Across Asia, business schools are transforming how they prepare graduates, placing real-world relevance at the center of their education.

• Business curricula are aligning more closely with employers’ daily priorities, translating classroom theory into real workplace purpose.
• Regional case studies and industry-tested faculty are reshaping the Asian classroom experience.
• Hands-on simulations and real-world scenarios are turning classrooms into living laboratories that deepen student engagement.

Transcript

Joseph Cherian: [00:12] When individuals, employers, and students question the value of the business degree, they’re questioning everything: the entire model, the value it brings to the table, the relevance to industry (especially employees asking, ‘is this relevant for my workplace?’) and the costs.

[00:33] Fortunately, Asians still value education. The half-life, or the duration for time decay in terms of its relevance, will be longer than in the U.S. or Europe, which are more impatient. But that said, Generation Z is also getting impatient in Asia.

[00:51] They’re asking and questioning: why should I get this degree? How does that add value to my career trajectory or my relevance in society? Many Gen Zers want to do good. They want to give back to the community more than I did—now I do, but in the old days, I did not. As a result, they begin to question, even in Asia.

[01:14] What employers are signaling is that the stuff that you learn in business schools—if we can focus on business schools, since this is what we’re here for—has to be relevant to what we are doing on a daily basis: our vision, our mission, our purpose.

[01:29] The last thing an employer wants is to take in talent from a business school, retrain them, and put them through some kind of rotation program to drink the Kool-Aid.

[01:42] Schools should be doing that. We should make our curriculum and our programs relevant. If you live in Asia, you’d better be using Asian cases. It should be experiential, it should be hands-on.

[01:56] Sometimes it’s good in life that you fail in every aspect of your career. I failed in academics. I failed industry. And I failed in, I don’t know, what’s the last one? Policymaking…Just kidding.

[02:05] What I think is useful is the experience. The blended experience of working in academia, being trained in academia, and then having a career in industry is invaluable. I don’t say it for self-serving purposes. I say it because that’s what a business school is about.

[02:23] It’s like talking to a professor of surgery at the top medical school who says, ‘hypothetically speaking, this is how you perform an incision for a type of surgery.’ You don’t want to go to such a school. You want to make sure you get a surgeon, a professor of surgery who’s performed surgery.

[02:42] Somehow, business schools are exempt from this rule, but we can be straight through from university with no experience, and yet be teaching students how to become professionals. Something doesn’t add up.

[02:55] At the Asia School of Business, we are doing modularized learning. Basically, you can take the education in bite-sized pieces. We call them stackable microcredentials. It’s not the newest concept on Earth. It’s been around for many years; many schools have been doing it.

[03:12] But we’ve made it into a unique form suited to the Asian audience. When students come to my class—I teach finance, particularly portfolio management and investments—they watch my videos asynchronously, and at the end of the week, they can dial in or come in person. Most come in person if they’re in the neighborhood or in that zip code.

[03:34] What happens is we have the jam sessions. I mean, I don’t mean we plug in the guitar, drums, and all that. What we mean is that we run simulations, conduct scenario analyses, and perform what-if situations. So we put students in a thinking-cap mode, and it’s more fun.

[03:52] For the boring theory stuff, you can get it from any textbook or watch videos anytime you want—and you can rerun it as many times as you want, like on Netflix. You watch the series a gazillion times. But when you come to the class, we learn how to apply that theory in the living laboratory.

Originally published by AACSB

Malaysia’s financial center ambitions are gaining traction by leveraging its world-leading Islamic finance strength rather than directly competing with Singapore. To maximize success, economists emphasize uniting its various regional financial hubs into a single, cohesive ecosystem centered in Kuala Lumpur.

For instance, TRX has attracted major financial institutions including HSBC, Prudential and Affin Bank, alongside technology companies such as Ant International, consultants and other professional services firms.

Professor Joseph Cherian, CEO, president and dean of Asia School of Business, noted that physical clustering is only the beginning.

He said at the moment, TRX is a very successful property development, but that alone does not make it an international financial centre.

He said the financial capability has to be deliberately built. Labuan arguably has more of that institutional infrastructure already because it has operated as an offshore financial centre for many years.

“You need intellectual capital. You need people who understand finance, markets, regulation, asset management, capital raising and product development.”

He suggested bringing expertise from institutions including Bank Negara Malaysia, the Securities Commission, Employees Provident Fund, Permodalan Nasional and the Ministry of Finance together at TRX with a mandate to develop the financial ecosystem.

The discussion should focus on three key areas: developing new financial products, attracting asset managers, and internationalising Malaysia’s sukuk market.

He said Malaysia’s strongest opportunity lies in something more difficult for Singapore to replicate: Islamic finance.

He said Malaysia’s decades spent building expertise in sukuk, Islamic banking, takaful, and Shariah governance give it an unrivaled edge in the region.

Rather than trying to replicate a conventional financial centre and adding Islamic products around its edges, Islamic finance should become the organising principle of Malaysia’s IFC strategy.

One opportunity would be to internationalise Malaysia’s sukuk market by encouraging major multinational companies operating in the country to issue US dollar-denominated sukuk and distribute them to global investors.

“If you want an Islamic financial centre, come to Malaysia. We are among the best in the world,” 

The objective should not be to defeat Singapore but to build capabilities that make the two centres valuable to each other.

“Malaysia doesn’t have to defeat Singapore or Hong Kong… It has to develop capabilities that make those centres want to work with Malaysia,” 

Malaysia’s efforts to develop multiple financial centres also present another challenge: whether spreading activity across different locations undermines the concentration that makes financial centres successful.

Malaysia’s efforts to develop multiple financial centres also present another challenge: whether spreading activity across different locations undermines the concentration that makes financial centres successful.

Prof Cherian said Malaysia needs a clearer hierarchy, with Kuala Lumpur and TRX serving as the country’s principal international financial hub and other centres developing specialised roles.

“You cannot have Labuan, Penang, Johor and every other location all saying, ‘We want to be the financial centre.’ You need to choose your main international financial centre,” 

Under his proposed hub-and-spoke model, Labuan could retain its offshore role while developing areas such as Islamic finance and tokenisation, while Johor could specialise in Islamic wealth management and family wealth.

Originally published by Business Times

Universities around the world are offering unique, tailored module selections that address and anticipate the evolving demands of the business world. And for many in Japan, the value of an international program is clear: access to a comprehensive English-speaking business environment, multinational appeal and the prestige of a recognized university.

To help make the choice easier, here’s our GoConnect guide to some of the best international MBA programs in 2026, and why each is worth your consideration if you’re looking overseas.

Asia School of Business

School Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Affiliated University: Established as a collaboration between MIT Sloan School of Management and Bank Negara Malaysia
International Student Cohort: 50-60%

The Asia School of Business MBA (ASB) has a unique origin story. MIT Sloan and Malaysia’s central bank, Bank Negara, built the school together. For the students, this means that they’re being taught by ASB residential faculty and MIT Sloan faculty. They aren’t just licensing the name and walking away — they’re creating an MBA worthy of the MIT Sloan name. 

One of ASB’s biggest strengths is that their course isn’t all theory. About one third of the coursework is what the school calls Action Learning. It’s a practical element, working with consulting projects for companies across Southeast Asia. The cornerstone of the MBA is then cemented in with a required stretch on MIT’s own campus in Cambridge. This, combined with the small cohort of 35 to 50 students in each course, ensures a first-class educational experience. This is only enhanced by the support offered in housing and relocation by ASB’s team, so students arrive without the stress of weeks of house searching and utility setup.

Dr Yi-Ren Wang, Associate Professor II of Organizational Behavior, and head of ASB’s ‘Mindset Lab,’ put the commitment to student care and development on full display when describing the program: “Beyond the curriculum itself, ASB places a strong emphasis on how students think, act, and grow. Students are trained to think like scientists, seek evidence, integrate perspectives, and act on what they learn. At the same time, the school’s Mindset Lab and executive coaching help them develop self-awareness, cultivate mindsets to continually stretch beyond their comfort zones, and grow into well-rounded leaders.”

The value for anyone based in Tokyo is clear. Students walk away with an MIT-caliber degree with Asia’s business norms baked in, at a fraction of Tokyo prices. Add the planned on-the-ground experiences in China, Vietnam, Japan and Thailand designed to offer global exposure and deepening students’ local roots and connections. And sign the package off with classes and instructors from MIT Sloan, which still opens doors on prestige alone, and you’re left with a premium MBA.

Read the full article HERE.
Originally published by GoConnect.jp