company needs and at the same time are trying to fulfil a course requirement. Consideration has to be given to such potential role conflicts and the perceived power of the parties such as the threat of negative marks from the course instructor or negative feedback from the company. This requires the course instructor to clearly
communicate his or her expectations about students not ceding all authority to the instructor, and that their role is to act as independent consultants for their project company and not as their employees. This has to also be made clear in conversations between the instructor and company prior to and, if necessary, during the project.
It was also apparent that the time allocated was perceived as being insufficient for some groups (see also Bourner et al. 2001, for similar results). It appeared that students would have presented a more detailed and in-depth solution if they had had more time to work on the task. This may have to be considered for the next service-learning projects by possibly changing the timeline from two to three months duration, integrating the projects differently with other assignments to give students a longer warm-up phase with group tasks whilst also working on other assignments in parallel. All of this, of course, has to be balanced with regard to the workload of the students.
21 From a student perspective, suggestions from the final feedback forum indicate that, at times, some groups faced challenges during their collaboration with the company:
“The project outlook was huge and the company expected us to know everything within a short span of time.”
“Fantastic company and product, but [the] company contact appeared to trying to make life difficult for us and catch us out. We worked quite well independently without him.”
These are important comments to take into consideration when monitoring the company and student relationships. Company representatives may need a more extensive briefing from the instructor prior to and during the projects as to what is expected of them in terms of their availability and also in regard to their general expectations of the students and the project outcomes.
While this service-learning approach seems feasible for postgraduate education, there may only be limited adaptability for undergraduate courses. This is mostly due to larger class sizes, a potential lack of work experience among the students, a potential deficiency of experience in working in autonomous groups among the students, and potentially different levels of maturity among the students when interacting with a company on a professional level. However, in undergraduate courses, it may be possible to offer service-learning projects in a more structured and smaller manner (see, for an example, Bourner et al. 2001) so that students’ experience and knowledge levels are aligned for appropriate company projects.
Summary
Service-learning through live client-sponsored cases has been highlighted in the literature as a highly effective and engaging teaching technique. This paper has outlined how this approach can be used in the planning and management of concurrent client-sponsored group projects. It
22 seems obvious that having students work on marketing cases by applying marketing course knowledge will increase the workload of the instructor organising this teaching and learning approach. Thus, any potential benefits of this approach will need to be considered in a workload model. The extra effort seems to be worthwhile as universities are not solely educating students to become marketing scholars but rather should be trying to enable students to also understand marketing from a practical perspective. Live cases are the ideal tool to do so.
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29
Dr Jörg Finsterwalder, Department of Management, University of Canterbury, Te Whare
Wānanga o Waitaha, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch 8140, New Zealand, Phone: +64 3 364 2987 ext 8614, Fax: +64 3 3642020, Email: [email protected]
(corresponding author)
Jörg Finsterwalder is Senior Lecturer in Marketing and in the Department of Management at The University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. He has a Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) in Marketing from the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland, holds a Diploma in Business Administration from the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Germany, and has a Postgraduate Diploma in Tertiary Teaching from The University of Canterbury, New Zealand. His research focus is in the areas of relationship marketing, services marketing and marketing education.
Dr Sven Tuzovic, Pacific Lutheran University, School of Business, Morken Center for
Learning & Technology, Tacoma, WA, 98447, USA, Email: [email protected]
Sven Tuzovic is Assistant Professor of Marketing at Pacific Lutheran University, School of Business, Tacoma, WA. He was a Visiting Professor in Marketing at Murray State University (2006/07) and at the University of New Orleans (2005/06). He holds a Doctoral Degree in Marketing from the University of Basel in Switzerland, a Diploma in Business Administration from the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Germany, and a BBA from Georgia Southern University, Statesboro, GA. His research has been published in Managing Service Quality, the Journal of Services Marketing, the International Journal of Business Performance Management and in several international conference proceedings.
