Broad School, Masco Corp. jointly develop
award-winning exec program

Steven A. Melnyk

Morgan L. Swink

Masco Corporation's "Leadership Program in Operations Management (MLP-OM)" has received the 2004 Award of Excellence from Corporate University Xchange (CUX), in association with Fortune magazine. The Masco program was jointly developed by the Broad School, under the leadership of Steven A. Melnyk, professor of Marketing and Supply Chain Management.

The program uses a unique learning design that emphasizes the importance of process in understanding operations and planning improvements. According to Melnyk, "The program has been successful because Masco Corporation is a remarkable strategic partner in terms of their openness to innovative educational techniques and their commitment to being a continuous learning organization." The one-year certificate program has 100 graduates to date and has shown a return on investment in excess of 500 percent.

Melnyk, along with Morgan L. Swink, associate professor of Marketing and Supply Chain Management, has also partnered with Masco on key research into the success factors surrounding the program. "We're looking at various measures of success, such as goal achievement and personal growth," says Melnyk, "as well as the factors that contribute to the success, including project clarity and perceived project importance. While our findings will help us develop a better program for Masco, they should also generate new information that could help other corporations learn how they should approach programs like this."
According to Robert B. Duncan, the Eli and Edythe L. Broad Dean, Melnyk and Swink's relationship with Masco Corporation "is a best practice example of a business school partnering with a business, bringing real-world learning together with leading-edge research. Through our Executive Development Program, we want to continue to foster collaborative opportunities like this to advance our mission: To excel in the education and development of business leaders and in the creation and dissemination of knowledge."

For more on the Broad School's Masco program and the related research, here.

Corporate University Xchange is the leading provider of corporate university research, benchmarking, and advisory services for helping organizations transform corporate learning.

Headquartered in Taylor, Michigan, Masco Corporation is one of the world's leading manufacturers of home improvement and building products as well as a leading provider of services that include the installation of insulation and other building products.

Click here for past home page stories