experimenting with new ways of leading. What this perspective highlights is that executive learning is not only about acquiring knowledge or skills; it is about who leaders become. From a research perspective, executive programmes are unusually rich environments. Written reflections, project reports, learning journals and peer discussions all offer detailed material on how leaders think, act and learn. In AMBA-accredited part-time EMBAs, this vantage point is particularly strong. Participants’ experiences describe transformation efforts, strategic dilemmas and organisational tensions as they unfold. Capturing these experiences systematically can create a research resource of unusual quality and this does not require turning classrooms into laboratories in any artificial sense. In many cases, the data is already being produced – what is needed is a shift in how we treat it. Towards an R&D logic for business schools Many other professional schools take the integration of practice and research for granted. Medical schools rely on teaching hospitals; engineering schools operate laboratories. These environments serve dual purposes: educating professionals and advancing knowledge. Business schools have their own equivalent – it is the MBA and EMBA classroom. Treating executive education as a form of research and development does not mean compromising academic rigour. On the contrary, it allows scholars to study managerial phenomena close to where they occur. It also enables institutions to build cumulative insight over time. I would call it a research and development activity for business schools. Obviously, adopting such an R&D-type of logic would require careful consideration. It would involve systematic data collection, appropriate ethical governance and rigorous analysis, potentially including longitudinal comparisons across cohorts. Clear distinctions would also need to be drawn between research, programme evaluation and marketing. When done well, this approach would allow insights generated through executive education to inform both scholarship and programme design. The benefits are reciprocal: research gains immediacy and relevance, while teaching gains depth and evidence. Participants benefit from programmes that are grounded in an evolving understanding of executive development. A new approach to programme design Adopting this perspective would also subtly but meaningfully reshape how business schools think about executive education. Programme design would become more evidence-informed, while faculty would engage with participant data not only as teaching material, but as an insight into contemporary leadership challenges. Schools could identify emerging themes, compare industries and track shifts in managerial concerns over time. This also strengthens the legitimacy of executive education within research-oriented universities. Rather than being seen as a revenue-generating add-on, EMBA programmes become
they genuinely wish to learn, their reflections rarely stay within the boundaries of a single discipline. Strategic understanding blends into questions of personal confidence; financial acumen sits alongside the desire to lead with more empathy; collaborative relationships matter as much as individual expertise; and organisational renewal stands next to the search for one’s leadership voice. These multiple dimensions became visible in our analysis as a four-part structure – expertise, self-knowledge, networks and change – which together form a holistic view of executive learning. The significance of this structure is not that it introduces new terminology, but that it reflects how development actually unfolds in practice. Executives rarely learn one thing at a time; they learn as a whole person embedded in their organisational realities. This is also where the language of paradox becomes useful. Not in its complexity, but in its simplicity. Executives develop individually, yet through others; they build long-term capacity while simultaneously responding to immediate pressures. These tensions shape their learning journeys and explain why narrow or fragmented educational approaches often fall short. Recognising the interplay between inward reflection, outward interaction and organisational action can allow schools to design programmes that align more closely with the lived experience of leadership. EMBA learning as a professional identity process In our current ongoing research, we approach executive learning from a different angle. Instead of asking what participants want to learn, we explore how they describe their professional development that has taken place during the programme. The interest lies in understanding learning as personal change. Participants reflect on how their thinking, behaviour and sense of themselves as leaders evolve over time. They describe, for example, gaining confidence in their judgment, using authority more deliberately and becoming more aware of how they affect others. Many also reflect on letting go of established habits and
26 Ambition • ISSUE 3 • 2026
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