Convergence and Divergence Dynamics in British and French Business Schools: How Will the Pressure for Accreditation Influence these Dynamics?
| Author | Véronique Ambrosini,Jon Billsberry,Harry Barton,Lisa Thomas |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8551.12007 |
| Date | 01 April 2014 |
| Published date | 01 April 2014 |
Convergence and Divergence Dynamics in
British and French Business Schools: How
Will the Pressure for Accreditation
Influence these Dynamics?
Lisa Thomas, Jon Billsberry,1Véronique Ambrosini2and Harry Barton3
IESEG School of Management LEM-CNRS, Socle de la Grande-Arche, 1 parvis de la Defense, 92044
Paris-La Defense cedex, France, 1Deakin University, Department of Management, Burwood, Victoria 3125,
Australia, 2Monash University, Department of Management, 900 Dandenong Road, Caulfield East, Victoria
3145, Australia, and 3Nottingham Trent University, Burton Street, Nottingham NG1 4BU, UK
Corresponding author email: v.ambrosini@monash.edu
This paper focuses on convergence and divergence dynamics among leading British and
French business schools and explores how the pressure for accreditation influences these
dynamics. We illustrate that despite historical differences in approaches to management
education in Britain and France, these approaches have converged partly based on the
influence of the American model of management education but more recently through the
pursuit of accreditation, in particular from the Association to Advance Collegiate
Schools of Business and the European Quality Improvement Standard. We explore these
dynamics through the application of the resource-based view of the firm and institutional
theory and suggest that, whilst achieving accreditation is a necessary precursor for
international competition, it is no longer a form of competitive advantage. The pursuit of
accreditation has fostered a form of competitive mimicry reducing national distinctive-
ness. The resource-based view of the firm suggests that the top schools need a more
heterogeneous approach that is not easily replicable if they are to outperform the
competitors. Consequently, the convergence of management education in Britain and
France will become a new impetus for divergence. We assert that future growth and
competitive advantage might be better achieved through the reassertion of national,
regional and local cultural characteristics.
Introduction
Business schools constitute a business sector in
their own right (Starkey and Tiratsoo, 2007); they
profit from, and add to, the world economy
(Durand and Dameron, 2011). This sector is inter-
nationalizing and is increasingly competitive
(Dameron and Durand, 2009). Schools have
responded to competitive pressures by pursuing
accreditation, ‘a quality assurance scheme that
certifies that accredited schools have the struc-
tures and processes in place necessary to meet
their stated objectives and continually improve
performance’ (Zammuto, 2008, p. 260), and by
trying to climb the global rankings, both of which
they believe will bring competitive differentiation
(McKee, Mills and Weatherbee, 2005). This is
important because students make international
study decisions primarily on their perceptions of
the overall quality of the country’s education
institutions, influenced by the highly visible role
We would like to thank Professor Yochanan Altman and
three anonymous reviewers for their insightful com-
ments, which have helped us develop a clearer and more
elaborated argument.
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British Journal of Management, Vol. 25, 305–319 (2014)
DOI: 10.1111/1467-8551.12007
© 2013 The Author(s)
British Journal of Management © 2013 British Academy of Management. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd,
9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA, 02148, USA.
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