If you are a careful shopper, or executive and do your research, executive education benefits you in several ways.
Learn new hard skills and update your old skills. You think and work in a certain way, so you’ll be challenged to defend, improve or teach why do you do what you do in the way that you do it.
Build networks: good for business, often leads to friendships. A week or three in a great school is very refreshing and energizing. You’re surrounded by smart people, you’re developing yourself, and you’re thinking in a new way.
Many executive programs ask you to bring a real challenge into the course. It may be a marketing or digital business transformation or leadership issue that you deal with in the workplace. Take a week to focus on this with the help of professors, coaches and other managers/executives from other industries and backgrounds. This delivers real value to your organization.
It is possible to have a poor experience. An Un-engaging faculty, poor organization or logistics, bad class fit (all your peers are much older/younger), and so forth can be disappointing – to to mention a lost opportunity and waste of time and money. Speak with the school’s advisers, connect with a few alumni, ask for the last few class profiles… spend a few hours doing your homework and it will be worth it.
