Secret to business success is kindness, according to ‘MBE’ course provider Small Giants

An Aussie company is offering a $28,500 course to teach CEOs how to be kind, with bosses from some of the country’s biggest companies jumping on board.

Tamsin Jones from Small Giants Academy says businesses need empathy to survive.

An Aussie company is offering a $28,500 course to teach CEOs how to be kind, with bosses from some of the country’s biggest companies jumping on board.

Small Giants Academy has sold the course as an alternative to the Master of Business Administration (MBA) – cheekily naming it the Mastery of Business Empathy (MBE).

Executives from Coles and Rio Tinto are among business leaders who have taken the course, despite it offering no formal accreditation.

An MBA is a postgraduate degree focused on leadership – usually covering business strategy, finance, marketing and operations.

Academy programs head Tamsin Jones said it covers the same topics, with a “lens of empathy”.

The 10-month program holds some workshops requiring in-person attendance in Melbourne, but it’s largely a virtual course with online modules, open to anyone across the world.

Ms Jones said she studied an MBA at Oxford University’s Said Business School, but felt something was lacking.

“I felt like there was a script written for me, like a way I needed to be in order to lead according to the school I went to,” she said.

“For me there were quite a few pieces that were missing and part of it also is the ability to … respond to the dynamics immediately in front of you.

“There is a bit of lag in a university environment and you know when you talk to academics as well, they say ‘well I really wish we could push, encourage, inspire, engage the leaders in our programs to really dramatically shift things in their context’.

“I think MBAs were really built for a different era and they’re often focused on maximising shareholder value, which is the way we were taught. I think that is important but it’s not enough.”

The MBE course asks leaders to consider what she calls the “poly-crisis” – societal issues like AI, geopolitics and housing, and how it might impact their business.

There is a focus on impacts to people in decision-making, company policy and business plans, Ms Jones said.

Students complete eight modules which are four weeks each, delving into topics like leadership, strategy, operations and governance.

Dane O'Shannassay, Patagonia country director for Australia and New Zealand is a speaker for the Small Giants Academy MBE course.

She said some companies like Rio Tinto and superannuation provider Future Group had been collaborators on the program.

Other speakers included Greenpeace Asia-Pacific CEO David Ritter, Patagonia country director Dane O’Shannassay and Lorna Davis, former CEO and chair of US food and beverage group Danone North, the largest company to achieve B Corp status, a certification for environmental and social performance.

“We spend some time really thinking about what is the context of our businesses that we’re operating with and what are some of the ways we might want to respond to those things,” Ms Jones explained.

“Business is fundamentally about people, so I think any business that isn’t centring empathy isn’t centring people and that’s a problem.”

She added in a time of rapid change and rising polarisation, companies needed to bring people together as a “survival skill”.

“Empathy helps us to listen better, which is essential to building really strong teams, but also understanding customers and making wiser business decisions.

“In an AI world where we’re increasingly being influenced online and by other technologies, we need to be able to have real and genuine dialogue, so we can make decisions for our business and consumers.”

Rio Tinto's senior manager for social impact, Elle Pound, has taken the MBE course.

Ms Jones said alumni had included executives from Coles, Rio Tinto and Bunnings owner Wesfarmers, as well as public servants, veterans and people from the arts.

Some companies sent their executives, while others self-elected to complete the course over an MBA, she said.

Other students attended the course from the UK, Portugal, the Netherlands, Kenya and Namibia.

“I think a lot of people are out there are sitting in cognitive dissonance, meaning I can do better than I’m currently doing but I’m not sure how to do it,” Ms Jones said.

“A lot of people are saying I know we can do a lot better.

“We’re bringing together people with these ideas and views and by the end of the program they have redesigned their organisations, redesigned their thinking processes.

“Some of them have launched new businesses and they don’t end when the program ends at that 10-month point, they are like long-term collaborators with each other.”

Ms Jones said she was not concerned the course would be perceived by some as a way for companies to “greenwash” their public profiles without taking genuine action on social or environmental issues.

“I think we all want to do things that are genuinely impactful,” she said.

“I think it is important to always ask the deeper questions and do the analysis around what is really going to have a genuine impact.

“Because of the way our program’s structured … we feel like people are trying to fundamentally change their leadership in business practice.”

Originally published as Secret to business success is kindness, according to ‘MBE’ course provider Small Giants