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Purpose of the Study: To present a strategy for developing and maintaining an advisory board of executives to guide the content and activities of a capstone Marketing Management course; to assess the effectiveness of a course-level advisory board as compared to a traditional textbook approach.
Method Design and Sample: Six sections of senior-level marketing students participated in the study. Paired sample t-tests were used to compare the advisory board approach with a traditional textbook classroom.
Results: The advisory board approach was evaluated significantly more favorably than the traditional textbook approach across all four categories: pedagogical affect, value of the course content, impact of the course on the student, and willingness to recommend.
Value to Marketing Educators: This study can be used as a guide for marketing faculty seeking a meaningful way to connect students and executives. Advisory board members help guide the topics to be covered, readings assigned, weekly projects, a semester-long group project, and other mentoring/teaching activities. A six-step process for designing and implementing a course-level advisory board is presented: Acquire, Develop, Vison, Incubate, Scale, Embed.
Keywords: advisory board, experts, value, marketing management, innovation
With every passing semester, the challenges that face our marketing students increase. The business environment is complicated, intense, and fluid. The boundaries within which firms compete reach around the globe via a myriad of new structures, increased expectations, changing channels of distribution, fickle consumers, and technological innovations that are dizzying in pace. As marketing faculty, the pressure to prepare students for this world requires innovative tools and new technologies to transfer relevant and timely knowledge in the most effective manner.
A course-level advisory board is an innovative option to enhance the learning environment in a meaningful way. The use of an advisory board to guide a capstone Marketing Management course is presented, using the ADVISE framework: Acquire, Develop, Vision, ļncubate, Scale, Embed. A comparison of student perceptions of the advisory board is discussed, identifying key benefits compared to traditional textbook approaches. This research is based on four themes: (1) given the competitiveness and dynamism of today's business world, many institutions are seeking unique experiences to prepare students for the careers they will be pursuing; (2) advisory boards have been an effective tool in a diverse set of corporate and...